nothing else but the power Sect. 51. Pag. 262. which a body hath of reflecting light into the eye Then immediately you say Light is nothing else but the superficies of it and shortly after Colours are not qualities but tractable bodies With the same breath you contradict your selfe for you deny colour to be a qualitie and yet you will have it a power in the bodie to reflect light Are not naturall powers or faculties qualities Is not the power that water hath to coole a qualitie but in this you are also mistaken for colour is not such a qualitie as you make it to wit in the second species where only those powers are which can naturally produce their owne acts As in the eye there is a power to see a power I say which it can produce into act when occasion serves for the eye doth not alwaies actually see but colour is no such power for it cannot produce its owne act primarily as the former power did but in the second place For first it must affect the subject in which the colour is and secondly work upon the eye and so colour is in the third species of Qualitie Now if colour be a qualitie how can it be a superficies which is a quantitie The essence of colours is not in extension though they may be extended according to the extension of the subject in which they are Extension is the essence only of quantitie If colour then be not a quantitie but qualitie how can it be a tactable bodie Colours cannot subsist of themselves they admit degrees therefore cannot be substances You are angry with vulgar Philosophers who force you Sect. 52. Pag. 275. c. 22. to beleeve contradictions in that they say life consisteth in this that the same thing hath power to work upon it selfe Aristotle then and his learned Peripateticks are with you but vulgar Philosophers who teach us that those which move themselves by an internall principle have life in them and so because quick-silver seemes to move it selfe and fountaines or springs of water seeme also to move themselves hence the Latines call the one argentum vivum the other aquas vivas And because these created entities which wee call living actuate themselves either by perfecting themselves or by representing something within themselves by their knowledge or by enclining themselves to the things which they know by their appetite hence it is that we attribute life unto God in that hee actuates himselfe at least negatively so that hee is not actuated by any other and in that hee understands and wills himselfe and all things in himselfe But here is the difference between the life of the Creator and of the creature that our life is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Aristotle sayes the abode or mansion of the vegetive soule in the bodie or naturall heat Or as Scaliger another of these vulgar Philosophers tells us unio animae cum corpore the union of the soule with the bodie And our life hath a dependance from a higher cause and our vitall actions depend from a causality as Understanding and Will from the essence of the soule but the life that is in God and his vitall actions are the same identically with his essence having no dependance or inhesion or connexion at all Tell us then where the contradiction lieth when wee say that the living creature can move it selfe Doth the Scripture teach contradictions when it tells us that Saul killed himselfe that Iudas hanged himselfe that we should accuse our selves condemne our selves convert our selves and many such like Neither doe we say that life consists in this that a thing can work upon it selfe as you would have it for wee make not the essence of life to consist in this wee only make this a propertie of life for the living creature to move it selfe Neither doe wee say that life is action but that life is the principle of action therefore we act because we live actiones sunt suppositorum Though the forme work upon the matter yet the suppositum or compound is the subject of action or motion The form worketh originally or as principium Quo the suppositum worketh subjectively denominatively or as principium Quod. The forme is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the suppositum 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and so life is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the act not the action but the efficient cause of five actions to wit of understanding sense motion nutrition and generation For if life were an action it should be the cause of these actions but actionis non datur actio Lastly life is in the soule originally in the bodie by participation and in the compound subjectively You challenge also Philosophers that they hold sensation Sect. 53. Pag. 275 ca. 32. to be a working of the active part of the same sense upon its passive part and yet will admit no parts in it but will have the same indivisible power work upon it selfe Philosophers distinguish between the organ the faculty and action of the sense The organ is a substance the faculty a qualitie which is properly called sense of which ariseth the action which is properly sensation The forme is the cause of sense God is the supreme cause of the forme and consequently of sense too for dans formam dat consequentia ad formam and sense is the cause of sensation And so they hold that there is in the sense an action and a passion but in a different respect for the passion is in respect of the object the species of which is received by the sense but reception is passion yet in the sense there is an action too but that 's in respect of the soule working by the sense its instrument which it animates and by it judgeth of those objects which are convenient or inconvenient not only for the bodie but for the soul too For the two noblest of the senses were made principally for the soule that by them she might gaine knowledge and in the second place for the bodie Now out of all that 's said tell us where this indivisible power workes upon it selfe or who holds any such thing The power of the soule in actuating the sense the power of the sense in receiving the species is not the same power no more then the power of the soule in moving the hand and the power of the hand in receiving a blow the one being an active the other a passive power the one being from the soule the other from the disposition of the matter whose propertie is to suffer as the formes is to act Therefore wee hold not active and passive parts in the sense but that the whole sense is passive in respect of the object the whole sense is active in respect of the soul working in it So the whole water is passive in regard of the fire which hears it and it 's wholly active in respect of the hand which is warmed by
it Lastly I hope you will not deny but some indivisible powers there are which work upon themselves else how can Angels and soules of men love and know themselves The atomes are your sanctuary to which you flie upon Sect. 54. Pag. 277. c. 32. all occasions For you will now have these materiall parts of bodies work upon the outward organs of the senses and passing thorow them mingle themselves with the spirits and so to the braine These little parts must needs get in at the Pag. 278. doores of our bodies and mingle themselves with the spirits in the nerves and of necessity must make some motion in the braine Doubtlesse if this be true there must needs be an incredible motion in the braine for if the atomes of two armies fighting should rush into your braine by the eye they will make a greater motion then Minerva did in Iupiters braine you would call for a Vulcan to cleave your head and let out those armed men who would cause a greater strugling in your head then the twins did in Rebecca's womb For I doe not think these little Myrmidons would lie so quiet in your braine as the Grecians did in the Trojan horse But if the materiall atomes of the object pierce the organ as for example of a horse then tell us how many atomes must meet to make up a little horse and how can that horse being bridled and sadled pierce your eye without huring of it especially if you should see mounted on his back such a gallant as S. George armed with a long sharp lance or Bellerophon upon Pegasus And if a thousand eyes should look at one time upon that object will it not be much lessened by losing so many atomes and parts as enter into so many eyes Or can the object multiply it selfe by diminution as the five loaves did in the Gospel Or suppose you should see as many horses at a time as were in Xerxes his army would there be stable-room enough in your braine to containe them all Or if you should see a thousand horses one after another doth the coming in of the later drive out the former Which way doe they come out the same they went in or some other way or do they stable all together there or doe they die in the braine Will not they perish the braine and poyson your optick spirits with which you say they are mingled Or suppose you should see in a looking-glasse a horse doth the atomes of that horse pierce first the glasse to get in and then break thorow the glasse again to get into your eye Sure if this be your new Philosophy you are like to have but few sectaries of these deambulatory wise men whom you call vulgar Philosophers Is it not easier and more consonant to reason that the image or representation of the object be received into the sense which reception we call sensation then to say that the very materiall parts which you call atomes should pierce the organ for then the same object must be both one and many and so if all the inhabitants of either hemisphere should look at once upon the Moon there must be as many Moons as there are beholders Againe wee distinguish that which you confound to wit first the organ which is called sensorium secondly the sensitive facultie which resides in the spirits thirdly the act of sensation which is caused by the object fourthly the object it selfe which causeth sensation but not the sense or facultie it selfe fifthly the species which is the image of the object sixthly the medium which is aire water c. seventhly the sensitive soul actuating the organ and in it judging and perceiving the object which diffuses and sends its species or spirituall intentionall qualities both into the medium the sensorium this is no more impossible then for the wax to receive the impression or figure of the seale without any of its matter What are words but motion and words are the chiefest Sect. 55. Pag. 283. c. 32. object of our remembrance Words are not motion but by the motion of the tongue words are uttered I beleeve you move your tongue many times when you speak not but if words were motion you must still speak when you move your tongue Words are articulate sounds but wee have already shewed that sounds are not motions but caused by motion or the collision of solid bodies And if words be the chiefe object of our memory we have spent our time ill for the end why we learne words and languages is to come by them to the knowledge of things And if we remember words onely then our knowledge is verball onely Doe you remember nothing in Divinity but words or are these the chiefest object of your memorie If this assertion be true Christians are of all men most miserable who spend their time strength and meanes to attaine the knowledge of those things which when they remember prove but words I have read of a verball and of a reall memorie some are apter to remember words then things others remember things better then words The medium which these bodies move in that is the memory Sect. 56. Pag. 286. c. 33. is a liquid vaporous substance in which they swim at liberty These atomes in this Chapter you call sometimes bodies and sometimes similitudes and species confounding qualities and substances as you are wont But if you take memory here for the organ or hinder-part of the brain that is not the medium but the receptacle of the species the medium are the spirits which conveigh the species from the phantasie to the memorie which two senses are neere neighbours in the braine much lesse can these bodies as you call them in the memorie be the memorie it selfe which is a facultie of the intellective soule in man of the sensitive in beasts And indeed the intellect and intellective memorie is one and the same power of the soule onely differing in this that as it keeps the species it is called memorie as it makes use of them in understanding it is called intellect And what need wee multiply faculties to no purpose for as the same facultie which apprehends judgeth also so the same facultie which understandeth remembers too And as these bodies or medium cannot be the memorie much lesse can they be reminiscence or recordation which is the motion of the impressed images in the memorie which reminiscence is onely in man because it requires discourse of which beasts are not capable You tell us of two effects of purging the one to Sect 57. Pag. 292. c. 34. make the humour more liquid the other to make the stomack or belly suck or vent it But indeed the effect of purging is not the liquefaction of the humour which is liquid enough of it selfe saving the melancholy humour which is somewhat thicker then the rest by reason 't is more earthy but the pituita and choler are liquid enough of themselves
to originall fin which notwithstanding is propagated though the soule be pure which is infused by reason of the union betwixt the soule and the bodie for originall sin is in the parent as in the efficient in the seed as in the instrument in the soule as in the subject but in the flesh by way of punishment or rather indeed the whole man is the subject of originall sin which with the soule is convayed from the parent to the childe by and in the seed but onely dispositivè not effectivè by disposing and preparing the embryo to receive the soule and not by way of efficiencie producing the soule and so upon the infusion of a pure soule into the prepared and disposed embryo the whole man is made up who becomes the subject of originall sin by reason of the union of the soule and corrupted flesh and in that hee is the issue of such a parent the branch of such a stocke which hath derived corruption in and by the seed and fitted or disposed the bodie to receive a soule though pure in it selfe yet upon the union impure and corrupted and even in it selfe actually void of originall righteousnesse and inclinable or potentially subject to guilt or sin As a leprous father begets a leprous son which leprosie is not in the seed actually but potentially and dispositivè so the privation of righteousness is in the seed actually but concupiscence or inclination to sin dispositivè Fifthly they tell us that mans soule cannot conceive Sect. 10. Object 5. any thing yea not a spirit but under the notion of a bodie therefore shee is corporeall and consequently mortall Answ. Though shee were corporeall yet is shee not therefore mortall for the Sun Moone and Stars are bodies and yet incorruptible Secondly though the soul being in the bodie understands by the outward senses and phantasie yet the act of understanding is inorganicall and that not onely when she is separated but while shee is in the bodie though then in the bodie she stands in need of the phantasie without the bodie shee shall not need it Thirdly the soule not onely understands bodies under materiall notions but searcheth deeper then any corporeall facultie can do even into the natures formes and abstruse principles of bodies so that here shee understands the quiddities and essences of things which a bodily power cannot doe Sixthly they say that the soule can suffer to wit by Sect. 11. Object 6. griefe paine c. therefore shee is corruptible Answ. As the soule is a spirit so her sufferings are spirituall all suffering supposeth not corruptibilitie except it be caused by the prime elementary qualities of which the soule is not capable Secondly there are some sufferings so far from being destructive that they are rather conservative and perfective such are the motions of the heavens Thirdly the soule suffers not but by her selfe in griefe for by her owne agencie she makes her selfe a patient by her thoughts and knowledge of griefe and sorrowes shee grieves and sorrowes and so becomes a sufferer Seventhly they tell us that immaterialitie is no argument Sect. 12. Object 7. of the soules immortalitie for spirituall graces which are infused into us are immateriall yet corruptible Answ. These graces are accidents we speake of the soule which is a substance Secondly these graces are not corrupted by us physically but metaphorically or morally onely Eighthly the desire of immortalitie say they is the Sect. 13. Object 8. affection of the whole man not of the soule alone and yet man is mortall therefore they will not have us inferre the soules immortalitie from her desire thereof Answ. Though this desire be subjectively in the whole man yet it is originally in the soule Secondly it is a good argument to prove that something is immortall in man though not all because he so earnestly desires immortality Thirdly this desire is in man onely and not in beasts which shewes that he not they hath an immortall soule Fourthly though the beasts strive to preserve their naturall being yet man onely aimes at a supernaturall being as having a more divine knowledge and appetite then other creatures are capable of Fifthly how much man desires immortalitie is plaine by the many pyramides obelisks triumphant arches mausolets brasse and marble statues prodigious palaces bookes and other monuments for which who would care if hee thought his soule should perish with the beasts Ninthly mans understanding perisheth after death Sect. 14. Object 9. therefore the soule cannot be immortall Answ. Though the act of understanding did cease yet the power remaines and consequently the soule the subject of that power for actually wee understand not many things here by reason of some defect in the organs yet the soule ceaseth not therefore to be nor the faculty of understanding to be none Secondly the soule doth actually understand and more excellently being separated then shee did in the bodie because not onely doth shee retaine the species which shee carried out with her but also shee receiveth an addition of new species by divine illumination Thirdly though shee understands now by the phantasie yet hereafter by reason of new illumination shee shall need neither phantasie externall object nor any corporeall organ Fourthly the knowledge which the soule shall have after death shall be naturall to the soule though it proceed from God for he is the author both of naturall and supernaturall light These are the chiefe weapons by which the Soules Sect. 15. Antagonists strive to wound and kill her which are of no more validity to hurt her then that dart which old feeble King Priamus flung at Pyrrhus was able to hurt him telum imbelle sine ictu Conjecit summo quod protinus aere pependit These arguments make a sound but have no strength These Arabian Pigmies will never be able with such engines to overthrow the soules immortalitie which is the strong Fort and Citadell of every good Christian in his afflictions Let there be but way given to this doctrine of the Saducees wee must bid farewell to lawes and civility nay to Religion and Christianity We must bid adieu to vertuous actions and to all spirituall comforts Christ died the Apostles laboured the Martyrs suffered but all in vaine if the soule be mortall Our faith our hope our preaching and reading our restraint from pleasures our sorrowing for sins our taking up of our crosse and following of Christ is all in vaine if the soule be mortall And in a word wee Christians are of all men the most miserable if the soule be mortall Why did Abel offer sacrifice Abraham forsake his countrie Ioseph forbeare his mistresse Moses refuse the pleasures of Pharaoh's Court And why have so many thousands endured mockings scourgings bonds prisonment stoning hewing asunder murthering by the sword Why would they wander up and downe in sheeps skins and in goats skins being destitute afflicted tormented if the soule be mortall What needs Cain feare to kill
HAving with much delight satisfaction and content perused this Treatise entituled The Philosophicall Touch-stone I allow it to be printed and published and commend it to the learned and judicious Reader as a work sound and solid and eminently acute and accurate Iohn Downame THE PHILOSOPHICALL TOUCH-STONE OR OBSERVATIONS UPON Sir Kenelm Digbie's Discourses of the nature of BODIES and of the reasonable SOULE In which his erroneous Paradoxes are refuted the Truth and Aristotelian Philosophy vindicated the immortality of mans Soule briefly but sufficiently proved And the weak Fortifications of a late Amsterdam Ingeneer patronizing The Soules mortality briefly slighted By ALEXANDER ROSS Pers. Sat. 5. Non equidem hoc studeo bullatis ut mihi nugis Pagina turgescat dare pondus idonea fumo LONDON Printed for Iames Young and are to be sold by Charles Green at the signe of the Gun in Ivie-lane 1645. TO THE Right honourable IOHN Earle of RUTLAND Lord Ross c. My Lord WIth the same boldnesse that I have adventured to lap up in the folds of a few paper sheets the rich Jewells of Philosophicall truths with the same have I presumed to present them to your Lordships view not that you can receive from them any addition of honour but that they from your Name and Protection may partake a farther degree of irradiation and lustre Here you may see what odds there are between naturall gems and counterfeit stones between solid wholsome meats and a dish of Frogs or Mushroms though made savoury with French sauce to which that ingenious rather then in this Discourse judicious Knight doth invite us who breathing now in a hotter climate cannot digest the solid meats of Peripatetick verities which hitherto have been the proper and wholsome food of our Universities and therefore entertaines us with a French dinner of his owne dressing or with an airie feast of Philosophicall quelque choses a banquet fitter for Grashoppers and Camelions who feed on dew and aire then for men who rise from his Table as little satisfied as when they sate downe We that have eat plentifully of the sound and wholsome viands which are dressed in Aristotle's kitchin are loth now to be fed as the Indian gods are with the steem or smoak of meats or as those Umbrae tenues simulachraque luce carentum those pale ghosts in Proserpine's Court to champ Leeks and Mallowes My Lord in this Dedication I onely aime at an expression of my gratefulness and observance which I owe to your goodnesse and of those reall sentiments I have of your favours and opinion which your self and your truly noble and religious Countesse have been pleased to conceive of mee I heartily pray for an accumulation of all happinesse on you both as likewise on the fruit of your bodies especially the tender plant and hopefull pledge of your mutuall loves my Lord Ross which is the wish of Your Honours humble servant ALEXANDER ROSS The CONTENTS of the first part containing 68. Sections WOrds expresse things as they are in their owne nature sect 1. Divisibility the effect of extension this is not the essence of quantity sect 2. Rarity the effect not the cause of heat rarified bodies not the hottest sec. 3. The essence of locall motion consisteth not in divisibility sec. 4. Place is not a body but the superficies of a body sec. 5. Not density but gravity is the cause of activity and frigidity cause of both sec. 6. Pressure and penetration not parts but effects of frigidity heat is more piercing sec. 7. Though accidents be reall entities yet they exist not by themselves sec. 8. Heat is not the substance of the fire sec. 9. Light no body but a quality proved by twelve reasons Nor can it be fire sec. 10. Of the qualities of light and how it heats and how it perisheth sec. 11 12. The dilatatioâ— and motion of the light and how seen by us sec. 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20. The greatest bodies have not the greatest vertue sec. 21. How naturall bodies move themselves sec. 22. How the Sun causeth motion sec. 23. If the light beares up the atomes and if it be a part of them sec. 24. There is in nature positive gravity and levity by which she works sec. 25. Light descends thorow dense bodies sec. 26. Atomes doe not presse sec. 27. Egyptian earth why heavie upon change of weather How a vessell with snow and salt in it freezeth by the fire The vanity of atomes sec. 28. Water is not actually heavie in its owne sphere The sea moves naturally to the centre Water can divide water sec. 29 Heavie bodies tend naturally to the centre Gravity is not the cause of violent motion The effect sometimes exceeds the cause Inanimate things without understanding affect and dis-affect what 's good or bad for them sec. 30. The true cause of the motion of projection and its properties sec. 31. The heavens void of generation corruption alteration they are naturall bodies sec. 32. Atomes are not the causes of heat nor ofre-action sec. 33. How elementary formes remaine in mixed bodies sec. 34. There are in nature foure simple bodies sec. 35. Wind is not the motion of atomes but an exhalation sec. 36. Naturall Mathematicall and Diabolicall magick sec. 37. The weapon-salve a meere imposture sec. 38. The true causes of the temperament under the line sec. 39. The load-stone is not begot of atomes drawne from the North-Pole sec. 40. Without qualities no operation in nature sec. 41. Atomes pierce not the earth Odors decay by time Salt how it growes heavie sec. 42. Naturall agents at the same time work diversly sec. 43. The heat of the marrow is not the cause of the hardnesse of the bones but the heat of the bones themselves sec. 44. God is not dishonoured by calling him the Creatour of the meanest things sec. 45. The formative power of generation in the seed sec. 46. Whether the heart or the liver first generated sec. 47. Thin bodies as well as thick the objects of touch Rarity and density what kind of entities sec. 48. Objects work not materially but intentionally on the sense sec. 49. Sound is not motion proved How perceived by deafe men It shakes not houses sec. 50. Colours are not quantities nor substances but qualities s. 51. How living creatures can move themselves Of nature and properties Of life And how the life of God differs from the life of the creature sec. 52. Of sense and sensation How the sense worketh and suffereth sec. 53. Vision is not caused by materiall atomes Seven things required in sensation sec. 54. Words are not motion nor are they the chiefe object of memory sec. 55. The organ of the memory How the intellect and memory differ sec. 56. Purging consisteth not in liquefaction but in attracting and expelling sec. 57. Pleasure is not the motion of a fume about the heart but the apprehension of a convenient object sec. 58. Paine and pleasure move not the heart Of systole
have cold and heat c. to arise quantities but qualities for rarity is nothing else but the tenuity of parts and that is a quality but if you take rarity for the distance of parts among themselves as a spunge is called rare or thin so it is in the predicament of Site but quantity you cannot make it by Logick Your argument by which you prove the object to Sect. 49 worke materially upon the sense is because it works so Pag. 245. c. 27. upon inanimate things as the heat or cold works alike upon a stone and upon a mans body but indeed these work not alike for the fire that heats the stone heats also my body and in that respect it works upon both materially that is it produceth the same form specifically not numerically of heat in the matter of the stone and of my body yet besides this operation it produceth another which we call spirituall or intentionall upon my sense which it doth not upon the stone to wit the Image Idea or representation of that heat which my sense apprehends or receives and by meanes of the sensitive soul in me judgeth of it which a stone being inanimate cannot do The heat then worketh on the stone only materially by heating it worketh on my body not only materially by heating but spiritually also by impressing the species of the heat in my sense of feeling by which the soule in the sense is stirred up to judge of it and to make use of it so far as it may be convenient for the body otherwise to avoid it therefore we need not labour much to prove these intentionall species to be in nature which you deny for though their entity be weaker then of materiall formes because their being is not in the subject that is the intentionall heat by which my sense is affected is in the sense as in a subject yet in its being and conservation it depends not on the sense but on the agent the fire that produced it whereas the materiall forme of heat is received into the body and depends onely in fieri from the agent but in its esse and conservation from the matter in which it is received Neither is it hard for us to prove that your materiall actions are not able to performe these effects that our intentionall can for if the heat did work materially on your body it must produce another heat for a materiall accident cannot passe from one subject to another which it must do if the same numericall heat of the fire did pass out of the fire into your body so you having another heat in your body then was in the fire cannot feel nor judge of that heat which was in the fire Again if the hardness of the iron did work materially on your hand when you touch it your hand must be also hard Besides when you see a horse is the same horse in your eye that is without Or hath he the same materiall being in the eye that he hath without This must needs be true if he worke materially on your eye Moreover if the object work materially on the sense the neerer it is to the sense the better it is perceived but the contrary is true for sensibile positum supra sensorium impedit sensum Again no materiall action is in an instant being it is a motion and hath resistance from a contrary quality but the act of sense is in an instant Lastly you must attribute action to quantities if the object worke materially for when you see a triangle that must produce another triangle in your eye which is absurd may be avoided by saying the species or image of the triangle is in the eye That thing which we call sound is purely motion If Sect. 50. Pag. 249. c. 28. sound be motion which is the mobile for every motion is in a subject and no other subject can be given but a body The aire is the medium that conveyeth the sound to us but the subject thereof it is not for the aire being a light body its motion is to ascend but sounds are carried to us by all sorts of motions imaginable The sound of the bell at the same instant ascends descends spreads it selfe abroad through all the parts of the circumstant aire Besides no motion is performed in an instant but the sound in an instant fiâ—s thousands of eares if they be neere Againe rest is opposite to motion but it is not opposite to sounds By the motion of the aire sound is carried to us but sound is not therefore motion and so you doe often times in this Chapter distinguish sounds from the motion of the aire And whereas you say Great sounds do shake houses It is not the Pag. 251. sound but the wind of the Ordnance or Gun-powder that moveth the aire violently by which houses or towers may be shaken and the same aire which is moved by the winde and shakes the house carries the sound to our eare which sound can no more be perceived by the eye as you averre in this Chapter thereby confounding both the actions of the senses and their objects then colours can be perceived by the eare He that sees sounds let him heare colours too 'T is true a blind man will discerne light from darknesse when a candle or the Sun beame is brought and let in to a room not that he perceives the light by his eares but because though the chrystalline humour of his eyes be out yet the visive spirits in the optick nerves not being lost can easily discerne light their proper object though they cannot see visible objects by it the chrystalline humor which should receive the visible species being gone As for a Pag. 257. deafe mans perceiving of musick by a stick held in his teeth whose other end lieth on a Violl I deny that he heares any sound at all if he be deafe he may perceive a motion or trembling of the aire by meanes of his stick but a sound he cannot perceive as wanting the organ of perception And though I should yield that he perceives the sound yet that will not evince sound to be a motion for there be many motions without any sound as the motions of the heavens The shooting of stars and the light which you will have a body move through the aire without any sound So the clouds move and you may move your hand or any part of the bodie without sound Besides there is a sympatheticall an antipatheticall power in sounds to affect or dis-affect the hearer which is not in motion Againe after the sound of the Ordnance is past the motion of the aire continueth a while Lastly lay any soft cloth or silk upon a bell whilst it 's sounding the sound will be dulled or stayed but not the motion therefore doubtlesse sounds and motions are different entities these being in divers predicaments and sounds only in the predicament of Qualitie You conclude That colour is
soule as you call it in saying that her being in a body is her being one thing with the body she is said to be in for if she be one thing with the body she hath the same essence and essentiall properties of a body which I beleeve you wil not subscribe to Sect 22. Pag. 441. c 1 1. Should a soule by the course of nature obtaine her first being without a body and be perfect in knowledge she must be a compleat substance not a soule whose nature is to acquire perfection by the service of the senses 1. You suppose what is not to be supposed for no soul can obtain her first being by the course of nature 2. If she did yet it were not repugnant to her nature to be perfect in knowledge 3. Perfection in knowledge will not make her a complete substance 4. Though the soule naturally acquires perfection by the service of the senses yet that hinders not her bringing in of knowledge with her Adams soul had perfect knowledge as it was fit being all the works of God were created in their perfection and Adam was to be the Doctor and instructor of his posterity and because he was created both in the state and place of happinesse which could not subsist without knowledge yet Adams soule ceased not therefore to be a soule or the forme of his materiall body nor did her knowledge make her a complete substance for in her substance she was no more complete then our soules are in our nativity Neither did that knowledge which Adam brought with him hinder his soule from acquiring by the service of his senses a fuller measure of understanding for hee neither had the knowledge of future contingencies nor of the secrets of mens hearts nor of every particular individuum of every species nor of every stone or sand in the world which belonged nothing to his perfection and happinesse If you 'l say that Adams soule obtained not her first being by the course of nature I grant it nor was it possible she should but by what course soever you imagine the soule to have her being shee may bring perfect knowledge with her and yet not cease to be a soule But when you say That no false judgements can remaine in a Pag. 442. miserable soule after her departure you make the damned soules in hell in farre better condition then wee are here upon earth who are subject to false judgements and erroneous opinions even the best of us but I am not of your mind for doubtlesse false judgements are a part of that punishment which the wicked soules suffer in hell But if there be no falshood or errour of judgement in them they must be in this point as happy as Adam was in Paradise If nothing be wanting but the effect and yet the effect Sect. 23. doth not immediately follow it must needs be that it cannot follow at all This inference will not follow at all for wee see many effects doe not immediately follow upon the working of the efficient and yet follow at last The fire melts not the metall presently nor the Carpenter builds the house nor the Sun produces corne grasse and fruits immediately nor doth the Physician presently cure diseases and yet all these are efficient causes and actually work the effects follow at leasure and at last though not immediately You should doe well to distinguish between 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the working or operation and the work it selfe When the efficient is not only in its act of entity but of causality too there followes immediately operation but not opus the working not the work the effect in fieri not in esse Againe you must discriminate between voluntary and naturall agents the one operate freely the other of necessity The soule is doubtlesse a voluntary not a naturall agent so that the effect may follow though not immediately And if in naturall causes the effect followes still immediately it is where the effect is an essentiall property of the subject flowing immediately from the forme as heat from the fire which notwithstanding produceth not heat immediately in water or other subjects Lastly if your argument be good they are not to blame who held the eternity of the world for they reasoned as you doe that the cause being eternall the effect must immediately or eternally follow or else not follow at all But they should have knowne that God was no naturall but a voluntary agent and though from eternity hee did actually exist yet he did not from eternitie actually create The act of entity in him was eternall but not the act of causality In the conclusion of your discourse you make nature Sect 24. play the Smith for you say If the dull percussion which by natures institution hammereth out a spirituall soule from grosse flesh and bloud can atchieve so wondrous an effect by such blunt instruments as are used in the contriving of a man fifty or an hundred yeares time must forge out in such a soule an excellency above the forme of an abortive embryon You may with your Rhetorick as soon perswade me that Minerva was hammered out of Iupiters braine by the percussion of Vulcans hatchet as that the spirituall soule can by natures institution or any dull percussion of hers be hammered out from grosse flesh and bloud It is not nature but the God of nature that is the efficient cause of the soule It 's not natures dull percussion but Gods active inspiration that is the instrument It is not flesh and bloud out of which it is educed but into which the immateriall soule is introduced The soule is not framed either in or of the bodie by the work of nature but is inspired by the breath of the Almighty who in the beginning breathed into Adam the breath of life and so became a living soule Nature cannot hammer out such a piece as the soule is though shee had the help of Vulcans Cyclopes Brontesque Steropesque nudus membra Pyracmon She is of too pure a quintessence and of too sublimated an alloy to be extracted out of such grosse materialls as flesh and bloud are After the bodie is articulated the new created soule is infused accompanied with her perfections which she receives not from but communicates to the bodie and so that rude masse of flesh in the matrix becomes a man And the same soule which makes him a man makes him lord over all the workes of Gods hands by this he subdues the wilde beasts commands the earth masters the ocean measures the heaven searcheth into the nature of herbs trees metalls mineralls stones c. fore-tells celestiall changes inventeth arts and sciences and becomes the lively character and expresse image of the Almighty Can nature then hammer such a divine essence out of grosse flesh and bloud It is questioned whether God himselfe can doe it without implying a contradiction which is so repugnant to him Nature
indeed extracts the grosse soules of the beasts out of their grosse bodies which as they came of them so they dye with them but the reasonable soule being 1. the act of the bodie and principle of all vitall operations 2. being shee is a spirit not capable of physicall matter and quantitie for she is all in all and all in every part of the bodie 3. being shee is not onely the first act of the organicall bodie but also the very agent or efficient of the bodies organisation therefore shee cannot be materiall nor hammered out of the matter 4. If shee were corporeall either in her being or in her extraction the world could not be perfect or complete for as it is made up of creatures some meerly spirituall some meerly corporeall so for the complement and perfection of it there should be some creatures partly spirituall partly corporeall and these are onely men 5. The effect cannot exceed the cause in perfection and eminencie but the soule farre exceeds the bodie 6. Man had not been fit to rule over the corporeall creatures if hee had not a spirituall soule which onely is capable of reason and dominion and not the bodily substance 7. One species cannot beget another but the soule is a species of spirits far different from bodily species 8. There can be no connexion between the superiour and inferiour creatures but by certaine media by which nature passeth from one extreme to another therefore it was fit that the spirituall and corporeall creatures which are the extremes should be united in that creature which is partly spirituall partly corporeall and this is onely man 9. If the soule be not meerly spirituall she cannot enjoy the vision of nor friendship and familiarity with God who is a spirit nor can she be capable of any spirituall gifts The Spirit of God cannot dwell but in a spirit nor can that which is meerly corporeall be like unto God or see him as he is 10. If the soules be materiall they must be mortall for we have no other reason to induce us to beleeve the soules of beasts to be mortall but because they are materiall and educed out of the possibility of the matter 11. As Christ proved the truth of his body by feeding upon bodily substances so we prove the spirituality of the soule by her food and delights which are not corporeall but spirituall things for knowledge wisdome truth vertue honesty which are incorporeall things are the soules chiefe delights next to God in whom only she rests and with whom onely she is satisfied Fecisti August nos Domine à te inquietum est cor nostrum nisi requiescat in te 12. If the soule be of the parents seed or conveyed with it the seed must needs be man and so a reasonable creature and consequently capable as being man of eternall joy or paine 13. The operations of the soule are spirituall such as be the actions of understanding and will The principall then of these operations which is the soule cannot be corporeall for no operation can in dignity of entity exceed the substance whence it ariseth or the power and facultie of the soule by which she worketh and which differs from the soule as the property doth from the subject for as the potentia or facultie receiveth its specification from the act so the act hath all its dignity from the faculty now if the faculty be spirituall the soule which is its subject cannot be corporeall for no indivisible quality can be inherent in a divisible subject And as the faculty receives its specification from the act so doth the act from the object and therefore the act by which we understand spirits must be spirituall And though in the act of conception we may fancie spirits to be like bodies yet in the act of judgement we know them to be immateriall substances and of a far other nature or essence then bodies and this act is elevated above the senses and abstracts the spirituall object from all sensible conditions 14. The soule knows all bodies celestiall terrestriall simple mixed c. which she doth by receiving these intelligible objects but she could not receive them being corporeall if she were not free from corporiety her selfe for Intus existens prohibet contrarium and she doth not receive them as the senses doe to wit superficially onely but she pierceth into their inmost natures searcheth out their causes properties and effects and yet higher she riseth above the senses by substracting bodies from individuation and all sensible accidents which the senses cannot do and so she considereth them in their universalities which is a kind of spirituality but this she could not do if she were not spirituall her selfe 15. As the dissolution or corruption of the body dissolveth not the soule neither doth the constitution or generation of the body give being to the soul for if she hath her being from the body she must decay with the body 16. Liberty of will proves also the immateriality of the soule for all materiat agents worke either by necessity as the insensitive or are led by instinct as the animat except man who is master of his owne actions and can promote or stay suspend and incline them which way he likes best and in this he comes neere to the Angelicall nature for onely Men and Angels have this prerogative of free-will inferiour creatures want it because of their materiality which determinats them to one kind of operation and so to a necessary working that way as for the fire to heat for a stone to fall downward But such is the independency and spirituality of mans soule that no creature neither Heavens Stars nor Angels have any power to command or force mans will whereas all materiall entities are subject to mutation by the influence and working of the superiour agents to wit the Angels and the Heavens 17. If the intellect or the soule were corporeall she should be hurt and weakned by a vehement object as the senses are to wit the eye with too much light the eare with too violent sounds but no intelligible object be it never so strong and powerfull hurts the intellect at all but perfects it rather 18. If the soule were corporeall it would grow weak and feeble and by degrees decay as the body doth by old age but we see the contrary for the soule even when the body is weakest is most active and by old age rather perfected then weakned 19. If the soule were corporeall entity in its latitude could not be the adequat object of the intellect for the materiall and organicall faculties are determinated by the matter to some particular objects onely mans understanding as likewise that of the Angels have entity as entity for their object that is both uncreated and created spirituall and corporeall substantiall and accidentall entities which could not be if the intellect were not spirituall 20. That this hath been the doctrine of the Church of
are not immortall but my meaning is that the soule is not a subject capable as bodies are neither hath she in her selfe any passive power or possibility of dissolution 4. The soules immortality is proved by naturall and morall reasons thus 1. If the soule perish it must be either by annihilation or dissolution not by the first naturally for nothing of its owne nature can be annihilated God indeed by his omnipotency may annihilate what he made of nothing but there is no entity of it selfe capable of non-entity nor any action tending to it naturally Neither by the second for nothing is dissolved but what had parts dissolution being nothing else but the solution of one part from another but what is not compounded hath no parts and such is the soule as I have shewed For she is independent as she is a substance from any subject as she is a spirit from any created substance therefore dieth not when the body dieth for neither is she compounded of essentiall parts which we call matter and forme nor of integrall which we call members or limbs And hence it appeares that though the soules of beasts may be free from such compositions yet they are not from dependence on the body of which they came and with which they decay 2. The soule is a quintessence and of a more excellent nature then the foure elements are and therefore as she is not of their nature and substance she cannot be capable of their affections and properties but the maine quality and property of elements is to be the subjects of generation and corruption 3. Such as the operation of a thing is such is the subject whence the operation proceeds for operations are emanations of the substance and flow from thence but the chiefe operation of the soule which is understanding is spirituall therefore the soule cannot be corporeall for if the soul were compounded of the elements these operations of the soule must be in the elements for whatsoever is in the compound was before in its principles these being their acts whose principles they are but understanding and will were never in the elements nor are they capable of such operations and so the soule is immortall as she is incorporeall 4. If the soule may be annihilated naturally then naturally she was produced of nothing but such a production is repugnant to the Peripatetick tenents and so by consequence must such an annihilation be 5. Whatsoever is corruptible is corrupted or destroyed by a contrary agent for without contrariety there can be neither generation nor corruption But in mans soule there are no contrarieties for she can receive contrarieties without contrariety because she receives not contrary formes as they are in their naturall but as they are in their intentionall being Hence it is that the heavens though they be compounded are not corruptible because they are not subject to contrarieties 6. The Gentiles by the glimmering light of Nature knew there were some supreme entities by which the world was guided the wicked punished and the innocent rewarded which the Poet acknowledgeth Si genus humanum mortalia temnitis arma At sperate deos memores fandi atque nefandi But they saw that for the most part wicked men enjoyed most outward happinesse here and good men were most wronged and oppressed therefore they beleeved the soules immortality that wicked men might receive their due punishment and good men their reward or else they must confesse that their gods were unjust And as this reason did strongly move them so it must us also to beleeve the soules immortality for it is a righteous thing with God to render vengeance to the wicked and 1 Thes. 1. to you that are afflicted peace with us saith the Apostle 7. It is an undeniable Maxime that God and Nature made nothing in vaine but if there should be in mans soule such a desire and so earnest an affection to immortality and yet not enjoy it that desire which God hath given to her had been in vaine 8. From what proceeds the horrour of conscience in wicked men their trembling at the report and serious thoughts of future judgement on the other side the unspeakable joyes of good men their cheerefulnesse comforts and alacrity even in their paines and afflictions if they did not beleeve the soules immortality and that after this life all teares should be wiped from their eyes 9. God made man for some end and that was to enjoy eternall beatitude which consisteth in the enjoyment of himselfe but if the soule be mortall man cannot attaine to his end and so God made him to no end 10. In extasies and raptures though the body be without sense and motion and seemes as it were dead yet the soule is not but remaines unperished or unextinguished which doth argue her immortality 11. If the soule were mortall as the body is she would grow aged feeble and would decay as the body doth but we see the quite contrary for then she is most active and vigorous when the body is most weake and decrepit 12. If the soule be corruptible she may be separated from her existence and being now this cannot be done but by the worke of an externall and contrary agent which is more powerfull then the soule but no contrary agent abolisheth one forme but by introducing another nor taketh away one existence but by giving another for no action tends to a negative but to some thing that is positive 13. The Gentiles by the light of nature beleeved the immortality of the soule hence sprung the doctrine of transanimation among the Pythagoreans of the Elysian fields and places of torment among the Poets Hac iter Elysium nobis at laeva malorum Aeneid 6. Exercet poenas ad impia tartara mittit Hence Tully concludes that the ancient Romans beleeved the soules immortality because they were so carefull of their dead bodies and funerall ceremonies Tam religiosa De Amici◠jura majores nostri mortuis non tribuissent si nihil ad eos pertinere arbitrarentur c. So Homer acknowledgeth Iliad 23. the soule of Patroclus to live appearing after his death to Achilles The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by him and imago by the Prince of Poets is much used for separated soules as Inhumati venit imago Nota major imago Sub Aeneid 1. 2. 4. terras ibit imago c. The barbarous Indians assent to the soules immortality as Acosta Lerius Martyr and others do witnesse and Aristotle who in some places seemes De Anima l. 1. t. 13. l. 3. t. 5. l. 2. de gen Animal c. 3. to doubt yet in other places plainly asserts this doctrine so universally beleeved that the soules can subsist by themselves because they have distinct affections and operations from the body and the understanding or intellect enters from without into the body it is void of passibility and is some divine thing and that the actions of
and diastole sec. 59. Paine is not compression but the effect of it All hard things breed not paine nor soft things pleasure The heart is more active then passive because hot Feare sorrow and stupidity how they differ Passion is not the motion of the bloud and spirits but of the sensible appetite Every passion is not motion The division of passions Why birds more musicall then other creatures sec. 60. There are sympathies and antipathies in nature of which we can give no reason which is the punishment of Adams pride sec. 61. Of impressions made in the embryo and of the formative power sec. 62. Substances could not be knowne were it not for qualities No action passion and motion without qualities Alterations from them sec. 63. All bodies are not meerly passive Rare and dense not the primary division of bodies sec. 64. Aristotle not the author of atomes but Democritus sec. 65. The necessity of metaphysicall knowledge Privations and negations conceived as positive entities by Aristotelians how sec. 66. Qualities are not dispositions of parts Beauty is neither composition nor proportion Health is not temper Agility is not proportion nor strength Science is not ordered phantasmes sec. 67. Sir Kenelme modestly reproved for mocking at Aristotelians sec. 68. How and why accidents are in their subjects Accidents are entities Aristotelians vindicated from tautologies Nature aimes at unity why Of similitudes and the ground thereof How man is like to God not God to man sec. 69. The CONTENTS of the second part containing 28. Sections ARistotelians make not heat and cold indivisible qualities Not they but the Masse-Priests turne bodies into spirits sec. 1. Not the nature but the similitude of the thing apprehended is in the man apprehending and therefore the understanding is not the same with the thing understood proved by ten reasons sec. 2. All relations are not notions but reall entities proved by ten reasons sec. 3. Existence is not the property of man but of entity or rather its formality in God onely it is one with essence sec. 4. The soule is more then an active force She sleepeth not in the grave c. sec. 5. Being hath no great affinity with the soule it is neither the end nor the Idea of the soule sec. 6. Things are understood rather by way of similitude then of respect or relation sec. 7. Mans knowledge how finite and infinite God onely absolutely infinite How he is knowne by us here and hereafter How infinity can be knowne sec. 8. Things lose not their being by reason of quantity but by the privation of the forme sec. 9. Mathematicians consider not the natures of things but bare accidents abstracted from sensible matter sec. 10. All life consisteth not in motion Life is not an action but the act How motions come from without how not sec. 11. How the soule is perfect In her no privative but negative imperfections There are accidents in the soule sec. 12. Place is not a body it is neither forme nor matter Whatsoever hath existence hath ubiety even Angels and soules How soules are in their bodies They are not no-where nor are they every-where sec. 13. How time is the measure of motion Time and motion different things When the heavenly motions shall cease there will be time how understood Things below would move though the heavens stood still sec. 14. What things are in time chiefly and primarily How spirits are not in time and how in time Tempus aevum eternitie God onely exempted from time Discrete time sec. 15. The soule is no accident She knoweth not all things There is no exteriour and interiour soule Phantasmes are not bodies All soules have not the same amplitude of knowledge Life is not motion Neither the soule nor the life becomes to be a spirit sec. 16. Both Angels and soules stand in need of externall and internall helps of knowledge Memory remaines in separated soules How the species depend from the phantasie Divers habits left in the soule separated The soules in their understanding differ from the Angels What things they know not God is not understood by species sec. 17. The phantasie worketh not upon the soule but the active intellect upon the passive How the phantasie helps the understanding The phantasie workes in sleep How the soule worketh upon her selfe by meanes of her divers faculties sec. 18. In Angels and departed soules there are actions and perfective passions The want of action argues death rather then life Some actions cease after death not all All actions not corruptive Sir Kenelm contradicts himselfe sec. 19. The soule the subject of memory recordation reminiscence and of oblivion too What habits are left actually and potentially in the soule 'T is a happinesse to be forgetfull of some things sec. 20. Rhetoricall flourishes uselesse and hurtfull in Philosophicall disputes sec. 21. Perfection of knowledge makes not the substance of the soule more perfect The soule ceaseth not to be a soule though shee brings knowledge with her False judgements and erroneous opinions are a part of the punishment of damned soules in hell sec. 22. All effects doe not immediately follow upon the working of the efficient Opus and Operatio The act of entity and of causality are to be distinguished The effect which is the property of the cause followeth immediately God an eternall entity not an eternall cause sec. 23. That the soule is not a materiall but a spirituall substance infused not traduced proved by twenty arguments Of the operations knowledge and liberty of the soule in willing Of her excellency above the senses and corporeall substances this is proved by Scripture In what sense the soule is called corporeall by some Fathers She is no part of the divine essence as some hereticks thought sec. 24. The specificall perfection or excellency of soules is alike in all There may be some difference in accidentall perfections in respect of the organs and phantasie sec. 25. The neerer the Intelligences are to God the more they know The superiour have a greater similitude with God then the inferiour and stand in need of fewer intelligible species All behold Gods essence but not in the same measure Neither is their knowledge equall nor infinitely unequall sec. 26. The soule is not made complete in or by the body but rather incomplete because she is then a part of the whole sec. 27. Nature reason and knowledge are but blind guides to heaven without Christ proved by Scripture and reason What we are by nature How Christ may be called nature reason and knowledge sec. 28. The CONTENTS of the Conclusion containing 17. Sections THe immortality of the soule proved by Scripture sec. 1. The same proved by six reasons grounded on the Scripture sec. 2. That the soule is immortall of her owne nature proved by foure reasons and how this phrase is to be understood sec. 3. The soules immortality proved by thirteen naturall and morall reasons The Gentiles by natures light were not ignorant of this truth
Aristotle in this point cleered and vindicated sec. 4. How Angels and mens soules subject to annihilation or dissolution sec. 5. The first Objection against our doctrine answered and is shewed how the soule is immortall both by grace and nature sec. 6. The second Objection answered Solomon compares not mens soules to beasts but the death of mens bodies to that of beasts sec. 7. The third Objection answered Job denieth not the resurrection but sheweth it cannot be effected by the power of nature sec. 8. The fourth Objection answered Austin cleered The way how the soule is infused and originall sin propagated sec. 9. The fifth Objection answered How the soule in under standing depends from the senses sec. 10. The sixth Objection answered how the soule suffers sec. 11. The seventh Objection answered How immateriall grace is corrupted sec. 12. The eighth Objection answered Desire of immortality in man onely sec. 13. The ninth Objection answered The soule understands better being separated then now she doth in the body sec. 14. The many mischiefes that Christian Religion suffers by this opinion of the soules corruptibility sec. 15. The late printed Pamphlet at Amsterdam which undertakes to prove the soules mortality briefly refuted and slighted as a frivolous and irreligious rapsodie having nothing in it but froth Wherein he abuseth Scripture He is refuted in foure observations The soule after death subsisteth naturally not violently nor miraculously sec. 16. A devout and comfortable meditation upon the soules immortality fit for all afflicted Christians sec. 17. THE PHILOSOPHICALL TOUCH-STONE NOble Sir KENELME as I reverence your worth so I admire your paines who being a Gentleman of such eminencie thinks it no disparagement but an honour to spend your time in good literature which giveth true Nobilitie your practice herein is exemplary which I wish the Gentry of our Nation would imitate who think they are born meerly for themselves and their pleasures whose time is spent either idlely wickedly or impertinently as Seneca complaines Eorum vitam mortemque juxta existimo but your mind being of a more noble extraction semine ab aethereo you know that you are not borne for your selfe and therefore by your indefatigable paines doe both eternize your fame and enoble your Countrie but because this life of ours cannot challenge the priviledge of perfection and truth here is accompanied with errour as the light with shades therefore I find that this your Work of the nature of Bodies and of the Soules immortality hath some passages in it Heterodoxall and not consonant to the principles of Divinity and Philosophy which have drawne from mee these sudden Observations for I have here neither time books nor opportunitie to enlarge my selfe in which I promise both brevity and modesty suffering no other language to passe from mee but such as may beseem both your worth and my ingenuitie for my end is not to wound your reputation but to vindicate the truth The first mistake I meet with is That words expresse Sect. 1. Pag. 2. cap. 1. things only according to the pictures we make of them in our thoughts and not as the things are in their proper natures But if our words expresse not the things which we conceive in our minds as they are in their owne natures then our conceptions are erroneous and our words improper or false and if there be not an adequation of our conceptions with the things we conceive there can be no metaphysicall truth in us which consisteth in the agreement of our thoughts with the things as ethicall truth doth in the consent of our words to our thoughts Our conceptions are our internall words which represent reall things and our externall words represent these conceptions and by consequence they expresse things as they are in their natures So Adam in Paradise gave names to the creatures according to their natures and so have wise men ever since The Latines call the sea mare quasi amarum from its saltnesse or bitternesse for it is so in its owne nature Secondly You define quantity to be nothing else but the Sect. 2. Pag. 9. cap. 2. extension of a thing and shortly after that quantity is nothing else but divisibility Thus you confound extension and divisibility which differ as much as in man rationality differs from risibility the one being the effect of the other for therefore things are divisible because they are extensive take away extension divisibility faileth and therefore numbers are not properly divisible because they have no extension but onely in resemblance Secondly extension is not the essence of quantity for if it were all that have quantitie must have also extension but Angels have discrete quantitie which wee call number and yet have no extension Thirdly there is a quidditative or entitive extension by which one part is not another in bodies though there were no quantitative extension at all therefore not every extension is the essence of quantitie There is also the extension of site which is no quantitie Whereas you make heat a property of rare bodies and Sect 3. Pag. 28. cap. 4. Pag. 30. that out of rarity ariseth heat and that a body is made and constituted a body by quantity you speak paradoxically for the rarest bodie is not still the hottest A burning coale is hotter then the flame and scalding lead is hotter then scalding water Secondly rarity is not the cause of heat but heat the cause of rarity that which begets heat is motion and the influence and light of the Stars motion then begets heat heat begets rarity 'T is true that rarefaction prepares the matter to receive heat as heat prepares the matter to receive the forme of the hot element but what prepares is not the cause Thirdly a bodie is not made and constituted by quantitie for this is posteriour to a bodie being a substance and followes the bodie as its accident and therefore more ignoble Every accident hath a subjective dependence from the substance a bodie hath or may have entitie without quantitie so cannot quantitie without the bodie The essence or as you call it the substance of locall motion Sect. 4. Pag 34. cap. 5. doth not consist in division because whatsoever division there is in this motion it is either in respect of the thing moved or in respect of the space in which it is moved but both these are externall to motion and not belonging any waies to its essence therefore in that divisibility which is in them cannot consist the essence of locall motion Besides divisibility is a propertie of quantitie flowing from its essence whereas locall motion is quantitative but by accident and not but by way of reduction in the predicament of quantitie therefore except you be of Scotus his opinion who will have mobile and motus all one division cannot be the essence of locall motion And if you were a Scotist in this yet you cannot prevaile for division being the accident of the thing moved it cannot be
a pretty way for generation of Sect. 40. the load-stone which you say is begot of atomes drawne Cap. 21. from the North Pole by the heat of the torrid Zone and so sent downe into the bowels of the earth where meeting with some condensate stuffe becomes this stone This is the summe of your large discourse But first wee would know what these atomes are whether parts of that cold aire or of the light Secondly how the heat of the torrid Zone can draw cold atomes such a great way ninety degrees at least whereas wee have shewed that hot aire expelleth the cold but draweth it not Thirdly how it comes that load-stones are found in Macedonia Spaine Bohemia Germany and other Northern places Did the atomes in their Southern progresse stay there being weary of so long a journie and plant colonies neer home Or were they sent back by the heat which brought them thence Fourthly how can such weak bodies pierce so deep into the earth Fifthly when these atomes cast their spawne into the matrix of our great Mother whether she doth feed upon iron when shee 's breeding seeing the stone when it 's come to maturitie loveth iron so well Or did shee not surfeit upon garlick which is such an enemy to the load-stone Sixthly of what atomes is the stone Theamedes made that so much hates the iron which the load-stone loves and the Adamant that hinders its operation Though I honour your worth and ingenuitie in aiming at such abstruse causes yet both you and I and all men must confesse that our science here is but ignorance and wee see the natures of things as that blind man who saw men walk like trees Who can tell why Rhubarb purgeth choler Agarick phlegme How the Torpedo stupefieth the hand thorow the cane and the Remora stayes the ship Virgil. Has nè possimus naturae accedere partes Frigidus en obstat circum praecordia sanguis The load-stone you say workes by bodies Ergo not by Sect. 41. Pag. 18. 5. c. 21. quabities I deny the consequence for bodies doe not work upon bodies but by their qualities take these away and there will be no action in nature for actions have their originall from qualities and their properties too therefore actions are susceptible of contrarieties of intension and remission because the qualities from which they have their being are capable of these And as among substances only the forme so among accidents only the qualitie is operative because it is the accidentall forme of the subject in which it is 'T is true accidents work not by their owne power but in and by the power of their substances The hen by her heat which is a qualitie prepares the matter of the egge for introduction of the forme of a chick for the same agent that disposeth the matter introduceth the forme The fire warmes by its heat What 's the reason that you can cut downe a tree with an axe which a childe cannot doe with a woodden dagger 't is because you have the qualities of strength and skill which the childe wants and the axe hath the qualities of strength and sharpnesse which are wanting in the woodden dagger Your reasons by which you prove your assertion are weak viz. Because a greater load-stone hath more effect then a lesser A greater fire heats more then a lesser is therefore heat no qualitie Or must the same degree of heat be in a little fire that is in a greater The qualitie encreaseth and decreaseth according to the quantitie of the subject Secondly A load-stone giveth lesse force to a long iron then to a short one So the fire warmeth more at a neer then at a remoter distance Naturall agents work not in distans Will you deny your facultie of seeing to be a qualitie because you can see better neer at hand then at too remote a distance Thirdly The longer an iron is in touching the greater vertue it getteth Fourthly An iron or load-stone may lose their vertue either by long lying or by fire Will these reasons prove the vertue of the load-stone to be a bodie then vertue I see is a body with you and in the predicament of Substance These your reasons prove the load-stone to work by a qualitie because it hath degrees of more and lesse vertue and because it may be lost Is cold no qualitie because it may be lost in the water Or is the blacknesse of a mans haire no qualitie because it may be lost Or doth the fire consume nothing but bodies Is whitenesse an accident or a bodie a qualitie it is doubtlesse Cast your paper in the fire and what becomes of its whitenesse Qui color albus erat nunc est contrarius albo Your arguments are so weak that they refute themselves and so they will save me a labour Atomes which pierce iron may penetrate any other body Sect. 42. Pag. 186. I know the fire can pierce iron and yet not pierce the dense bodie of the earth which your atomes must doe if they will beget a load-stone And if the fire could pierce the earth yet this will not prove that your magneticall atomes can doe the like except you give them the same Pag. 186. vertue And though light passe thorow thick glasses as you say yet there is some hinderance for the thicker the glasse is the lesse light you shall have Trie if light can passe thorow a thick unpolished horne as it doth thorow the thin horn of a lantern If the thicknesse of a bodie makes no opposition to the light then you may see the Sun as well thorow a thick cloud or thorow the bodie of the Moon as thorow the thin aire If then there be opposition though never so little of the glasse to the light there must needs be some tardity As for odoriferous bodies which you say continue many yeares spending of themselves and yet keep their odour in vigour is a miracle for how can the odour be kept in vigour in those bodies that still spend themselves If odour be a qualitie it must decay as the bodie spends in which it is If odour be a bodie it cannot continue in its vigour and be still spending of it selfe this is a contradiction Besides ' its repugnant to sense for as the flower decayes so doth the smell And though there be a power in roots of vegetables to change the advenient juice into their nature yet there is not the like power in loadstones or salt as you will have it except you will make these also vegetables and so they must not be called stones and mineralls but plants rather Salt doth not change the aire into its substance by lying in it as you say and would prove by the weight of it increased for if it change the aire into its substance it feeds on it and so some parts of its matter must be still wasting and there must be still a repairing of the decayed matter by nutrition and this
therefore 't is not the work of the purge to liquefie the humour but by reason of its innate similitude it hath with the humour to draw it as the load-stone doth iron which similitude consisteth in their essentiall forms and in the properties flowing thence And as the load-stone draweth iron is not drawn by it so doth the medicament being the more active draw the humor but is not drawne by the humour Neither doe I think that the stomack or belly sucks the humor which is so offensive to it for simile trahit simile but the expulsive facultie of these parts wherein the humour lay being partly oppressed by the humor partly irritated by the medicament sends it away to the stomack or belly these also being quickly wearied with such troublesome guests send away the humour by vomit or by the stoole There riseth a motion of a certaine fume about the heart Sect. 58. Pag. 294. which motion is called pleasure Apuleius makes pleasure to be the childe of Cupid and Psyche you say that it is the motion of a fume about the heart of which Psyche cannot be the mother nor Cupid the father There are oftentimes fumes about the heart which beget more pain then pleasure and there are pleasures where are no fumes at all What fumes are there in beautifull objects of the eye with which it is delighted Musick affords pleasure to the eare but no fume at all and so the other senses have their pleasures in their objects without fumes for pleasure is nothing else but the apprehension of a convenient object or its species rather which object is the efficient cause of pleasure The forme or esience of pleasure consisteth in the fruition of that convenient object either by judging of it if present or by remembring it if absent If from this pleasure there proceed an elation of the mind by diffusing of the spirits this wee call joy Againe if pleasure consist in fruition it is rather a rest then a motion Besides if pleasure be the motion of a fume what think you of the soule Sure there are no fumes and yet there is pleasure in the soule And Angels have their pleasures too without fumes for I beleeve the fumes in Popish Churches doe as much please the Angels as they affright Divels Did Paradise the garden of pleasure called therefore Eden beget many fumes about Adams heart Or are there greatest pleasures where there be most of these cordiall fumes I think that where is most heat there are most fumes but so a lion should have more pleasure then a man for the lions heart is hotter and so our hearts are hotter in burning fevers then in health Moreover when at the first sounding of musick we take pleasure that pleasure quite vanisheth if we grow weary of the musick do the fumes then vanish also Lastly if beatitude consists in pleasure as many think then it is within our selves having these fumes and so we need not goe farre to be blessed But why should the fumes about the heart be pleasures rather then the fumes about the braine seeing in the brain is the phantasie and apprehension as also the originall of the senses Now pleasure consists in feeling and apprehension so that pleasure encreaseth as the sense and apprehension doe I beleeve Tobacco-suckers and Wine-bibbers will hardly admit of your Philosophy who define their pleasure by the motion of fumes in the braine rather then about the heart All that moveth the heart is either paine or pleasure Sect. 59. Pag. 298. Physicians tell us that the heart is moved by the vitall spirits the Aristotelians by the heat which is the soules instrument the heat moves it upward the hearts owne weight moves it downward and this is that they call systole and diastole not a compounded motion but two severall motions proceeding from divers principles for no naturall motion can be compounded nor can two contrary motions make up one nor is motion made of motions and not only are these two motions opposite in the heart but also different in respect of time Secondly paine and pleasure are passions of the appetite for every motion in the sensitive appetite is passion caused by externall objects being apprehended as good or evill but passions are not agents Thirdly what paine or pleasure moves the childes heart in the mothers belly or our hearts when we sleep or a heart after it 's taken out of the bodie We see it moves so long as any heat or spirits remaine in it but you will hardly beleeve that paine or pleasure moves it Fourthly if pain and pleasure move not the senses but the species of such objects which are convenient or inconvenient for us cause this motion and of this ariseth paine or pleasure how can these move the heart which never moved the sense The effect which we call paine is nothing else but a compression Sect. 60. Pag. 298. Paine is not a compression but the effect of compression and not of this neither for some pleasing compressions there are but of compression as it is offensive or hurtfull to our nature Neither are they generally Pag. 298. hard things which breed paine in us and those which breed pleasure oily and soft as you say for there are divers soft and oily things which being touched would not cause any pleasure in us A Toad is soft gold is hard but as the touching of this breeds no paine so the touch of that begets no pleasure Neither is the heart Pag 299. extremely passive by reason of its tendernesse and heat but rather active for heat is an active qualitie and where is most heat there is most activity therefore is the fire the most active of the elements and the heart the most active of all our members because of heat And how the heart is exceeding tender I know not the flesh of it is not so tender as of other parts Feare in its height contracteth Pag. 301. the spirits and thence 't is called Stupor Sorrow contracteth also the spirits what difference then do you put between sorrow and stupiditie You should have said a sudden contracting for stupor suddenly contracts those spirits which sorrow doth leasurely and by degrees Secondly you should have distinguished stupiditie for there is one that comes of feare another of admiration Thirdly feare and stupiditie are not the same thing for in feare there is an inordinate motion of the spirits in stupiditie there is an immobility of the same spirits Passion is nothing else but a motion of the bloud and Pag. 306. c. 35. spirits about the heart There is a continuall motion of the spirits and bloud about the heart even when wee sleep is there then also a continuall passion I think in sleep men are seldome troubled with passions Secondly if passion be continually in us then passions and patible qualities are ill distinguished by Logicians which make the one transient the other permanent Thirdly passion
and goe with the bodie Is not the understanding of a separated soule as capable to lodge and entertaine such guests as before Or are these little bodies made of dust that to dust they must returne Seventhly have all separated soules the same amplitude of knowledge then the soule of Iudas in hell hath as much knowledge as Abraham's soule in heaven but I see no reason for it Eighthly if life be a motion it is an imperfect thing consisting not in esse but in fieri and so the life of man both here and hereafter cannot be perfect no not in heaven And in a separated soule tell mee which is the mover the motion and the mobile Ninthly tell us what this Shee is that becomes an absolute spirit Is it the soule or is it life If the soule then she was before she was a spirit If life then motion may become a spirit I see it is not without cause you complaine of engulfing your selfe into the sea of contradiction Help your selfe out againe if you can But you plunge your selfe over head and eares when Sect. 17. Pag. 430. c. 10. you tell us That separated soules doe enjoy their knowledge without the help of externall objects phantasmes instruments or any other helps having all things requisite in themselves This is to deifie soules and to elevate them above the pitch of created entities For the Angels themselves have not such an eminent knowledge in that they stand in need of helps both externall to wit that supreme light and cleere looking-glasse of the Trinity in which they see all things as also of the innate species or idea both of universalities and of singularities without which they can have no knowledge therefore à fortiori if Angels stand in need of such helps much more must departed soules Secondly memorie remaines in departed soules but memory or recordation is by help of the species laid up in the mind to the understanding of which when the mind applies it selfe this is called recordation Thirdly though the intelligible species depend from the senses and phantasie in their fieri or being yet they have no dependence from them in their conservation For the sensible species in sleepe serve the phantasie though the common sense and all the outward are bound up and as it were dead Fourthly in Angels and departed soules there are divers habits both of love and knowledge and vertue yea of tongues also in respect of entitie though there be no use nor exercise but after a spirituall way of speaking now habits are the causes of action and in vaine should they be left in the soule if she by them did not worke and actually understand neither can the effect to wit actuall understanding subsist without its cause which is the habit for this is such an effect as depends in its conservation from the cause Fiftly understanding and the manner of understanding accompany the nature of the soule but the nature of the soule is the same here and hereafter therefore the manner of understanding must be the same to wit by the species Sixtly Whereas the soules departed do specifically differ from the Angels they must have a different manner of understanding to wit by discourse but this way needs help not of the phantasme or senses being all commerce with the body is taken away but of the species Hence then it is apparent that departed soules stand in need of helps and of objects of their understanding and that they have not all things requisite in themselves which objects are externall in respect of their essence though the species be inherent or adherent to the soules much more externall are these objects which they see in God although God himselfe is not intelligible by any species by reason of his immensity neither doth the soule understand it selfe by any species nor doth she know except by revelation what is done or doing here on earth which she must needs know if she had all things requisite for knowledge in her selfe but indeed Abraham is ignorant of us and Israel knows us not Nesciunt mortui quid hic agatur De cura pro mortuis nisi dum hic agitur saith S. Austin Our looking upon the phantasmes in our braine is not our Sect. 18. Pag. 430. c. 10. soules action upon them but it is our letting them beat at our common sense that is our letting them work upon our soule The phantasie being a corporeall sense cannot work upon the soul which is a spirit it is not then the phantasie that works upon the soule but the agent intellect refines purifies and makes more spirituall those phantasmes or species which are represented by the phantasie and so impresseth them in the passive intellect and this is called understanding The agent intellect is the force or quality of the soule mediating betweene the phantasie and passive intellect framing the intelligible species which the passive intellect receiveth and so by the one power the soule acteth and by the other suffereth but not at all by the phantasie whose hand cannot reach so high as to knock at the gates of the soule It must then be a spirituall power that must worke upon a spirit the passive intellect is rasa tabula like cleane paper having no innate species or images of objects in it selfe but what it receiveth from the active intellect so that the phantasie helps the understanding onely dispositivè not efficienter being rather the materiall then efficient cause of understanding furnishing those species which the active intellect refineth and impresseth in the passive If you should ask whether our understanding is an action or a passion I answer that it consists in both for not only doth it receive the intelligible species but also operats upon them And this is that action of the soule which you deny and what do you talke of letting our phantasmes beat at our common sense The phantasmes will beat whether you will or no. If you will not beleeve me beleeve your owne dreames in sleep I suppose your phantasmes then beat when you could be content they would spare their labour and be quieter But so long as the spirits do make their intercourse betweene the phantasie and the common sense there will be an agitation and beating of the phantasmes But it seemes you take the soule and common sense for the same thing when you say that to let the phantasmes beat upon the common sense is to let them work upon the soule They may beat upon the one and not work upon the other for the soul suffers not but by it selfe and her suffering is perfective not destructive as that of the matter is But she doth not worke upon or deduce her selfe out of possibility into act considered as the same thing but in respect of her divers faculties whereof the one is the efficient the other the patient and resembles the matter and if it were not so we should never actually understand for what should excite the
Fathers of Councels of Philosophers and Poets is manifest to them who are conversant in their writings even Aristotle himselfe was of this opinion though a few passages in him have caused some to doubt And the Scriptures lastly are plaine in this case which we will not forbeare to alledge though we deale with a Philosopher Solomon tels us that the Eccles. 12. Spirit returnes to God that gave it Christ commends Luke 23. 〈◊〉 spirit into the hands of his Father S. Paul sayes that 〈◊〉 holy Spirit beares witnesse with our spirits in which Rom. 8. places the word spirit is used as it is opposite to a corporeall substance Apollinaris of Alexandria indeed held the souls to be corporeal and Tertullian too but in that sense that he held God himself to be corporeall to wit a true reall substance and not imaginary or fictitious And when we read in Athanasius Basil Damascen and some others that the soule is a bodily substance we must know that they speake of her not as she is in her selfe but as she is compared to God to wit that both soules and Angels are infinitely distant from that purity and excellency which is in the Divine Essence in comparison of which they are corporeall and grosse substances And the more willingly they used to call the soule corporeall because they would beat downe their heresie which held the soule to be a part of the Divine Essence such as were Carpocrates Cerdon the Gnosticks Manichees and Priscillianists then which heresie none can be more pernicious for it makes God changeable and divisible and the soule altogether immutable all-sufficient eternall omnipotent these then are two dangerous rocks wee must avoid to wit deifying of the soul with the Gnosticks and incorporating her with the Stoicks He that holdeth the soule to be Particula divinae aurae is a Manichee and he that beleeves the soule to be a body is a Sadducee the one is injurious to God the other to the soule the one is the scholer of Carpocrates the other of Cleanthes or Chrysippus but neither of Christ. You will have a soule of fifty or a hundred yeeres standing Sect. 25. Conclus to be more excellent then the soule of an Embryon All souls are of equall excellency and perfection as well the soule of an Embryon as of Aristotle if you speake of the essentiall or specificall excellency which is equally communicated to all the singulars or individua of the same species for there is but one specificall difference by which man and every particular man is distinguished from the beasts so that one man is not more reasonable then another It is true that the genus may be more perfect in one species then in another so man is a more excellent creature then a beast because the difference of rationality which is in man is more excellent then the irrationality of beasts but Peter is not a more excellent man then Paul because the specificall difference is not more in Peter then in Paul in respect of some accidentall differences there may be some inequality but these concerne nothing the nature or essence of man even so one soule may have more knowledge or other accidentall perfections then another in respect of fitter organs and a better disposed phantasie otherwise the same essentiall excellencie is equall in all and the soule of a foole is not lesse excellent then that of Salomon nor of an Embryon then of him who hath lived a hundred yeares except in accidentall perfections as I have said for had the Embryons soule the same perfection of organs and phantasie that the soul of Aristotle had she would exercise the same organicall acts that he did the same I say that immediatly flow from and depend upon the soule Among the Intelligences the lowest knows as much as Sect. 26. Pag. 453. Conclus the highest and yet the knowledge of the highest is infinitely more perfect and admirable then the knowledge of his inferiours The neerer any Intelligence is to God the more perfectly doth he know his will and the more acquainted he is with his counsels the neerer he is to that Divine Light the more illumination he must needs have but the superiour Intelligences are neerer to God then the inferiour and therefore better acquainted with his counsels There is a greater measure of knowledge and other perfections in the superiour then in the inferiour Intelligences seeing the inferiour worke by the power of the superiour and God who is the God of order not of confusion will have a dependency of these inferiour spirits from their Superiours Secondly where there is a greater similitude with God and a more lively representation of divine excellencies there must be the greater knowledge but this similitude is greatest in the superiour Intelligences Thirdly where are fewest intelligible species and more universall there is a more excellent way of knowledge but such are the species of the superiour Intelligences whereas the inferiour must make use of multitudes of species which is an imperfection in knowledge Fourthly the inferiour Intelligences do not understand so exactly the nature of the superiour as the superiour doe themselves therefore their knowledge cannot be so great as that of the higher Intelligences Fiftly can the lowest Intelligence as well understand the nature of that orbe which the supreme Intelligence moveth as he himselfe that by his understanding moveth it I deny not but all the Intelligences immediatly behold the Divine Essence yet not all in the same measure and perfection we looke upon the same Sun that Eagles do but much more weakly then they therefore doubtlesse the inferiour Intelligences must in knowledge yield to the superiour who know things both sooner and more exactly sothat what is revealed immediatly by God to the superiour is communicated by them to the inferiour Intelligences But whereas you make the knowledge of these spirits equall and yet the knowledge of the highest infinitely more perfect and admirable is to me an admirable riddle for can there be in equality an infinite inequality this is one of your contradictions and none of the least If their knowlege be equall it must be infinitely perfect in both or else it is not equall besides you must grant there may be two infinits which cannot be because there must be something in the one which is not in the other or else they cannot be discriminated but there can be no infinitude where there is a defect I like not your phrase of a complete soule completed in Sect. 27. Pag 453. Conclus its body for the soule receives no completion or perfection in or from the bodie but shee brought it with her You should rather say that shee is incomplete in the bodie because she becomes a part of the compositum and every part is incomplete She was complete before she informed the bodie and she will be complete after she hath forsaken the bodie Complete I say in her entitie