§. XIII.
Quest. 2.Secondly, By this Seed, Grace, and Word of God, and Light wherewith, we say, every one is enlightened, and hath a Measure of it, which strives with him in order to save him, and which may, by the Stubbornness and Wickedness of Man’s Will, be quenched, bruised, wounded, pressed down, slain and crucified, we understand not the proper Essence and Nature of God precisely taken, which is not divisible into Parts and Measures, as being a most pure, simple Being, void of all Composition or Division, and therefore can neither be resisted, hurt, wounded, crucified, or slain by all the Efforts and Strength of Men; The Light what it is, and its Properties described.but we understand a spiritual, heavenly, and invisible Principle, in which God, as Father, Son, and Spirit, dwells; a Measure of which divine and glorious Life is in all Men, as a Seed, [66]which of its own Nature draws, invites, and inclines to God; and this some call Vehiculum Dei, or the spiritual Body of Christ, the Flesh and Blood of Christ, which came down from Heaven, of which all the Saints do feed, and are thereby nourished unto eternal Life. And as every unrighteous Action is witnessed against and reproved by this Light and Seed, so by such Actions it is hurt, wounded, and slain, and flees from them even as the Flesh of Man flees from that which is of a contrary Nature to it. Now because it is never separated from God nor Christ, [67]but wherever it is, God and Christ are as wrapped up therein, therefore and in that Respect as it is resisted, God is said to be resisted; and where it is borne down, God is said to be pressed as a Cart under Sheaves, and Christ is said to be slain and crucified. And on the contrary, as this Seed is received in the Heart, and suffered to bring forth its natural and proper Effect, Christ comes to be formed and raised, of which the Scripture makes so much Mention, calling it the new Man, Christ within, the Hope of Glory. This is that Christ within, which we are heard so much to speak and declare of, every where preaching him up, and exhorting People to believe in the Light, and obey it, that they may come to know Christ in them, to deliver them from all Sin.
[66] Cant. 3. 9.
[67] 1 Tim. vi. 16.
But by this, as we do not at all intend to equal ourselves to that Holy Man the Lord Jesus Christ, who was born of the Virgin Mary, in whom all the Fulness of the Godhead dwelt bodily, That the Fulness of the Godhead dwells in Christ bodily, &c.so neither do we destroy the Reality of his present Existence, as some have falsely calumniated us. For though we affirm that Christ dwells in us, yet not immediately, but mediately as he is in that Seed which is in us; whereas he, to wit, the Eternal Word, which was with God, and was God, dwelt immediately in that Holy Man. He then is as the Head, and we as the Members; he the Vine, and we the Branches. Now as the Soul of Man dwells otherwise and in a far more immediate Manner in the Head and in the Heart than in the Hands or Legs, and as the Sap, Virtue, and Life of the Vine lodgeth far otherwise in the Stock and Root than in the Branches, so God dwelleth otherwise in the Man Jesus than in us. We also freely reject the Heresy of Apollinarius, who denied him to have any Soul, but said the Body was only actuated by the Godhead. As also the Error of Eutyches, who made the Manhood to be wholly swallowed up of the Godhead. Wherefore, as we believe he was a true and real Man, so we also believe that he continues so to be glorified in the Heavens in Soul and Body, by whom God shall judge the World, in the great and general Day of Judgment.