AN ANSWER TO SOME Queries proposed by W. C. OR, A REFUTATION of Helmont's Pernicious Error (that every Man is often Born, and hath Twelve Ages of Trial allowed him in the World by GOD) warmly Contended for In, and About, LAMBOURN in Wiltshire.  
In a LETTER to a FRIEND.  
They shall proceed no farther, for their Folly shall be made known unto all Men.  2 Tim. 3. 9 
OXFORD, Printed by Leon. Lichfield, for John Buckeridge Bookseller in Marlebrough, 1694.   

SIR,  
WHY these Papers, which before attended you in Manuscript, now come to your hands in a more public way, is chiefly due to the threatenings of our Inquirer's Friends, who upon hearing them Read, declared, That they would see that they should be Printed: This it seems they thought an Advantage, and you see I am so fair an Adversary as to give it them.  
You will readily observe that not only the Style, but the whole Contexture is negligent: and I freely own that I have endeavoured to be Fine in neither; For no body that knows the Persons I write For, or those I write Against, or the Trifling Opinion I am to refute, can believe there is need of any accuracy on this Occasion. My chief care hath been that I might be understood by those few plain Readers this Paper is designed for, and therefore I have not run into Physics or Metaphysics, so often as my Subject would carry me thither; and when the stream of Reasoning hath sometimes brought me amongst these Sciences, my stay there hath been as short as I could make it, and I have at such times endeavoured to express Philosophical matters in terms Unphilosophical, and by which I made, or endeavoured to make the Poor to know, & c?  
Answ. Our blessed Saviour, in those Texts of Scripture before-cited, warns Men against all rash and uncharitable Censuring of men's Persons and Actions, from this Consideration, That they, that do so, shall be sure to find the like hard Usage, either from Men in this Life, or from himself when he shall come to judge the World; Then you, saith Christ, who have so freely passed your Judgements on your Brethren, without any allay of Clemency, shall, when you come to my Tribunal, find Judgement without Clemency; for with what measure you meet, it shall then be meted to you again. This is the natural and obvious Signification of these Words, and what is agreeable to the Sense of all Christian Expositors. None, besides these Helmontians, did ever think of a Revolution, upon Reading them: Thus far, however we both agree in the meaning of this Passage, as to believe, That hereby Christ doth threaten to punish Offenders in a way suitable to their Crimes; and besides, that this Punishment is sometimes inflicted in this Life. But here's the Point at which we part; he concludes, That if God should fail to punish an Offender, before he cometh to his Grave, he must be born into the World again, to suffer in like manner as he hath offended; whereas I conclude, concerning such a one that so dies unpunished, that his Doom is deferred till the great Day of our Accounts, in order to which he shall rise again, and then shall God reward every 
Mat 16. 2●  man according to his works. 
* 〈…〉 8, 1. 4 Job. 〈…〉  This Life is no time of Recompense, but in that day ye shall see, without the Expedient of so many Revolutions, all the Dispensations of God cleared; for than shall ye return, and discern between the righteous and the wicked, betwixt him that serveth God, and him that serveth him not, Mal. 3. 18.  
But I shall not be thought fully to have satisfied this Query, till I have distinguished between the same general Analogical measure, according to which God will meet to every man in that day, and between a measure the same in kind, which our Inquirer imagines God doth meet to every man in this World. The Impossibility of which I will show by and by, in its proper Place.  
Qu. 2 How shall we understand that Saying of John, Rev. 13. 10. He that killeth with the Sword, shall be killed with the Sword: He that Answ. Our Inquirer thinks, That these Two passages of St. Paul, speaking of the Jews, That, a remnant shall be saved, and all Israel shall be saved, are inconsistent, unless they be explained by his enlightening Doctrine of Revolutions; whereas I think, there needs only a Capacity to distinguish, between the first Tender of the Gospel to the Jews, which was made in the time of our Saviour, which they generally refused; and the last, which shall be hereafter, upon the Completion of the Gentiles, which they shall as unanimously embrace. Let me advise such as need any farther Enlargement on this Distinction, to take notice, That in the Chapters from whence these Passages are taken, the Apostle doth with some length speak, concerning the calling of the Gentiles to the Christian Faith, by God's acceptance of whom they were to become his Children, according to Promise; whereas his own People, which were always favoured by him, and might for their Number (so greatly were they Blest!) be compared unto the sand of the Sea; were so hardened, that but few of them would receive the the Gospel, when 'twas first tendered unto them by our Saviour, and therefore but a Remnant of them could be saved at that time: But I, says St. Paul, would not have you ignorant of this Mystery, or Secret (lest you should be puffed up with Spiritual Pride) that there shall come a Generation of the Jews in Aftertimes, that shall be as Unanimous as you, in embracing the Gospel of Christ, though for the present till the fullness of the Gentiles be come in, God gives them up to an hardened Heart.  
Qu. 4 What may be the meaning of those Words of Christ in Mat. 23. 35. That upon you may come all the righteous Blood shed upon the Earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias Son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the Temple and the Altar? Doth it not plainly appear, that they were the very Men that did kill Zacharias? Or else what Justice were there in God to punish them for that which their Fathers had acted Forty Generations, or near Four Thousand Years before? Since God no where threatens to Visit the Sins of the Fathers beyond the Third and Fourth Generation, under the Law?  
Answ. From this Passage, as he thinks, he draws a double Argument for his Opinion: The Men here mentioned he concludes must be greater mark of Distinction between Persons, than their not living in the same Age, which 'tis plain these Men did not, for ver. 30. they say, If we had been in the days of our Fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the Prophets: So that the same Men could not be the Children and Fathers too, as our Inquirer imagines; they could not be the same Persons, because they never lived together in the same Age.  
I cannot but farther observe, That tho' the Murder of Abel be as remarkable, and bears an equal weight in the Verse with that of Zacharias, our Inquirer doth not Argue from that, as he doth from the other; because he could not but see that this Instance of Abel would ruin his Proof of a Revolution for Two Reasons. 1. Because the vast Multitude of the Jews, upon whom the Blood of Abel (as well as Zacharias, and others) was charged, could not live in Abel's time, when all Mankind made up but Four Persons. 2. Because his Master, Van Helmont, allots to every Man only 
* See a Letter concerning the Revolution of Humane Souls p. 10.  1000 Years in the World, to undergo his 12 Revolutions in; whereas this Punishment, threatened the Jews, befell them 4000 Years after Abel's Murder. What a stand then are we at! By the Helmontian Doctrine, unless the Murderer of Abel be Born again, to have the same Measure meted to him, the Justice and Truth of God cannot be salved; and yet you see 'tis beyond the Power of this Expedient called a Revolution, to bring him down low enough to suffer with the Jews for it: So that hereby instead of defending the Dispensations of Providence, which they pretend to aim at, they expose it, by making it liable to all those Absurdities and Contradictions this Doctrine doth run them into.  
Qu. 5 What may be the meaning of the Prophet Ezekiel 16. 55. When thy Sister Sodom and her Daughters shall return to their former estate, and Samaria and her Daughters shall return to their former estate, than thou and thy Daughters shall return to your former estate (that is Jerusalem and her Daughters.) Seeing it plainly appears that they were Dead and gone, how is this possible to come to pass that they should return to their former Estate without being born a new into this World?  
Answ. The Prophet here useth an exalted manner of Denying. Sodom and Samaria were ●●…tage he will bring to his Cause; for who can read such Expressions, Generation goeth and Generation cometh, Age goeth and Age cometh, Year goeth and Year cometh, and thereby apprehend that the very same Generation, Age or Year goeth and cometh? If Solomon had meant any such Sense, as there would have been a necessity of his expressing himself in a different form of Speech from what he hath done, so who can doubt but that he was able enough to do it?  
Qu. 7 What may be the meaning of these words in 1. Peter, Chap. 3. ver. 18, 19, 20. For Christ also hath once suffered for Sin, the Just for the Unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to Death in the Flesh, but quickened by the Spirit, by which also he went and Preached to the Spirits in Prison [in Greek to the same Spirits] which were sometimes disobedient, when once the long-suffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the Ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, Eight Souls were saved by Water? Were not these the same Souls that were living in bodies of Flesh again at the time of Christ and his Apostles on Earth, that so they might have his Death and Resurrection preached to them? Else what benefit could these men have had of the Death of Christ, had they not lived and had the Grace and Favour of our Lord Jesus Christ tendered to them, according to what is written, he tasted Death for every Man?  
Answ. The force of the Inquirer's Argument is this, That the Disobedient Persons in the times of Noah must afterwards be born again, or else Christ could not by his Spirit Preach to them, as he is here affirmed to do. But I see no necessity at all of forcing such a Conclusion from these words: a Signification may be allowed them, that is more natural, which is, that Christ by his Spirit in Noah, who was styled a 
* ● Pet. 2, 5  Preacher of Righteousness, did once Preach to that Generation of Rebellious Sinners, who lived before the Flood, whose Spirits at the time the Apostle speaks of them were in Prison (i. e.) in Hell, for their former Disobedience.  
The Inquirer's Interpretation will not stand for these Reasons. 1. Because he takes the Prison here mentioned for Humane Bodies, which tho' it be agreeable to the Platonic Philosophy to call the Body the Prison of the Soul, and to say that it is thrust into ●…ther it can find any Countenance from Reason.  
OUR Inquirer discovers to us his Notion of this Revolution from some Instances which he lays down of a rich Man that bears himself to the Poor in an Unmerciful way: He informs us that if this Text of Scripture be true [The same measure etc.] that then 'tis necessary that this rich Man should be born again and become Poor and know hunger and want as he made the poor man to know; that he which killeth with the Sword shall be killed with the Sword, etc. But tho' in these and the like Cases punishments in the same kind will hold, yet we shall find upon a little Consideration, that it must fail in a Thousand instances; for Pray, how is it possible for Nero who destroyed the Christians by more than a Hundred kind of Deaths, to suffer Death in so many kinds himself, tho' we should with Helmont grant him Twelve Revolutions? These Revolutioners say that the design of their Hypothesis is to clear the Justice of God in such matters: Let us suppose this bloody Tyrant to have taken away the life of Ten Thousand Men only, it cannot consist with God's Justice to let either of these Murders to go unpunished; and if Nero should live Twelve times, and be killed as often, the measure would be abundantly too short: the Blood of 9988 would still remain calling for Vengeance; and if we should allow Nero as many Births and violent Deaths, 'twould (not only contradict the Helmontian Doctrine, but) lay a necessity on God to prolong the World 200000 years (allowing but 20 years to a Revolution) before Nero can have all these measures of Murder meted to him that he hath meted to others; but I'll change the Instance: What is to be done to a Man that makes himself Drunk, or Murders himself? must he not be born again, and exercise the same upon himself again? If a Man commits a Rape, he must according to this Doctrine be born a Woman, and suffer the like. Did Wat Tiler and Jack Straw raise Rebellion against their Prince? Woe be to 'em! for they must be born again, and be Princes, to have Rebellion committed against them. He that abuses a Beast by Sodomy, must be born a Beast, or else he cannot have the same kind of measure meted to him.  
II. God would be the Author of Sin. Whatsoever God hath ordered to come to pass must make a large Breach in this Helmontian Hypothesis.  
VI If Men that live now have lived divers lives before, Either they do remember what was done in their former lives or they do not. If they do not remember, to what purpose is it for Men to be born again to suffer for Faults which they cannot recollect, or have the least knowledge that ever they were guilty of them? and how can they be hereby made sorry and Repent for their Offences, seeing upon the strictest Search they can make, they cannot tell when, against whom, in what, nor how they have Offended: and how shall they or others take warning by these Punishments, since they can never guests for what it is they are punished: God forbid that we should think that the great Judge of Heaven and Earth should ever establish such a senseless manner of Inflicting punishments. If they do remember, how useful may such Men be to the World, in supplying the Defects, and desiding the Differences amongst Historians reporting the Facts of dark and Fabulous Ages? And that we may know whether the Enquirer be able in this kind to become a Benefactor to the Public, let him show the length of his memory, in the more easy task of recounting in what Countries he received his various Births; who were the Princes or Governors there, what Profession or Trade he might be of in each life, and whether many or one Religion served his turn, how many Wives and Children he hath had in all times of his Revolutions, and in what Registers I may find their names. But if to excuse himself from this trouble it be said that our Inquirer hath not yet undergone his Second Revolution, than indeed he will not be brought into either part of this Dilemma as it now stands; but if this present Life will become future, than I shall bring him within the compass of it, and that too with great advantage to himself, if this be his Opinion and he in earnest with it; for I do hereby make him this Offer, that on condition that he will now deliver me 100l I will give him the best security he can desire, to pay 2000l, when he comes a second time into the World; and by the leave of the Government I must be allowed to say that this is an Encouragement, beyond the Lottery-Act, (which provides only for the present Life) for by this means an old Helmontian that hath done with the Enjoyments ●●…tion etc. cannot, in any tolerable Sense be true, if this Opinion be.  
III. This interferes with the Doctrine of the Resurrection, for (allowing this Opinion) what St. Paul delivers of it, would not hold so much as generally true, He that 
Rom. 8. 11.  raised up Christ from the Dead, shall quicken your mortal Bodies. Now all Bodies are Mortal, and therefore All are to rise, for as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be 
1 Cor. 15. 5. 22.  made alive. But if these Pretenders to Inspiration should not think St. Paul's Authority Great enough, take that of our Saviour himself in Joh. 5. 28, 29. The hour is coming in the which all that are in the Graves shall hear his Voice, they that have done good unto the Resurrection of Life, and they that have done evil unto the Resurrection of Damnation: So that All must Rise, and All come to Judgement. Wherefore Van Helmont, seeing that He could not drive his Revolution this way, unless he would fall on these and many other passages of Scripture of the like Importance, takes the other end of the Staff, and affirms, that the same Soul is joined to the same Body again, and being so united, do make up the same Person that lived before. If you would know the manner of this Union, read his 123 and 124 Queries, where you are informed, That the Soul in each Revolution, 
See a Letter concerning etc. p. 25.  when it receives the first beginning of the Body in the Womb, doth by a Magnetic Virtue, attract to itself the Particles of its former Body, as the Loadstone doth the Particles of Iron-dust, so that there is a Revolution of the same Bodies as well as of the same Souls. Now if the Inquirer will follow his Master in accounting thus learnedly for our beginning in the World, he will upon a little better Consideration find, that it must force him, if not to do greater Violence to Scripture, yet certainly to offend more against Reason and Philosophy, than if he had taken the former way, and held that the Soul is united to a new Body. For first, (to consider the manner of this reunion) 'tis impossible for what is immaterial, as the Soul is, to attract in a way Real and Natural, as 'tis here affirmed to do; for whatsoever doth so attract doth do it by sending out of Particles or Qualities, which nothing but what is Corporeal or a Body can do, because no Being's besides Corporeal ones, do harbour such Qualities or Particles in them, and whatsoever is Corporeal doth consist of divisible parts, and what  
V. But if I should be so kind to these Helmontians, as to grant that this is a proper Generation; let us then sit still, and consider what will follow from it. They tell us that this same Person that is now born did live perhaps before in the World divers times: at this rate 'twill fall out that a man may beget his own Grandfather and Grandmother, which is one of the most ridiculous Paradoxes in the World. Let me explain myself in the instance of Adam and Eve; They after their first Death could be born of none but their grandchildren, and if they were born of them, 'twill unavoidably follow, that these grandchildren begot the very same Persons that begot their Father and Mother: And if Adam had died young, and had, according to Helmont's Hypothesis come to his Second Revolution within a little more than 27 Years, he must have been Born of his own Children, and so Cain or Seth, whom he begat, must have done as much for his Father in begetting him again. Hence too must follow, that, our First Parents were the mediate causes of themselves, that they were Born and Created too, that they were Polluted with original Sin, and yet lived in a state of Innocence. That Adam was in Paradise, was Tempted, did Fall, that he Knew Eve his Wife, and yet he knew her not, but was born long after all these things were done. If Riddle and Banter can recommend any Doctrine to the World, I know none that deserves better Esteem than this.  
VI This will bring Confusion and Obscurity upon the Geneology of Adam, and the imputation of Ignorance or Falsehood on St. Judas; for he reckons Enoch the Seventh from Adam; which 'tis impossible he should be, if Adam made his first Revolution in due time, and if Seth too received his next Birth in his own Line, there can be but 5 Persons from Adam to Enoch, tho' Moses also reckoneth up 7 in the fifth Chap. of Gen. And if Adam and Seth were born again, and under new Names reckoned amongst the 7, are not these inspired Men more likely to know it then the Inquirer or his Master? And if they knew it, can we believe them such Sophisters as to reckon up 7 Persons for 5, to amuse us with new Names instead of new Men? Would it not have well become the Ingenuity of such pious Men, by some information, to prevent that Error and Confusion, such a strange way of Numera  
8▪ But to cut my Work shorter, instead of amassing more Arguments of this kind, I will make use of one sensible Demonstration, which I will desire leave here to lay down out of its proper place. But that the force of it may be better understood, 'twill First be necessary for me to give you an account of as much of the Hypothesis of Van Helmont, as will be needful for my purpose; and this I will do out of a Book, sent me by the Inquirer, called, A Letter concerning the Revolution of Humane Souls. In that we are told, pag. 10, 11, 12. That every Man lives a 1000 years on the Earth, in which time he undergoes 12 Revolutions in the same Body: In all which time the Soul is absent from the Body 333⅓ Years; and if these 12 times of Absence are computed one with another, the distance between every parting and meeting again of the Soul and Body, will be 27 Years, 10 Months and 2 Days. Now I will show the Impossibility of the Reunion of these parts, in the time that this Philosopher hath assigned for it; and the Reason I do it by is obvious. viz. The testimony of our Senses, That the Bodies of departed Souls are not reassumed by them in a much longer space. 'Tis so intolerably ignorant to think that our Bodies do, within the compass of 28 years, corrupt small enough to be drawn into the Womb at every new imaginary Birth, that the Plea of Dotage, which commonly attends old Age, will not be sufficient to excuse it. For whose Faculties can be so much impaired as not to know, That ordinarily in dry Graves the Bones will appear entire, and in some Vaults the Flesh will not be all consumed in that time. Many Persons now living, who saw Bishop Braybrook's Body taken up out of a Vault in St. Paul's Church, about 20 Years since, (in which he was laid about 200 Years before) can testify, That there remained not only a firm Connection between the Bones, but that also the outward Skin that covered them, and some Entrails within, tho' dried like Parchment, were not consumed. The Romanists do show abundance of Bones, as Relics, which though most of them did never belong to those ancient Persons they are ascribed to; yet they have, amongst them, Loads of such as are about 1000 Years Old. These are not, can not be attracted into the Womb, and yet the Men, in whose Contexture they once were, cannot make their Revolutions without them; unless the Helmontians believe that a Man may be made up like a Collar of Brawn, all Flesh and no Bone. But if you desire Instances that are more General, I would carry your Thoughts as far as Egypt, Judea, and indeed to all the East, where anciently that curious way of Embalming dead Bodies prevailed, or to old Rome and many other Nations, who burned their dead Bodies, and by an Artful way they had, separated the Ashes of the Body from that of the Fuel, and then put them into Pots. Now were I an Helmontian, there is nothing I should hate more than these ways of preserving Bodies; for they are so ordered, that the Magnetism of the Soul hath afterward no power to draw them towards a Revolution: I will send these curious Inquirers no farther than the University of Oxford, where they may see Instances of both these Sorts of preserving: There is a Body Embalmed, of which there are undeniable Tokens, that it must be 2000 Years old, and their Urns are but little under that Age: but 'tis not to be doubted but if the Vessels which contain this Humane Dust could last so long, but that they would remain till the last Trump shall call them to Reunion. Well then, if the Souls to which these Bodies did belong, have not fetched them away in all this time, there is then no Ground for this Unphilosophical Position: That the Soul, after a few Years spent in a state of Separation from the Body, should join with its old Companion again.  
Lastly, This Doctrine, if believed, would lead Men into Security: For if they cannot recollect, that they ever had any Life besides the Present, they must conclude that they have XI more behind, and on that Account would defer the trouble of living well till their Last Revolutions. That Men, if they had lived at all before, would remember it, I prove 1. From 
* 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, etc. Iamb. cap. 14.  Pythagoras, who positively affirms it. Now his Testimony in this Case ought to be deciding, because He first taught this Doctrine to all the Eastern Nations, and therefore must better understand his own Opinion than his late Disciples the Helmontians. 2. Because the Body decayed by Age would be repaired at every new Birth, and therefore the Soul would exercise memory, and all its other Functions, in it better than before. 3. The Rich Man in the Gospel (Luk. 16. 25, 27.) is represented as remembering his Family. 4. Unless we retain in another Life a memory of this; we cannot give an Account of it in the day of Judgement, as we must do. (Rom. 14. 14.) 5. The Worm that never dies, (Mar. 9 44.) is an evil Conscience, reflecting in the next World upon Sins committed in this; But if I should not insist on this, but yield that Men cannot remember, this Consequence against Religion will still follow: For since they declare that every one must have XII Revolutions, granting that a Man cannot come to know whether he be at the First or Last of them, yet he is sure, that 'tis XI to one but that he shall have another Revolution, which is odds enough on the Sinners side. And if Men are apt now to delay their Repentance, whilst they are under the Persuasion that this Life is the only time of Trial; how wicked will they be, when they come to believe, (as so great a probability must make them do,) that they shall live again, at least one Age more, on the Earth.  
The Inquirer concludes thus,  
Now if any Man will put Pen to Paper to deny the Return of Souls, I would put my Hand to Paper to prove that That Man does deny there is any God but what he hath fond conceived. But if Men will only exclaim against, and call it Damnable Doctrine (as I hear some do) I would thereupon ask this Question, Whether it be not a Duty incumbent on Teachers to refute this Damnable Doctrine (if they are able) that Men might not run into it? But seeing many Books containing this Doctrine, have been Printed in divers Languages and divers Countries, and no Man, that we can hear of, hath hitherto written against it, therefore I think it altogether impossible for them to confute it. If any One will undertake to Answer these Questions (I mean any Teacher of one of the divers Congregations) and send his Answer to me, it shall be kindly received. I have offered my Queries to some of the Clergy of the Church of England, and I could not find that they were willing to meddle in the Matter. I have also sent them to the Learned amongst the presbyterians; but if I receive no Answer from them, nor any other of the divers Congregations, to whom they are proposed, I shall conclude that they are altogether unable to Answer what I have Written.  
W. C.  
Here he forgets what Modesty becomes One who pretends to be seeking about after the Truth, and insults upon all that differ in Opinion from him. He swaggers, like Goliath, before he enters the List, and Challenges out the Army of separate Teachers; but in a manner that bespeaks him a foul Adversary: for if they will not Answer him, he concludes 'tis because that they are Ignorant and Unable; but if they will Answer him, than he will charge them with Atheism. I know there are some amongst the Persons he provokes, that are Men of good Learning, and who could, had they not despised This Cause and the Defenders of it, easily have corrected the Opinion the Inquirer and his Master have of themselves, and let them understand what little Creatures they really are. Toleration hath lately brought forth Three unshapely Sons at a Birth, the New-Jerusalem-Man, the Barker and Revolutioner; But of the Three, the last is the weakest Brother, as having only instead of Reason, a hard Forehead where with to defend himself.  
That I may not be too tedious, I'll put a stop here, and conclude myself, SIR,  
Your Most Affectionate Friend and Servant, J. H.