A39675:137
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. The Conscience belongs also to this faculty,1 for it being the judgement of a man upon himself, with respect or relation to the judgment of God; it must needs belong to the understanding part or faculty. Thoughts are formed in the speculative, but Conscience belongs to the practical understanding.2 It is a very high and awful power; it is solo Deo minor, and rides (as Joseph did) in the second Chariot. The next and immediate Officer under God. He saith of Conscience with respect to every man, as he once said of Moses with respect to Pharaoh, See, I have made […] a God to Pharaoh, Exod. 7.1. The voice of Conscience is the voice of God, for it is his Vicegerent and Representative. What it binds on earth, is bound in heaven; and what it looseth on earth, is loosed in heaven. It observes, records, and bears witness to all our actions: and acquits or condemns as in the name of God for them. Its Consolations are most sweet, and its Condemnations most terrible, so terrible that some have chosen death, which is the King of terrors, rather than to endure the scorching heat of their own Consciences. The greatest Deference and Obedience is due to its Commands. And a man had better *endure any rack or torture in the world, than incur the torments of it. It accompanies us as our shadow, wherever we go; and when all others forsake us, (as at death they will) Conscience ⟨p. 22⟩is then with us, and is never more active and vigorous than at that time. Nor doth it forsake us after death, but where the Soul goes, it goes; and will be its Companion in the other world for ever. How glad would the Damned be, if they might but have left their Consciences behind them, when they went hence, but as Bernard rightly, *It is both Witness, Judge, Tormentor and Prison, it accuseth, judgeth, punisheth and condemneth.
2. The Conscience belongs also to this faculty,