mifery complete, viz. the duration of it all, the eternity of his condition; that he is without hope, without redemption, without recovery.

If any thing can inflame this hell, and make it hotter, it is this only; and this does add an inexpreffible horror to the Devil himfelf; namely, the feeing man (the only creature he hates) placed in a state of recovery, a glorious ftate of redemption formed for him in heaven, and the scheme of it perfected on earth; by which this man, though even the Devil by his art may have deluded him, and drawn him into crime, is yet in a ftate of recovery, which the Devil is not, and that it is not in his (Satan's) power to prevent it. Now, take the Devil as he is in his own nature angelic, a bright immortal feraph, heaven-born, and having tafted the eternal beatitude, which these are appointed to enjoy; the lofs of that state to himself, the poffeffion of it granted to his rival, though wikced like himself: I fay, take the Devil as he is, having a quick fenfe of his own perdition, and a ftinging fenfe of his rival's felicity, it is hell enough, and more than enough, for an angel to fupport; nothing we can conceive can be worse.

As to any other fire than this, fuch, and fo immaterially intenfe, as to torment a fpirit, which is itself fire alfo, I will not fay it cannot be, because to God every thing is poffible; but I muft fay, I cannot conceive rightly of it.

I will not enter here into the wifdom or reasonablenefs of reprefenting the torments of hell to be fire, and that fire to be a commixture of flame and fulphur. It has pleafed God to let the horror of thofe eternal agonies about a loft heaven be laid before us by thofe fimilitudes or allegories, which are moft moving to our fenfes and to our understandings; nor will I difpute the poffibility, much lefs will I doubt but that there is to be a confummation of mifery, to all the objects of mifery, when the Devil's kingdom in this world, ending with the world itself, that liberty he has now may be farther abridged; when he may be returned to the fame ftat

P

he was in between the time of his fall and the creation of the world, with perhaps fome additional vengeance' on him, fuch as at prefent we cannot defcribe, for all that treafon, and thofe high crimes and mifdemeanors, which he has been guilty of here in his converfation with mankind.

As his infelicity will be then confummated and completed, fo the infelicity of that part of mankind who are condemned with him, may receive a confiderable addition from these words in their fentence, "to be tormented with the Devil and his angels;" for as the abfence of the Supreme Good is a complete hell; fo the hated company of the deceiver, who was the great caufe of their ruin, must be a subject of additional horror; and they will be always faying, as a Scots gentleman, who died of his exceffes, faid to the famous Dr P, who came to fee him on his death-bed, but had been too much his companion in his life,

O tu fundamenta jecifti

I would not treat the very fubject itself with any indecency; nor do I think my opinion of that hell, which I fay confifts in the abfence of him in whom is heaven, one jot lefs folemn than theirs who believe it all fire and brimftone: but I must own, that to me nothing can be more ridiculous, than the notions that we entertain and fill our heads with about hell, and about the devils being there tormenting of fouls, broiling them upon gridirons, hanging them up upon hooks, carrying them upon their backs, and the like; with the feveral pictures of hell, reprefented by a great mouth with horrible teeth, gaping like a cave on the fide of a mountain: fuppofe that appropriated to Satan in the Peak, which indeed is not much unlike it, with a ftream of fire coming out of it, as there is of water, and fmaller devils going and coming continually in and out, to fetch and carry fouls the Lord knows whither, and for the Lord knows what.

These things, however intended for terror, are indeed

fo ridiculous, that the Devil himself to be fure mocks at them; and a man of fenfe can hardly refrain doing the like; only I avoid it, because I would not give offence to weaker heads.

However, I must not compliment the brains of other men at the expence of my own, or talk nonfenfe becaufe they can understand no other. I think all these notions and representations of hell and of the Devil, to be as profane as they are ridiculous; and I ought no more to talk profanely than merrily of them.

Let us learn to talk of these things then as we should do; and as we really cannot defcribe them to our reafon and understanding, why fhould we defcribe them to our fenfes? We had, I think, much better not defcribe them at all, that is to fay, not attempt it. The bleffed apostle St Paul was, as he faid himself, carried up, or .caught up into the third heaven; yet, when he came down again, he could neither tell what he heard, or defcribe what he faw: all he could fay of it was, that what he heard was unutterable, and what he faw was inconceivable.

It is the fame thing as to the ftate of the Devil, in thofe regions which he now poffeffes, and where he now more particularly inhabits. My prefent bufinefs then is, not to enter into thofe grave things fo as to make them ridiculous, as I think moft people do that talk of them; but as the Devil, let his refidence be where it will, has evidently free leave to come and go, not into this world only, (I mean the region of our atmosphere), but, for aught we know, to all the other inhabited worlds which God has made, where-ever they are, and by whatsoever names they are, or may be known or diftinguished; for if he is not confined in one place, we have no reason to believe he is excluded from any place, heaven only excepted, from whence he was expelled for his treafon and rebellion.

His liberty then being thus afcertained, three things feem to be material for us to give an account of, in or der to form this part of his hiftory:

1. What his bufinefs is on this globe of earth, which we vulgarly call the world; how he acts among us; what affairs mankind and he have together; and how far his conduct here relates to us, and ours is, or may be influenced by him?

2. Where his principal refidence is; and whether he has not a particular empire of his own, to which he retreats upon proper occafions; where he èntertains his friends when they come under his particular adminiftrations; and where, when he gets. any victory over his enemies, he carries his prisoners of war?

3. What may probably be the great bufinefs this black emperor has at prefent upon his hands, either in this world or out of it; and by what agents he works?

As thefe things may, perhaps, run promifcuously through the courfe of this whole work, and frequently be touched at under other branches of the Devil's hiftory, fo I do not propose them as heads of chapters, or particular fections, for the order of difcourfe to be handled apart; for (by the way) as Satan's actings have not been the moft regular things in the world, fo, in our discourse about him, it must not be expected that we can always tie ourselves down to order and regularity, either as to time, or place, or perfons; for Satan being hic et ubique, a loose ungoverned fellow, we must be content to trace him where we can find him.

It is true, in the foregoing chapter, I fhewed you the Devil entered into the herd ecclefiaftic, and gave you fome account of the first fuccessful step he took with mankind fince the Chriftian epocha: how, having fe cretly managed both temporal and fpiritual power apart, and by themselves, he now united them in point of management, and brought the church-ufurpation and the army's ufurpation together; the Pope to blefs the general in depofing and murdering his mafter the em

peror; and the general to recognize the Pope in dethroning his mafter Jefus Christ.

From this time forward, you are to allow the Devil a mystical empire in this world; not an action of moment done without him, not a treafon but he has an hand in it, not a tyrant but he prompts him, not a government but he has a in it; not a fool but he tickles him, not a knave but he guides him: he has a finger in every fraud, a key to every cabinet, from the divan at Conftantinople to the Miffiffippi in France, and to the South-Sea cheats at ; from the first

attack upon the Christian world, in the perfon of the Romish Antichrift, down to the Bull Unigenitus; and from the mixture of St Peter and Confucius in China, to the holy office in Spain; and down to the Emlins and Dodwells of the current age.

How he has managed, and does manage, and how in all probability he will manage, till his kingdom fhall come to a period, and how at laft he will probably be managed himself, enquire within, and you fhall know farther.

Of the manner of SATAN's acting and carrying on his affairs in this world; and particularly of his ordinary workings in the dark, by possession and agitation.

T

HE Devil being thus reduced to act upon mankind by tratagem only, it remains to inquire how he performs, and which way he directs his attacks. The faculties of man are a kind of garrifon in a ftrong caftle, which, as they defend it on the one hand under the command of the reafoning power of man's foul, fo they are prefcribed on the other hand, and cannot fally out without leave; for the governor of a fort does not permit his foldiers to hold any correfpondence with the enemy, without fpecial order and direction. Now the great inquiry before us is, How comes the Devil to a parley with us? How does he converfe with our fenfes,