John to be seen by the angels and saints (as far as they are capable of enduring his glory), and will unfold himself still more fully to their view at the end of the world, 1 Cor. xiii. 12. riv. 2, 3. "in my Father's house are many mansions." xi. 10, 16. "he looked for a city which hath foundations. . . . they desire a better country, that is, an heavenly.... for he hath prepared for them a city." It is generally supposed that the angels were created at the same time with the visible universe, and that they are considered as comprehended under the general name of heavens. That the angels were created at some particular period, we have the testimony of Numb. xvi. 22. and xxvii. 16. "God of the spirits," Heb. i. 7. Col. i. 16. "by him were all things created........ visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, &c. But that they were created on the first, or on any one of the six days, seems to be asserted (like most received opinions) with more confidence than reason, chiefly on the authority of the repetition in Gen. ii. 1. "thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them,"- -unless we are to suppose that more was meant to be implied in the concluding summary than in the previous narration itself, and that the angels are to be considered as the host who in"The opinion that angels were not created, but self-existent, according to the Manichæan system, is with great propriety attributed to Satan in Paradise Lost. That we were form'd then say'st thou ? and the work Of secondary hands, by task transferr'd From Father to his Son? strange point and new! Doctrine which we would know whence learn'd? who saw When this creation was? remember'st thou Thy making, while the Maker gave thee being? We know no time when we were not as now; Know none before us, self-begot, self-rais'd By our own quick'ning power, when fatal course Of this our native Heav'n, ethereal sons. V. 853. See Jortin's observations on this passage, Remarks on Ec. clesiastical History, I. 411. In another place Satan proposes the question as doubtful; Whether such virtue spent of old now fail'd More angels to create, if they at least Are his created—. IX. 145. So Jenkins, quoting Job xxxviii. 7. On the Reasonableness of the Christian Religion, B. II. Ch. 9. habit the visible heavens. For when it is said Job xxxviii. 7. that they shouted for joy before God at the creation, it proves rather that they were then already in existence, than that they were then first created. Many at least of the Greek, and some of the Latin Fathers, are of opinion that angels, as being spirits, must have existed long before the material world;" and it seems even probable, that the apostasy which caused the expulsion of so many thousands from heaven, took place before the foundations of this world were laid. Certainly there is no sufficient foundation for the common opinion, that motion and time (which is the measure of motion) could not, according to the ratio of priority and subsequence, have existed before this world was made; since Aristotle, who teaches that no ideas of motion and time can be formed except in reference to this world, nevertheless pronounces the world itself to be eternal.5 Angels are spirits, Matt. viii. 16. and xii. 45. inasmuch as a legion of devils is represented as having taken possession of one man, Luke viii. 30. Heb. i. 14. " ministering spirits." They are of ethereal nature, 1 Kings xxii. 21. Psal. civ. 4. 4 Plures e patribus Christianis angelos extitisse ante terram, vel ante mundum Mosaicum, per ignota nobis sæcula, statuerunt; aliqui etiam cœlos supremos, vel cœlum empyreum. Sed de angelis constantior est et a pluribus celebrata sententia. Ut mittam Origenem, hoc Sanctus Basilius in Hexaemero, Chrysostomus πρὸς τοὺς σκανδαλισθέντας, c. 7. πολλῳ raúrns tÕs Kriσεws πрεσßúтεpol, &c. Gregorius Nazianzemus Orat. 38. et alibi, Johannes Damascenus 1. ii. Orth. Fid. c. 3. Joh. Philoponus De Creatione Mundi, 1. i. c. 10. Olympiodorus in Job xxxviii. aliique e Græcis docuere. E Latinis etiam non pauci eidem sententiæ adhæserunt. Hilarius, 1. xii. De Trinitate; Hieronymus, Ambrosius in Hexaëmero, l. i. c. 5. Isidorus Hispalensis, Beda, aliique.' T. Burnet. Archæol. Philos. 1. ii. c. 8. It is observable that Milton had indirectly declared himself to have believed in the pre-existence of angels in the Paradise Lost, where he represents Uriel to have been present at the creation of the visible world, and puts into his mouth the beautiful description quoted in a preceding page,' I saw when at his word the formless mass,' &c. 5 See Aristot. Natural Auscult. lib. viii. cap. 1. In reference to this. Milton says elsewhere: .Time, though in eternity, applied Paradise Lost, V. 580. • Your bodies may at last turn all to spirit, 499. Created in compared with Matt. viii. 31. Heb. i. 7. "as lightning," Not long divisible. Paradise Lost, VI. 330. 7 Meanwhile the winged heralds, by command Of sovran pow'r-. 8 I came among the sons of God, when he I. 752. Gave up into my hands Uzzean Job. Paradise Regained, I. 368. • Dark with excessive bright thy skirts appear, Yet dazzle heav'n, that brightest Seraphim Approach not, but with both wings veil their eyes. Paradise Lost, III. 380. 1 'Yea the angels themselves, in whom no disorder is feared, as the the apostle's reprehension, Col. ii. 18. "intruding into those things which he hath not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind." THE VISIBLE CREATION comprises the material universe, and all that is contained therein; and more especially the human race. The creation of the world in general, and of its individual parts, is related Gen. i. It is also described Job xxvi. 7, &c. and xxxviii. and in various passages of the Psalms and Prophets. Psal. xxxiii. 6—9. civ. cxlviii. 5. Prov. viii. 26, &c. Amos iv. 13. 2 Pet. iii. 5. Previously, however, to the creation of man, as if to intimate the superior importance of the work, the Deity speaks like to a man deliberating :2 Gen. i. 26. "God said, Let us make man in our own image, after our own likeness." So that it was not the body alone that was then made, but the soul of man also (in which our likeness to God principally consists); which precludes us from attributing pre-existence to the soul which was then formed,—a groundless notion sometimes entertained, but refuted by Gen. ii. 7. "God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; thus man became a living soul." Job xxxii. 8. "there is a spirit in man, and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth them understanding." Nor did God merely breathe that spirit into man,3 but moulded it in each individual, and infused it throughout, enduing and embellishing it with its proper faculties. Zech. xii. 1. "he formeth the spirit of man within him." We may understand from other passages of Scripture, that when God infused the breath of life into man, what man thereby received was not a portion of God's essence, or a participation of the divine nature, but that measure of the divine virtue or influence, which was commensurate to the capabilities of the recipient. For it appears from Psal. civ. 29, 30. that 2 'It is not good. God here presents himself like to a man deliberating; both to show us that the matter is of high consequence,' &c. Tetrachordon. Prose Works, III. 329. 4 3 Lest that pure breath of life, the spirit of man Which God inspir'd-. Paradise Lost, X. 784. ♦ Unde a quibusdam dicitur, particula auræ divinæ, Horat. II. Sat. ii. quod non reprehendo, modo bene intelligatur non quasi a Dei essentia, tanquam ejus pars, avulsa fuisset; sed quod ineffabili quodam modo pro Quere eam ex se fecerit.' Curcellæi Institutio, III. 7. he infused the breath of life into other living beings also ;"thou takest away their breath, they die.... thou sendest forth thy spirit, they are created;" whence we learn that every living thing receives animation from one and the same source of life and breath; inasmuch as when God takes back to himself that spirit or breath of life, they cease to exist. Eccles. iii. 19. "they have all one breath." Nor has the word spirit any other meaning in the sacred writings, but that breath of life which we inspire, or the vital, or sensitive, or rational faculty, or some action or affection belonging to those faculties. Man having been created after this manner, it is said, as a consequence, that man became a living soul; whence it may be inferred (unless we had rather take the heathen writers for our teachers respecting the nature of the soul) that man is a living being, intrinsically and properly one and individual, not compound or separable, not, according to the common opinion, made up and framed of two distinct and different natures, as of soul and body,—but that the whole man is soul, and the soul man, that is to say, a body, or substance individual, animated, sensitive, and rational; and that the breath of life was neither a part of the divine essence, nor the soul itself, but as it were an inspiration of some divine virtue fitted for the exercise of life and reason, and infused into the organic body; for man himself, the whole man, when finally created, is called in express terms a living soul. Hence the word used in Genesis to signify soul, is interpreted by the apostle, 1 Cor. xv. 45. animal.' Again, all the attributes of the body are 5 99 6 He form'd thee, Adam, thee, O man. Dust of the ground, and in thy nostrils breath'd Express, and thou becam❜st a living soul. Paradise Lost, VII. 523. See Beza's version in loc. Factus est prior homo Adamus anımal vivens.' when God said, VII. 450. Let the earth bring forth soul living in her kind. in which passage the original reading, even in the copies corrected by Milton, was fowl instead of soul. Dr. Newton agrees with Bentley, Pearce, and Richardson, in preferring soul, and gives the following reason: We have observed before, that when Milton makes the Divine Person |