A39675:1121
Pneumatologia, a treatise of the soul of man
Pneumatologia, a treatise of the soul of man wherein the divine original, excellent and immortal nature of the soul are opened, its love and inclination to the body, with the necessity of its separation from it, considered and improved, the existence, operations, and states of separated souls, both in Heaven and Hell, immediately after death, asserted, discussed, and variously applied, divers knotty and difficult questions about departed souls, both philosophical, and theological, stated and determined, the invaluable preciousness of humane souls, and the various artifices of Satan (their professed enemy) to destroy them, discovered, and the great duty and interest of all men, seasonable and heartily to comply with the most great and gracious design of the Father, Son, and Spirit, for the salvation of their souls, argued and pressed / by John Flavel ...Pneumatologia, a treatise of the soul of man wherein the divine original, excellent and immortal nature of the soul are opened, its love and inclination to the body, with the necessity of its separation from it, considered and improved, the existence, operations, and states of separated souls, both in Heaven and Hell, immediately after death, asserted, discussed, and variously applyed, divers knotty and difficult questions about departed souls, both philosophical, and theological, stated and determined, the invaluable preciousness of humane souls, and the various artifices of Satan (their professed enemy) to destroy them, discovered, and the great duty and interest of all men, seasonable and heartily to comply with the most great and gracious design of the Father, Son, and Spirit, for the salvation of their souls, argued and pressed / by John Flavel ...
London: printed for Francis Tyton, 1685
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
Objection.
But if separation from the Body be (as it is) an enemy to Nature, and there be no possibility to extinguish natural aversation; to what purpose is it to argue and persuade, where there is no expectation of Success?
But if separation from the Body be (as it is) an enemy to Nature, and there be no possibility to extinguish natural aversation; to what purpose is it to argue and perswade, where there is no expectation of Success?
Solution.
Death is considerable two ways by the people of God, 1. As an Enemy to Nature, 2. As a medium to Glory.
If we consider it simply in it self, as an Enemy to Nature, there is nothing in it for which we should desire it: but if we consider it as a medium or passage into glory, yea, the only ordinary way through which all the Saints must pass out of this into a better state, so it will appear not only tolerable, but desirable to prepared Souls. Were there not a shore of glory on the other side of these black Waters of death, for my own part, I should rather choose to live meanly, than to die easily. If both parts were to perish