A39675:119
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.
(2.) It rejoiceth in the essential Properties of a Spirit: for it is an incorporeal Substance, as Spirits are. It hath not parts extra parts, extension of parts: nor is it divisible, as the body is: It hath not Dimensions and Figures as matter hath; but is a most pure invisible and (as the acute and judicious Dr. More expresseth it) an indiscerptible Substance. It hath the Principle of Life and Motion in it self, or rather, it is such a Principle it self, and is not moved as the dull and sluggish matter is per aliud, by another. Its efficacy is great, though it be unseen, and not liable to the Test of our touch, as no spiritual substances are. A Spirit (saith Christ) hath not Flesh and Bones, Luke 24.39. We both grant and feel that the Soul hath a love and inclination to the body, (which indeed is no more than it is necessary it should have;) yet can we no more infer its Corporeity from that love to the body, than we can infer the Corporeity of Angels from their affection and benevolent love to men. It is a Spirit of a nature vastly different from the body in which it is immersed. 1There is (saith a learned Author) no greater mystery in nature, than the union betwixt the Soul and Body. That a Mind and Spirit should be so tied and linked to a clod of Clay, that while that remains in a due temper, it cannot by any art or power free it self! — What so much a-kin are a Mind and a piece of Earth, a Clod, and a Thought: that they should be thus affixed to one another?
(2.) It rejoyceth in the essential Properties of a Spirit: for it is an incorporeal Substance, as Spirits are. It hath not partes extra partes, extension of parts: nor is it divisible, as the body is: It hath not Dimensions and Figures as matter hath; but is a most pure invisible and (as the acute and judicious Dr. More expresseth it) an indiscerpible Substance. It hath the Principle of Life and Motion in it self, or rather, it is such a Principle it self, and is not moved as the dull and sluggish matter is per aliud, by another. Its efficacy is great, though it be unseen, and not liable to the Test of our touch, as no spiritual substances are. A Spirit (saith Christ) hath not Flesh and Bones, Luke 24.39. We both grant and feel that the Soul hath a love and inclination to the body, (which indeed is no more than it is necessary it should have;) yet can we no more inferr its Corporeity from that love to the body, than we can infer the Corporeity of Angels from their affection and benevolent love to men. It is a Spirit of a nature vastly different from the body in which it is immersed.