A39675:37
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.
I have also here set before the Reader an Idea or representation of the state and case of damned Souls, that if it be the Will of God, a seasonable discovery of Hell may be the means of some mens recovery out of the danger of it, and closed up the whole with a Demonstration of the invaluable preciousness of Souls, and the several dangerous snares and artifices of Satan their professed Enemy to destroy and cast them away for ever.
This is the design and general scope of the whole, and of the principal parts of this Treatise, and Oh that God would grant me my hearts desire on your behalf in the perusal of it! Even that it may prove a sanctified instrument in his hand both to prepare you for, and bring you in love with the unbodied life to make you look with pleasure into your Graves, and die by consent of Will, as well as necessity of Nature. I remember Dr. Staughton in a Sermon preached before King James, relates ⟨image 8⟩a strange Story of a little Child in a Shipwreck fast asleep upon its Mothers lap as she sate upon a piece of the Wrack amidst the Waves; the Child being awaked with the noise, asked the Mother what those things were, she told it they were drowning Waves to swallow them up, the Child with a pretty smiling Countenance, begged a stroke from its Mother to beat away those naughty Waves, and chid them as if they had been its Play-mates. Death will shortly Shipwreck your Bodies, your Souls will sit upon your lips, ready to expire, as they upon the Wrack ready to go down▪ Would it not be a comfortable and most becoming frame of mind to sit there with as little dread as this little One did among the terrible Waves. Surely if our Faith had but first united us with Christ, and then loosed our hearts off from this enchanting and ensnaring World, we might make a fair step towards this most desirable temper: but unbelief and earthly mindedness make us loth to venture.
This is the design and general scope of the whole, and of the principal parts of this Treatise, and Oh that God would grant me my hearts desire on your behalf in the perusal of it! Even that it may prove a sanctified instrument in his hand both to prepare you for, and bring you in love with the unbodied life to make you look with pleasure into your Graves, and die by consent of Will, as well as necessity of Nature. I remember Dr. Staughton in a Sermon preached before King Iames, relates