III. It follows, from their being spirits, and incorporeal, that they are immortal, or incorruptible, since nothing is subject to death, or dissolution, but what is compounded of parts; for death is a dissolution of the composition of those parts, that were before united together; but this is proper to bodies. A spirit, indeed, might be annihilated; for the same power that brought it out of nothing, can reduce it again to nothing. But, since God has determined that they shall exist for ever, we must conclude that they are immortal, not only from the constitution of their nature, but by the will of God.
IV. Besides the excellency of their nature, as spirits, they have other super-added endowments; of which, three are mentioned in this answer.
1. They were all created holy; and, indeed, it could not be otherwise, since nothing impure could come out of the hands of a God of infinite purity. Creatures make themselves sinners, they were not made so by him; for, if they were, how could he abhor sin, and punish it, as contrary to his holiness; nor could he have approved of all his works, as very good, when he had finished them, as he did, Gen. i. 31. if he had created any of the angels in a state of enmity, opposition to, or rebellion against him.
2. They excel in knowledge, or in wisdom, which is the greatest beauty or advancement of knowledge. Accordingly, the highest instance of wisdom in men, is compared to the wisdom of an angel. Thus the woman of Tekoa, when extolling David’s wisdom, though with an hyperbolical strain of compliment, compares it to that of an angel of God, 2 Sam. xiv. 20. which proves that it was a generally received opinion, that angels exceeded other creatures in wisdom.
3. They are said to be mighty in power: thus the Psalmist speaks of them, as excelling in strength, Psal. ciii. 20. and the apostle Paul, when speaking of Christ’s being revealed from heaven, in his second coming, says, that it shall be with his mighty angels, 2 Thess. i. 7. And, since power is to be judged of by its effects, the great things, which they are sometimes represented, as having done in fulfilling their ministry, in defence of the church, or in overthrowing its enemies, is a certain evidence of the greatness of their power. Thus we read of the whole Assyrian host, consisting of an hundred and fourscore and five thousand men, being destroyed in one night; not by the united power of an host of angels, but by one of them. The angel of the Lord did it; but this will more evidently appear, when, under a following head, we speak of the ministry of angels.
V. These natural, or super-added endowments, how great soever they are, comparatively with those of other creatures, are subject to certain limitations: their perfections are derived, and therefore are finite. It is true, they are holy, or without any sinful impurity; yet even their holiness falls infinitely short of God’s, and therefore it is said concerning him, Thou only art holy, Rev. xv. 4. and elsewhere, Job xv. 15. speaking concerning the angels, who are, by a metonymy, called the heavens, it is said, they are not clean in his sight, that is, their holiness, though it be perfect in its kind, is but finite, and therefore infinitely below his, who is infinitely holy.
Moreover, though they are said, as has been before observed, to excel in knowledge, we must, notwithstanding, conclude, that they do not know all things; and therefore their wisdom, when compared with God’s, deserves no better a character than that of folly, Job iv. 18. His angels he charged with folly. There are many things, which they are expressly said not to know, or to have but an imperfect knowledge of, or to receive the ideas they have of them by degrees: thus they know not the time of Christ’s second coming, Matt. xxiv. 36. and they are represented as enquiring into the great mystery of man’s redemption, or as desiring to look into it, 1 Pet. i. 12.
And to this let me add, that they do not know the hearts of men, at least not in such a way as God is said to search the heart, for that is represented as a branch of the divine glory, Jer. xvii. 10. 2 Chron. vi. 30. And, besides this, it may be farther observed, that they do not know future contingencies, unless it be by such a kind of knowledge, as amounts to little more than conjecture; or, if they attain to a more certain knowledge thereof, it is by divine revelation. For God appropriates this to himself, a glory, from which all creatures are excluded; therefore he says, Shew the things that are to come, that is, future contingencies, that we may know that ye are gods, Isa. xli. 23. which implies, that this is more than what can be said of any finite mind, even that of an angel.
As to the way of their knowing things, it is generally supposed, by divines, that they know them not in a way of intuition, as God does, who is said to know all things in himself, by an underived knowledge; but whatever they know, is either communicated to them, by immediate divine revelation, or else is attained in a discursive way, as inferring one thing from another; in which respect, the knowledge of the best of creatures appears to be but finite, and infinitely below that which is divine.
Again, though they are said to be mighty in power, yet it is with this limitation, that they are not omnipotent. There are some things, which are the effects of divine power, that angels are excluded from, as being too great for them; accordingly they were not employed in creating any part of the world, nor do they uphold it; for as it is a glory peculiar to God, to be the Creator of the ends of the earth, so he, exclusively of all others, is said to uphold all things by the word of his power.