15. In the gospel the case is nothing altered; for besides that those austerities, rigours, and mortifications which are in the gospel advised or commanded respectively, are more salutary or of less corporeal inconvenience than a vicious life of intemperance, or lust, or carefulness, or tyrant covetousnes; there is no accident or change to the sufferance of which the gospel hath engaged us, but in the very thing our life is carefully provided for, either in kind, or by a gainful exchange. He that loseth his life for my sake, shall find it; and he that will save his life, shall lose it." And although God, who promised long life to them that obey, did not promise that himself would never call for our life, borrowing it of us, and repaying it in a glorious and advantageous exchange; yet this very promise of giving us a better life in exchange for this, when we exposed it in martyrdom, does confirm our title to this, this being the instrument of permutation with the other: for God obliging himself to give us another in exchange for this, when in cases extraordinary he calls for this, says plainly, that this is our present right by grace, and the title of the Divine promises. But the promises are clear; for St. Paul calls children to the observation of the fifth commandment, by the same argument which God used in the first promulgation of it: Honour thy father and thy mother, (which is the first commandment with promise,) that it may be well with thee, and that thou mayest live long upon the earth." For although the gospel be built upon better promises than the law, yet it hath the same too, not as its foundation, but as appen

Matt, x. 39.

2 Ephes. vi. 2, 3.

dages and adjuncts of grace, and supplies of need. 'Godliness hath the promise of this life, as well as of the life that is to come.' 1 That is plain. And although Christ revealed his Father's mercies to us in new expresses and great abundance; yet he took nothing from the world which ever did in any sense invite piety, or endear obedience, or co-operate towards felicity. And therefore the promises which were made of old, are also presupposed in the new, and mentioned by intimation and implication within the greater. When our blessed Saviour, in seven of the eight beatitudes, had instanced in new promises and rewards, as heaven, seeing of God, life eternal ;' in one of them, to which heaven is as certainly consequent as to any of the rest, he did choose to instance in a temporal blessing, and in the very words of the Old Testament; to show that that part of the old covenant which concerns morality, and the rewards of obedience, remains firm and included within the conditions of the gospel.3

16. To this purpose is that saying of our blessed Saviour, 'Man liveth not by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God :'* meaning, that besides natural means ordained for the preservation of our lives, there are means supernatural and divine. God's blessings does as much as bread. Nay, it is every word proceeding out of the mouth of God; that is, every precept and commandment of God is so for our good, that it is intended as food and physic to us, a means to make us live long. And therefore God hath done in this as in

1 Tim. iv. 8.

3 Psalm xxxvii. 11.

2 Matt. v. 3, 5.

4 Matt. iv. 4; Deut. viii. 3.

other graces and issues evangelical, which he proposed to continue in his church for ever. He first gave it in miraculous and extraordinary manner, and then gave it by way of perpetual ministry. The Holy Ghost appeared at first like a prodigy, and with miracle; he descended in visible representments, expressing himself in revelations and powers extraordinary: but it being a promise intended to descend upon all ages of the church, there was appointed a perpetual ministry for its conveyance; and still, though without a sign or miraculous representment, it is ministered in confirmation by imposition of the bishop's hands. And thus also health and long life, which by way of ordinary benediction is consequent to piety, faith, and obedience evangelical, was at first given in a miraculous manner; that so the ordinary effects, being at first confirmed by miraculous and extraordinary instances and manners of operation, might for ever after be confidently expected without any dubitation, since it was in the same manner consigned by which all the whole religion was; by a voice from heaven, and a verification of miracles, and extraordinary supernatural effects. That the gift of healing, and preservation and restitution of life was at first miraculous, needs no particular probation. All the story of the gospel is one entire argument to prove it: and amongst the fruits of the Spirit, St. Paul reckons gifts of healing, and government, and helps, or exterior assistances and advantages, to represent that it was intended the life of Christian people should be happy and healthful for ever. Now that this grace also descended afterwards in an ordinary ministry is recorded by St. James. Is any man sick amongst

you? let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil, in the name of the Lord:' that was then the ceremony, and the blessing and effect is still for 'the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up." For it is observable, that the blessing of healing and recovery is not appendant to the anealing, but to the prayer of the church; to manifest that the ceremony went with the first miraculous and extraordinary manner, yet that there was an ordinary ministry appointed for the daily conveyance of the blessing: the faithful prayers and offices of holy priests shall obtain life and health to such persons who are receptive of it, and in spiritual and apt dispositions. And when we see, by a continual flux of extraordinary benediction, that even some Christian princes are instruments of the Spirit, not only in the government, but in the gifts of healing too, as a reward for their promoting the just interests of Christianity, we may acknowledge ourselves convinced that a holy life in the faith and obedience of Jesus Christ, may be of great advantage for our health and life, by that instance to entertain our present desires, and to establish our hopes of life eternal.

17. For I consider that the fear of God is therefore the best antidote in the world against sickness and death: 1. Because it is the direct enemy to sin, which brought in sickness and death; and besides this, that God by spiritual means should produce alterations natural, is not hard to be understood by a Christian philosopher, take him in either of the two capacities. 2. For there is a rule of propor

tion and analogy of effects, that if sin destroys not only the soul but the body also, then may piety preserve both, and that much rather. For if sin, that is, the effects and consequents of sin, 'hath abounded, then shall grace superabound; that is, Christ hath done us more benefit than the fall of Adam hath done us injury; and therefore the effects of sin are not greater upon the body, than either are to be restored or prevented by a pious life. 3. There is so near a conjunction between soul and body, that it is no wonder if God, meaning to glorify both by the means of a spiritual life, suffers spirit and matter to communicate in effects and mutual impresses. Thus the waters of baptism purify the soul; and the holy eucharist, not the symbolical, but the mysterious and spiritual part of it, makes the body also partaker of the death of Christ and a holy union. The flames of hell, whatsoever they are, torment accursed souls; and the stings of conscience vex and disquiet the body. 4. And if we consider that in the glories of heaven, when we shall live a life purely spiritual, our bodies also are so clarified and made spiritual, that they are also become immortal; that state of glory being nothing else but a perfection of the state of grace, it is not unimaginable but that the soul may have some proportion of the same operation upon the body as to conduce to its prolongation, as to an antepast of immortality. 5. For since the body hath all its life from its conjunction with the soul, why not also the perfection of life according to its present capacity, that is, health and duration from the perfection of the soul, I

Rom. v. 20.