make it impossible to agree again When they cannot bring their Antagonists to their Opinion they count it Religion to disgrace their party and if they know any evil of their Persons they refer it wholly to their Principles though their own Sect hath the same and other faults and if any evil thing follow from their Opinion though at the distance of seven Consequences well stretch'd upon the rack of Censure they fasten it upon the Conscience of their Opponent though he understand no coherence between his Opinion and their Deductions and doth so really abhor such Conclusions as they make that if he could think they did follow from what he holds he would renounce his Assertions When the Disputation vvas ended each Chieftain had his distinct herd standing as near the door as they could get and vvhen they appear'd they all applauded their ovvn Champions vvhom they suppos'd Conquerors and so triumph'd before they vvere sure of a Victory vvith as much discretion and no lesse noise then if the multitude had consisted of adverse flocks of angred Geese When Ontagathus had gone thus far they were come near to Mataeoponus which upon their approach began a Verification of his Story for they were accosted with a prodigious noise infinite numbers of Agazelians thronging together to be made partakers of the din. The presse was so great that Bentivolio and his Companions could not get into the new-built Logomachia only whilst they stood in the Court they perceiv'd an older house where there was more free accesse and thither they went thinking to repose themselves a while after their long walk It was not so much frequented because at that time the Agazelians eares did itch more after new Controversies But when they were enter'd they perceiv'd that no place is void of disputation in Agazelus for four Grave persons call'd Bellarmo Therulus Lucanius and Erotidius had been a good while in a sharp contest about divers matters wherein they differ'd and as they came in Bellarmo was telling a strange story of Anaxanacton a great King and he particularly extoll'd his magnificence for a Royal feast which he made for his Subjects and making a relation of the variety of Dishes amongst other things he said he gave them his own Flesh for Meat and in stead of Wine pour'd forth his Bloud into golden Bowles Then he prais'd the inimitablenesse of his Love that would feed the bodies of his Subjects with his own Perceiving that his Companions did scarce believe him That you may know quoth he how he did such a wonderful thing I will acquaint you with a rare mystery By an unspeakable way which he had when the Bread and Wine were put upon the Table he would convert them into the substance of his own Body and Bloud and yet they could not perceive but the Bread and Wine retain'd their former nature for they had the same Taste Colour and Shape and yet there was no such thing upon the Board for what remain'd was only the Accidents of Bread and Wine preserv'd still in being by an Omnipotent power without their Subjects and had the same colour to see to and the same power to nourish such as did eate and drink as if they had still been joyn'd to their proper substance though that was conveyed away invisiâ—ly So that though it be a strange thing yet I may tell you it for a Truth That the King sate at the Table in his Chair at the same time when he was in the mouths of some and the hands of others that feasted with him And I have heard that though his Subjects are scattered through large dominions yet he can after the forementioned manner feast them all at once and be present with them all though they be separated from one another by the distance of many thousand miles whilst they all eate him at the same moment of time At these words Therulus who sate not far from him replyed You are something out in your story Bellarmo for the King you talk of did not convey away the meat and drink of his Guests as you say and by way of Transubstantiation convert them into his own Flesh and Bloud but united himself with their Bread and Wine And while he was so corporally mix'd with their meat and drink they did eate and drink the King and his meat both together This I know for I have been feasted at his Table a hundred times and such as cannot see how this should be were either never at his house or else are as blind as a stone Upon this Lucanius grew a little angry and said For my part I cannot see it yet I have been there many times and I believe as oft as any in this Company and I thank God I am not so blind but I can read a Book which I have heard you both acknowledge for a true Record of that Story and by what I find there I am forc'd to deny credit to your report For it saith That Anaxanacton went to Heaven long ago and at his Ascension declar'd that he would not return till the Restauration of all things which is not only not past but as I fear a great way off Were you at Supper in Heaven Bellarmo or you Therulus Did either of you see his Subjects cut that Glorified Body in bits But that it cannot possibly be true that the Bread and Wine are chang'd into the Body and Bloud of the King by any Corporall Metamorphosis is manifest in that the hallowed Bread and Wine of which you affirm such incredible things will grow mouldy and soure which are things impossible to be attributed to Anaxanacton's condition who since his reception into Heaven is according to the most perfect sense in a state of Incorruptibility Bellarmo and Therulus were so offended with these words that they rose up in a great passion and would needs be gone But Erotidius prayed them to have patience till he also declar'd his opinion unto which with much ado they consented and sate down again whereupon 〈◊〉 began after this manner Bellarmo you and Therulus have related strange things which amaz'd me to hear and I understand that you have told these stories formerly in divers Companies but I fear much to the dishonour of Anaxanacton For whilst you report such impossible things you tempt people to doubt whether ever there was any such King or whether he made any Feast at all because they are sure he could make no such as you mention'd the thing being in its nature impossible Some body hath extremely abused you to make you esteem it for an Excellency in his Religion to be fill'd with Opinions which are contrary to common sense and to introduce a suitable Faith which commends its worth from a power of believing such Doctrines as contradict the Principles of Naturall Reason which God hath planted in our Souls unlesse God should be thought to design the Extirpation of the Roots which he hath set If you put such monstrous Assertions
into Religion men will be apt to take it for an old-wivestale or a fabulous Superstition invented by brain sick men and those that are initiated into your mysteries being taught to believe any thing will as easily believe nothing and by being religious after this fashion will be effectually disposed to Atheisme for when they examine their Faith they will find that in truth they only believe for fear or professe that they do for worldly regards but that they have no reason for what they hold Ingenuous men are govern'd by the Divine light which shines in their Souls by which they know that God cannot do that which implies a Contradiction and upon the same ground they assure themselves that there was never any such Feast You affirm unreasonably that the Body of your King which is but One may be in divers places at once that it may be a thousand miles remov'd from me and yet but the distance of a hand-bredth at the same time and so you make the same distance greater and less then it self For if he be corporally present with me at his Feast and after the same manner with another at a thousand miles distance from me the same Longitude will be shorter then it self You deny not but his Body is in Heaven and you affirm it to be in a Chappel upon Earth at the same time so that if you draw a line from the same point of my Hand to the same point of the King's Body which is the same line because it is a straight line between the same terms the distance will be but a yard long and yet reach many hundreds of miles which is a plain Contradiction Your Monster hath another head also no lesse deformed then this for your Transubstantiation doth suppose one Body may penetrate another whenas all the world have confess'd it to be the nature of Bodily substance to be Impenetrable and ever since that Propriety was stamp'd upon its Essence by the Creator each Material Substance doth stoutly and irresistibly keep it self from being penetrated by another So that whilst you report that the Viands were transubstantiated into the Flesh and Bloud of your King you would make people believe that either he had no true Body when he made that Feast or at least that he hath not now You say to make the wonder the greater That the whole masse of your King's Bloud is in each drop of Wine and that every Crum of Bread is converted into the whole Body not one Crum into the head and another into the feet and so the Whole is thrust into every Part which doth necessarily infer a Penetration of Matter which can no more reasonably be affirm'd then Contradictions can possibly be reconcil'd This Contradiction is swell'd with another for whilst you allow the Convertiblenesse of one Body into another without the destruction or augmentation of each other you grant leave for an absurd Inference which is That Body may be without Space or which is all one Extension for Space is Extension Since therefore the Essential property of a Body is Extension into Longitude Latitude and Profundity your Transubstantiation and Consubstantiation are confounded with this absurdity That a Body may be without Space and that Extension may be not extended Therefore Gentlemen since our Master's Body is in Heaven and that he hath told us he will not return to Earth till he come to restore this miserable world and hath appointed us to commemorate the love of his death by the renewall of his holy Feast where each dish is a Symbol of better things then any fleshly eye can see let us receive the benefits of his Divine presence by an humble Faith without this quarrelsome dispute for the bold determination of the manner of his being there So shall we who are now divided by that which was appointed to unite us become again a holy Synaxis and in stead of offering a ridiculous sacrifice we shall celebrate an acceptable Eucharist When Erotidius had sate down Lucanius rose up with an intention to speak further concerning Erotidius his Arguments but Therulus netled with the former discourse prevented him saying Hold thy tongue Vain Man thou wilt consent to his silly talk dost thou not see him so ignorant of the Nature of Faith that he will not believe Contradictions After those words he went out of the Room saying I will talk no more with such Asses Bellarmo took the opportunity to wave an answer with pretence of great wrath and went away to the chief Governor of Exosemnon to give him an account of what had pass'd How he reported the discourse I know not but in recompence of his ill-bestow'd Zeal in such a pitiful cause he received a Red Hat As soon as they were gone Erotidius guessing Lucanius to be inwardly vex'd as far as outward Looks are significations of the Mind ask'd him the reason of those immorall passions which had been entertain'd that day by such as boast themselves to be Christians and look down from the high battlements of Spirituality as they call it upon the Holinesse of Morality as a poor low thing pretending in their own more rais'd spirit transcendently to contain whatsoever is good in it as the Reasonable Soul doth the Sensitive Faculties adding withall that such irregular expressions would not be kept secret but be improv'd to the greatest disgrace whilst they were divulg'd by such adversaries as they had who were not so heedlesse as not to make use of such fair pretences of accusation To this Lucanius answer'd not without a fretful peevishnesse that he understood no great reason for such carriage only he knew that by a just though most dismal Judgment they were predestinated to these distempers so rising up with that cholerick haste that he overturn'd his Chair he went away Erotidius sitting still in a posture of extreme grief pull'd his hat over his eyes and wept heartily whilst the teares ran down both his cheeks so fast as if each tear had been pursued by his fellow and that one eye vied drops with the other Urania taking notice of his passion came near and demanded the reason of his sorrow Alas Madam said Erotidius I would gladly with these waters quench the unchristian heates which you saw just now kindled and to these teares I would willingly adde my Bloud if by that I could wash away the guilt of these foul distempers Come Erotidius said Urania grieve no more you have done your best be patient till they repent of their follies Come along with me and I will carry you where you shall hear other matters discours'd after another manner Now she intended to conduct him with her Company to Theoprepia into the sweet vales of Sophrosyne where divers Virtuoso's did daily meet and with most excellent Understanding discourse upon the most profitable things knowable As they were leaving the Room a company of illiterate fellowes but more fierce then the former would needs renew the Disputation and
over the Body since we are not brutishly affected with every Passion which is rais'd in it by the Motion of Spirituous bloud nor carried to Action according to those Provocations which are transmitted into the Phancie from the Impulse of External Objects By which Experiment the Soul proves it self to be of an Immaterial Nature for though it hath an actual Sensation of a fleshly Delight yet by a noble Act of the Rational Will it chuseth a good which is contrary to fleshly Pleasure and which no Corporeal Faculty is able so much as to apprehend By this which I have said it is manifest that the Soul though it be not one with the Body may be capable of those Advantages and Disturbances which you mention'd and being distinct in Essence from the Body with which it is closely united may receive considerable hinderances in its Operations from the Indisposition of the Animal Spirits in Sickness and old Age and from the Confusion of Phantasms when the Bloud is drench'd too much in Wine or swell'd with gross Humours and the Brain clouded with Melancholick Fumes and the Phancie deprav'd with black Vapours the Soul remaining untouch'd in the vigour of her Intellectual Faculty only hinder'd by the Distemper of those Instruments which she is forc'd to use in this Conjunct State So that the Inconveniences which you objected do no more prove that the Soul is weakned in her own Nature then we can conclude our Foot to be lame because we halt when one Shoe hath an higher heel then the other It is not to be expected that whilst the Soul is under such disadvantages she should perform her usual Actions as well as at other times more then that an Artist should express his best Skill with a bad Tool But that the Essential Faculties receive no damage in themselves appears by those regular Operations which she doth again exert when the Body is restor'd to its proper Usefulness by the recovery of Health by returning to a sober Temper by awakening from Sleep and victory over Apoplectical Distempers Besides this we have great reason to think our Souls Immortal notwithstanding what happens to us in Sleep since though they are then secluded from Converse with External Objects they do frequently and for ought we know alwayes Act neither do the sufferings of Mad-men weaken our Faith since though they have extravagant Phancies yet they Apprehend which no Material thing can doe Your Argument taken from that which Dying persons feel would signifie something if we should take for truth whatsoever you have a mind to say We know not what Sensation is in the Souls of Dying persons in that moment when they leave the Body We must grant that which is easie to be experimented that when the Vital Heat is suffocated by Putrefied bloud or exhausted by old Age the Members of the Body will receive no Influence from the Soul and the Immortal Spirit will then go away as Birds flie voluntarily out of old Nests or is forc'd out of an unfit lodging which afterward will decay by the absence of the former Inhabitant But that doth no more prove that the Soul perisheth then it is true that a Tenant dies because he is turn'd out of his house by his Landlord You added I remember that the Soul is not put out but cut in pieces sometimes and so must needs die To prove this you urge the Motion which remains in the Divided parts of a Body But you will perceive that this is a very weak Argument if you consider that the Activity of the Animal Spirits can easily move the Divided parts till by that Motion they are dissipated but it doth not give us any just occasion to think that the Soul is divided since it was prov'd before that it is Immaterial and this Phaenomenon is otherwise fairly salvable the Soul having a power to withdraw it self intirely into one part or to go away from the whole as it pleaseth without suffering any prejudice by the Division of the bodily Members Whereas you phansie that if the Soul should subsist in the Separate state it would be unhappy being depriv'd of all the Organs of bodily Sense and so render'd unable to understand or doe any thing I crave leave to tell you that though many of our present Faculties must needs be buried in a kind of Sleep by Death and though the particular description of the Future state in which our Souls shall be after their Separation from the Body doth by many degrees transcend the capacity of our Reason and that God hath not supply'd that Defect with the clearness of Revelation yet being fully satisfied as to the Existence of our Souls after Death by the fore-mention'd Arguments I am not displeas'd that the Happiness of my Future state is so great that I cannot now comprehend it and as I trust the Goodness of God for my Felicity so I leave the Manner of making me happy to his Wisdom not doubting but he will bestow upon the Soul or awake out of it Faculties suiteable to that condition And since the Soul is an Intelligent Principle and contains in it self a power of universal Perception by which it now understands what is represented by the Organs of Sense so when it is destitute of these Instruments it may well enough perceive after some more transcendent manner in a degree proportionable to that which we attribute to God and Angels He who made our Souls can easily give them when they are out of these Bodies the Species of all things which will concern us to know if we did not understand them before or to remember if we did That because they cannot act as they do now therefore they shall be able to doe nothing at all is an Argument no better then this A man cannot sing because his Lute is broke A Country Clown doth scarce understand any other use of his Hands then to plow to dig to sow to reap or to thrash but he would be laugh'd at if he should affirm that there were no other besides these for we know to what excellent Imployments they are put by Lutenists Painters and other Artists And we may rationally think that there are noble Operations in the other State of which this Principle is capable since it doth declare an admirable Capacity at present and so there is no fear that we shall be idle in the other World That disconsolate Solitude which you talk'd of is as little to bedreaded for the Ethereal Regions must needs be so well Peopled that we cannot easily be alone and the Companions to which Good Souls will then be gather'd are so desirable that they will have no great mind to return hither Whereas you said that if Souls be Immortal it is strange that they are unwilling to leave the Body and that if they be destinated to a happy condition it is impossible but they should rejoyce in the near approches of that Felicity to which Death doth transport them I