The first Chapter.
B HERE H. Card. lib. de var. rer. 16. cap. 93. is no question nor theme (saith Hierome Cardane) so difficult to deale in, nor so noble an argument to dispute upon, as this of divels and spirits. For that being confessed or doubted of, the eternitie of the soule is either affirmed or denied. The heathen philosophers reson hereof amongest themselves in this sort. First, The Platonists and Stoiks. they that mainteine the perpetuitie of the soule, saie that if the soule died with the bodie; to what end should men take paines either to live well or die well, when no reward for vertue nor punishment for vice insueth after this life, the which otherwise they might spend in ease and securitie? The other sortThe Epicureans and Peripatetiks. saie that vertue and honestie is to be pursued, Non spe præmii, sed virtutis amore, that is, Not for hope of reward, but for love of vertue. If the soule live ever (saie the other) the least portion of life is here. And therefore we that mainteine the perpetuitie of the soule, may be of the better comfort and courage, to susteine with more constancie the losse of children, yea and the losse of life it selfe: whereas, if the/490. soule were mortall, all our hope and felicitie were to be placed in this life, which manie Atheists (I warrant you) at this daie doo. But both the one and the other missed the cushion. For, to doo anie thing without Christ, is to wearie our selves in vaine; sith in him onelie our corruptions are purged. And therefore the follie of the Gentils, that place Summum bonumSummum bonum cannot consist in the happines of the bodie or mind. in the felicitie of the bodie, or in the happines or pleasures of the mind, is not onelie to be derided, but also abhorred. For, both our bodies and minds are intermedled with most miserable calamities: and therefore therin cannot consist perfect felicitie. But in the word of God is exhibited and offered unto us that hope which is most certeine, absolute, sound & sincere, not to be answered or denied by the judgement of philosophers themselves.Morall tēperance. For they that preferre temperance before all other things as Summum bonum, must needs see it to be but a witnesse of their naturall calamitie, corruption and wickednes; and that it serveth for nothing, but to restraine the dissolutenes, which hath place in their minds infected with vices; which are to be bridled with such corrections: yea and the best of them all faileth in some point of modestie. Wherefore serveth our philosophers prudence,Morall prudence. but to provide for their owne follie and miserie; whereby they might else be utterlie overthrowne? And if their nature were not intangled in errors, they should have no need/353. of such circumspection. Morall justice.The justice whereof they speake, serveth but to keepe them from ravine, theft, and violence: and yet none of them all are so just, but that the verie best and uprightest of them fall into great infirmities, both dooing and suffering much wrong and injurie. And what is their fortitude,Morall fortitude. but to arme them to endure miserie, greefe, danger, and death it selfe? But what happinesse or goodnesse is to be reposed in that life, which must be waited upon with such calamities, and finallie must have the helpe of death to finish it? I saie, if it be so miserable, why doo they place Summum bonumRom. 2. therein? S. Paule to the Romans sheweth, that it cannot be that we should atteine to justice, through the morall and naturall actions and duties of this life: bicause that never the Jewes nor the Gentiles could expresse so much in their lives, as the verie lawe of nature or of Moses required. And therefore he that worketh without Christ, doth as he that reckoneth without his host./