A39675:488
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.
Inference VIII.
IF our Souls be immortal, certainly our enemies are not so formidable, as we are apt by our sinful fears to represent them. They may, when God permits them, destroy your Bodies, they cannot touch or destroy your Souls, Matth. 16.28. As to your Bodies, no enemy can touch them till there be leave and permission given them by God, Job 1.10. The Bodies of the Saints as well as their Souls are within the line or hedge of Divine Providence. They are securely fenced, sometimes mediately by the ministry of Angels, Psal. 34.7. And sometimes immediately, by his own hand and power, Zech. 2.5. As to their Souls, whatever power Enemies may have upon them, (when divine permission opens a gap in the hedge of Providence for them) yet they cannot reach their Souls to hurt them, or destroy them, but by their own consent. They can destroy our perishing flesh, it is obnoxious to their malice and rage; they cannot reach home to the Soul: no Sword can cut asunder the band of Union betwixt them and Christ: they would be dreadful Enemies indeed if they could do so. Why then do we tremble and fear at this rate as if Soul and Body were at their mercy, and in their power and hand? The Souls of those Martyrs were in safety under the Altar ⟨p. 130⟩in Heaven, they were clothed with white Robes, when their Bodies were given to be meat to the Fowls of Heaven, and Beasts of the Earth. The Devil drives but a poor trade by the persecution of the Saints; he tears the nest, but the bird escapes: he cracks the Shell, but loseth the Kernel. Two things make a powerful defensative against our fears, (1) That all our Enemies are in the hand of Providence. (2) That all providences are steered by that promise,