John Flavel · 3 of 34

Sermon 1. Gen. 2:7 · Part 1

And the Lord God formed man out of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.

Three things (says Athanasius) are unknown to men according to their essence, viz. God, angels, and the souls of men." Of the nature of the divine and high-born soul, we may say, as the learned Whitaker doth of the way of its infection by original sin, "it is easier sought than understood, and better understood than explicated." And for is original, the most sagacious and renowned for wisdom amongst the ancient philosophers understood nothing of it. It is said of Democritus, that "there is nothing in the whole workmanship of nature of which he did not write;" and in a more lofty and swelling hyperbole, they stile their eagle-eyed Aristotle, "the rule, yea, and miracle of nature; learning itself, the very son of knowledge:" yet both these are not only said, but proved by Lactantius to be learned idiots. How have the schools of Epicurus, and Aristotle, the Cartesians, and other sects of philosophers abused and troubled the world with a kind of philosophical enthusiasm, and a great many ridiculous fancies about the original of the soul of man! and when all is done three words of God, by the pen of the inspired Moses, enlightens us more than all the subtle notions of he accidential concretion of atoms, their materia subtilis, and anima mundi, and the rest of their unintelligible fancies could ever do.

The account Moses gives us in this context, of the origin of the world, and of man the epitome of it, is full of sense, reason, congruity, and clearness; and such as renders all the essays of all the Heathen philosophers to be vain, inevident, self-repugnant, and inexplicable theories.

The inspired penman gives us, in this context, a compendious narrative of the world's creation, relating more generally the rude, inform, and undigested chaos; and then more particularly the specificating, and diversifying of the various beautiful beings, thence educed by the notion of the Spirit of God upon the face of the waters.

When the first matter was strictly created out of nothing, "the Spirit (as Moses excellently expresseth it, chap. 1:2.) hovered, or moved over it as a bird over her eggs, and, as it were, by way of incubation, cherishing and influencing it, did thereby draw forth all the creatures into their several forms, and distinct particular natures, wherein we now, with delight and admiration, behold them.

In this manner and order was the stately fabric of the world produced and erected; but as yet, it remained as a fair and well furnished house without an inhabitant. God had employed infinite wisdom and power about it, and engraven his name upon the meanest creature in it; but there was no creature yet made (except angels, the inhabitants of another city) to read the name and celebrate the praises of the Almighty Creator.

He therefore thought the world imperfect till there was a creature made that could contemplate, praise, and worship the Maker of it; for this very use and purpose was man created, that he might not only see, but consider the things he saw; discourse, and rationally collect out of them the things he saw not; and both praise, and love the Maker for, and in them all.

The palaces of princes are not beautified and adorned, to the intent men should pay their respects and honours to the walls, but to shew the grandeur and magnificence of the king, to whose person their honour is due, as Athenagoras in his excellent apology for the Christians, speaks. The world is a glorious and magnificent pile, raised designedly to exhibit the wisdom and power of its Creator to the reasonable creature man, that from him God might receive the glory of all his other works. Of this creature man, the master-piece of all the visible world, (and therefore crowned king over it the first moment he was made, Psal. 8: S.) Moses in the next place, gives us the account, both of his original, whence he came, and of his dignity, what he is. "The Lord God formed man out of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul." Where we find,

The original of the body of man.

The original of the soul of man.

I. The original of the body of man: "Formed out of the dust of the ground." "Dust was its original matter; of dust was it made, and into dust it must be resolved, Gen. 3:19. The consideration is humbling, and serves to tame the pride of man", who is apt to dote upon his own beauty. Man's body was not made of heavenly matter, as the radiant sun, and sparkling stars: no, nor yet of the most precious and orient earthly matter: God did not melt down the pure and splendid gold and silver, or powder the precious pearls and sparkling diamonds, but he formed it of the vile and despicable dust.

We find that the sprinkling of dust upon new writing prevents many a foul blot: I am sure, the sprinkling of our original dust upon our minds by serious consideration, is the way to prevent many a proud boast.

However, the baseness of the matter, and coarseness of the stuff, serves to set off the admirable skill of the most wise and powerful Architect, who out of such mean, despicable materials, has fashioned so exact and elegant a piece. "The Lord God formed man out of the dust."

"The Lord God.] The name of God is here set down at full, to set forth the dignity of man," the subject matter wrought upon, as some conceive.

Formed.] Fashioned, or curiously moulded, and figured it. The Hebrew verb, primarily signifies "to press, compress, or squeeze together; and by a metalepsis, by pressing or compressing, to mould or fashion, as the potter doth his clay." The Psalmist useth another word to express the artificial elegancy of the body of man, Psal. 139:15, 16. "rakamti", acupictus sum, I am embroidered, painted, or flourished as with a needle. We render it curiously wrought. Whatsoever beauty and comely proportion God has bestowed by creation upon it, "it is all answerable to that excellent idea, or model before conceived in his mind and purpose." All this care and cost was bestowed upon the body of man, which, when all is done, is but the case in which that inestimable jewel, the soul, was to be lodged. This therefore I must lay aside, and come to the more noble subject,

II. The soul of man: about which we have before us four things to ponder in this text, viz.

(1.) The nature and property of the soul of man.

(2.) The descent, and original of the soul of man.

(3.) The manner of infusion of the soul of man.

(4.) The nexus, or bond that unites the soul of man.

(1.) The nature and property of it, a living soul. The word "nefesh" as also the Chaldee Naphsha; and the Greek "psuche", have one and the same etymology, all signifying to breathe, or respire; not that the breath is the soul, but denoting the manner of its infusion by the breath of God, and the means of its continuation in the body, by the breath of our nostrils. God's breath infused it, and our breath continues it in union with the body. It signifies here the rational soul and the Hebrew "nefesh" has a very near affinity with the word "shayamim", the heavens; and indeed there is a nearer affinity betwixt the things, viz. soul and heaven, than there is betwixt the names.

The epithet "chazah" which we translate living, the Arabic renders a rational soul, and indeed, none but a rational deserves the name of a living soul, for all other forms or souls, which are of an earthly extract, do both depend on, and die with the matter out of which they were educed, but this being of another nature, a spiritual and substantial being, is therefore rightly stiled, a living soul.

The Chaldee renders it, a speaking soul. And indeed, it deserves a remark, that the ability of speech is conferred on no other soul but man's. Other creatures have apt and elegant organs; birds can modulate the air, and form it into sweet delicious notes, and charming sounds; but no creature, except man, whose soul is of an heavenly nature and extraction, can articulate the sound, and form it into words, by which the notions and sentiments of one soul are in a noble, apt, and expeditious manner conveyed to the understanding of another soul. And indeed, what should any other creature do with the faculty or power of speech, without a principle of reason to guide and govern it? It is sufficient to them that they discern each others meaning by dumb signs, much after the manner that we traded at first with the Indians; but speech is proper only to a rational, or living soul, however, we render it a living, a rational, or a speaking soul, it distinguishes the soul of man from all other souls.

(2.) We find here the best account that ever was given of the origin of the soul of man, or whence it came, and from whom it derives its being. O, what a dust and pother have the disputes and contests of philosophers raised about this matter! which is cleared in a few words in this scripture; "God breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul:" which plainly speaks it to be the immediate effect of God's creating power. Not a result from matter; no, results flow e sinu materiae, out of the bosom of matter; but this comes ex halitu divino, from the inspiration of God. That which is born of the flesh, is flesh; but this is a spirit descending from the Father of spirits. God formed it, but not out of any pre-existent matter, whether celestial or terrestrial; much less out of himself, as the Stoics speak; but out of nothing. An high born creature it is, but no particle of the Deity. The invisible and immutable essence of God is utterly repugnant to such notions; and therefore they speak not strictly and warily enough, that are bold to call it a ray or emanation from God.

A spirit it is, and flows by way of creation, immediately from the Father of spirits; but yet is a spirit of another inferior rank and order.

(3.) We have also the account of the way and manner of its in fusion into the body, viz. by the same breath of God which gave it its being. It is therefore a rational, scriptural, and justifiable expression of St. Augustine, Creando infunditur, et infundendo creatur; it is infused in creating, and created in infusing; though Dr. Brown too slightingly calls it a mere rhetorical antimetathesis. Some of the fathers, as Justin, Ireneus, and Tertullian, were of opinion, That the Son of God assumed a human shape at this time, in which afterwards he often appeared to the fathers, as a prelude to his true and real incarnation; and took dust or clay in his hands, out of which he formed the body of man, according to the pattern of that body in which he appeared: and that being done, he afterwards, by breathing, infused the soul into it. But I rather think it is an anthropopathia, or usual figure in speech, by which the Spirit of God stoops to the imbecility of our understandings, "He breathed into his nostrils the breath of life;" Hebrew, lifes. But this plural word "chayim" rather the twofold life of man, in this world, and in that to come; or, "the several faculties and powers belonging to one and the same soul, viz. the intellective, sensitive, and vegetative offices thereof; than that there are more souls than one, "essentially differing, in one and the same man; for that, (as Aquinas truly says,) is impossible." We cannot trace the way of the Spirit, or tell in what manner it was united with this clod of earth. But it is enough, that he who formed it, did also unite, or marry it to the body. This is clear, not by way of natural resultancy from the body, but by way of inspiration from the Lord; not from the warm bosom of matter, but from the breath of its Maker.

4. Lastly, We have here the nexus, copula, the tie or band by which it is united with the body of man, viz. The breath of his (i.e. of man’s) nostrils. It is a most astonishing mystery to see heaven and earth married together in one person; the dust of the ground, and an immortal spirit clasping each other with such dear embraces and tender love; such a noble and divine guest to take up its residence within the mean walls of flesh and blood. Alas, how little affinity, and yet what dear affection is found betwixt them!

Now, that which so sweetly links these two different natures together, and bolds them in union, is nothing else but the breath of our nostrils, as the text speaks: it came in with the breath; while breath stays with us, it cannot go from us and as soon as the breath departs, it departs also. All the rich elixirs and cordials in the world cannot persuade it to stay one minute after the breath is gone. One puff of breath will carry away the wisest, holiest, and most desirable soul that ever dwelt in flesh and blood. When our breath is corrupt, our days are extinct, Job 17:1. "Thou takest away their breath, they die, and return to their dust," Psal. 114:19.

Out of the text thus opened, arise two doctrinal propositions, which I shall insist upon, viz.

Doct. 1. That the soul of man is of a divine original, created and inspired immediately by the Lord.

Doct. 2. That the souls and bodies of men are linked, or knit together, by the feeble band of the breath of their nostrils.

In the prosecution of these two propositions, many things will come to our hands, of great use in religion; which I shall labour to lay as clearly and orderly to the reader's understanding, and press as warmly upon his heart as I can. And first,

Doct. 1. That the soul of man is of a divine original, created and inspired immediately by the Lard.

In this first proposition, two things are to be distinctly pondered, viz.

1. The nature of the soul.

The original of the soul.

Or, what it is, and from whence it came.

I. The first thing which arrests our thoughts, and requires their attention and exercise, is the nature of the soul, or what kind of being it is.

Those that are most curiously inquisitive into all other beings, and put nature upon the rack to make her confess her secrets, are in the mean time found shamefully slight and negligent in the study of themselves. Few there are that can prevail with themselves to sit down and think close to such questions as these. What manner of being is this soul of mine? whence came it? why was it infused into this body? and where must it abide, when death has dislodged it out of this frail tabernacle? There is a natural aversation in man to such exercises of thought as these, although in the whole universe of beings in this lower world, a more noble creature is not to be found.

The soul is the most wonderful and astonishing piece of divine workmanship; it is no hyperbole to call it the breath of God, the beauty of men, the wonder of angels, and the envy of devils. One soul is of more value than all the bodies in the world.

The nature of it is so spiritual and sublime, that it cannot be perfectly known by the most acute and penetrating understanding, assisted in the search by all the aid philosophy can contribute.

It is not my design in this discourse to treat of the several faculties and powers of the soul, or to give you the rise, natures, or numbers of its affections and passions: but I shall confine my discourse to its general nature and original. And seeing "none can so well discover the nature of it, as he who is the author of it," as Tertullian speaks, I therefore justly expect the best light from his words, though I will not neglect any other aid he is pleased elsewhere to afford.

The soul is variously denominated from its several powers and offices, as the sea from the several shores it washes. I will not spend time about the several names by which it is known to us in scripture, but give you that description of it, with which my understanding is most satisfied, which take thus:

The soul of man is a vital, spiritual, and immortal substance, endowed with an understanding, will, and various affections; created with an inclination to the body, and infused thereinto by the Lord.

In this description we have the two general parts into which I distributed this discourse: viz. its general nature, and divine original. The nature of the soul is expressed to us in these following terms.

I. It is a substance.

That is to say, not a quality, nor an accident inhering in another being, or subject; as whiteness doth in the snow: but a being by itself. Qualities and accidents have no existence of their own. but require another being, or subject to their existence; but the soul of man is a substantial being of itself, which will evidently appear upon the following grounds.

(1.) Because it is, in a strict and proper sense, created by God, "He formeth, or createth the spirit in man," Zech. 12:1: To him we are advised to "commit it, as to a faithful Creator," 1 Pet. 4:19. The substantial nature of the soul is implied in the very notion of its creation; "for whatsoever is created, is a substance, an ens par se. Accidents are not said to be created, but concreated;" the crasis of humours and results of matter are not substances created, but things rising in a natural way from created substances. They flow from, and as to their essence, depend upon pre-existent matter; but the soul was created out of nothing, and infused into the body after it was formed and organised; which evidenceth its substantial nature.

(2.) This evidenceth the soul to be a substance; that it can, and doth exist, and subsist by itself alone, when separated from the body by death, Luke 23:43. "Today shalt thou, (i. e. thy soul) be with me in paradise," and Mat. 10:20. "Fear not them that kill the body, but cannot kill the soul." Were the soul but an accident, a quality, or a result, he that kills the body must needs kill the soul too; as he that casts a snowball into the fire, must needs destroy the whiteness with the snow. Accidents fail and perish with their subjects: but seeing it is plain in these and many other scriptures, the soul doth not fail with the body; nothing can be more plain and evident, than that it is of a substantial nature.

When the Spaniards came first among tile poor Indians, they thought the horse and his rider to be one creature; as many ignorant ones think the soul and body of man to be nothing but breath and body: whereas indeed, they are two distinct creatures, as vastly different in their natures as the rider with his horse, or the bird and his cage. While the man is on horseback, he moves according to the motion of the horse; and while the bird is incaged, he eats and drinks, and sleeps, and hops and sings in his cage. But if the horse fail and die under his rider, or the cage be broken, the man can go on his own feet, and the bird enjoy itself as well, yea, better in the open fields and woods, than in the cage; Neither depend, as to being, or action, on the horse or cage.

(3.) Both scripture and philosophy consent in this, that the soul is the chief, most noble, and principal part of man, from which the whole man is, and ought to be denominated. So Gen. 46:26. "All the souls that came with Jacob into Egypt," i.e. all the persons; as the Latins say, tot capita, so many heads or persons. The apostle, in 2 Cor. 5:8. seems to exclude the body from the notion of personality, when he says, We are willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord: That we, a term of personality is there given to the soul, exclusively of the body, for the body cannot be absent from itself: But we, that is, the souls of believers, may be both absent from it, and present with Christ.

To this we may add, 2 Cor. 4:16. where the soul is called the man, and the inner man too, the body being but the external face, or shadow of the man. And to this philosophers agree. The best philosophers are so far from thinking that the body is the substantial part of man, and the soul a thing dependent on it, that contrarily they affirm, that the body depends upon the soul, and that it is the soul that conserves and sustains it; and that the body s in the soul, rather then the soul in the body, and that which is seen not the man, but that is the man which is invisible, that the body might be killed and the man not hurt; meaning the soul, which only deserves the name of man. Now if it be the chief part of man, and that which is only worthy the name of man, and from which therefore the whole is and ought to be denominated a man; if it be so far from depending on the body, or being contained within the body, that the body rather depends upon it, and is in it, then surely the soul must be, what we describe it to be, a substantial being.

(4.) It is past all controversy, that the soul is a substance, because it is the subject of properties, affections and habits; which is the very strict and formal notion of a substance. All the affections and passions of hope, desire, love, delight, fear, sorrow, and the rest, are all rooted in it, and springing out of it; and for habits, arts and sciences, it is the soul in which they are lodged and seated. Having once gotten a promptitude to act, either by some strong, or by some frequently repeated acting, they abide in the soul, even when the acts are intromitted, as in sleep, a navigator, scribe, or musician, are really artists, when they are neither sailing, or writing, or playing; because the habits still remain in their minds, as is evident in this, that when they awake, they can perform their several works, without learning the rules of their art anew.

II. The soul is a vital substance, i.e.

A substance which has an essential principle of life in itself; a living, active being. A living soul, says Moses in the text; and hereby it is distinguished from, and opposed to matter or body. The soul moves itself and the body too; it has a self-moving virtue or power in itself; whereas the matter, or body is wholly passive, and is moved and acted, not by itself, but by this vital spirit, James 2:26. "The body without the spirit is dead.- It acts not at all, but as it is acted by this invisible spirit. This is so plain, that it admits of sensible proof and demonstration. Take mere matter, and compound or divide it, alter it, and change it how you will, you can never make it see, feel, hear, or act vitally without a quickening and actuating soul. Yet we must still remember, that this active principle, the soul, though it has this vital power in itself, it has it not from itself, but in a constant receptive dependence upon God, the first cause, both of its being and power.

It is a spiritual substance.

All substances are not gross, material, visible and palpable substances; but there are spiritual and immaterial, as well as corporeal substances, discernible by sight or touch. To deny this were to turn a downright Sadducee, and to deny the existence of angels and spirits, Acts 23:8. The word substance, as it is applied to the soul of man, puzzles and confounds the dark understandings of some, that know not what to make of an immaterial substance, whereas in this place it is no more than substare accidentibus, i.e. to be a subject in which properties, affections, and habits are seated and subjected. This is a spiritual substance, and is frequently in scripture called a spirit; "Into thy hands I commit my spirit," Luke 23:46. "Lord Jesus receive my spirit," Acts 7:59. and so frequently all over the scriptures. And the spirituality of its nature appears, (1.) By its descent, in a peculiar way, from the Father of spirits. (2.) In that it rejoiceth in the essential properties of a spirit. (3.) That at death it returns to that great Spirit who was its efficient and former.

(1.) It descends, in a peculiar way, from the Father of spirits, as has been shown in the opening of this text. God stiles himself its Father, Heb. 12:9. its former, Zech. 12:1. It is true, he gives to all living things "dzoen kai pneuma", life and breath, Acts 17:25. Other souls are from him, as well as the rational soul; but in a far different way and manner. They flow not immediately from him by creation, as this does. It is said, Gen. 1:24, 27. "Let the earth bring forth the living creature after its kind;" but "God created man in his own image." Which seems plainly to make a specified difference betwixt the reasonable and all other souls.

(2.) It rejoiceth in the essential properties of a spirit: For it is an incorporeal substance, as spirits are. It has not partes extra partes, extension of parts; nor is it divisible, as the body is. It has no dimensions and figures as matter has; but is a most pure, invisible, and (as the acute Dr. Moore expresseth it) indiscernible substance. It has the principle of life and motion in itself, or rather, it is such a principle itself, and is not moved as dull and sluggish matter is, per aliud, by another. Its efficacy is great, though it be unseen, and not liable to the test of our touch, as no spiritual substances are. "A spirit (says Christ) has not flesh and bones," Luke 24:89. We both grant and feel, that the soul has a love and inclination to the body, (which indeed is no more than it is necessary it should have) yet can we no more infer its corporiety from that love to the body, than we can infer the corporiety of angels from their affection and benevolent love to men. It is a spirit of a nature vastly different from the body in which it is immersed. There is (says a learned author) no greater mystery in nature, than the union betwixt soul and body: That a mind and spirit should be so tied and linked to a clod' of clay, that while that remains in a due temper, it cannot by any art or power free itself! What so much a-kin are a mind and a piece of earth, a clod and a thought, that they shall be thus affixed to one another?

Certainly, the heavenly pure bodies do not differ so much from a dunghill, as the soul and body differ. They differ but as more pure and less pure matter; but these, as material, and immaterial. If we consider wherein consists the being of a body, and wherein that of a soul, and then compare them, the matter will be clear.

We cannot come to an apprehension of their beings, but by considering their primary passions and properties, whereby they make discovery of themselves. The first and primary affection of a body (as is rightly observed) is that extension of parts whereof it is compounded, and a capacity of division, upon which, as upon the fundamental mode, the particular dimensions (that is, the figures) and the local motion do depend.

Again, for the being of our souls, if we reflect upon ourselves, we shall find that all our knowledge of them resolves into this, that we are beings conscious to ourselves of several kinds of cogitations; that by our outward senses we apprehend bodily things present; and by our imagination we apprehend things absent; and that we oft recover into our apprehension things past and gone, and, upon our perception of things, we find ourselves variously affected.

Let these two properties of a soul and body be compared, and upon the first view of a considering mind it will appear, that divisibility is not apprehension, or judgement, or desire, or discourse: That to cut a body into several parts, or put it into several shapes, or bring it to several motions, or mix it after several ways, will never bring it to apprehend, or desire. No man can think the combining of fire, and air, and water, and earth, should make the lump of it to know and comprehend, what is done to it, or by it. We see manifestly, that upon the division of the body, the soul remains entire and undivided. It is not the loss of a leg or arm, or eye, that can maim the understanding or the will, or cut off the affections.