Seculum Est Speculum : Isaac Watts And Recovering the Use of Nature in Spiritual Formation

Puritan Spiritual-Mindedness

Beyond its political or ecclesiological aspects, scholarship has recently identified Puritanism as a type of spiritual movement with a focus on individual piety. ¹⁷ As such, Puritanism unsurprisingly lends itself to using the natural world in terms of spiritual formation. They shifted away from allegorizing nature toward a more logical employment of creation for polemical and devotional purposes. ¹⁸ One scholar summarizes the Puritans’ approach in this manner:

[T]he accommodation of theological truth through revelation in nature gained prominence among the Puritans, and an epistemological doctrine developed to explain the use of nature as a source of truth. The conception of nature as a vast book revealing the will of God was inherited from medieval exegesis, but the Puritans evolved a new role for human reason in the process of accommodation. ¹⁹

John Flavel’s publication, Husbandry Spiritualized: The Heavenly Use of Earthly Things (1669) is an exemplary illustration of this shift. ²⁰ Composed of four individual sections, Flavel structures the work around a literary maneuver he terms “similitude.” He finds the “similitude” of nature akin to the prophets of the Old Testament and parables of Christ. ²¹ In the first three sections of the book, Flavel defines various aspects of farming, applies them to spiritual matters, offers devotional reflections, and closes with a poem. A good example is seen in his similitude of plowing corn. Flavel gives general observations about the labor of plowing, such as how it requires skill and judgment to operate a plow. The plow “must neither go too shallow, nor too deep in the earth” and it must “cast the furrow in a straight line.” ²² Taking these observations about plowing, Flavel applies them to spiritual aspects of Christianity. Just as Scripture equates plowing to the work of salvation (Luke 9:62; Jer. 4:3; Hos 10:12), Flavel sees nine general “similitudes” between plowing and the work of the Spirit. First, he equates the manual difficulty of plowing to the difficulty of convincing a sinner of their brokenness. It is easier “to rend the rocks, as to work saving contrition” in the heart of a “confident sinner.” ²³ Second, just as the plow “pierces deep into the bosom of the earth” so too does the Spirit pierce the soul of a sinner through conviction. ²⁴ Third, like a plow separating unified soil, the Spirit separates the soul from sin. Flavel observes, “sin and the soul were glued fast together…[and the sinner] would as soon part with their lives, as with their lusts.” ²⁵ Fourth, the plow works the earth to turn over and discover parts of the soul that are hidden. Similarly, the “Lord plows up the heart of a sinner by conviction, then the secrets of his heart are made manifest.” ²⁶ Fifth, conviction of sin is a gradual work and, like plowing soil, the Spirit is “preparative to a farther work” and the eventual bearing of fruit. ²⁷ Six, Flavel notes how plowing is made easier by rain. Likewise, the heart is softened through the Spirit’s work. It will then “kindly melt…when the gospel-clouds dissolve, and the free grace and love of Jesus Christ comes sweetly showing down.” ²⁸ And finally, in the remaining three similitudes, Flavel notes how plowing through weeds, fallowed ground, or fresh ground all indicate the different types of human souls that might exist. A plow that goes through fields of weeds, “turns them up by the roots, buries and rots them.” ²⁹ In similar fashion, a “saving conviction” of the Spirit is akin the weeded field because He kills sin at the root and “make the soul sick of it.” ³⁰

In the concluding section of the work, Flavel provides twenty-nine meditations on birds, animals, trees, and aspects of a garden, respectively. In a related fashion to previous three sections, Flavel outlines factual observations regarding a particular bird or tree and then relates it to an aspect of the Christian life. However, this section is written for contemplative purposes as a means of advancing holiness. ³¹ Take for example a meditation on a dog’s love for his owner:

How many a weary step, through mire and dirt, hath this poor dog followed my horse’s heels to day, and all this for a very poor reward?…yet will he not leave my company, but is content upon such hard terms, to travel with me from day to day. O my soul! What conviction and shame may this leave upon thee, who art oftentimes ever weary of following thy master, Christ, whose rewards and encouragements of obedience are so incomparably sweet and sure! I cannot beat back this dog from following me, but at every inconsiderable trouble is enough to discourage me in the way of my duty. Ready I am to resolve as that scribe did in Matth. viii. 19. “Master, I will follow thee withersoever thou goest;” but how doth my heart fault, when I must encounter with the difficulties of my way? ³²

A governing implication of this work is how Flavel leverages nature for spiritual purposes. The thrust of Flavel’s Husbandry Spiritualized is strictly for devotional purposes. He positions the practice of meditation on nature as an important means of growing in holiness. Meditating on the external works of God in nature is “a great part of our holiness [is] to be spiritually-minded.” ³³ The phrase “spiritually-minded” is an important term for understanding Flavel’s aim. He envisions being “spiritually-minded” as an “art” whereby the Christian walks “with God from day to day” and makes objects in nature function as “wings and ladders to mount your souls nearer to [God], who is the centre of all blessed spirits.” ³⁴ Flavel’s aims for the cognitive to spur the affective, for purposes of practical piety. Additionally, this “art” of being “spiritually-minded” via nature is never divorced from Scripture. ³⁵ A careful reading of Husbandry Spiritualized proves it is replete with scriptural references because “similitudes” lack complete authority in teaching knowledge of God. Scripture triumphs in clarifying what nature can only communicate in part. ³⁶ Flavel is careful to shortstop any confusion on this front by highlighting the “special, gracious presence” of God found specifically through the means of grace, not in nature. ³⁷ He notes, “You may see the footsteps of God in creatures, but the face of God is only to be seen in his ordinances.” ³⁸ Flavel’s “spiritual-mindedness” begins the larger transition to English naturalist and their use of nature in the practice of spiritual formation.

English Natural Theology

Flavel’s context eventually gives way to sweeping effects of the eighteenth-century English Enlightenment and its pervasive impact on the science and religion. ³⁹ According to one historian, “the Enlightenment took place not only against but also within the major Churches.” ⁴⁰ The theological use of nature is one area in which the seismic shifts of the Enlightenment reformed Christian thought. Figures such Robert Boyle (1627–1691), Nehemiah Grew (1641–1712), and Samuel Clarke (1675–1729) gave rise to a system of theology that grappled with a scientific understanding of the natural world. ⁴¹ Perhaps the earliest natural theologian during Watts’s era is the English botanist, John Ray (1627–1705). ⁴² As the “father of natural history,” Ray’s The Wisdom of God Manifested in the Works of the Creation (1691) functions as a groundbreaking work in linking the empirical and the spiritual. For example, David Ney positions The Wisdom of God as a “turn away from Emblematicism to empiricism…[which] is accompanied by a turn away from allegorical to literal biblical interpretation.” ⁴³ All through the treatise Ray weaves between the empirical and the spiritual to communicate truths about God’s attributes through the natural world. The discourse goes to great lengths in describing the scientific details of the earth and human body as representations of God’s goodness and glory. ⁴⁴ For example, Ray details the “constitution and consistency” of the earth in terms of water, gravel, valleys, mountains, planes, lime, and stone. These features of the earth interplay with the plants and animals as precise accounts of God’s “work of omnipotency and infinite wisdom.” ⁴⁵ Ray also discusses the details of the human body’s posture, head, brain, teeth, heart, skull, and lungs as God’s work of goodness and glory. He even details how the body makes “provisions” against “evil accidents and inconveniences” of the stomach so that it “hath an ability of contracting itself and throwing it up by vomit.” ⁴⁶ All of these empirical observations regarding the earth and body lead Ray to three spiritual inferences. First, scientific understanding of the earth and body results in thanksgiving to God. Ray believes thankfulness to God for works in nature should make its way into our daily devotion:

It would not me amiss to put into the eucharistical [sic] part of our daily devotions: We praise thee O God for the due number, shape, and use of our limbs and senses, and in general of all the parts of our bodies; we bless thee for the sound and healthful constitution of them; it is thou that hast made us and not we ourselves; in thy book we all our members written. ⁴⁷

Second, Ray believes the human body is made for God’s service through sanctification. The human eye is an example of this spiritual inference. The Christian should fight against sin found in the (1) proud eye, (2) wanton eye, (3) covetous eye, and (4) envious eye. ⁴⁸ And finally, Ray emphasizes how the human soul is the prize creation and must be cared for accordingly. We do this through increase in knowledge of God, repentance and faith in Christ, virtuous habits, and armoring against spiritual warfare. ⁴⁹ Ray emphasizes the primacy of Scripture in caring for the soul. “The food of the soul is knowledge, especially knowledge in the things of God, and the things that concern its eternal peace and happiness; the doctrine of Christianity, the word of God read and preached.” ⁵⁰

Another critical figure in natural theology is William Derham (1657–1735) who produced a landmark publication entitled, Physico-Theology: Or, a Demonstration of the Being and Attributes of God From His Works of Creation (1713). This work has been referred to as “probably the single most important text” to the discipline of natural theology. ⁵¹ In a much superior length of detail to Ray, including copious footnotes and figures, Derham wades through the scientific nuances of the natural world. ⁵² Physico-Theology is separated into eleven individual chapter-books. Books 1-3 deal with the “terraqueous globe” (i.e. a globe formed of land and water) in terms of its atmosphere, weather, gravity, soils, and other terrain. ⁵³ Books 4-5 detail aspects of humankind such as the senses, soul, breathing, eating, and many other human functions. ⁵⁴ In books 6-10, Derham describes the design and function of mammals, birds, reptiles, fish, and vegetables. ⁵⁵ It is however the final book of the work that functions as a guide for using nature to advance piety. Like Ray, Derham draws these inferences from the foregoing details regarding nature. First, Derham argues God’s works in creation speak of His greatness and excellence. Derham laments how humans disregard nature by concentrating on the “toys and trifles” of our lives. He believes all aspects of creation (good and bad) show God’s excellence and should be “sought out, enquired after, and curiously and diligently pryed [sic] into.” ⁵⁶ Second, the natural world is the means of expanding rational inquisition as a means of magnifying God’s power, wisdom, and goodness. The more one studies details of the natural world, “the greater and more glorious we find them to be, [and] the more worthy of, and the more expressly to proclaim their great Creator.” ⁵⁷ Another inference Derham makes is the natural world leads to fear of God and thus obedience. The works of God are “serviceable to our spiritual interest…for if whenever we see them, we should consider that these are the works of our Lord…to whom we are to be accountable for all our thoughts, words, and works.” ⁵⁸ Fourth, study of nature results in thanksgiving and praise to God for “providing every thing conducing to [our] life, prosperity, and happiness.” ⁵⁹ Derham notes, for example, creation’s benefits that are unique to humankind such as the “excellence and immortality of the soul” or the “happiness of our state.” ⁶⁰ He petitions the Christian to reflect upon these benefits to enflame the affections for God. Finally, the natural world should lead to paying “God all due homage and worship, particularly that of the Lord’s Day.” ⁶¹ The sabbath, according to Derham, is a day of celebration for the world’s birth and a time to cease labor and remain holy. ⁶²

Both The Wisdom of God and Physico-Theology have been analyzed by scholars in terms of their contributions to the flow of natural history. ⁶³ These works undoubtedly function as apologetical responses to atheism and significant contributions to the rise of natural theology. ⁶⁴ However, there has been little attention given to how Ray and Derham impact future pastor-theologians and their use of nature in spiritual formation. ⁶⁵ Ray nor Derham intended for their works to function singularly as contributions to natural history. ⁶⁶ Rather, each work also functions devotionally as manual for practical holiness. In the preface to Wisdom of God, Ray positions the entire work as his personal effort to serve Christ’s church. He notes, “being not permitted to serve the church with my tongue in preaching, I know not but it may be my duty to serve it with my hand by writing.” ⁶⁷ Through an polemical tone, Ray aims for the discourse to be “rather theological than philosophical” as to “illustrate some of [God’s] principal attributes.” ⁶⁸ He believes Christians are too content to study philosophy or history, at the neglect of natural theology. He writes:

I do not discommend or derogate from those other studies: I should betray mine own ignorance and weakness should I do so; I only wish they might not altogether justle out and exclude [natural theology]…no knowledge can be more pleasant than this, none that doth so satisfy and feed the soul…It may be (for ought I know, and as some divines have thought) part of our business and employment in eternity to contemplate the works of God, and give him the glory of his wisdom, power and goodness manifested in the creation of them. ⁶⁹

Likewise, Derham’s work is in fact the organization and publication of sixteen sermons that he preached for the Boyle’s Lectures in England. ⁷⁰ Derham prefaces the work by paying homage to the spiritual nature of Robert Boyle’s work as a “improver of natural knowledge.” ⁷¹ He notes Boyle had the “settled opinion, that nothing tended more to cultivate true religion and piety in a man’s mind, than through skill in philosophy.” ⁷² Derham concludes the best way to honor Boyle are sermons on the attributes of God found through nature in “physico-theological way.” ⁷³ Therefore, Ray and Derham aim to take seriously the science of nature and link it to the spiritual. They effectively relocate the use of nature from allegory and similitude to a natural theological system that aids in Christian piety. Ray and Derham’s emphasis upon Scripture is indicative of their continuity with Puritanism. Yet, each work deviates from its predecessors by more robust use of empirical sciences. ⁷⁴ Charles Raven notes that Ray’s “direct insistence upon the essential unity of natural and revealed, as alike proceeding from and integrated by the divine purpose, had not found clear and well-informed expression until [Wisdom of God] was published.” ⁷⁵ For figures like Watts, devotion and praise for God must be grounded in theology. Relying on the groundbreaking work of Ray and Derham, eighteenth-century pastor-theologians found a theological bases to begin infusing their spiritual writings with the natural world. ⁷⁶

Horae Lyricae (1706)

At the earliest stage of his literary production, Watts weaves the natural world into his poetry for purposes of instruction and devotion. ⁸² Watts’s first ever publication came in the genre of poetry, entitled Horae Lyricae, and contains three books of poems. The natural world is a mainstay in this publication, particularly in the first sections (or “book”), subtitled: “Sacred to Devotion and Piety.” Watts distinctively uses poetry to associate the natural world to theology proper for the purposes of praise and devotion. Take for example stanzas within the poem “Sun, Moon, and Star, Praise Ye the Lord:”

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Another example is the poem: “Flying Fowl, and Creeping Things, Praise ye the Lord.” Influenced by Psalm 148:10, Watts details the “artless harmony” in flocks of birds that should “awake your tuneful voices with the dawning light” to “nature’s God your first devotions pay.” ⁸⁴ He notes the “scaly gold” of a snake’s “shining back” and its “thousand mingling colours.” ⁸⁵ These observations regarding the serpent lead to proclaiming the wisdom and kindness of the Creator God. In the final stanza, Watts details the vast swarms of “insects and mites” which God “painted with a various die.” These insects are “moulded by wisdom’s artful hand” and leads to praise of the one who “wears th’ ethereal crown.” ⁸⁶ Similarly, Watts details the praise that arrives from elements of the earth in another poem entitled “Fire, Air, Earth, and Sea, Praise Ye the Lord.” The poem positions the earth as the “great footstool” of God. Watts uses elements of the earth to feature the being of God in terms of his power, sovereignty, command, and all-sufficiency. God’s power is visible in “Thou bulky globe, prodigious mass,/That hangs unpillar’d in an empty space!/While thy unwieldy weight rests on the feeble air,/Bless that Almighty Word that fix’d and holds thee there.” ⁸⁷ Watts terms God’s negative use of fire as a “heav’nly flame” that is “artillery of a jealous God.” ⁸⁸ In a positive sense, he employs air as a blessing from God: “Thou vital element, the air,/Whose boundless magazines of breath/Our fainting flame of life repair,/And save the bubble man from the cold arms of death.” ⁸⁹ The vital element of air leads to confessing’s God’s nature and being as independent from creation because he needs no “aid to build, or to support our frame.” ⁹⁰ Watts also seems to utilize the poem to highlight and instruct about the doctrine of creation ex nihilo. “From eternal emptiness/His fruitful word by secret springs/Drew the whole harmony of things/That form this noble universe.” ⁹¹ Watts’s poetry is therefore an early glimpse into how the association of natural theology and spiritual formation is a fixture of his thought.

Hymns and Spiritual Songs (1707) and The Psalms of David (1719)

Moving forward from his poetical writings, Watts aimed to reform public worship through free-verse hymnody and psalmody structured in a recital and response pattern. ⁹² Tom Schwanda notes, “Evangelical hymns served two purposes: to instruct and to inspire. Hymns taught the content of the gospel…[and] also provided an experiential means of response.” ⁹³ Watts grasped Schwanda’s modern observations about Evangelical hymnody before most within his era. For Watts, the contents of a hymn, or paraphrased psalm, not only communicate knowledge of God (recital), but it also functions as a script for guiding worship (producing response). Watts briefly details how the recital and response motif is fundamental to the content and practice of worship:

The first and chief intent of…worship, is to express unto God what sense and apprehensions we have of his essential glories; and what notice we take of his works of wisdom and power, vengeance and mercy; it is to vent the inward devotion of our spirits in words of melody, to speak our own experience of divine things, especially our religious joy. ⁹⁴

Watts exercises the recital and response composition through topics ranging from weightily doctrinal truths, such as the atonement, to empirical matters within the natural world. ⁹⁵ Watts’s publications of hymns and paraphrased psalms are the core of his genius in terms of bringing nature to bare upon the spiritual. ⁹⁶

First, Watts’s famous hymnbook, Hymns and Spiritual Songs (1707), plays a significant role in understanding how he links nature and the divine in a recital and response structure. Take for example stanzas four through eight, and eleven, of Hymn 147, “The Creation of the World”:

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Here we see the recital of specific features regarding nature such as water, the sun, the moon, gravity, birds, fish, and lions (fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, and eighth stanzas). The hymn reveals how Watts’s goes beyond the natural object to detail the interwoven functions of created order. For example, the rain and sun “bless the earth” and give birth to plants (fourth and fifth stanza). The rotation of the earth causes the sun to appear and the “moon and stars in order rise,” which “makes our months and years.” (sixth stanza). The use of creation’s function in this hymn is a direct influence of English natural theology. These truths regarding God’s work in nature (recital) then elicit “praise” (response) with a “filled tongue” to give the world “a more exalted song” (eleventh stanza). As this one example provides, Watts effectively brings about worship and devotion into hymnody, through using the natural theology in a recital and response structure.

Second, Watts later published a collection of his paraphrased Psalms entitled The Psalms of David, Imitated in the Language of the New Testament, And Apply’d to the Christian State and Worship (1719). In this work, Watts aimed to “evangelize” the verses of each Psalm in accord with the New Testament. He was convinced the Psalms needed paraphrasing for singing to capture a full view of the New Testament gospel. For instance, Watts is adamant that public worship, if done by way of psalmody, should have explicit references to Christ. ⁹⁸ Not only does Watts bring New Testament concepts of Christ into his paraphrased psalms, but he also imports the explicit influence of English natural theology. Take for example, his paraphrase of Psalm 104, entitled: “They Glory of God in Creation and Providence.” ⁹⁹ Composed of twenty-eight stanzas, this free-verse psalm is replete with empirical aspects of nature. Watts draws stanzas from things such as olive oil, cattle, birds, the sun, the moon, and fish. Again, he does not simply note these aspects of nature, rather he draws empirical scientific content directly from John Derham. Watts’s even gives credit to Derham in a footnote and makes plain he intends to make Derham’ scientific thought “more evident” and “more easy and useful to an ordinary reader.” ¹⁰⁰ In other words, Watts takes the fine details of Derham’s natural theology and molds them to free verse for purposes of worship and devotion. Consider stanza 14, wherein Watts writes,

To craggy hills ascends the goat,

This reference to most likely drawing from Derham’s argument against considering mountains as a deformity to the earth, which Derham believes are positive because they provide “for the safety of the earth’s inhabitants, whether beast or man.” ¹⁰² Additionally, in stanza 15, Watts generalizes the scientific aspects of light:

He sets the sun his circling race,

Watts, here again, is capturing Derham’s detailed discussions of how the globe functions in terms of gravity and light. Derham finds the moon to be “provision” that God contrives as a “noble, glorious, and comfortable benefit.” ¹⁰⁴ Watts then closes the psalm with a clear shift toward responding to the knowledge of God in creation:

In thee my hopes and wishes meet,

The closing stanzas of this psalm harken upon the Puritan notion of “spiritual-mindedness” through meditation on God’s truth. Watts is achieving, in a free-verse Psalm paraphrasing that was intended for worship and devotion, what Flavel, Ray, and Derham accomplish in theological prose.” ¹⁰⁶

Reliquiae Juveniles (1734)

In addition to poetry, hymns, and psalms, Watts’s spiritual prose provides a glimpse into how he utilizes nature for spiritual purposes. His publication Reliquiae Juveniles (1734) is a composition of miscellaneous thoughts on “natural, moral, and divine subjects.” ¹⁰⁷ In the preface, one senses the influence of Flavel as Watts outlines the publication’s purpose. He hopes “the many pieces herein contained” will lead to “elevation of thought towards the things of heaven.” ¹⁰⁸ The work includes prose, poetry, and verse on a range of subjects, including the natural world. ¹⁰⁹ For example, one of the writings, entitled “A Mediation for the First Day of May,” details the wisdom and power of God employed during the springtime. Watts details how flowers, vegetables, leaves, gardens, and meadows come alive during the spring. The plants renewal from dormancy is an “astonishing variety” and indicative of God’s engagement with nature “every moment” through “innumerable millions of exquisite works.” ¹¹⁰ He then petitions the reader to “raise our contemplations another story, and survey a nobler theater of divine wonders” in the sky. ¹¹¹ He notes,

An exquisite world of wonders is complicated even in the body of every little insect, an ant, a gnat, a mite, that is scarce visible to the naked eye. Admirable engines which a whole academy of philosophers could never contrive; which the nation of poets hath neither art nor colours to describe; nor has a world of mechanics skill enough to frame the plainest, or coarsest of them. Their nerves, their muscles, and the minute atoms which compose the fluids fit to run in the little channels of their veins, escape the notice of the most sagacious mathematician, with all his aid of glasses…It is a sublime and constant triumph over all the intellectual powers of man, which the great God maintains every moment in these inimitable works of nature, in these impenetrable recesses and mysteries of divine art! ¹¹²

Another of Watts’s muses, entitled “A Hornet’s Nest Destroyed,” details the beauty of a hornet’s body, the nimbleness of their limbs, and the punishment of their sting. Watts believes this leads to awe because if we could have created the hornet, “it would have been valued at the price of royal treasures, and thought fit only for the cabinet of the greatest princes.” ¹¹³ Furthermore, Watts believes Scripture highlights how God employs the hornet to drive the Canaanites and their kings out of their own land and “plant his beloved Israel there.” ¹¹⁴ This bespeaks of God’s gloriousness through his ability to arrange and control nature. “What can be wanting to that God who has all the uncreated and unknown world of possibilities within the reach of his voice?” ¹¹⁵

In another miscellaneous writing, “Divine Goodness in Creation,” Watts piggybacks on the work of Derham and Ray to detail God’s goodness through creating nature for human convenience, profit, pleasure, nourishment, and delight. ¹¹⁶ He writes of the joys of food, benefits of light, and even the delightfulness of colors in nature to the human eye. “Common experience, as well as philosophy, tells us, that bodies of blue and green colours send us such rays of light to our eyes, as are least hurtful or offense; we can endure them the longest…therefore the divine goodness dressed all the heavens in blue, and the earth in green.” ¹¹⁷

Improvement of the Mind (1741)

Though Watts’s poetry, hymnody, and spiritual prose are critical to his use of the natural world in spiritual formation, but they do not mark the balance of his thought on the matter. Watts’s extends the use of the natural world into his educational literature. His publication Improvement of the Mind (1741) is a practical supplement to his well-respected work Logick (1724). ¹¹⁸ Improvement of the Mind centers around five methods for improving knowledge that include reading, lectures, observation, conversation, and meditation. According to Watts, for example, observation is “the notice that we take of all occurrences in human life…it is by this we know that fire will burn, that the sun gives light, that a horse eats grass, that an acorn produces an oak.” ¹¹⁹ Though mingled with “defects” due to sin’s influence upon human reason, Watts finds a specific connection between knowledge, observation, and natural world. He believes the capacity of the regenerate mind is enlarged through observation and study of the natural world. Watts argues the study of geometry, astronomy, observation of the solar system through use of telescopes, and even reading Milton’s Paradise Lost all lead to a “more exalted apprehension of the great God our Creator.” ¹²⁰ The natural world expands the mind to “entertain our thoughts with holy wonder and amazement” as one contemplates the “most inconceivable wisdom in the contrivance” of the created order. ¹²¹ Most of all, study and observation of the natural world the regenerate person leads to an important theological emphasis of Watts:

By these steps we shall ascend to form more just ideas of the knowledge and grandeur, the power and glory, of the Man Jesus Christ, who is intimately united to God, and is one with him. Doubtless he is furnished with superior powers to all the angels in heaven, because he is employed in superior work, and appointed to be the sovereign Lord of all the visible and invisible worlds. It is his human nature, in which the Godhead dwells bodily, that is advanced to these honours and to this empire; and perhaps there is little or nothing in the government of the kingdoms of nature and grace, but what is transacted by the Man Jesus, inhabited by the divine power and wisdom, and employed as a medium or conscious instrument of this extensive gubernation. ¹²²

Nature foreshadows what special revelation explicitly reveals. One can look back through the New Testament’s revelation of Christ’s humanity and marvel at the work of God. Thus, for Watts, greater piety results from the study of the natural world, even in terms of Christ’s humanity.