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For I solemnly declare in the presence of the great and terrible God, at the thoughts of whose infinite majesty, my spirit trembles, that I would not lie under the like insupportable oppres sion of his wrathful indignation and almighty vengeance, for the of one week, if I might by that means gain all the treasures of India, or the gold of Africa, or have all the kingdoms of the world at my disposal during a long and prosperous course of life: for I am no more capable of making a proper description or representation of what I underwent during that dreadful conflict: than I am able to count the stars in the firmament, or the number of sands on the seashore; it was ap parently too great a calamity to be expressed in words, or to be described in writing by any pen on earth; for à wounded concience who can bear?

Thus I have proved by reason and my own experience, that there is a temporal hell on this side the grave for

all those that have any sense of a God, and do not live conformably to his sacred laws; I have also showed, how long this hell may be said to continue, that is to say, from the years of discretion to the time of conversion, or to the hour of death; and now I shall proceed to explain the nature of the eternal hell, but so ample à description has been already made of it in treating of the former, that I hope my labor will be in a great measure superseded, and the less may suffice to be delivered on this article. So that having laid down my opinion, that there never was, is, nor shall be any material fire in hell, I come to produce my reasons for it, which are as follows: that the soul of man is a breath of life, infused by an almighty being, and not a bodily substance, that is capable of undergoing any misery by corporal pains, of what kind soever they may be; so that the former is undoubtedly of a more sublime nature, and will be

rewarded or punished, after a quite different manner. It is certain that God ordained corporal punishments for the material and mortal body, and not for the immaterial and immortal soul; such being fit only to be inflicted in this world, and not in that which is to come.

But farther, our own reason must needs induce us to believe, that the punishment of the soul in the future state, will be much of the same nature with what it is in the present, and we are all sensible, that the anguish of the spirit is different from the pains of the body. Thus when a judge condemns a malefactor, he does not doom his soul to any material punishment, but His body; for if the sentence be to be pressed, burnt, or starved; to be hang ed, impaled, or torn to pieces; to be racked, whipt, or suffer any other exquisite pains, these material tortures may be extremely afflicting and griev bus to the latter, but they cannot ef

fect the former; as being a divine ray, which is altogether impassible with respect to such sufferings: however I readily own, that the 'soul may participate of anguish with the body, and endure as much misery; but it is of another kind; for there is a natural ́ and a spiritual sense of pain: so that the flesh, blood, and bones may be properly said to undergo the material punishment; whilst the soul suffers a spiritual convulsion, which the body is not capable of feeling; there being as much difference between one sort of pain and the other, as there is between a spiritual and a corporeal substance.

Therefore I have often admired, that men of a sound judgment should inconsiderately depart so far from the main scope, and meaning of the holy scriptures, as to hold, that there is a material punishment in hell, to be inflicted upon undone souls: and indeed, it is of so great a contradiction to di

vinity and good sense, that I take it to: be an absurd error. We may as well treat of the true nature of hell, as of what it is not; which would tend much more to the edification of our christian brethren, than a different practice.

However I would have none mis take my meaning in this particular, I do not maintain in the least, but that: the pains of hell may be conveniently represented by familiar comparisons, since that is altogether agreeable to the word of God, and the weakness of human apprehension, but we ought to be very cautious about proceeding farthar than sacred writ directs us: for we have no account in the Old or New Testament, that there is any material fire in hell, or that lost souls are to be tormented in the future state, with the same punishments that are usually. inflicted on the body in this world. I could alledge several other reasons to