R. Their senses were not at all deceived: And if by rash judging they would go beyond sense, and wilfully deceive themselves, it was their fault. Their sense saw the shape or likeness of a man and dove. The text saith, not that the Holy Ghost was a dove, but that it descended in the likeness of a Dove: and their senses perceived no more. And this was true. A man consisteth of a soul and a body of flesh and blood: Did sense perceive any of this in the Angels? either, soul, flesh or blood? or any such thing in the appearance of a dove? If I see your picture or statue, is my sense deceived if I take it not for a living man? It I see it moved, is my sense deceived if I take it not for any other than a moving Image? Nature doth not bind me to take every simile to be idem; a corps for a man; an Image for the person. It will be foolishness so to take it. But if this Angel, or Dove, had come near to the senses, all the senses, of all sorts of men, and they had seen, and felt, and tasted, and smelt, all that are the objects of these senses, and yet there had been indeed no visible, tactible, sensible substance at all, this had been a deception of the senses remediless. Christ I am sure appealed to sense, to prove that he had flesh and blood and was not a mere spirit. The same I say of Moses Rod: either it ⟨p. 95⟩was really a Serpent or not; If it was, then it was no deception to judge it such: If not, sense was not at all deceived: For it perceived nothing but the similitude and motion, and those (with the substance) were certainly there. But if all mens senses, seeing, feeling, tasting, &c. had been deceived, and there had been indeed no shape of a Serpent, nor any sensible substance at all but Accidents real without any substance, this had been indeed a deception of the senses. And if God so subvert mans nature, he will not bind him to do the things which belong to the nature of man to do.
But by all this we may perceive, that there is no end of Controversies with you to be hoped for: For how is it possible to bring any thing to a more satisfying issue, than when the senses of all the world do as clearly perceive it, as any sensible thing can be perceived? If our difference were whether this be Paper, and these be Letters;
R. Their senses were not at all deceived: And if by rash judging they would go beyond sense, and wilfully deceive themselves, it was their fault. Their sense saw the shape or likeness of a man and dove. The text saith, not that the Holy Ghost was a dove, but that it descended in the likeness of a Dove: and their senses perceived no more. And this was true. A man consisteth of a soul and a body of flesh and blood: Did sense perceive any of this in the Angels? either, soul, flesh or blood? or any such thing in the appearance of a dove? If I see your picture or statue, is my sense deceived if I take it not for a living man? It I see it moved, is my sense deceived if I take it not for any other than a moving Image? Nature doth not bind me to take every simile to be idem; a corps for a man; an Image for the person. It will be foolishness so to take it. But if this Angel, or Dove, had come near to the senses, all the senses, of all sorts of men, and they had seen, and felt, and tasted, and smelt, all that are the objects of these senses, and yet there had been indeed no visible, tactible, sensible substance at all, this had been a deception of the senses remediless. Christ I am sure appealed to sense, to prove that he had flesh and blood and was not a meer spirit. The same I say of Moses Rod: either it ⟨p. 95⟩was really a Serpent or not; If it was, then it was no deception to judge it such: If not, sense was not at all deceived: For it perceived nothing but the similitude and motion, and those (with the substance) were certainly there. But if all mens senses, seeing, feeling, tasting, &c. had been deceived, and there had been indeed no shape of a Serpent, nor any sensible substance at all but Accidents real without any substance, this had been indeed a deception of the senses. And if God so subvert mans nature, he will not bind him to do the things which belong to the nature of man to do.
But by all this we may perceive, that there is no end of Controversies with you to be hoped for: For how is it possible to bring any thing to a more satisfying issue, than when the senses of all the world do as clearly perceive it, as any sensible thing can be perceived? If our difference were whether this be Paper, and these be Letters;
