air, that worketh in the Children of disobedience_, it is not literally so to be understood, as though he had the natural power of ruling the air, and causing of winds, hail, snow, frost, rain, thunder and lightning, for these are all ordered according to the will of divine providence and the causes that he hath established in the Elements: So _David_ speaking of the Heavens, the Earth, and the Elements, doth conclude thus; _They continue this day according to thine ordinances, for all thy servants_: And it is he that ordereth all these, as saith the Text: _Who covereth the Heavens with Clouds, who prepareth rain for the earth, who maketh grass to grow upon the mountains. He giveth snow like wool, he scattereth the hoary frost like ashes. He casteth forth his ice like morsels: Who can stand before his Cold? He sendeth forth his word, and melteth them: he causeth his wind to blow, and the waters flow._ And all these fulfil the will and command of God, and not the will of the faln Angels; for the Text saith: _Fire and hail, snow and vapour, stormy wind fulfilling his word_; so that if they have any thing to do in the sublunary changes or motions of Meteors, it is but only as instrumental and organical Causes, working meerly as they are ordered and acted by the first cause that worketh all in all, as the Christian Philosopher Doctor _Fludd_ hath most learnedly proved in his Treatise of Cosmical Meteors, which I seriously commend to those that desire full satisfaction in this particular. But the Devil is chiefly called _the Prince of the power of the air_, because he is the proud, high, airy and spiritual Prince and Ruler of wickedness in high or super-cœlestial places, by which proud, airy, and spiritual wickedness, _he worketh in the Children of disobedience. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places_, ἐν τοῖς ἐπουρανίοις. Upon which learned _Beza_ saith thus: _Homines quorum fragilis & caduca est natura, cui opponuntur versutiæ spirituales, infinitis partibus potentiores_. And again, _Ista nomina tribuit Angelis malis, propter effectus, non quod eos suâ vi possint præstare, sed quia illis Deus laxat habenas_. And therefore S. _Chrysostom_ upon this place saith thus: _Mundi verò dominos eos vocat, non quod mundum gubernent, sed solet scriptura malos actus hunc mundum vocare, ut quando Christus dicit, vos non estis ex hoc mundo quemadmodum ego non sum ex mundo_. [Sidenote: _De operib. Dei_ _l._ 4. _c._ 6. _p._ 175.] [Sidenote: Jo. 17.]