The fourth (and last) volume of discourses, or sermons, on several scriptures

The first Position I shall lay down is this,¹ That God is intimately and essentially in all parts and places of the World; yea, this Presence being essential is also necessary, so that it is simply impossible that God should not be wheresoever the Creature is. By the World, I mean whatsoever was at the beginning created by the Power of God, the Heavens, the Air, the Earth and Sea, and all things visible and invisible; God is with them and in them all. There are three things briefly to be touched upon here.

1. 1Position 1.

First, That God is intimately present with the Creatures. He passeth through their very Beings and Inward Parts; he is in the very Centre of their Essence; and this flows from the Spirituality of his Essence. From hence it is that it is impossible that he should be excluded out of the most close compacted Being. Bodies cannot thus enter one another, because of their gross and material Substances; they can only stand without and knock for admission; they cannot enter into the substance one of another: Water, when sucked up by a Sponge, doth not pass into the substantial part of it, but only fills, up those Caverns and hollow Pores that were before filled with Air. The Air we breath in cannot enter into the Substance of our Bodies, but only into those Pores and hollow Recesses that are by Nature fitted to receive it; so of all other Corporeal Beings. But Spirits are not tied up to this Law. The Soul of Man, because it is a Spirit, resides not only in the empty void Spaces of the Body, but also in the midst of the most solid and substantial part of it. Angels, who are a degree of Spiritual Beings above the ⟨p. 437⟩Soul, they cannot be excluded from being present in the most condensed Bodies; and we know not how often they are in us; we know not how often they pass through us, nor how many of them are now present with us. We read of no less than a Legion, which is Six Thousand, that quartered themselves together in one possessed person,