punishments of Wicked men after Death and tells us in his Timaeus That the Soul of a good man shall be kindly received by his Creator but the Soul of a wicked man shall be cast into Hell The truth is the Platonists have improved the Doctrine of the Soul's Immortality better than many of our own Writers notwithstanding their greater helps have done though sometimes they speak too high as if they would even deify the Soul as do some of the Stoicks Plotinus discourseth excellently upon this Subject and shews that if we would seriously view the Soul in its own naked essence we shoul◠〈◊〉 doubt of its Immortality Let a man says he contemplate himself in his own pure and truly Intellectual Nature divesting it of all that is alien to it and he will certainly know that it is immortal He will then observe that his Understanding is not properly directed to things sensible and mortal but by an eternal Virtue doth contemplate Eternal and Intelligible Objects and becomes as it were an Intelligible lucid World to it self And again he tells us That by how much the Soul is more abstracted from the Senses by so much it reasons better so that when it shall be wholly separate from the Body it will know intuitively without elaborate Ratiocinations That now it deliberates when it doubts it doubts when 't is hindred by the Body but will neither doubt nor deliberate when free from the Body but will comprehend the Truth without any hesitation See his Enneads and elsewhere Maximus Tyrius Dissertat 41. handles that Question viz. Whether the Diseases of the Soul or Body be more grievous and tells us That degenerate Souls are buried in their Bodies like Insects in their Holes and are in love with those lurking Places p. 495. And withal That the health of the Body is but uncertain and temporary that of the Soul solid and immortal pag. 491. It were easy to mention more of the Platonists who all to a man maintain the Immortality of the Soul But I proceed The Stoicks say That the Souls of Good men separated from their Bodies are Heroes as Laertius informs us in Zenon Plutarch says That they call all separate Souls Heroes promiscuously and so distinguish Heroes into good and bad De placitis Philosophorum lib. 1. cap. 8. Epictetus calls the Soul of man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 near a-kin to God Antoninus styles the Soul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And in his 9th Book Sect. 39. Wilt thou say to thy mind thou art dead or become like a Beast Seneca speaks too high Quid aliud vocas c. What will you call the Soul but a Deity dwelling in an Humane Body And perhaps such boldness was one Original of Heathen Idolatry And elsewhere Animus si propriam ejus Originem aspexeris c. The Soul if you consider its true Original descends from that heavenly Spirit Sursum Animum c. Its beginnings call it upward there Eternal Rest remains for it And comforting Martia concerning her dead Son Ipse quidem aeternus he is Eternal and in a better State now than he was before The Body is the Prison of the Soul The Soul it self is sacred and eternal Happy is thy Son O Martia who being dead knows such things as these Nec est Ratio aliud quam in corpus pars Divini Spiritùs mersa Idem Plutarch says That the Providence of God and the Immortality of the Soul are so connected that the one necessarily follows the other de serâ Numinis vindictâ And therefore by the way Epicurus made thorough-work in denying both Come we now to Cicero a moderate middle-way Philosopher He disputes at large for the Immortality of the Soul in the First Book of his Tusc Quaest de contemnendâ Morte as also in his Dialogue de Senectute c. I will cite some Passages out of him to the shame of those Christians who stand in need of such Instructions from an Heathen Tu cum tibi sive Deus c. Wilt thou when God or Nature hath given thee a Soul than which nothing is more excellent and Divine so debase thy self as to suppose that there is no difference between thee and a Beast Cic. Paradox pag. 217. Ii vivunt qui c. These Men live who are escaped from the Prison of the Body but that which you call Life is Death De Somn. Scip. 233. Haec Coelestia semper spectato illa Humana contemnito Ibid. Reckon with thy self that thou art not Mortal but only thy Body the Mind is the Man and not that Bodily Figure which you can point as with your Finger Ibid. And to the same purpose he brings in that of Cyrus mention'd by Xenophon I could never perswade my self that our Souls live in the Body and dye when they go out of it Nec vero tum animum esse insipientem cum ex insipienti corpore evasisset sed cum omni admistione corporis liberatus purus integer esse caepisset tum esse Sapientem This is purely Platonick De Senect 211. Except God deliver you from this Prison of the Body you can never come to Heaven Idem And elsewhere he argues from the Worship which was paid to their departed Heroes That the Souls of all Men are Immortal but the Souls of good Men Divine de Legib. Also Tusc lib. 1. Ipsi illi Majorum Gentium Dii qui habentur hinc à nobis perfecti in Coelum reperientur pag. 329. And so infinitely fond is he of this Opinion that he thus concludes de Senect pag. 213. Quod si in hoc erro c. If in this I be mistaken that I believe the Souls of Men immortal I am willingly mistaken Nor will I suffer this Error in which I am delighted to be extorted from me as long as I live But if after Death I shall have no Sense as some diminutive Philosophers think I fear not lest those dead Philosophers should deride my Error In a word both Cicero Seneca and several of the Platonists and Stoicks speak of the Soul as if it were an Incarnate Deity That it has many bright Resemblances of God stampt upon it Deum te scito esse Somn. Scip. Because as the Great God rules the World so thy Soul rules and governs thy Body as an inferior kind of Deity It must indeed be acknowledged that Aristotle speaks sometimes dubiously and is not consistent with himself in this matter But his greatest Admirers have generally believ'd it And some of them take it ill that any should question whether their Master was of the same mind However the Authority of that Philosopher needs not much to move us since he is also inconsistent with himself concerning the Deity as Lactant. observes And again Aristoteles Deum nec coluit nec curavit See more to the same purpose in Lips Manuduct ad Stoic Philos lib. 1. pag. 18. Nevertheless there are not wanting even in him some fair acknowledgments of this great
THE Contrary Hypothesis laid down with an Account how far it agrees or disagrees with the Philosophy of Epicurus Lucretius Hobs c. The Method of the following Discourse Page 1. CHAP. II. The Immortality of the Soul proved by Scripture Page 12. CHAP. III. The Immortality of the Soul proved by such Arguments as are drawn from the Light of Natural Reason and the common Sense and Experience of Mankind The First Argument from the Powers and Faculties wherewith the Soul is endued Page 25. CHAP. IV. The Second Argument from the many gross and dangerous Absurdities wherewith the contrary Opinion is attended Page 49. CHAP. V. Some Subservient Considerations for the further Establishment of the Doctrine of the Soul's Immortality p. 67. CHAP. VI. The Testimony of the Ancient Philosophers produced for a further Confirmation of this great Truth p. 79. CHAP. VII Our Author's Objections considered and answered p. 93. CHAP. VIII Of Materiality or Immateriality as they are ascribed to the Soul p. 103. CHAP. IX Directions to such as are in suspence as to the Immortality of the Soul shewing how they may arrive at a certainty in that matter p. 109. CHAP. X. Directions to such as believe the Immortality of the Soul shewing how they ought to improve so important a Doctrine p. 131. The Conclusion p. 161. THE Immortality of the SOUL ASSERTED c. CHAP. I. The contrary Hypothesis laid down with an Account how far it agrees or disagrees with the Philosophy of Epicurus Lucretius Hobs c. The Method of the following Discourse THE Principles of sound Philosophy well tried and digested do greatly improve Humane Understandings the Reasoning Faculty is cultivated and advanced by Exercise by accustoming our selves to think we learn in time to think better and to more purpose and every Truth which we meet with and really make our own prepares us for the discovery of some further Truth which is annexed to it and depends upon it And as our Knowledge increaseth so will also the sense of our Ignorance Hence it is easy to discern the Reasons why amongst so many Pretenders there are so few that deserve the name of Philosophers Some take the knowledge of Words Terms of Art and commonly received Forms of Expression for the knowledge of Things and these they swallow without chewing and upon all occasions bring up again as raw as they took them in and play with them as Boys do with Bubbles till Wise men laugh at them Others there are near a-kin to the former who suck in Opinions as the wild Asses do the Wind without distinguishing the wholsome from that which is corrupt Others can go no further than they are led by the Nose These are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of a slavish Nature and he that can so far get the Ascendent over them as to insinuate himself into their esteem which is no hard matter to do may command their Understandings because they themselves never knew how to use them Others have Imaginations so little used to government that they cannot six their thoughts upon a serious enquiry after Truth but they quickly give them the slip and go to play with Impertinencies Some are so dull that they cannot apprehend any thing that lies out of the common Road and is not plain and obvious Others are so sloathful that they grow weary before they have half accomplish'd their search And others so foolishly conceited that they think it below them to alter their present Sentiments But the great hinderance of useful Knowledge is an in-bred radicated Enmity in Corrupt Nature against those Truths which have a nearer tendency to the reformation of ill Manners and the exercise of serious Religion Hinc origo mali And the Age in which we live affords many unhappy Instances of the Predominancy of this Corruption which makes a Learned Gentleman thus to reflect upon it viz. That we are fallen into an Age declining from God in which many are fond of those things which lead us farthest from him and seem most to secure us against him and the Rabble of Atheistical Epicurean Notions which have been so often routed and have fled before the World are now faced about and afresh recruited to assault this present Generation Sir Ch. Wolseley's Unreasonableness of Atheism pag. 37. A like Complaint we have in a late Judicious Philosopher who speaking of the Excellency of the Platonick Doctrine because it draws off our Minds from perishing Transitory things to the contemplation of more noble Intellectual Beings further adds Quâ quidem in re infinitum propè momentum est c. i. e. which is a matter of infinite moment for we are overwhelmed with a Rout of Philosophers who contend that nothing but Bodies can be understood Du Hamel de consens Vet. Nov. Philos Praefat. The like you may find in Ludovic Viv. de Veritat Fidei lib. 1. pag. 145. The Knowledge of Atheists saith Van Helmont wholly depends on a Brutal Beginning and they are unapt to understand those things which do exceed sense for that is the cause why they exclude themselves from the Intelligible World pag. 348. And I find that the late Ingenious E. of Rochester came at last to the same Apprehension viz. that That absurd and foolish Philosophy which the World so much admired propagated by the late Mr. Hobs and others had undone him and many more See his Funeral Sermon pag. 26. How far these Observations are pertinent to the matter in hand you shall see more by and by For my part I desire not to make any man's Opinions seem worse than they are much less to charge Atheism or Infidelity upon a Gentleman who in appearance disowns them You shall therefore hear him speak for himself The Opinion which he undertakes to maintain is this viz. That the Humane Soul is a material Spirit generated growing and falling with the Body and rising again with it at the sound of the voice of the Archangel and the Trump of God pag. 1. Hereupon he endeavours to persuade us that the Soul is nothing else but the inflamed glowing Particles of the Blood called Spirits which are says he the Active Principle of Life Motion Sense and Understanding in Man and Beast pag. 10. And hence he infers That the Soul cannot subsist act or suffer any thing in a state of Separation from the Body but that by Death the man's Faculty of thinking is certainly destroyed pag. 2 3 14 15. And yet he owns the Article of the Resurrection and the last Judgment appointed of God for the distributing of Recompences according to the behaviour which men have used in passing through the Trials and Temptations of this World pag. 6. You have here such a medly of Epicurean Dreams and Christian Doctrines mixt together as is not commonly to be met with The one part of his Hypothesis is below the common Reason and Sentiments of Mankind the other above the reach of the greatest Philosophers without the help of
Supernatural Revelation I mean the Doctrine of the Resurrection at the sound of the Voice of the Archangel and the Trump of God The truth is Our Author hath advanced so far into the Tents of Epicurus Lucretius Hobs and others of our trifling Atomists that it is a wonder he went no further and who knows but he may yet be within call or at least that we may prevent others from being infected with the like Contagion Let us now see how far these Philosophers and he are agreed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. The Soul says Epicurus is certainly a Body consisting of thin subtil parâ—s and at our dissolution is dissipated and hath no longer the same Faculties no motion nor sense Diog. Laert. in Epicur pag. 281 282. The same you have over again in Gassendus's Syntagm Philos Epicur pag. 136. And moreover pag. 137. Exortum ergo Anima habet à quo usque ut adolescit vigescit que cum corpore sic tendat oportet ad Interitum cum eodem senescens ac sensim deficiens That is The Soul riseth grows decays and falls with the Body It is needless to tell the Learned how much Lucretius and Hobs c. have endeavoured to cultivate and recommend this sort of Philosophy See Hobs of the Kingdom of Darkness Leviath part 4. chap. 44. and Gassendus himself hath too much encouraged it Thus you see how far they are agreed Nevertheless there are not wanting in our Author's Book some Concessions which I think will be sufficient to overthrow all that part of his Hypothesis which savours more of the Epicurean than the Christian As for Example 1. He would not be taken for one who denies that there are any Spiritual Substances pag. 6. but rather supposeth that the Angels are Immaterial Intelligent Spiriâ—â— pag. 15. and in this I must acknowledge he is more refined than Mr. Hobs who cannot endure to hear of any Substances but corporeal and explodes the rest as mere Phantasmes and Idols of the Imagination Leviath part 3. cap. 34. pag. 208. and so did his Master Epicurus see Diog. Laert. in Epicur pag. 282. where he endeavours to make us believe that nothing can be understood as incorporeal 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 except a Vacuum an Inanity or Empty Space for Bodies to move in and therefore says he they who say the Soul is incorporeal 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 talk vainly Now thus far our Author agrees with him that the Humane Soul is corporeal but yet he denies not the Angels to be immaterial And this I say is somewhat odd if we consider that the Soul of man is made to know love and delight in God as the Angels themselves are and indeed what can they do that is higher than this yet our Author supposeth them to be Immaterial but the Soul to be no better than corruptible matter Surely it is much more rational to say Ex operationum similitudine colligi potest similitudo essentiae Anima autem vim intelligendi volendi cum Angelis habet communem ergo 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 essentiae as Alsted observes from the likeness of Opeâ—â—â—ion we may gather the likeness of Esseâ—â—e c. which Consideration will weigh the more with those who consider at how great a rate the Soul of man was redeemed by him who took not upon him the Nature of Angels And therefore I must take leave to conclude with Mr. B. Nulla mihi obvia est ratio quae prohibere videtur ne Naturam totam mentalem nobis notam Angelorum scilicet Hominum ad unam speciem in sensu generaliore quasi in classem unam benè redigam Meth. Theol. part 1. cap. 4. pag. 134. 2dly He owns the Being and Perfections of the Deity and speaks with Reverence of our Blessed Saviour Jesus Christ 3dly He speaks well of the Holy Scriptures and cites several passages out of them which he thinks make for his purpose and moreover is willing that the Point of the Soul's Immateriality should be tried by their Authority pag. 19. And therefore I must say sans ceremonie if he refuse to submit to the determination of the Scripture as to the Soul's Immortality the Appeal which he hath made is no better than trifling Prevarication ill becoming a Philosopher and worse a Christian And besides if he imagine that he can prove the Article of the Resurrection as laid down in his Position without â—â—e help of Scripture I think he would do well to give the World a Specimen of his Transcendent Sagacity in that matter but if he fly to Scripture-Authority where it is on his side it will justly be accounted a piece of Partiality and Impiety too if he yield not to it where it makes against him In a word If the Scripture may be Judge in the case it will be easy enough to disprove the former part of his Assertion viz. That the Soul falls or dies with the Body And again If he renounce the Scripture he will never be able to prove the latter part of it viz. That the Body riseth again at the voice of the Arch-angel So that the two parts of his Hypothesis seem to mix together like Oyl and Water They want a tertium quid to unite them which yet must be neither Reason nor Scripture These things being premised what I have to say at present upon this occasion shall be digested into the following Method First I shall evince by plain Scripture-proof That the Soul of man is immortal and doth not fall dye or perish with the Body 2dly I shall prove the same by the Light of Natural Reason for the conviction of such as will not submit to Scripture-Authority 3dly I shall shew That the most considerable amongst the Ancient Philosophers did assert and maintain the Doctrine of the Soul's Immortality 4thly Our Author's Objections shall be considered 5thly Something shall be said to the point of materiality and immateriality which our Author harps so much upon 6thly Some Directions shall be given to such as question the Soul's Immortaâ—ity that they may arrive at a certainty in this matter 7thly I shall shew how those who believe the Immortality of the Soul ought to improve so momentous a Doctrine CHAP. II. The Immortality of the Soul proved by Scripture SO full and clear is Scripture-Evidence in this matter that he who owns the Authority of those Sacred Records and yet denies the separate subsistence of the Soul after Death seems to be as inconsistent with himself as those Philosophers against whom Aristotle disputes Metaph. Lib. 4. who affirmed That a thing might be and not be at the same time I shall therefore under this Head make it appear That the Scriptures do frequently speak of the Soul as a Substance distinct from the Body and capable of subsisting acting and suffering in a state of separation from it and do further assure us That the Souls of good men shall be happy when so separate even before
Scripture and to be tried by them and with open arms to accept and embrace the Truth as our Authour speaks pag. 19. But there is no Truth so sacred no Evidence so clear which perverse Wranglers will not seek to evade and wrest though they do it to their own destruction What can be more clear against the obstinate Jews than that memorable Prophesy Gen. 49.10 The scepter shall not depart from Judah nor a Law-giver from between his feet until Shiloh come And yet they have no less than Twenty six Answers for it See Taylor 's Liberty of Prophecying pag. 80. Thus the late Infamous Mr. Hobs every-where abuseth the Scripture with a Profanation not inferior to the denying of it And so do those of the Church of Rome Socinians Enthusiasts and others See John 3.20 21. CHAP. III. The Immortality of the Soul proved by such Arguments as are drawn from the light of Natural Reason and the common Sense and Experience of Mankind The First Argument WE come now to the proof of the Immortality of the Soul by such Arguments as are proper for the conviction of those Persons who will not acknowledge the Authority of the Scripture and they are drawn either from those Faculties and Powers wherewith the Soul is endued or from the gross and dangerous Absurdities that flow from the contrary Opinion Under each of those general Heads of Argument several particulars will be necessarily comprehended Argum. I. The noble Faculties and Capacities of the Soul argue that its Original is higher than our Author is willing to allow of and that its Nature is immortal The excellency of any Substance must be known by the Faculties Virtues or Powers radicated in it and the excellency of those Faculties by the Acts proceeding from them which connotes or takes in the Objects about which those Acts are conversant Talis est cujusque rei Natura qualis est ejus Operatio or if you will Operari sequitur esse the being of things is the root of their working As they are more or less noble so are their Acts and the Natures of all things are suited to the Ends and Uses for which they are design'd by the All-wise Contriver Thus from the Influences Operations and Effects of the Sun we boldly conclude that its Nature is more noble than that of a Clod. First It is manifest that the Nature of the Soul is very vigorous and sprightly It s vital active Power worketh ad intrà both in the Operations of the Intellect and Will and ad extrà as excited by the Imperium of the Will How quick are the flights of our Thoughts into the uttermost Regions of the Earth How speedily do they compass Sea and Land and not content with such a Circuit soar aloft and lose themselves in forming Notions of imaginary Spaces beyond the Coelum Empyraeum it self and by and by are got as low as the very Centre of the Earth And all this in the twinkling of an Intellectual Eye With what facility and briskness can it turn it self from one Object â—o another and instead of being weary delights it self in these sportful Vagaries which are as agreeable to its active Nature as it is for Matter to lie still in a drooping senseless unactive State Insomuch that some good Philosophers think that the Soul is constantly in action without which they suppose the cessation of its Essential form would be inferred And it is a great question whether the nature of Habits which has puzled so many thinking men lies not much in some unobserved Acts which the Soul hath intrinsecally and in the depth of it of which we are not conscious till some further Acts proceed from them which take in more of Corporeity and Animal Spirits However we are sure that when the use and exercise of our Senses are interrupted by natural Sleep the Soul is often at work and its Reasonings sometimes as lofty and solid in Dreams as when we are awake and it may be more Whence an Ancient Philosopher thought that mens dreaming when asleep was an intimation that they should live when dead And the Peripateticks as Aelian tells us Var. Hist lib. 3 cap. 11. supposed that the Soul was more sagacious and its Apprehensions more Prophetick in Dreams than in the day-time when taken up with serving and caring for the Body And the Stoicks of old thought that Sleep was familiare domesticum Oraculum However 't is evident from all this that the Nature of the Soul is very active Hence Porphyry argues That for the Soul to die is for life it self to die or for that which is per essentiam life to cease to be what it is And Cicero Tusc quaest lib. 1.336 Nulla est celeritas quae possit cum animi celeritate contendere and from this Consideration amongst others concludes it must needs be immortal But there is one thing more under this Head which I must not pass by viz. That strength and solidity of Judgment which is many times observable in dying Persons notwithstanding the languishing of their material Animal Spirits now here I demand If the Soul be nothing else but the purer parts of the Blood separated inflamed and made lucid in the Brain how comes it to pass that when the Senses grow dull and the Spirits low Reason doth not always equally decline with them If any of those Material Spirits be more pure and volatile and so apter to be dissipated than the rest one would think it should be the reasoning part and therefore that the decay should always begin there But we find quite contrary that the Rational workings of the Soul are many times rais'd above the usual pitch when the Animal Spirits are almost dissipated and gone or however extremely enfeebled Which made Heraclitus say That the Soul goes out of the Body as Lightning out of a Cloud because it is many times clearest in its conceptions when taking its flight from this Prison This helped to perfect the late Earl of Rochester's Persuasion of the Soul's Immortality viz. When Sickness had brought him so near Death and his Spirits were so low and spent that he could not move nor stir and did not think he should live an hour yet he observed that his Reason and Judgment were so strong and clear that from hence he was fully perswaded that Death was not the Spending or Dissolution of the Soul but only the Separation of it from Matter See his Life page 20 21. And it may be that which we call a Lightning before Death ariseth from some sprightly efforts of the Soul finding it self loosening from Matter shaking off its Fetters and hastening to be quite disentangled But this brings me to a second Particular 2dly The Understanding is a very noble Faculty eager in its pursuits after Knowledge searching into Objects far enough remote from Matter and above the Sphere of Sense It has a natural Bias and inclination to Truth as its object and embraceth it with unspeakable
unequal Tenuity and that Snow is white though when the Eye is affected with bilious Humours in the Jaundice it seems yellow and that the Heads of our Antipodes are as erect as our own whatever our imagination obstinately suggests to the contrary Now if the Mind was of the same nature with the corporeal Faculties their Judgment would be uniform Therefore how much soever Matter and Motion may be concerned in these erroneous Impressions which are made upon our Senses and Imaginations it must needs be some nobler Principle in us which supplies these defects and corrects the Errors which proceed from them Can Matter and Motion make such gross mistakes and rectify them when it has done This is to act above it self to do and undo and is altogether unconceivable and incredible to those who will not be imposed upon by an empty sound of words If you cannot explain the manner of Sensation it self by meer Matter and Motion how will you solve those Phaenomena which transcend the power both of Sense and Imagination What is that in Man which will not form its judgment of things according to the rude Votes of the Senses but consults some clearer Principle within it self Speak to the purpose or not at all 6thly The Soul has a Power of restraining and controlling the inordinate Efforts of the material Animal Spirits which argues that it is a Substance distinct from them The frequent Conflicts between Reason and the sensitive Appetite fully prove that there is in Man a Power superior to that of Matter and Motion The material Animal Spirits are much concerned in the disorders of Passion and Concupiscence But what is that Regent Predominant Principle which condemns and checks these unruly Motions of the bruitish Appetite and chuseth sometimes the most distastful things to Sense yea and can give the Body to be burned for high and weighty Reasons notwithstanding all the Recoils and Tumults of the Material Animal Spirits and useth the Body as its Instrument to serve its own Will and Pleasure What can this be but the Rational Intellectual Spirit which is capable of subsisting without the Body or else would never so consent to its Destruction But on the other hand when the Soul of a Man is so immers'd in Sensuality that it lets loose the Reins to Lust and Appetite and forgets its own Dignity and Prerogative we justly say the Beast rules and not the Man And I believe it will prove at last that the Soul must be accountable to its Maker for such mismanagement and so gross a neglect of its Duty To conclude this Argument If both the Sensitive and Intellectual Powers arise from no higher a Spring than Matter and Motion How come these Material Spirits so to struggle one with another and one part of them side with Reason the other fight against it If you think all this is nothing else but the striving of the ambitious Particles of Matter for superiority and pre-eminence you may think so still for me I am not at leasure to fight with Shadows 7thly There is in the Soul a natural apprehension of its own Immortality and by this God rules the World who needs not will not rule it in a way of deceit The belief of the Souls capacity of subsisting in a state of Separation from the Body is so apt to insinuate it self into the minds of Men and hath been so generally received and entertain'd in the World that it may justly be reckoned amongst the Notitiae Communes or natural Notions which are imprinted upon the minds of Men by the Author of Nature 'T is a Notion which hath endured the Test of all Ages and still prevailed Good Men believe and rejoyce in it Bad Men cannot shake off the fears of it Those that are of contrary Factions Opinions and Interests in other respects are yet agreed in this That the Soul is Immortal The illiterate Vulgar who are guided by the more simple Dictates of Nature have more deep impressions of this great truth than some of the Learned themselves who by their laborious trifling have disputed themselves into greater Ignorance and raised Devils which they have not the Wit or Honesty to lay again Not only the Civilized Greeks and Romans but the Barbarous Scythians Indians c. have believed it And what Salmasius says upon another account de Comâ is as applicable to the matter in hand Quanto magis Barbari tanto felicius faciliusque Naturam Ducem sequi putantur Eam detorquent aut ab eâ magis recedunt politiores Gentes The most Eminent of the Philosophers who have taken pains to cultivate their Understandings and to rescue them from the mistakes which Education Example or Inconsiderateness had betrayed them to have still seen Reason to stand up for this great Truth except a few self-conceited Epicureâ—ns who have been the scorn and by-word of all the rest and the Sadducees whom the Jewish Writers reckon among them Cicero observes that there is in the minds of Men Quasi saeculorum quoddam augurium futurorum Tusc Qu. lib. 1.331 A kind of presage of a future World Moreover these Persons who have endeavoured to run down the Notion of the Soul's Immortality have not been able to avoid the force of it in their own Breasts nor to secure themselves from the fear of what might befal them in a State of Separation from the Body finding something within themselves which bore witness to the Truth in despight of their stupid Opposition And what Seneca saith of Atheists may be applied to these Men viz. That though in the day-time and in company they may with some shew of confidence deny the Immortality of the Soul yet in the Night when they are alone sibi dubitant they are full of doubts about it The Giant Epicurus of whom Lucretius saith He was the first man who durst fight against Heaven Lib. 1. de Natura rerum was himself as fearful as any man of those things which he denied were to be feared viz. Death and the Deity As Cicero observes de Natur. Deor. Lib. 1. and so you find him arguing in Laertius That Death is not a thing to be jested with Vid. Laert. in Epicur 297. Whence the Learned Dr. Stillingfleet observes How hard it is for an Epicurean to silence his Conscience after he has prostituted it for whatever there be in the Air there is says he an Elastical power in Conscience that will bear it self up notwithstanding the weight that is laid upon it Orig. Sacr. 365. And 't is very observable that our Author himself though pag. 15. he says positively That by Death the man's Faculty of thinking is certainly destroyed yet else where he speaks more dubiously pag. 3 11 12. The Minds of such Persons says my Lord Bacon are always wavering and unsatisfied never able to smother the in-bred consciousness of their Immortality so as not to have continual suggestions of fear and scruple Have you not heard of some such Persons
can never be reconciled to or explicated by the rigid Laws of Matter and Motion but all our Actions must either arise from the fortuitous dances and friskings of Atoms up and down the Brain and Nerves or else be necessitated by the irresistible impulse of some Superior Cause and so there is a fatal determination which sits upon the Wheels of these Corporeal Motions And thus Mr. Hobs will have it That our Volitions are necessitated by Superior or Natural Causes as much as any motion in a Clock or Watch and that it is unconceivable that any Act or mode of Act can be without a necessitating Efficient Cause Thus he also affirms a certain connexion betwixt all our Thoughts and a necessary Fate in all things If this be true we must no more say that the Will cannot be compelled but rather that it is always so and by consequence the man that kills another is no more blame-worthy than the Sword wherewith he kills him both their Motions being alike necessitated and the Dog acts philosophically when he bites the Stone but considers not the Hand that threw it Neither is it to any more purpose to persuade men to Virtue than it would be to make a Learned Discourse of Harmony to a Lute instead of putting it in Tune As you like these Consequences you shall have more of them at another opportunity If you say your Opinion is not so gross as that of Mr. Hobs's I answer it had ill hap to be so like it Your words are pag. 2. We see in a Musical Organ every Pipe has its proper sound and function and the same Breath acts them all and therein appears a great effect and power of Matter and Motion rightly fabricated and acted by the hand of Artists and what then may not God do with them and by them when he pleaseth So that if our Material Spirits be inordinate in their motions you are in a ready way to make God the Author of sin by your Philosophy It were much better to say with Cicero Sentit animus se moveri quod cum sentit illud únà sentit se vi suâ non alienâ moveri nec accidere posse ut ipse unquam à se deseratur Ex quo efficitur aeternitas c. Tusc Qu. lib. 1.341 so be it we overlook not the Universal concourse of the First Cause with his Creatures but in a way suitable to their Natures 3dly If the Hypothesis which I am writing against be true no man can rationally believe a Future State of Retribution You have heard already how Individuation and Personality are overthrown by it and by consequence there can be no just room for Rewards and Punishments hereafter because the Person when he died had not the same Soul that he had a month before and why should one Soul be punished for another's Crimes and that other go free Our Author indeed owns the Articles of the Resurrection and Future Judgment 't is likely to serve a turn but what he builds up with one hand he pulls down with the other He says That Soul and Body as they fall together so shall rise again together Whereupon Judgment Rewards and Punishments shall ensue according as men have behaved themselves in this present world pag. 6. But the difficulty returns upon him Why should that Soul which according to his Hypothesis was no better than a little Wheat-flower Malt or it may be some Cordial Julap or other a few days before the man died be judged and punished for all the Faults which were committed long since Will you say that all the rest are past by and that he is only accountable for the Sins of the last Week or ten Days of his Life This would be to turn the Solemnity of the Resurrection and Final Judgment into a meer piece of Pageantry Moreover the Doctrine of the Resurrection cannot be known but by Supernatural Revelation and therefore 't is an Article of meer Belief There is much in it above the reach of Natural Reason and therefore I ask What must the poor Heathens do who know not that God has revealed any such thing Are they obliged to believe and prepare for a Future State or no If you say they are not they themselves will contradict you and so will the Scripture too which makes them inexcusable for their neglects Rom. 1.20 and that they could not be if there lay not upon them an obligation to the contrary Duties If you say they are so obliged you will be ill set to prove it according to your Hypothesis For if the Soul die with the Body and the Resurrection cannot be proved by Natural Reason how shall they believe without Objective Evidence 'T is true they commonly assert a Future State of Retribution and ground their belief of it upon the Immortality of the Soul which if your Opinion be admitted is an unsound Foundation Whence it appears that Natural Light taught them better things than you have learnt from Supernatural and it together And whatever uncertain hints may be found in any of their Writings as to the Resurrection derived perhaps by Tradition from the Jews or inserted afterwards by the pious Frauds as they call them of some well-meaning Christians we are sure they speak solidly and distinctly concerning the Soul's Immortality 4thly Our Author's Hypothesis makes such a sudden descent from the Angelical Spirits to meer matter and motion denying all the active Natures that are between as is absurd and not to be endured Such Jumps as these are not usual in Nature which is wont to act by due and orderly Gradations and not to take precipitous leaps from one extream to another He would not be thought to deny that there are Immaterial Intelligent Angelical Spirits pag. 6 15. And how unreasonable is it to suppose that there are no other Spirits or active Natures inferior to the Angels and differing in their several kinds and degrees of Perfection and Virtue from each other answerable to the several Operations whereunto they are designed by the Author of Nature But that all the great and wonderful Phanemena which we daily behold must be reduced to and solved by the supposed power of Matter and Motion How much doth the Wisdom of God shine forth in that admirable variety which is observable in the visible Corporeal World And are not spiritual or active Natures as noble as Bodies Why then should there not be a proportionable variety in the Spiritual Invisible World Especially when we observe such Vistigia or Images of the higher Natures in those that are lower Thus there is something in Plants like Sense and in Bruits like Reason and in Men there is somewhat which resembles the Deity Must we therefore say that God and the Creature are all one Or must we confound the inferior Orders of Creatures with those that are Superior and deny those active Natures which animate the visible World and distinguish one Species of Creatures from another While
we cry up the meer sound of Matter and Motion Dubium quidem nullum est immaterialem Mundum essentiarum varietate intelligibilium aequè admirabilem augustum esse atque mundum corporeum videmus sed in quo illa consistat Diversitas nobis indicio certo non percipitur says a Modern Metaphysician Ritschel Metaph. pag. mihi 43. See also Mr. Glanvill's Sadducismus Triumphatus page 78. Our Author has told you what Dr. More and Mr. Baxter have said in this matter but for reasons best known to himself says not a word to answer their Arguments And it is no contemptible Observation of the Platonists which a late Author takes notice of viz. They observe That the Unity of the World is so closely combined in all its parts that between the Superior and Inferior Species there are middle Natures wherein they meet that no Vacuum might interpose in the Series of things And to Man they give the name of Horizon as uniting the Superior and Inferior Natures together in some respects nearly allied to the Bruits in others to the Angels 5thly If our Author's Opinion be true the best Men are most wretchedly deceived and befooled The wiser and holier any Man is the more firmly he believes and rejoyceth in the consideration of the Soul's Immortality Such will not be perswaded that they shall ever be deserted of that Free Divine Goodness and Grace which hath so often embraced them but firmly believe that Almighty Love whereby they live to be stronger than Death and more powerful than the Grave They cannot imagine that their Souls which have been so often blest with the Irradiations of Divine Light and the Warmth and Vigour of Divine Love shall ever fall down into a dead unactive State Hence many of them have died triumphantly with raised expectations of entring immediately into a glorious and blessed State How chearfully Socrates that Philosophical Proto-Martyr received the Summons of Death you shall hear by and by Seneca tells Lucilius with what pleasure he thought on a future State and that when the Soul takes a view of the Amplitude and Glory of the heavenly Regions contemnit prioris domicilii Angustias It contemns the straitness of its former Habitation And Cicero brings in Cato crying out O praeclarum diem c. O excellent happy day When I shall go to that Assemby of Divine Souls and depart from this Rout and Confusion here below Plotinus talks Seraphically upon this Subject Ennead 4. lib. 7. ch 10. where he tells us That purified vertuous Souls differ but little from Angelical Essences and that little is their present Inhabitation in the Body and if Men were of this divine and raised Temper they would not in any sort disbelieve the Souls Immortality More of this kind you may find in Plato Hierocles Epictetus Antoninus not to mention the Raptures of many dying Christians Martyrs and others lest it should be called Canting according to the Dialect of this prophane Generation And now what think you Is it rational to imagine that Men of the most unspotted Integrity Wisdom and Vertue in all Ages have so wretchedly been deceived in a matter which so nearly concern'd them while a few dreaming sensual Epicureans have been in the right Credat Judaeus Apella If you think that Goodness and Purity naturally lead Men to such self-deceiving hopes of Immortality which Death will quickly defeat you confound the Natures of Good and Evil and contradict your self in the same breath Ni ita se haberet ut animi immortales essent haud optimi cujusque animus ad immortalem Gloriam niteretur Cic. de senect pag. 202. Equidem efferor studio patres vestros quos colui delexi videndi Ex vitâ istá discedo tanquam ex hospitio non tanquam ex domo commorandi enim Natura Diversorium nobis non habitandi dedit Ibid. Validiora sunt Divinorum virorum praesagia quam aliorum Plato Ep. 2. 6thly If this Hypothesis be true Nature hath dealt worse with Mankind than with the Beasts themselves by leading them into such mistakes as the inferior Creatures are not obnoxious to I have shewed you before how natural it is to the Soul of Man to apprehend it self to be Immortal and if this be a mistake it is so far better with the Bruits which are not misled by any such fallacious Instinct They are alive to the present but dead to the future They may play and sport themselves and enjoy the Objects that are grateful to their Senses without being abused with the hopes or disturbed with the dread of what may befal them in a future State While poor Mankind are divided between fruitless desires and groundless fears of what can never happen to them if the Soul perish with the Body The Swan may die singing while the pensive Emperor cries out Animula vagula blandula quae nunc abibis in loca Poor wandring Soul whither art thou now going Unhappy Reason which deals so ill with those that possess and admire it and worst with those who take most pains to improve it Thus you must agree with Cotta That God did Man a mischief by making him Rational Cic. de Nat. Deor. lib. 3. 7thly This Hypothesis cannot stand but upon the supposition of a continued course of Miracles to make it good which is very absurd and unphilosophical Take his Opinion in his own Words page 10. Every days experience shews That Corn ground and made into Bread is one of the strongest supports of Life both for Man and Beast that concocted in the Stomach is converted into Blood in the Liver purified in the Heart sent thence by the Arteries into the Head and Brain where becoming a Spirit inflamed and lucid it acts in all the Organs the powers of Life Motion Senses and Understanding And this is his material Soul In like manner page 12. It seems one may venture to conclude that Corn may be converted into a living and rational Activity as being a proper nourishment for Man and Beast and for their Bodies and Souls one as well as the other as being so for the Man who is a Contexture of both To this I answer 1st 'T is observable that his Anatomy and Philosophy are all of a piece In that he assigns the Office of Sanguification to the Liver from which Modern Anatomists have upon very good grounds discharged it 2dly If this Opinion hold good the Grass in the Fields and the very Dust and Mire in the Streets which we tread upon may after several refinings become a Rational Soul and prove as wise as our Philosopher himself and discourse as subtily of what it once was when it lay trodden under foot in the Streets That which the other day was no better than Wheat-flower or Meal may now be making Syllogisms reflecting upon its own Acts contemplating the highest Majesty aspiring after a glorious Immortality These things I must confess sound a little aukwardly but he has a ready way to solve
Truth in his lucid Intervals He confesseth the Soul is something distinct from the Elements and makes it to be quintam quandam Naturam And the like they speak concerning the matter of the Heavens which yet the Peripateticks look not upon as corruptible In his Book de Generatione Animal lib. 2. cap. 3. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. It remains that the Rational or Intellectual Soul only enter from without as being only of a nature purely Divine with whose Actions the Actions of this gross Body have no Communication Here he speaks like an Orthodox Scholar of his excellent Master Plato to whose footsteps the closer he keeps the less he ever wanders from the Truth Dr. More Immort Soul page 115. Elsewhere he says That the mind is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an impassible thing Xenocrates is fully of the same mind That all Souls are Immortal and that he who lives piously and holily on Earth shall certainly be blessed in a future State and shall enjoy more pure pleasures than he was capable of in this Prison of the Body Antisthenes from whom were derived both the Cynicks and Stoicks tells the Athenians glorying That they sprung from the Earth that they were no more noble than Snails and Locusts He exhorts to Piety and Justice as the way to Immortality Ejusmodi sibi viaticum dicebat comparare oportere quod Naufragium facienti simul enatare posset And amongst many other things he wrote 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 concerning the Invisible State Laert. in Antist I mention not the Gymnosophists Brachmans Druids c. What the Poets both Greek and Latin held in this matter is obvious even to School-Boys The Elysian Fields the Infernal Judges the Torments of Hell whereof they speak are so many Attestations to this great Truth Thus you see how generally the belief of the Immortality of the Soul obtain'd among the Ancient Ethnicks and shall any one who professeth to believe the Gospel deny it Who would not say Sit anima mea cum Philosophis I mean rather than with such Christians as these Object Some of the Philosophers whom you mention as Cicero Seneca and even Socrates himself speak sometimes doubtfully concerning the Immortality of the Soul Answ So much the more reason have we to be thankful for that clearer light by which Life and Immortality are so plainly set before us But yet you must remember it was only a certainty which these Philosophers professed to want and not a probability or Opinion that it was true As for Cicero he says he dares swear the Soul is Divine Tusc lib. 1.343 Seneca often asserts its Immortality And so did Socrates when he had to do with such as were capable of receiving and understanding that Doctrine as has been already proved And besides such was the modesty of that Philosopher that he was not wont to be positive in his Assertions but still upon all occasions to acknowledge his Ignorance As for the Epicureans Cicero tell us That all Learned Men contemned them And Austine says Quod ipsi Philosophi Epicurum Porcum nominaverunt Eusebius declares That Lucretius wrote his Poems in the Intervals of Madness Your Friend Dicaearchus is particularly derided by Cicero himself Tusc 335. I might easily mention many more of the Sayings of Ancient Philosophers which further hold forth their belief of the Soul's Immortality Anaxagoras was so intent upon his Philosophical Contemplations that he regarded not the Affairs of the Publick and when one asked him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Have you no care of your Country Yes said he the greatest care of all 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Pointing towards Heaven Laert. pag. 34. Thraseas said Nero might kill him but could not destroy him And the like said Socrates long before concerning his Accusers Anaxarchus told the Tyrant You may break in pieces the Prison of Anaxarchus himself you cannot hurt Laert. 252. Epicarmus as cited by Clemens Alexandrinus says If thou be a good Man Death cannot hurt thee Thy Spirit will live happily in Heaven CHAP. VII Our Author's Objections considered and answered THAT our Philosopher may not think himself slighted I am obliged in civility to take some notice of his Objections such as they are though sufficiently answered in what hath been already said Object 1. The Brutes act sensibly and knowingly by a Material Spirit ergo Man may perform all his Natural Functions by the means of a like Spirit page 2. Answ 1. As for the Nature of Matter I shall shew you by and by how little it is understood by the wisest of you all and that while you are talking so confidently concerning it you do but wrangle in the dark about you know not what 2. I cannot but observe how poorly you shift off the most difficult part of your Work In the first Page we are encountered with a daring Assertion viz. That the Soul falls with the Body But if we seek for proof as 't is all the reason in the world we should there is scarce so much as a shadow of it Parturiunt Montes Not one of the Arguments which have been used both by Ancient and Modern Philosophers and Divines is answered Perhaps they were not worth taking notice of by so transcendent a Genius Did you expect that your bare Word must pass for an Answer or that any Man of Brains would be amused with two or three obscure Quotations out of Aristotle and Pliny You were not born soon enough thus to impose upon Mankind Ipse dixit is quite out of doors 3. As for the Souls of Brutes you say they are Material and take it for granted that they are Mortal from whence you would infer that the Soul of Man is so too But have you well considered the Answers which have been given to this Objection by many great Philosophers If not you are not fit to write about these Controversies If you have you ought to give some satisfactory Reply and not to put it off by saying Dr. W. thinks that such Arguers deserve not an Answer This is but a mean way of Philosophizing Some of the Platonists assign to the Brutes Souls Immaterial Beings diverse from the Body And the Peripateticks say They have Substantial Forms distinct from Matter And Porphyry is peremptory for their Immortality Besides what is said of an Anima mundi But however these Controversies be determined I think 't is easy to demonstrate that the Souls of Brutes are much more noble than the Material Spirits of their Blood But the Immortality of our own Souls depends not upon such Speculations as these We need not run to the Brutes for Arguments Let them do so whose Principles require it If you think you can fairly answer the Reasons which I have given from Scripture and Natural Light in this Point and when you have so done undertake to prove I do not say meerly to assert That the Souls of Brutes are Material and Mortal and by consequence that the Souls of Men are so
we better understood what the Soul is and how it acts while united to the Body 't is meer frowardness to deny its Capacity of a separate Subsistence because we understand not what will be the mode of its Operation in that State But some men love to argue ab ignoto ad ignotius Mihi quidem naturam animi intuenti multo difficilior occurrit cogitatio multoque obscurior qualis animus in corpore sit tanquam alienae domi quam qualis cum exierit in liberum coelum quasi in domum suam venerit Cic. Tusc Quaest lib. 1. pag. 339. CHAP. VIII Of Materiality or Immateriality as they are ascribed to the Soul THAT which our Author seems most to trust to in the present Controversy is the supposed Materiality of the Soul and this it is which he thinks gives him so great an advantage against his Adversary that as the manner of some is he triumphs before the Victory and yet all this Dust which he raiseth about Matter is an easily dissipated as the Apostle shook off the Viper from his hand which will appear by the following Particulars 1. Many great Philosophers and Divines have earnestly contended that the Soul is immaterial and have laid great stress upon this for the proof of its Immortality The Reasons which they offer should have been well weighed and answered by our Author before he had set up for a new Discoverer 'T is an endless piece of work to write against those persons who will take no notice of what has been said before How little alliance is there between a Thought and any bodily thing The more strictly you consider this the more reason you will see to conceive of the Soul as a substance distinct from and far more noble than Matter The Notions which we have of a Mind i. e. something within us that thinks apprehends reasons discourses wills nills affirms denies doubts c. are mightily different from any Notions which we can fasten upon a Body And yet our Author thinks that Corn may be converted into a rational activity pag. 12. But to that I have said enough already 2dly Others say that the Soul is material and yet are as great Asserters of its Immortality as the former Many of the Ancient Fathers of the Church were of this Opinion Tertullian in his Treatise de Amimâ disputes hotly for it Augustine says that the Soul if compared to God is corporeal and so doth Damascene See many more in the Appendix to the Reasons of the Christian Religion where you will find that they took the Angels themselves for more sublime purer Bodies And the Learned Zanchy agrees with them in his Treatise de Angelis chap. 3. Neither will it follow that the Soul is â—â—â—al if it should be acknowledged material Aristotle himself supposes it to be a certain Quintessence distinct from the four Elements analogous to the matter of the Heavens which yet the Peripateticks suppose incorruptible And it can never be proved that so simple and pure a Substance as the Soul is hath any natural tendency to dissolution or separation of parts but on the other hand the noblest Natures incline most to union neither is it to be feared lest God should annihilate or destroy it since he has given it a Nature fitted for Immortality which shews that he has design'd it thereto Quid multa Sic mihi persuasi sic sentio Cum simplex animi Natura sit neque habeat in se quicquam admistum dispar sui dissimile non posse cum dividi quod si non possit non posse interire Cic. de Senect pag. 210. 3dly The Nature of Matter is not so well understood as that the determination of the present Controversy shou'd be supposed to depend upon it The Accidents and Modes of Matter are obvious to our Senses but how little know we of its intimate Essence Sensus infra Naturae opera subsistunt 〈◊〉 que intima illius penetrant sed in extâ—â—â—â— semper facie versantur Lud. Viv. de Ver. Fid. 151. Rerum omnium verae germanaeque Essentiae ipsae per se non cognoscuntur A nobis abditae latent In penitissimis cujusque rei quò mens nostra in hujus corporis mole tenebris vitae non penetrat Idem And to the same purpose Dr. More Antid against Atheism pag. 15. As for the very Essence or bare Substance of any thing whatsoever he is a very Novice in Speculation that does not acknowledge that utterly unknown But for the Essential and inseparable Properties they are as intelligible and explicable in a Spirit as in any other Subject whatsoever And shall we in the midst of all this darkness talk confidently about materiality and immateriality and dispute our selves into Atheism or Sadducism by wrangling about we know not what Can you tell whether Matter be divisible in infinitum or no Take which side of the Question you please and the distinction of mentally or really divisible into the bargain and make your best of it If it be not infinitely divisible then every part of Matter is not Matter as not having extension or trinal dimension If iâ—â—e then a Grain of Mustard-seed may be divided into as many parts as a Mountain And shall the Immortality of the Soul be supposed to stand upon so lubricous a Foundation as this is No such matter Answer honestly and fairly the Arguments which I have produced from Scripture and Reason or else tell us plainly which of these two you renounce but do not think to shift it off by quibbling upon the word immaterial unless you better understood what Matter is For this would be to run into the dark that you might not be seen to blush while you talk against Light it self The formal Vertues of Spirits are better known to us by their Acts than their Substances yea and better perhaps than the naked Essence of Matter it self is Some great Philosophers have affirmed that the Soul is more knowable than the Body See Descart princ Philos pag. 3. and his Meditat. de prima Philos pag. 4. To conclude The substance of our Souls differs so much from any corporeal thing that we are acquainted with that â—t may well enough be called immaterial though we know not wherein the difference of Spirits from the finest Matter consists excepting their formal Vertues and unspeakable Purity Mihi quidem sufficit dum aliorum ausibus nihil oppono nec contradico ex virtute formali in substantiâ purissimâ fundatâ sine compositione Spiritum à materiâ passivâ distinguere Qui plus praestare potest praestet Method Theol. par 1.142 CHAP. IX Directions to such as are in suspense as to the Immortality of the Soul shewing how they may arrive at a certainty in that matter THough I have already said so much as I think may suffice to satisfy such Persons as are willing to do their own Souls right yet all are not alike disposed for the reception of plain
THE IMMORTALITY OF THE SOUL Asserted and Practically Improved SHEWING By SCRIPTURE REASON and the Testimony of the ANCIENT PHILOSOPHERS That the SOUL of Man is capable of subsisting and acting in a State of Separation from the Body And how much it concerns us all to prepare for that State With some REFLECTIONS on a Pretended Refutation of Mr. Bently's Sermon By TIMOTHY MANLOVE 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Plat. in Phaed. LONDON Printed by R. Roberts for Nevill Simmons Bookseller in Sheffield Yorkshire And sold by George Coniers Bookseller at the Ring in Little Britain London 1697. To the Candid and Impartial READER § I. IT seems an Argument equally convictive and deplorable of the monstrous degeneracy of the Spirit of Man that it should doubt its own Spiritual Nature and be in suspence unto which Class of Beings to annumerate it self Whether it be more a-kin to Mind or Dust and whether as the latter it should count it self more ally'd to this World which it is but to pass through or the other where it is to design for it self an everlasting abode that it should suspect its Nature to be less similar to the Inhabitants of Heaven than to Particles of Earth Or that it should any-where be found debased to so low a pitch as to think it self more fit to be sorted with Clods here below than with Angels above § II. We are indeed carefully to distinguish in the consideration we ought to have of our selves between what we are in natural and what in moral respects We cannot upon the latter account think too meanly of our selves as having sinned and fallen short of the glory of God But upon the former account we cannot judge of our selves more meanly than our proper rank in the Creation allows without reflecting injuriously upon our Maker Here a mean Self-despiciency is most ingenerous and ungrateful And when upon this natural account we are God's Off spring and in stiling himself the God of the spirits of all flesh and the Father of spirits he intimates our near alliance to himself and calls us his Sons we call our selves Sons of the Earth we cannot herein vilify our selves without reproaching him And in this respect it might amaze one to think it should be needful to write a Book to prove that a piece of Clay cannot reason deliberate lay Designs form Thoughts deduce one Thought from another raise Thoughts far above the whole Sphere of Material Beings even so high as to reach unto the Supream being it self Or that it should be requisite to confute a Book that if it have any meaning at all must be understood to mean as absurd a Paradox as this Inasmuch as no mortal man can prove that a Clod of Clay is not resolvible into as fine Particles as any the finest Matter whatsoever But since such an Antidote was become necessary against so stupifying a Poyson and that there is reason to think too many minds may be prepared to receive so poysonous Sentiments as the Pamphlet here animadverted on contains by a stupidity in reading equal to that wherewith it was writ we congratulate the Age that it hath produced the one so opportunely for the other But we cannot in the mean time but further pause and bethink our selves and with astonishment cry out § III. Whither is Human Nature sunk and gone that any persons can so solicitously brutify and degrade themselves and be as in pangs of travel till they have ranked themselves amongst those Creatures which God himself hath set so much below them and so evidently hath formed to be subjected to their use and pleasure 2 Pet 2.12 Souls so demonstrative of the Existence of a God so expressive of his Eminencies so receptive of his Favours so apprehensive of his Works and Will so useful and significant in his Creation so fit to know to govern and possess themselves and to make such great and wonderful improvements of what occurs in the whole frame and course of things Yea and so formed to and capable and ambitious of Immortality and so accommodated for it Are these only or ultimately given to keep a little Flesh from stinking to do some Artificial Feats and Tricks therein and then to perish with it These men are great strangers to themselves and inobservant of their own Faculties and Capacities and mind not the provisions which the great Original of all things hath produc'd abundantly and suited to every Faculty Sense and Member belonging to them § IV. Essences lie deeper than their Principles and Principles deeper than their Actions or Effects And every man is nearer to himself than any other Beings are or can be to him save his God And he that reads concerning Human Souls and minds not the powers and actings of his own Soul cannot but be a stranger to himself and the more fit to be impos'd upon both by himself and by others He that forgets and doth not mind and heed himself whilst he consults his Books can never be such a Proficient in Self knowledge as otherwise he might be It cannot be denied but that the Inordinacies and Immoralities of men professing Godliness and zealous in Polemical defending the Soul's Immortality have ministred greatly to the propagation of this dangerous Error That the Soul of man is mortal And when men are sunk in guilt and find their own Convictions troublesome to themselves to make themselves more easy in their course of Soul-neglect they judge themselves the more concern'd to baffle their belief of the Existence of God of the Extent and Exercise of his Providence of the Immortality of the Soul and of Eternal Judgment And when they have extirpated this Persuasion they can more easily contrive Principles and order Practices to serve their own particular purposes and turns But things are not always what and as men think they are or would have them be § V. It is true some of the Patrons and Promoters of this Fundamental Error are Men of admirable Parts and Learning and fit to make considerable Figures and to do great service to the Publick and eminently to serve their Generations in Consistories Courts Camps Navies or in other Stations through their Sagacity Courage Generousness and all the obliging Civilities of Conversation which the advantages of their Education might dispose them unto But he that can believe he hath no God to adore and please no Soul to save or lose no final Reckoning to make to a Supream Judge and so no Eternal Retribution to expect can have no reverence to his Conscience no great and noble end to influence and beautify his Actions nor indeed any thing fully fit and cogent to secure him against the most accommodate and strong Temptations in the severities and briskness of their assaults upon him His Interest Honour or Humour and his adventitious helps from men are now his strongest holds but when these things are likely to be ravishâ—d from him either his heart must sink and break or he will violate all
the general Resurrection and final Judgment and the Souls of wicked men miserable For the proof of these things let us take a view of the following places of Scripture We will begin with the Account of man's Creation at first Gen. 1.26 And God said let us make man in our image after our likeness and let â—hem have dominion c. Verse 27. So God created man in his own image in the image of God created he him male and female created he them Chap. 2.7 And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and man became a living soul Where you may observe First That man was the Master-piece of God's Workmanship or the most excellent Creature of all this lower World And therefore when all things were prepared for his happy Subsistence a Council as it were is held about his Creation to shew us how much the Wisdom of God is displayed and shines forth in such a Creature who is an Epitome of all the World besides 2dly He was made in the image of God after his likeness Let us therefore consider wherein this Image may reasonably be supposed to have consisted and where shall we seek for it but in the Soul which is the noblest part of man and therefore most fit to be the Subject of the Divine likeness And there you may find it partly in the spiritual intellectual Immortal nature of the Soul and partly in the holy rectitude of its Faculties The former was the natural the latter the moral or holy Image of God in man This was the health and perfection of his Nature some way due to it considering the end for which he was made though not inseparable from it The Fall defaced it Grace repairs it again Ephes 4.24 Col. 3.10 It is therefore absurd to suppose that the words should be interpreted of either of these viz. the Natural or Moral so as to exclude the other A Soul made of corruptible perishing Matter is not fit to be called an Image of the Immortal God neither is it a capable Subject of those Divine and Holy Qualifications which all speak an Immortal Nature in which they are implanted and point at a glorious Immortality as their end There is another part also of the Image of God in Man and that is the Image of his Supereminence or Majesty in that Dominion which God gave him over the Creatures But this need not stop us being altogether distinct from the former which are principally intended and mentioned as such Man was first created in the Image of God and then had this Dominion given him Let us makâ— man in our image and let him have dominion The gross Conceits of the Anthropomorphites I pass by though the Epicurean is as stupid as they who would Circumscribe the Deity with the finite Figure of a Man See Creech's Notes on Lucret. page 4. I only add If it be Treason to impair or debase the King's Coin which hath his Image and Superscription upon it let them look to it who are not afraid to vilify and cast dirt upon the Reasonable Soul which was created after the Image of him who accepteth not the persons of Princes 3dly It is observable that the original of the Soul was different from that of the Body The one was formed out of pre-existent created Matter the Dust of the Ground and so was a dead unactive thing till the other viz. the Spirit of Life or Lives as it is in the Hebrew was breathed into it by the Almighty This was not educed ex potentiâ materiae but rather created immediately to actuate and inform the Body which God had prepared for it This is Divinae particula aurae something nobler than the purest Spirits of the Blood and therefore under no necessity of perishing or being dissipated with them Which will further appear from the Account which Solomon gives of man's Dissolution by Death Eccles 12.7 Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it who is elsewhere styled the Father of Spirits and the God of the Spirits of all flesh These places do mutually illustrate each other and confirm the Truth which I am inferring from them There are many other places which speak of the Soul as a Substance distinct from the Body Job 14.22 His flesh upon him shall have pain and his soul within him shall mourn though Aristotle as cited by our Author pag. 2. counts it a great impropriety of speaking to say the Soul is sorrowful 2 Cor. 4.16 Though our outward man perish yet the inward man is renewed day by day It seems then that they do not both perish together in the end for if so they would both together tend alike to perishing in the way We find also the Soul distinguished from the Spirit Heb. 4.12 To the dividing asunder of soul and spirit and elsewhere we find these two distinguished from the Body 1 Thess 5.23 And I pray God your whole spirit soul and body be preserved blameless c. If you look narrowly and impartially into these places perhaps you may find not only aâ—â— Intellectual Spirit and a Body but also the material Soul or Spirits which you talk of that are the vinculum unionis between them and the nearer Instruments of the nobler Spirit 's Operations But I proceed Matth. 10.28 Our Blessed Saviour assures us That they which kill the Body are not able to kill the Soul But our Author would persuade us That the Soul falls perishes dyes with the Body pag. 1 14 15. How these will be reconciled I am utterly at a loss Ipse viderit 2 Cor. 12.1 2 3. The Apostle speaking of the Revelations which had been made to him viz. That he was caught up into Paradise or to the Third Heaven and heard unspeakable words which it was not lawful or possible for a man to utter tells us withal twice over That whether he was at that time in the body or out of the body he could not tell Whence it is plain that the Apostle supposeth the Soul capable of subsisting and acting out of the Body or else he would never have questioned whether it was not his own case But how easily could our Author have solved this difficulty and told the Apostle Sir You need not question but your Soul was in the Body for it cannot act without bodily Organs It cannot see without the Eye c. pag. 2. nor probably do or suffer any thing at all pag. 3. So true it is That vain man would be wise that is be accounted so Job 11.12 I wonder not that some of the Predecessors of these Philosophers encountred the Apostle and some said What would this babler say Acts 18.17 18. I might further add That the Apostle here doth not only suppose that the Soul can subsist and act separate from the Body but that it can act very nobly too which
will appear if we consider what Objects were like to be presented to him in the Third Heaven whither he was caught up and what deep impressions he received from them retaining the memory of those things when he was in the Body which for ought he knew were discovered to him when he was out of it Phil. 1.21 22 23 24. The Apostle tells the Philippians that he was in a strait betwixt two having a desire to depart or to be dissolved and to be with Christ which says he is far better i. e. it was more for his present personal advantage And this departing he opposeth to abiding in the flesh which was more needful for them viz. that they might be farther edified by his Ministry Now if the Soul die with the Body I demand what doth the Apostle mean by departing and being with Christ Did he not enjoy more communion with Christ before his death than he can be supposed ever to have enjoyed since if his Soul and Body perished together And why doth he say That to dye is gain verse 21. if by dying he mean sinking into an unactive state And why doth he oppose departing and being with Christ to living or abiding in the flesh if his Soul could not live out of the flesh nor survive his Body Again I ask Why the Apostle was in so great a strait as not knowing what to chuse in this matter Had he so little regard to the Honour and Interest of his great Master so little love to the Service of Christ and the Souls of men as to question whether he should chuse to live for the edification of the Church or fall down into a dead unactivity Will you say that the Troubles and Persecutions which he met with made him weary of his Life and Work The Answer is easy Himself tells you that none of those things moved him that he fainted not yea he calls them light Afflictions and had learnt to rejoice in Tribulations So that in short you may turn and wind which way you will either what the Apostle says here hath no tolerable sense in it or your Hypothesis of the Soul 's dying with the Body is absurd and unchristian A parallel place we have 2 Cor. 5.1 2 3 to the 9th where the Apostle speaks of the dissolution of the earthly tabernacle and moreover verse 6. While we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord and v. 8. We are confident and willing rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord. And v. 4. He compares Death to uncloathing What say you to this Cannot a man live when his Clothes are put off and laid aside even so may the Soul when separate from the Body else the Apostle's Confidence in this matter was vain What did you mean to appeal to the Scripture or so much as to name it The same Truth further appears in the Parable of the rich Sensualist and Lazarus Luke 16.19 c. whence you may learn the different States of separate Souls after Death Object But this is no History but a Parable and therefore it is absurd to draw any Arguments from it Answ I readily grant that there are many Circumstances in Parables which must not be too far strained and particularly in this But yet I say it was designed to instruct and not to deceive them Let it therefore be considered that either it was the common Opinion amongst the Jews the Sadducees excepted who were a despised Sect that the Souls of good men are happy and of bad men miserable when separate from their Bodies or it was not their common Opinion If not it seems not a thing worthy the Wisdom of our Lord to establish his Parable upon an Hypothesis contrary to the common belief of the Jews For this would be more likely to prejudice them against his Doctrine as built upon false and extravagant Opinions than to gain upon them But if it really was their Opinion that the Souls of men do subsist and are happy or miserable when separate from their Bodies c. then I say either this Opinion was true or false if true it was what I am pleading for if false this Parable was like to confirm them in their Error and so you reflect upon him that spoke it I mention not the Conceit of Tertullian who will have Herod and John the Baptist pointed at in it Deut. 34.5 6. We read that Moses died and was buried and yet long after Mat. 17. we find that Moses and Elias appeared upon the Mountain talking with our Saviour when he was transfigured Therefore something of Moses was alive and capable of acting though his Body was buried Again Exod. 3.6 God stiles himself the God of Abraham the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob long after they were dead And yet our Lord tells the Sadducees Matth. 22.32 That God is not the God of the dead but of the living i. e. their Ruler Benefactor and Felicity a Relation which the Dead are not capable of as Mr. B. observes See his Notes upon the place Therefore Abraham Isaac and Jacob were in some sense living viz. as to their Souls though their Bodies were dead And besides you must take notice that the Sadducees denied not only the Resurrection of the Body but the Immortality of the Soul as Dr. Hammond observes and that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifieth not only the rising of the Body but our living after this Life when the Body is dead And so the force of our Saviour's Argument is very discernible Again Luke 23.46 our Lord commends his self-resigning Soul into his Father's hands having before told the Penitent Thief To day shalt thou be with me in Paradise and Stephen dying prays Lord Jesus receive my spirit Pray be so kind as to give the World some satisfactory interpretation of those places and reconcile them to the Notion of the Soul 's dying with the Body For I do assure you most Christian Interpreters put another sense upon them and it would be a piece of Charity to undeceive them if you know how and when your hand is in pray write down that the Apostle meant where he speaks of the spirits of just men made perfect Heb. 12.23 If by perfection you mean sleep dissipation death or perishing you must make us a new Dictionary which may also tell us what your Notion of Blessedness is that so we may know how to interpret those words of St. John Rev. 14.13 Blessed are the dead which dye in the Lord and their works to follow or rather accompany them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Vide Pol. Synops And also what Solomon means Prov. 14.32 The righteous hath hope in his death It is easy to produce much more Scripture-proof to establish the Doctrine of the Soul's Immortality or to enlarge more upon what hath been already offered But thus much may suffice for those who are ready to submit to the Rules and Authority of
delight when it hath found it Contemplative Persons know this to be true which makes them so unwearied in their Studies and pleased with any discoveries they can make for the advancement of Knowledge This made divers of the Ancient Philosophers travel into remote Countries that they might converse with Learned Men and glean up any Fragments of Knowledge where-ever they could find them So did Apollonius Plato Pythagoras Thales c. and the Queen of Sheba came from the uttermost Parts of the Earth to hear the Wisdom of Solomon Seneca thought that Man buried alive who lived without Books And Lipsius thought himself on the top of Olympus when he read Seneca Aristippus thought a Man had better be a Beggar than unlearned Laert. in Arist 50. And what unaccountable delight had Julius Scaliger in Luâ—â—â— who â—â—ought twelve Verses in him better than all the German Empire So ravishing are intellectual Pleasures Impressions from without are made upon the Organs of Sense various according to the variety of Objects and hence correspondent Ideas are formed in the Imagination and laid up in the Memory But there is something higher which sports it self with these Phantasms compounds and divides them at pleasure and makes new ones out of them as of Centaurs Syrens little Boys with Wings and what the Painter pleaseth which have no pattern in rerum natura to answer them What is it which abstracting from the individuating Circumstances of singular Beings forms universal Notions entia Rationis inadequate Conceptions of those beings and so rangeth the World of Entities under the several Species to which they belong by observing wherein they agree or differ from each other and considering their mutual Analogies and Respects What is that which withdraws the Imagination from attending the Organs of Sense insomuch that a Person intent upon his Studies is sometimes as if h◠〈◊〉 in a Dream though awake 〈…〉 not what you say to hi◠〈…〉 the Time goes on though the Clock strike near him What is it that from suitable Premises infers certain Conclusions and thus argues it self into a firm assent to many things above the discovery of Sense yea and contrary to sensible appearance Of which more hereafter And what say you to Mathematical Speculations how far are they beyond the reach of Sense or Imagination The Ingenious Descartes in his Sixth Meditation de Primâ Philosophiâ sets himself to examine the difference betwixt Imagination and pure Intellection and thus proceeds I can imagine a Triangle as distinctly as if I saw it and with some more difficulty a Pentagone but when I come to consider a Figure with a thousand or ten thousand Angles I can form no such distinct Idea of it in my Imagination and yet I can easily understand that such a Figure there may be as well as either of the other and so he goes on Thus you see how soon the Imagination is jaded and tired out but the Understanding can demonstrate the Properties of those several Figures and argue it self into a satisfactory assurance of many Mathematical Truths which at first seem extravagant and unreasonable And hoâ—e it spends upon its own 〈…〉 and deaves Sense and Imagâ—â—â—◠〈…〉 it and many of the Precepts of Geometry are utterly unimitable in the purest matter that Phansy can imagine And yet with what unspeakable satisfaction doth the Mind acquiesce in these Demonstrations so abstract from matter and incompetible to it And when it hath thus by abstraction as it were unbodied them it takes them for its own and hath a perfect understanding of them and makes both Sense and Imagination know their distance and if they will be too busy it silenceth and controlls them by its Sovereign Power and pursues its search with so much earnestness that it knows not how to give over Hence the Mathematical Sciences are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Purifications of the Reasonable Soul Archimedes was so intent upon it that when the City was taken he observed it not and when the Soldier that killed him came into the Room where he was busy at it he bids him have a care of disordering his Figure It were easy to enlarge much on this Particular but I am very confident that no Mathematician who seriously considers what hi◠〈◊〉 â—â—s when intent upon Demonsâ—â—â—◠〈…〉 possibly persuade himself 〈…〉 a piece of folly as 〈…〉 â—â—â—â—le Wheat-meal in two or three days time should become capable of such Speculations as these It were every jot as irrational as to conclude with the Comedian That if the Blood of an Ass was transfused into a Virtuoso there would be small difference between the Emittent Ass and the Recipient Philosopher Shadwell But follow me a little further and you shall see yet greater things than these The Understanding is not satisfied with the knowledge of lower or less important Truths but it riseth up from visible Effects to the invisible Causes and Springs of Action and resteth not till it come to the Ens Entium the Cause of Causes the Fountain of Being and so contemplates him who is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 One and Truth it self as Plato speaks Crit. pag. 57. It considers its Relation to God its Dependence upon him its Duty to him It understands moral Good and Evil Right and Wrong Vertue and Vice which fall not under the Laws of Matter and Motion It studies the Nature of Spiritual Substances ad intimas rerum Spiritualium quidditates penetrat aut penetrare contendit Scheibler's Metaph. â—â—b â— â—â—g 272. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. 〈…〉 of the Understanding differ 〈…〉 sensible Objects as the I 〈…〉 â—om Sense Max. Tyr. Dissert 1. pag. 9. We have many abstracted Notions and Idea's of immaterial things which depend not on Bodily Figures And in what Subject can these Notions be lodged but in one that is Immaterial Therefore I say Si renunciatur tanto bono Immortalitatis c. If we renounce the Immortality of the Soul so great a good we must also renounce our Wit Reason and Mind by which we are Immortal Lud. Viv. de ver Fidei Lib. 1. pag. 147. And now let the whole Herd of our Epicurean Novelists who cry up the unconceivable power of Matter and Motion muster up their Forces and fairly deduce from the Principles of their Hypothesis a rational intelligible account of those Operations of the Intellect which are so spiritual and abstract from Matter What say you Can Matter and Motion contemplate the Glorious Attributes of God Can a Spiritual Object be apprehended without a Spiritual Act And can such an Act be produced without a Spiritual Power And can such a Power be radicated in meer Matter â—â—â—â—â—â—r modified or moved Must 〈…〉 be an Analogy between the 〈…〉 the Object Can any Eye 〈…〉 â—â—â—h is spiritual and Inâ—â—◠〈…〉 â—ho is a Spirit and Invisible Can Matter and Motion contemplate that Perfection which excludes all Corporeal Imperfection Is not this to act extra Sphaeram Does not
Aristotle himself in whose supposed Authority you seem to glory tell you That the Understanding is made one with the Object understood which yet must be interpreted cum grano salis No wonder if those who have gross material conceptions of their own Souls be suspected of Atheism it self as Epicurus was of whom Cicero saith he did nomine poncre re tollere Deos in word confess but in effect deny a Deity And why do you not answer Dr. Stillingfleet's Demands Origin Sacr. pag. 416. Can Atoms dispute whether there be Atoms or no And whether the Soul be corporeal or no Can Atoms frame Syllogisms in Mood and Figure Can meer Matter argue pro and con whether it be Matter or something else Or if these Questions be too hard for you why do you not accept the Challenge which Scaliger Sennertus and others have given you and tell the World how Matter and Motion can produce even Sense it self which is 〈…〉 â—â—ior Nature What poor contâ—◠〈…〉 â—ork do Lucretius Gassendus 〈…〉 â—â—e rest of your Tutors mak◠〈…〉 to solve these Phaenomena in a Mechanical way Nil dat quod non habet 3dly The self-determining power of the Will its Acts and Objects do further argue that the Soul is of a Spiritual and Immortal Nature This is that Faculty which chuseth refuseth or suspends its Acts as Objects appear and are estimated good or evil or of doubtful consideration This renders a man capable of moral Government by Laws with their annexed Sanctions Promises Threatnings c. This Faculty is the first Subject of Moral Good or Evil. The whole Frame of Government All Legislation Judgment and Execution Rewards and Punishments depend upon it And as the Understanding pursues Truth so doth the Will Goodness and if at any time it willeth Evil it is sub ratione boni under the appearance or notion of Good in some respect or other An inclination to Happiness is essential to its Nature neither can it be satisfied with sensible material corruptible Objects but mounts higher and reacheth forth after Spiritual and Divine things and can never rest till it centre upon the Infinite Good the Blessed God himself Fecisti nos ad te Oâ—â—â—â—equietum est cor nostrum donec requiesâ—◠〈◊〉 August Confess lib. 1. cap. 1. Thou hast made us for Thy self and our heart is restless till it rest in Thee So Lib. 4. cap. 10. Quaquaversùm se vertit Anima hominis ad dolores figitur alibi praeterquam in Te. Which way soever the Soul of man turns it can meet with nothing but grief till it rest in God Hi motus animorum at que haec certamina Now I would ask those Philosophers for so they yet affect to be called with whom I have to do How they will explain the Liberty of the Will by the Laws of Matter and Motion of which more under another Head And if the Soul be nothing else but the purer Spirits of the Blood meer perishing matter how comes it to pass that material corruptible Objects will not satisfy its Desires There is in every thing so great a tendency to union with its like that 't is become even a Proverb like to like simile gaudet simili Earth to Earth Water to Water c. And if the Soul be made of corruptible perishing Matter how is it that it so stretcheth it self beyond its compass and will not rest in Objects like it self but must needs be aspiring after Immortality and will not be satisfied with the Sphere which they have assigned to it but is for â—â—â—â—â—rsing with the invisible World of Spirits and cannot rest but in the Infinite Eternal Good Certissimum est signum c. It is says one a most certain sign that the Nature of the Soul doth excel all perishing things because none of those things can be found which will not in time grow vile and insipid to it Alsted It s Divine Tendencies and Flights speak its Extraction and Duration too 4thly The Power which the Soul hath of reflecting upon its own Acts both as to their Nature and Morality is a further proof of its Spiritual Immortal Being It not only understands but knows that it does so It contemplates and reflects upon its own Contemplation It can form Arguments and then examine and weigh the strength of them It can sift its own Notions and consider what may be objected against them and fortify it self against these Objections Thus it improves it self in the knowledge of Truth and then reflects upon the improvements which it has made It can retire from its commerce with external Objects and take a view of its own essential Powers and Virtues And indeed we cannot know what our Souls are but by these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their circular and reflex Motions and converse with themselves which only can steal from them their own Secrets as a Learned Man observes Smith of the Immortality of the Soul And if any doubt of this reflective Power his very doubting is enough to prove it for he could not doubt but by Reflection upon himself as Dr. Stillingfleet And what say you to the mighty power of Natural Conscience which reflects upon our Acts under a Moral Consideration compares them with the Law accuseth or excuseth raiseth Storms or speaks Peace and so is in part an Executioner as well as a Witness and a Judge How bitterly doth Tiberius complain of the lashes it gave him as Tacitus imforms us and so doth Suetonius and Dion Cassius The like may be said of Otho Jugurtha and many more Prima est haec ultio quod se Judice nemo nocens absolvitur Juv. Thus you see how Conscience gives Men a foretast of what 's like to come after whether they will or no. Insomuch that the greatest pleasures of the Soul and its most piercing troubles are from Moral Causes And what have Matter and Motion in them that can rationally be supposed adequate to such effects as these yea or so much as to the production of a thought Debate this Point impartially and closely with your own Faculties and I had almost said think so meanly of the Soul if you can Is it possible that any Man in his wits should believe that the Notions of Moral Good and Evil the remorse of a bad Conscience and the joys of a good one should proceed from nothing else but the shufflings and cuttings of the spirituous Parts of the Blood up and down the Cavities and Ventricles of the Brain Nothing can be imagined more absurd unless it be that the World also was made by a fortuitous concourse of Atoms which is the height of Nonsense and Extravagancy 5thly The Soul hath a power of rectifying those mistakes to which an over-credulous regard to Sense and Imagination too often betrays us Thus Reason boldly concludes that the Oar is straight though when part of it is under Water it appears crooked because of the Refraction of Rays through a double Medium of
all page 18. With God all things are possible and it seems he who made Matter out of nothing can make any thing out of Matter And to the same purpose page 14. he enumerates several Miracles As of Aaron 's blossoming Rod the staying of the Waters of Jordan the multiplication of Loaves and Fishes c. Thus you see he is so conscious of the weakness of his own Hypothesis that he is forced to fly to a miraculous Power to uphold it This is a ready way of explaining the Phaenomena of Nature But I reply 1st Is not the same Almighty Power able to uphold the Soul in a State of Subsistence separate from the Body 2dly Are the ordinary works of God in Nature and his extraordinary miraculous Works to be confounded 3dly Is it a valid way of arguing from the Power of God to his Will I readily grant That he can do all things which are Works of Power He can do all things which his infinite Wisdom sees fit to do he can do all things that he will do But doth it therefore follow that he will do all things that he can do Is it not horrid prophaneness to prostitute the Doctrine of the Divine Power to serve the ends of every trifling Hypothesis falsly called Philosophy Do we not know that ordinarily God works upon and by his Creatures in a way agreeable to the Natures which he has given them And what is there in a little Wheat-meal suitable to the production of Sense or Reason or Religion It is the part of a Philosopher humbly to contemplate what God hath done and to admire his Perfections shining forth in his Works and not to lay down Hypotheses contrary to the common Sense and Reason of Mankind and then to tell us that God can if he please make these Suppositions good Thus you see that our Author's Philosophy Anatomy and Theology are all alike absurd and that he hath made Miracles so common as will render them in a great measure useless for those extraordinary purposes whereunto they have mostly been designed and that he owns his Philosophy to be weak and impertinent when he is forced to have recourse to a supernatural miraculous Power to support it CHAP. V. Some subservient Considerations for the further establishment of the Doctrine of the Soul's Immortality BEsides the forementioned Arguments there are several other Particulars which may justly render the Opinion of the Soul 's dying with the Body odious to all Men who have either the due use of Reason or any sense of Religion 1st This Opinion is highly injurious to Human Nature carrying in it a vile Depression of that whole Species or rank of Beings to which we belong What an unnatural thing is it for a Man to abuse his Reason in vilifying and degrading the reasonable Nature it self as if he repented that God had made him a Man and was ambitious to herd himself among the more ignoble Animals Praeclarum autem nescio quid adepti sunt qui didicerunt se cum tempus mortis venisset totos esse peritos Cic. Tusc lib. 1.339 This is to bid defiance to the Common Interest of Humanity and such a Person should be looked upon as a Traytor against the Prerogative and Dignity of all Mankind And which is more it is contrary to that Obligation and Duty which we owe to the Common Parent and Author of our Beings an ungrateful contempt of that Power Wisdom and Goodness which hath given us so excellent a Nature a casting Dirt upon the Master-piece of the visible Creation and so a robbing God of that Honour which belongs to him upon the account of so noble a Production Let us therefore be more just to our selves more thankful to our Great Creator than so bruitishly to abandon our hopes of Immortality and basely desert the Common Interest and Honour of Humane Race 2dly The whole frame of this unmanly Philosophy is built upon the most precarious unsatisfying Principles imaginable They beg the Question all along and then pretend they have solved the Phaenomena of Nature Cicero told their Predecessors long ago That they assigned Provinces to Atoms without proof And Gassendus is fain to confess that Objection to be true And Dr. Willis himself in whose Authority our Philosopher seems so much to acquiesce rejects the Atomical Hypothesis because it supposeth its Principles without proof and is not suited to the Solution of Natural Appearances See his Book de Fermentatione But because these are but General Charges we will descend to Particulars and shew briefly what a knack they have at Philosophizing upon difficult Points If you ask them how the Soul comes to be so quick and active in its Operations and to turn it self with such wonderful vivacity and readiness from one Object to another Democritus Epicurus and after them Lucretius will tell you That the Atoms prepared for this purpose are of a smooth Spherical Figure See Diog. Laert. in Democ. Epicur Lucret. lib. 3. de Natura rerum and so you know they must needs be very fit for quick motion If you desire an account of Sensation according to their Hypothesis they will tell you of a vis Mobilis Motus sensiferi and something else which they confess they know not what to call from whence it proceeds If you would have the Liberty of the Will explained they tell you It ariseth from a Motion of Declination whereby the Atoms always moving downwards by their own weight towards the Center of the World are carried somewhat obliquely towards some Point different from it And this you must know is the Clinamen Principiorum as Lucretius calls it Ac nos ideo conati sumus declinationem motuum asserere Atomis ut deduceremus qui posset fortuna humanis rebus intervenire ac illud quod in nobis est sive Liberum arbitrium minime periret In a word if you ask what the Soul is they can tell you It is Efflorescentia Materiae and compare it to the Spirit of sweet Oyntment or that it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 some sort of Spirit they know not what Nihil enim est apud ipsos quod non Atomorum turba conficiat Cic. Tusc Quaest lib. 1. Such nonsensical Gibberish as this they call Philosophy and pretend to explicate the great Works of Nature by it and would needs forsooth be accounted Wits into the bargain when they have amused their inconsiderate Admirers by such an empty sound of unintelligible words But can any Sober Impartial Enquirer be satisfied with such Answers as these And must we let go the Doctrine of the Soul's Immortality that we may fall down and worship that Image of Philosophy which these Men have set up No surely we ought rather to be affected with a generous resentment of so vile an Indignity done to the Nature of Man and with just abhorrence to oppose such wild and impertinent Extravagancies 3dly Such absurd Notions as these expose Philosophy it self to
the scornful Reproaches of every capricious Enthusiast You take the way to render it contemptible and to open the Mouth of self-conceited Ignorance against all Humane Literature in General because you make so bad an use of a very small Part of it There is nothing more common than for confident Ignorance to get into the Chair and to pass Sentence without hearing what may be said on the other side and so Learning shall be condemned as an airy Phansy and those that want it will be ready to run it down lest they should be run down themselves for want of it I know the best things are liable to the greatest abuses but some cannot some will not distinguish between the use and the abuse of them You shall meet with some that will tell you That not only yours but all other Philosophy is vain and if an impartial Stander-by ask them how they prove it They will alledge the vanity of yours and infer an Universal Conclusion from a particular Instance This say they is your Philosophy which teacheth us that we have every Week a new Soul and that at length Soul and Body dye together But if these Reflections fall into the hands of any such Persons I must take the liberty to tell them That they do not argue fairly in the Case neither must they suppose that all Philosophers are Vertiginous because perhaps in some the Material Spirits in the Brain have a Circular Motion Neither is Philosophy to be worse thought of for the phantastick Dresses which these Men put upon it 4thly This impious Hypothesis opens a Door to Atheism Infidelity and all manner of Licentiousness Our knowledge of the Spirits above us must arise from the knowledge of our own Souls Hence the first part of Wisdom is truly to know our selves that so we may understand our Duty Interest and End And it is in our own Souls as in a Glass that we must behold the Image of God which should lead us to its great Original and the reason why we know God no better is because we are so ignorant of our selves Hence the Doctrine of the Soul is the most useful part of Natural Philosophy and so nearly connected with Divinity that it may justly be reckoned a part of it also Therefore they who can once persuade themselves that all those noble Operations of the Soul whereof we have been speaking proceed from no higher a Principle than matter and motion are in a ready way to deny the Deity or however to entertain very gross and unwarrantable Conceptions of it as the Epicureans did and to conclude with them that the World was made by a fortuitous concourse of Atoms and that God regards not the Actions and Affairs of Mankind nor is either pleased with Virtue or displeased at its contrary as Lucretius c. Omnis enim per se Divûm Natura necesse est Immortali aevo summa cum pace fruatur Semota à nostris rebus sejunctaque longe Nec bene promeritis capitur nec tangitur irâ And so said his Master Epicurus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. The Blessed and Immortal Being hath neither any business of his own nor creates any to others and is neither angry nor pleased with any man Laert. in Epicur A Notion more befitting Sardanapalus than a Deity as Max. Tyr. observes No wonder that Ill men are fond of such Opinions as these which so much befriend their Wickedness And as for Death they say it is nothing to us because all Good and Evil lies in Sense of which Death is the privation And such Apprehensions as these must make our Lives pleasant to us and take away the desire of Immortality Laer. ibid. And further They would persuade us that the Fears of Punishment after Death arise only from Old Wives Fables Ibid. Moreover the Immortality of the Soul is so clearly held forth in the Gospel that to deny the one is implicitly to deny the other And he who pretends to evade the Evidence produced out of the New Testament besides the Old for the proof of this Truth is in a proximate disposition to disown all the great Fundamentals of Christianity which are establish'd upon the same Authority And verily it is a gross reproach to our Holy Religion when Persons that profess it maintain such bruitish Principles as Socrates Plato Seneca and abundance more of the Heathens would have been ashamed of Which makes a great Divine suppose That in this Age it is one of the Devil 's chief Designs to assault Christianity by false Philosophy And pray consider What can such Opinions or any that border upon them lead men to but Sensuality and Debauchery though I verily believe you design not so Are any men more likely to live as Brutes than such who think they shall die alike You may tell them of a Resurrection and Future Judgment as long as you will 't is ten to one but they reply as the tree falls so it lies and if once they can so far stifle Reason as to disbelieve the Doctrine of the Soul's Immortality after so much Natural and Supernatural Evidence for it I do not see why they may not far more plausibly deny the Article of the Resurrection and then they will let loose the Reins to Lust and Appetite and become the Plagues of Humane Society And indeed 't is observable that many of those who maintain these beastly Opinions commonly live up to them and are not of the best Reputation in point of their Morals And 't is no thanks to their corrupt Principles if they be not all alike scandalously vicious 1 Cor. 15.32 Let us eat and drink for to morrow we die A Proverb familiar among the Epicureans or a reflection upon them in their own Language as Grotius and others observe And therefore I must say That those Persons who propagate such Conceits do discourage Virtue but incourage Vice and Wickedness which is contrary to the publick Peace Tranquility and Felicity of Mankind And let them tell us if they can what good purpose can be pretended for the establishment of such an Hypothesis which can in the least compensate for those Mischievous Effects and Influences upon the Lives of men which it has a manifest tendency to produce Let the matter be well weighed on both sides Indeed 't is not to be wondred at that wicked men should put the Evil day as far from them as they can even as the Devils would not be tormented before the time But that any good man except under the power of Melancholy or Temptation should be fond of such Opinions as these is hardly to be supposed What Shall we fear to be made happy too soon Shall a dead unactivity be preferr'd before Communion with God in a state of sinless Perfection But those that are after the flesh savour not the things of the spirit Rom. 8.5 A Turkish Paradise seems more suitable to the humour of such Persons than the heavenly Jerusalem
And their pleading against a more speedy admission thither argues their unfitness to be admitted at all 5thly Our Author's Hypothesis is directly contrary to the avowed Doctrine of the Church of England Which I the rather mention because he professeth himself to be a Member of that Church and looks upon those that dissent from it as mistaken persons pag. 17. Need I prove that the Church of England asserts the Doctrine of the Soul's Immortality See the Order for the Burial of the Dead where among many other Expressions to the same effect you find these words Almighty God with whom do live the Spirits of them that depart hence in the Lord and with whom the Souls of the Faithful after they are delivered from the burthen of the Flesh are in joy and felicity c. Nothing can be more express for the Immortality of the Soul and its separate subsistence Now I say no honest man who believes that the Soul dies with the Body can declare his unfeigned Assent and Consent to or heartily join with that Church in this part of the Burial Office which I have mentioned And as for those whom he calls Dissenting Brethren if our Author's Opinion be true they ought to dissent from that Church more than they do In a word he will find it hard to mention any point of difference between sober Dissenters and the Church of England so important as that wherein he himself differs from them or which tends so much to induce or encourage to an ill Practice or Course of Life See more of this in the Book of Homilies Sermon the 9th against the fear of Death CHAP. VI. The Testimony of the Ancient Philosophers produc'd for a further confirmation of this great Truth THough the Persons with whom I have now to do are commonly so full of themselves and overfond of their own Conceptions that the Sentiments or Authorities of others are not much regarded by them yet since our Author has thought meet to mention the names of Aristotle Dicaearchus and Pliny as supposing them to be of his Opinion I must say something to confront what is alledged from them that his Reader may not be amused with a meer shew of Antiquity This Point was often weighed in the Schools of the Philosophers the Academy Peripatum Stoa c. They thought it worth their most serious enquiry because the common Interest of Mankind was so nearly concerned in it Pherecydes is mentioned by Cicero Tusc Quaest lib. 1. as one of the first of the Ancient Philosophers upon record who defended the Doctrine of the Soul's Immortality though he doubts not but others were of the same Opinion before him And Pythagoras was so taken with his Discourses about it that thereupon he turned Philosopher who was before an Athleta as St. Augustin observes Epist 3. ad Vollusianum But now says he we all see Assyrium Amomum vulgò nascitur referring those words of Virgil to the Doctrine of the Soul's Immortality brought from Syria or Assyria into Greece by Pherecydes Vid. Menag Not. in Diog. Laert. pag. 41. Pythagoras was of the same mind with his Master and the name of the Pythagoreans was so famous for many Ages after that none else seemed learned but they as Cicero observes ubi supra These Philosophers were wont to call the higher Region of the Soul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the lower 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The one the Divine the other the beastly part 'T is reported of Plato that he travelled into Italy to converse with them and how well he and they agreed in this Point you shall see more by and by Thales was of the same mind as may be seen in Laertius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I mention not Zoroaster nor the Oracles of the Magi in Chaldaea who were his Followers of which the Platonists take notice nor yet what is wont to be alledged from Hermes Trismegistus because these Fragments of Antiquity are by some reckoned suppositious by others at least dubious But give me leave however to add what a great Philosopher of our own says So if what 's consonant to Plato's School Which well agrees with Learned Pythagore Aegyptian Trismegist and th' Antique Roll Of Chaldee Wisdom all which time has tore But Plato and deep Plotin do restore Which is my scope I sing out lustily If any twitten me for such strange lore And me all blameless brand with infamy God purge that man from fault of foul malignity Dr. More 's Psychozoia pag. 2. Tertullian also in his Book de Anima supposeth that Plato derived his Sentiments from the Writings of Trismegist in Egypt Come we therefore to that Divine Philosopher and his Master Socrates concerning whom we have more certain knowledge and in comparison of them and their Followers Cicero looks upon all other Philophers as Plebeian Tusc Quaest lib. 1.341 And brings in his greatest Encomiums of Aristotle with a Platonem semper excipio pag. 226. And St. Augustine agrees with him in it Augustinus Platonem caeteris Philosophis Gentium longè lateque praefert says Lipsius Manuduct ad Stoicam Philosoph pag. 19. But we will first begin with Socrates What this Great Man thought may be learned from his Admirer and Disciple Plato who in his Phaedo and elsewhere brings him in strongly disputing for and asserting the Soul's Immortality Where he shews That as Death is the separation of Soul and Body so the Soul can subsist of it self when so separate pag. mihi 84. And that the readiest way to attain to knowledge in this life is to abstract our minds as much as possibly we can from commerce with the Body till God set us free from it and then we shall have a more pure and sincere understanding of the Truth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 à corporis insipientâ liberati as Ficinus renders it pag. 89. He derides the Childish fears of those who think the Soul is dissipated when the Body dies as if they apprehended it should be blown away especially if they dye when the Wind is high pag. 110. 'T is impossible says he that the Soul should perish by Death except that can die which is immortal pag. 164. And smiles at his Friend Crito for asking him how he would be buried I cannot says he persuade thiâ— â—â—iâ—o that I who now dispute am Socrates but he thinks that Carcass which he shall see by and by is I But I tell you I shall go to a blessed State after I have drunk this poison and this I speak to comfort both you and my self Do not say when you see my Body laid out burnt or buried that it is Socrates Thus that Venerable Old man conquered the Fears of Death by the hopes of a Blessed Immortality and drank the fatal Potion without any observable disturbance of Mind or change of Countenance praying for an happy passage out of this Life into a better But I must not translate the whole Dialogue Plato speaks often of the
too Begin when you please I hope I shall not be unprovided for you But till then I am not obliged to incumber my Defence of the Soul's Immortality with needless Controversies 4. Though it should be granted That the Souls of Brutes are both Material and Mortal we are still sure that the Humane Soul is much more excellent than they as appears by those Operations in us which are not descernible in them I think it is ill done of those Philosophers who debase or deny the Sensitive Faculties of Beasts and make them meer Machines and I deny not that there is something in them which looks like Reason But what then These higher Operations of the Souls of Men which have a more immediate and direct reference to Immortality are such as we see no appearance of in the Inferior Creatures They know not God they love him not they have no apprehensions of a Future State no sense of Moral Good or Evil as Man hath and this is enough to distinguish us from them and to shew that our Natures are made for higher Ends than theirs as the Poet speaking of Religion says Seperat haec nos A Grege Brutorum And therefore to argue from the Mortality of the Souls of Brutes against the Immortality of the Souls of Men is every way to beg the Question 5. And thus again you carry the Controversy into the dark as the manner of such Philosophers is and plead Uncertainties against those things which are Certain not knowing the premises while you will needs hold the Conclusion and so abuse your Reason and lose the Truth and your Labour both together This method may indeed serve the ends of perverse Wranglers but is not the way to make any man wiser There is a great deal observable both in the Souls of Men and Brutes which the best Philosophers do not comprehend Must we therefore deny what 's plain because we are not agreed about more remote Difficulties This is the way to introduce Scepticism and unthankfully to reject what God hath made known to us because he hath not laid open all the rest The words of Tertullian in his Treatise de Animâ are very remarkable in the present Case Quis enim revelabit quod Deus texit unde sciscitandum est praestat per Deum nescire quia non revelaverit quam per hominem scire quia ipse praesumpserit pag. mihi 342. Your Masters have not yet satisfied the Learned World in any Account they have given of Sensitive perception and Appetite by reducing them to the Laws of Matter and Motion You must lay your Foundation better before you build so much upon it But Cicero and Laertius tell us That the Epicureans abandoned Logick and so do their Abettors If supposing would serve instead of proving there would be no great difference between an Ideot and a Philosopher Obj. 2. But Thinking Arguing c. which you ascribe to the Soul belong to the whole Compositum or contexture of Soul and Body which is the efficient proper cause of them pag. 2 4. Answ According to your own Hypothesis each part of the Compositum is not alike concerned in these Acts but especially the Animal Spirits and the Brain which you suppose to be a materia cogitativa but these are not the whole Compositum so that you must first reconcile your Philosophy to it self and then answer what I have said against the Capacity of these Material Corruptible Spirits for the production of such Acts before this Objection be at all valuable They very use which the Soul now makes of Corporeal Organs and Instruments plainly evinces That it doth exert some Action wherein they assist it not for it supposeth an operation upon them antecedent to any operation by them When therefore the Soul makes use of a bodily Organ its Action upon it must needs at last be without the ministry of any Organ unless you multiply to it Body upon Body in infinitum as a Reverend Author observes Blessedness of the Righteous pag. 205. Nullam vim virtutem aut aptitudinem ad ipsum intelligendi aut volendi actum purum formalem in se à spiritibus aut à sensu animus recipit Quomodo enim inferius vilius passivum virtutem activam nobilem Naturae superiori praestantiori activae communicare potest Method Theol. part 1.162 Obj. 3. Matter and Motion may do much as appears by a Musical Organ in the hand of a good Artist page 2. Answ The Instrument is not conscious of the Harmony produced by it as the Soul is of its own Acts and therefore your Similitude is far from running upon all four Obj. 4. Matter has a self-moving Power for if it be reduced to a fine Powder part of it will rise up into the Air like a thin Cloud pag. 7. 13. Answ The Air is a fluid body in which those little Particles are moved as Sticks or Straws are in the Water according to its motion and not by a self-moving Power of their own Though as our Author not observing how he almost confutes himself tells you in the very next words that they are apt to be moved with every little breath I believe indeed they are very susceptible of impressions from without but have no self-moving power within them If the Dust in the Streets fly into you Eyes will you therefore say it has a self-moving power stop it but close up in a Bottle where Wind and Air cannot disturb it and I will be bound for its good behaviour As for the nature of Fire you have light and heat as well as motion to give an account of which I fancy will put you hard to it Neither know you whence the Wind comes nor whither it goes nor what it is that puts it in motion and so we are not at all edified by your Assertion concerning it Obj. 5. The Spirit of the Egyptian whom David found at Ziklag in the field famished came to him again after they had given him Fruit and Water pag. 11. Answ No wonder that his Material Animal Spirits were refresh'd by suitable Nourishment but that proves not that he had no nobler Principle in him Neither do I deny that these Spirits are the immediate Instruments of the Soul 's Operations in its state of union with the Body But this is only ad modum not ad formam actus and therefore to say the Soul cannot subsist nor act in a state of Separation from them is an Argument à Bactdo ad Angulum And yet it is no wonder if it leave the Body when these Spirits are no longer fit to be a vinculum of vital union between them Obj. 6. It cannot be conceived how the separate Soul should think without the Brain see without an Eye c. Answ The Infant in the Womb hath no conception of these Actions which it shall perform when it is come into the World and grown up to maturity The Cases are much alike To conclude Except
Evidence when set before them Recipitur ad modum recipientis and therefore it will not be alien to the Design which I have in hand to lay down some Directions which will tend to make all that hath been already spoken more effectual And they are such as these Direct 1. Be impartial in your Enquiries about this matter and take special care that your Understandings be not byassed by the Interest of your Lusts which will dispose you to hate even Reason it self and to shut your eyes against the Light Socrates discoursing concerning the Immortality of the Soul warns his Hearers to take care that they be not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 haters of Reason than which a greater mischief could not befall them Phoedo pag. 133. Atheistical Inclinations in mens Wills and Affections do commonly set their Understandings on work to frame Principles suited thereto and to defend and maintain those Principles and a Mind thus depraved is like a Corrupt Judge who will hear nothing against the Party that has bribed him When the Soul has so far degraded it self as to become a Slave to the Sensual Appetite the consciousness of its own guilt makes it willing to suppose it self no nobler a Substance than those Material Spirits which have led it captive all the while that so it may die with the Body and not be called to an account for its unnatural self-abasement Alii deliciis immersi ac voluptatibus omnia cuperent cum illis paritèr concidere hoc est cum corpore nec esse ullum Judicem qui vitae hujus rationem à nobis reposceret Lud. Viv. de Ver. Fid. lib. 1.145 It is worth your while to examine whether something of this nature be not the Spring and Fountain of these brutish Principles and if so you have reason to suspect them as proceeding from so vile an Original It is also possible that some thinking Persons of a sober conversation may have an Ingenium Haereticum and affect singularity in Opinions to make themselves more taken notice of and admired by such who have not Wit enough to detect their Sophistry But ordinarily 't is Mens love to their Lusts and sensual Pleasures their neglect of God and Religion their wilful despising the Concerns and Interests of a future State which disposeth them to wish their Souls were Mortal for fear of what may come after and then to believe though not without a great deal of wavering and hesitation that they are so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Hierocles A wicked Man would not have his Soul to be Immortal lest he should be punish'd for his wickedness yet he anticipates the Sentence of his Judg condemning it to Death before-hand Malunt extingui quam ad supplicia reparari Minut. Felix Direct 2. Be not overfond of your present Conceits It becomes you to suppose that you may be mistaken because many as wise Men have been so before you He knows little of the weakness of Humane Understandings not of the unsearchable depths of the Works of God who sees not how necessary a qualification Modesty and a promptitude to suspect his own Judgment must needs be in a Philosopher And though this must not be so far strained as to make us turn Scepticks yet it ought to restrain us from an over-forwardness to vent uncouth Opinions and from passing an hasty judgment on things before we have well weighed what may be said on both sides These things which appear difficult to you may perhaps be easy to another and those things which you look upon as Demonstrations to a more discerning Person will it may be appear no better than Dreams and Self-conceit will make you slight the weightiest Reasons which are brought to awake and undeceive you Some of you value your selves upon the account of a natural quickness of Wit with some acquired Scraps of Philosophy but take care that this do not make you set too high an esteem upon your little crude Notions which a small time may discover to be meer trifles and Death will terribly confute for ever Direct 3. Let your Diligence and Seriousness in these Studies be answerable to the weight and consequence of those Truths you enquire after 'T is a matter that nearly concerns you to know whether the Soul be Immortal or no. If after all the pains you have taken to make your self believe that the Soul dieth with the Body you should at last find your self mistaken where are you then What will you do when Death hath drawn aside this Vail of Ignorance and placed you in the Society of wretched Spirits forsaken of God and past all hopes of recovery Will not this be a dreadful disappointment If I saw a Man cut a little too deep when he was pairing his Nails perhaps I might laugh at him for his rashness but if I see him attempting to Stab himself that 's no laughing matter and I am guilty of Murther if I do not endeavour to prevent it and therefore I say again be serious Let me tell you from a Person of as comprehensive a Genius and as high a Station as the best and greatest of you all the great Cardinal Richlieu That the Soul is a serious Thing and must be either sad here for a moment or sad for ever 'T is an easy matter to get some crude undigested Notions and Terms of Art to play withal but solid and satisfactory Knowledge must be the fruit of Industry and hard impartial Study And you have reason enough to question all those Opinions which are the Off-spring of unthinking sloathfulness though none are usually more confident than such Triflers who like drunken Persons boast of their Wit to the increase of their shame The best way to know that the Soul is Immortal is to keep its noblest Faculties indue Exercise and then they will speak for themselves Direct 4. See that your Ends be right in these Studies i. e. suitable to the tendency of those Truths you search into Study the Dignity of Humane Nature that you may walk as becomes Men worthy the Faculties of that Rational Immortal Spirit which God hath given you Right ends will help you in the use of means but if you study these things meerly to please your Phansy this is but a more refined sort of Sensuality and then 't is no wonder if you miss of the Truth nor indeed any great matter whether you find it or no for any great good it's like to do you An honest manly Design in these Studies will prepare you for the entertainment of the Truth Indeed 't is a noble Employment to enquire into the Works of God and especially into our own Souls that we may know him and love him better and discharge our Duty towards him more faithfully and in so doing we may humbly expect some such Afflatum divini Numinis as our Author speaks page 15. which may enlighten our Understandings and lead us into those Truths which we seek after Otherwise 't is
This or nothing will make you serious and restrain your Thoughts from those masterless Vagaries in which Irreligious Philosophers are wont to indulge themselves to their own Destruction Dare you take his Name in vain Or vilify his Works to his dishonour Doth not his Excellency make you afraid and his dread fall upon you Look up to the Heavens which are higher than you The Sun in its Meridian brightness is but a shadow of him who is LIGHT and in whom there is no Darkness at all Millions of Angels continually adore him The whole Host of Heaven is at his beck should he give Commission but to one of his Angels to destroy ten thousand such as you how quickly would it be done His Power is Omnipotent His Wisdom Infinite Who would set Thorns and Briars in array against him He would pass through them and consume them How much better is it to lay hold of his Strength that you may be at peace with him Be not deceived God is not mocked You may flatter and befool your selves for a while but what will you do in the end thereof When your mournful Friends stand about you and your Physicians give you up as past hope of recovery How dismal will the thoughts of Eternity then be How severely will Conscience pay you home for all the Tricks and Abuses you have put upon it And whither will you fly to avoid it Do you think your dreaming Philosophy will then stand you in stead Will it secure you from the amazing Apprehensions of what is like to come after Or will you not rather curse the Day that ever you became acquainted with these brutish Principles Well if none of these things move you The Lord have mercy on you for all good Men are deeply affected with them However remember you were fairly warned of your danger 4thly Abstract your Minds as much as possibly you can from things Corporeal that you may converse more intimately with your own Souls Divest your Spirits of all that 's foreign to them that you may better behold their naked Beauty and Perfection Let sensible Objects keep their distance and suffer not any tumultuous Passions to interrupt your more calm retired thoughts or to raise Mists before you And then you will quickly find that the more deeply you contemplate the noblest Acts of your own Souls the greater evidence will appear of their Spiritual Immortal Nature All those Discourses which have been written of the Soul's Heraldry will not blazon it so well as it self will do as a Learned Man observes When we turn our Eye in upon it 't will soon tell us its Royal Pedigree and Noble Extraction by those Sacred Hieroglyphicks which it bears upon it self Smith's Discourses page 66. Many Philosophers have spoken well of this Abstraction of our Minds and retiring into our selves but none more divinely than the Platonists and Plotinus in particular This made them say That Philosophy is Mortis Meditatio because that as in Natural Death the Soul is actually separated from the Body so in these Philosophical Contemplations we must abstract it from coporeal Commerce as much as we can And though this saying is commonly and particularly by Plutarch ascribed to Plato yet St. Jerom tells us Pythagoras was the first Man who said Philosophiam esse meditationem Mortis quotidie de carcere corporis nitentem educere Animae libertatem See Lypsii Manuduc ad Stoic Philos And this says Clemens Alexandrinus Pythagoras meant by the five years silence which he enjoyned his Disciples Ut scilicet à rebus sensilibus aversi nudâ mente c. However Plato discourseth excellently about it See his Phaedo where he brings in Socrates telling his Friends That of all Men Philosophers should not be unwilling to dye who have been endeavouring all their lives long to abstract themselves from their Bodies as much as they can 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 atque ad animam se convertere And should they therefore be unwilling to be set free from those Bodies which have been such an hinderance to them in their searches after Truth And thus he sums up the matter page 89. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. If while we are in the Body we can discern nothing purely it must either follow that we shall never attain to knowledge or that we shall do it after Death for then and not before the Soul will subsist without the Body and while we live here the less commerce we have with it the nearer approaches we make to knowledge Antisthenes being asked what good he had got by Philosophy Answer'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He learnt by it to converse with himself Laert. Aristotle himself owns the necessity of this Abstraction and makes it the peculiar Priviledge of some Men more abstracted than others from Corporeal Commerce to improve their Understandings in the steddy Contemplation of Truth And so doth Cicero in those excellent Words Magni est ingénii revocare mentem à sensibus cogitationem à consuetudine abducere Tuse Quaest lib. 1.333 and again 350. And to the same purpose speaks Van Helmont page 342. though in a Dialect almost peculiar to himself And so Descatres how ingeniously soever he talks elsewhere of Matter and Motion when he comes to consider his own Soul thus he begins See Meditat. 3. de prim Philos Claudam nunc oculos aures obturabo avocabo omnes sensus meque solum alloquendo c. Wonder not that I insist so largely upon this for the Life of Philosophy I had almost said of Religion too consists in it But when all is done those Persons who have long suffered their Minds to be immerst in things Corporeal must take a great deal of pains before they can extricate them from those unhappy Complications which have betrayed them to so many mistakes and kept them so ignorant of their more noble Faculties and Powers 5thly So live that you may not be afraid of the Doctrine of the Soul's Immortality I have shewed you already that the Interest of men's Lusts will strangely biass their Judgments and therefore keep the Sensitive Appetite at an under Yield not to its extravagant demands Accustom it to be frequently controlled and let it feel that you have something nobler than Material Spirits within you The Soul never more forgets its own Dignity than when it suffers Sense and Appetite to turn Dictators and carry all before them This disposeth it to terrene and sordid Conceptions concerning it self Vicious Inclinations are the Root of corrupt Principles Men will hardly love those Doctrines which Prophesy no good concerning them but evil On the other hand If you so live that your Consciences cannot upbraid you with an Atheistical Contempt or Forgetfulness of him that made you If you contemplate his Excellencies and delight in him as the chiefest Good and pay that Homage which is due to him in your Religious Worship and Attendances upon him such Exercises as these will soon convince you
takes occasion sharply as his manner is to upbraid the Heathens that they hated one another and were more ready to destroy one another The Learned Grotius mentioning this passage of Tertullian makes the following Reflection upon it Quid nunc illi dicerent c. What would those Christians now say if they saw our times If they saw not merely sharp Contentions but even cruel Wars amongst Christians quas ob reculas for what trifles If they heard all other marks of the Church brought in with a great deal of clamour rather than that viz. Loving one another which was assign'd by its Master Neither can the power of Godliness be supposed to consist in a customary Attendance upon the publick Worship of God Herod heard John gladly and did many things The Pharisees made long Prayers and Fasted often And the Prophet speaks of some Ezek. 33.31 32. who came and sat before him as God's people yea they would hear his words but not do them With their Mouth they have shew'd much love while their Heart run after their Covetousness Moreover a Man may be able to Discourse very well of Religion may be very just in his dealings very charitable to the poor quiet and peaceable among his Neighbours free from gross and scandalous pollutions be no Extortioner Adulterer unjust Person Luk. 18.11 and yet be a stranger to the Life and Power of Christianity all the while I know this will go ill down with those who have built their hopes of Salvation upon no better grounds than these But there is no helping them without undeceiving them In a word therefore these following places of Scripture if you be willing to learn will shew you wherein the power of Religion consists Luk. 13.24 Strive to enter in at the strait gate for many I say unto you will seek to enter in and shall not be able Matt. 22.37 38. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul and with all thy mind This is the first and great commandment Chap. 10.37 He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me or as Luke has it cannot be my disciple Rom. 8.9 Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of his 2 Cor. 5.17 Therefore if any man be in Christ he is a new creature Eph. 2.10 For we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus unto good works which God has before ordained that we should walk in them Tit. 2.14 Who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all iniquity and purify unto himself a peculiar people zealous of good works Col. 1.2 Giving thanks unto the father which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light 2 Cor. 5.5 Now he that has wrought us for the self-same thing is God who also has given unto us the earnest of the spirit Think not that I have here pickt together a few places of Scripture meerly to serve a turn I tell you the whole Strain of the Gospel runs this way and if it be hid it s hid to them that are lost Now if this Gospel be true certainly the Nature of Christianity is little understood or considered by multitudes that yet affect to be called Christians 'T is no such easy matter to be a Christian indeed as too many are apt to imagine Running Striving Wrestling taking the Kingdom of Heaven by Violence do all imply that we have many difficulties to conflict withal and must either be in good Earnest or else lose all our labour 'T is further observable that there must be a mighty change wrought upon us by the Spirit of God else Christ will never own us as his Members And 't is as clear that this great change consists in turning our Hearts from the love of the Creature to the Predominant love of God and Holiness This is the Life the Soul of the new Nature which must animate all our other Graces and be in us a continual Spring of holy Obedience In a word In this consists our fitness for Heaven and without it Heaven would not be Heaven to us were it possible we could be admitted thither These things are so plain that I need not further enlarge upon them unless it be to bring them nearer to your own case and help you to try your selves by them Let us therefore ponder the matter a little Can that Man be said to make Religion his business who will not be persuaded soberly to exercise his Reason about it Nor so much as to put the question to himself What was I Created and Redeemed for What shall I do to be saved Degenerate Souls To what end was your Reason given you Was it think you only to enable you the better to care and plod and provide for the Flesh Alas that you should know your selves no better Can that Man be supposed to love God with all his Heart and Soul who cares not how little he thinks upon him has no delight in his Service but is glad when 't is over No Zeal for his Honour and Glory in the world no concern when his Name is blasphem'd and prophaned by the ungodly who allows himself in a course of wilful Rebellion against him and will not be persuaded to renounce his Lusts nor to set up the Worship of God in his Family and Closet how plainly soever the Scripture enjoins it In a word who could be willing enough to continue on Earth for ever might he but enjoy Fleshly prosperity fulness and ease though he should never know more of God nor love him better than now he doth which is next to none at all And what shall we say of those who turn Religion into matter of ridicule and contempt whose heart riseth against any thing that 's serious They set their Wits at work to put Nick-names upon it and yet the Wretches have the front to usurp the Christian name Prodigious Insolence Is that man regenerate think you who if you ask him what Regeneration means what it is to be a new Creature to be led by the Spirit of God cannot answer you three words of sense about it nay perhaps knows not that there are any such Expressions in the Bible Or can it be imagin'd that a Person whose heart is set upon the world and has no relish nor savour of better things but is quite out of his Element when imploy'd in any thing that has a nearer Relation and tendency towards Heaven can such an one I say be imagin'd meet for that Inheritance or to have any treasure there where his heart is not I could wish to know what Notion such Men have of Heaven What think you How are the Saints and Angels employ'd there Do they love God or no Are they not wrapt up in admiring his Excellencies and Perfections and filled with continual Emanations and Influences of Light and Love from him and even transformed by that blessed
Intuition While the impure Spirits of the wicked are doom'd to a blacker Region and plac'd in the Society of the Devils that deceived them And can you believe two States so vastly different hereafter and yet not consider that there must be some suitable preparation while we are here something in the very disposition of our minds which may point out to us whither we are going And since your Eternal Happiness lies upon it is it not worth your while to enquire whether your Spirits are formed to any such temper as comports with the description of Heaven which has been set before you and which you must be forced to allow of unless you will renounce both Reason and Scripture And yet I deny not but the best of Men may have many Infirmities Who can understand his errors If we say we have no Sin we deceive our selves But still you must observe the sinful weaknesses of good Men are matter of continual grief to them They watch and pray and strive against them and heartily desire to be rid of them and long for that blessed State in which they shall be perfectly so Rom. 7.24 But on the other hand wicked men love their Lusts plead for them endeavour to extenuate them cannot endure to think of parting with them would rather have them gratified than mortified as Austin confesseth of himself before his Conversion so that they are under the power of Sin and Strangers to that Life of Grace which would make them see and feel the evil of it However this consideration should make religious persons the more circumspect because others are so apt to take encouragement from their failings These are no Singularities of Opinion nor Fanatick Enthusiastical Notions but words of Truth and Soberness in which all judicious good Christians of what denomination soever are fully agreed Would to God the serious consideration of them and a suitable practice did more generally obtain among us and then we should quickly see our little differences vanishing as smoak and the Churches of God in these Nations become a praise in the whole earth 5thly Study carefully the Reasons of the Christian Religion as they are excellently set forth in a Book which bears that Title where I dare be confident to affirm ringentibus licet viri celeberrimi adversariis you will find such a complication of Learning Perspicuity and Piety as all the Atheists Infidels Sadducees and Epicureans in the world will never be able to withstand The light of Reason indeed well employed may help you far in discovering your Nature Faculties Duty Interest and End But when you have done your best many things will remain appertaining to these already mention'd as to which you will still be in the dark without the assistance of supernatural Revelation For instance How the nature of man came to be so universally vitiated and depraved as we certainly find it is and the Pagans themselves have often acknowledged How Divine Justice may be satisfied and yet offending Sinners pardon'd and receiv'd into favour How humane Nature must be purified restor'd and fitted again for its proper use and end Quae quidem Purgaâ—io saith Porphyry omni homini adeo necessaria est ut fieri non pessit quin Deus universalem aliquam purgandi humani generis rationem procurà rit This indeed is high but you must remember he was a Philosopher 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the sacred Succession out of the School of Ammonius at Alexandria But that of Plato is yet more wonderful Alcib 2. Sect. 11. where he brings in Socrates instructing Alcibiades concerning Prayer And after he had shew'd how little we know what 's fit for our selves and how dangerous it is to pray for things unsuitable for us at last tells him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. 'T is necessary that you wait till ONE come who will teach you how to behave your self both towards God and man When will that be says Alcibiades and who shall this Teacher be For I would gladly know him whoever he is 'T is he reply'd Socrates who careth for thee But to me it seems that as Homer tells us Minerva took away the mist from the eyes of Diomedes that he might discern God from man So the darkness must be taken from thy mind At that day says Alcibiades will I make Offerings and it will come e're long let him take off the mist from mine eyes or what else he pleases for I am prepared to omit nothing which he shall command whoever he be so that I may be made better The poor Heathens were sensible of the need of supernatural Revelation which made them so fond of their Oracles and of the Books of the Sybills and the several ways of Divination that obtain'd among them And those of them who had great affairs in hand still pretended to take in the special help of some supposed Deity or other Thus Numa makes shew of consulting with the Nymph Egeria Lycurgus Minos Solon with Jove And the like is reported of that great Man Scipio Africanus Caligula with Castor and Pollux and after all Mahomet pretends to receive his Instructions from the Angel Gaâ—â—iel Look therefore into all the pretences that have been made to supernatural Revelation and see if you can find any which may stand in the least competition with these sacred Records which we have in the holy Scriptures The Fragments of Zoroaster the Chaldaean Oracles the Books of the Sybills the Alchoran of Mahomet will all appear uncertain or frivolous if compared with the Gospel of Jesus Christ Never was any Doctrine so suited to the raising of mens minds above this Earth and fitting them for Glory and Immortality as the Christian Doctrine is Our way and our end are here plainly set before us And the very design and tendency of the Gospel may tell you its Author It could not be the Invention of wicked men or Devils for it every where declaims against Sin yea even these inward Corruptions which are not discernible to the eyes of men It could not be a meer contrivance of good men or Angels for they would never have dared to arrogate to themselves a Divine Authority or to father their Writings upon God and therefore it must needs be from him who hath own'd it with Success confirm'd it by Miracles and preserv'd it in despite of the subtilty and malignity of its enemies to this day and still makes it his power to the Salvation of Sinners The better any man is the nearer he comes up to the Rules of Christianity and had the Gospel been a lye or device of deceivers the God of Truth would never have made it an Instrument of so much good in the world as he hath done Direct 2. If you believe that the Soul is Immortal be not over-fond of the Body Keep it under bring it into subjection use it as a Servant to the Soul that both the one and the other may be fitter for the Service of him that
made them Keep it not so high as to make it Masterless nor so low as to unfit it for duty A Servant when he ruleth is one of the things which the Earth cannot bear The Body is a good Servant if well managed but a bad Master Keep your Minds as much as you can above the power of Corporeal Impressions Let not the Objects of Sense and Appetite prevail too much upon you These two will quickly plead prescription and put in for Sovereignty if too much indulged They have ever been disposed to rebel since our First Parents gave them that fatal advantage and the sway they bear over their degenerate Posterity carries in it the mark and brand of that first Apostacy 'T is this which threatens our ruin a second time And shall we split upon the same Rock again after so dreadful a warning Suspect all those pleasures in which the Body is much concern'd lest the Spirit be debased by them and begin to put too high a value upon them and so contract a terrene sensual disposition and disrelish those noble delights which are perfective of its Nature Make not your Prison too strong Think how quickly this Flesh must be laid aside as useless and offensive Why then will you cherish it and make an Idol of it a◠if you thought you must never leave it What relief will it be to your miserable Souls to remember that in this Life you had your good things Or if it were reasonable to suppose as some have done that the Souls of the wicked hover about the places of their Bodies Interment what satisfaction would it be to such a Soul to think Here lies Dust which while I studied to pamper I forgot and lost my self A cutting Reflection to a desolate forlorn Spirit stript of all those Vanities which before inveigled it and destitute of those Virtuous Principles which would have enabled it to mount aloft into a purer Region It is therefore a great point of Wisdom to sit loose to the accommodations of this present Life And if at any time we find our Minds disposed as they are too apt to be to an over-great pleasure in our worldly enjoyments 't is fit that we remember this is not our home our highest Interests are above and the Relation which we bear to the world of Spirits whither we are going should make us look more shily upon these temporary perishing things as foreign and extrinsick to us and no way suitable for the Immortal Spirit to rest in And if the least thought should insinuate it self That it is good for us to be here we ought to reject it with disdain and turn our Minds to nobler Objects till the powerful sense of them hath awak'd us out of our dream and shew'd us the vanity and emptiness of it Neither should we be over-much concern'd at any crosses or disappointments which may meet us in our passage through this world Do not give them the way suffer them not to come too near you 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Epictet Enchir. Cap. 10. It is not the things themselves which trouble men but their Conceits and Opinions about them At least they grow heavier by weighing and so we create and multiply troubles upon our selves by our anxiety and sollicitude about these things which to a calm serene temper would have been but light afflictions Are your Circumstances low and mean in the world you are less in danger of growing in love with it and so being ensnared and undone by it Besides Nature is content with a little though mens Lusts are insatiable Are Friends and Relations unkind selfish unfaithful or otherwise unsuitable to you Who bad you over-value them or promise your selves too much from them or repose too great confidence in them you may thank your selves in this case as in most others if you be answer'd according to your Idols Is your Body afflicted with pain sickness or languishing you knew it was mortal before and to what purpose have you liv'd all this while if not to prepare for such a time as this Are you vilify'd and reproach'd by men as it oft falls out for keeping close to your Duty You ought no more to stop at it than a man in a race for his Life should be daunted at the braying of an Ass or the gagling of Wild-geese Our Life on Earth is but a dream It passeth away as a vision of the night Men are startled at phansied dangers but not duly apprehensive of real ones 'T is not amiss sometimes to suppose as Marsilius Ficinus directs forsitan haec non vera sunt forsitan in praesentiâ somniamus and as there is more of truth in such a supposition than most men consider so it will prevent our being over-much lifted up with prosperity or dejected with adversity since they are both alike parts of a dream and the invisible World of realities is so very near us whither when we are once arrived we shall think as contemptibly of the far greatest part of the Transactions of this world as men are wont to do of their dreams after they are well awake The CONCLUSION THUS I have endeavoured to prove That the Soul is Immortal and laid open the Absurd and Mischievous Consequences of the opposite Hypothesis and withal I have shewed what improvement ought to be made of so important a Doctrine A great deal more might have been said on this occasion but what some will think too little others will think too much and therefore to prevent misunderstandings on both hands I shall only add Two or Three particulars more 1st If any say That I have undertaken a needless piece of work and that such a Discourse deserved not to be answer'd but with scorn and contempt I must tell them That the degeneracy of this Atheistical Age is a sad but sufficient Apology for what I have done It can never be unseasonable to put men in mind of a Future State much less now And though I look upon our Author's Cause to be stark naught yet his management of it perhaps is not so contemptible as some may think However I am sure the effects of it upon others are not so 2dly Others it may be will think I have been too severe in the Remarks which I have made considering the Quality of the person with whom I have to do To which I answer I hope they will not accuse me of any rude personal Reflections and as for his Opinion to answer it is to expose it He has publickly debased all Mankind and himself among the rest and therefore ought not to think much at any rational endeavours to right both him and them And the figure he bears in the world makes an answer so much the more necessary When a person of considerable Note a sober Life and one that has the reputation of a studious thinking man shall vent such Opinions as these the Infection is like to spread so much further Nullis Aconita bibuntur Fictilibus Omne animi vitium tanto conspectius in se Crimen habet quanto Major qui peccat habetur 3dly Some perhaps will object That I have not laid stress enough upon the Immateriality of the Soul in the present Controversy I would have such to consider that over-doing is undoing and to argue à minus notis is not the way to defend the Truth but to open the Mouths of its Adversaries If I have proved that the Soul is no such perishing corruptible Matter as our Author supposeth this is what I undertook and if the use of the word Material will please him let him take it for me so long as he draws no bruitish Conclusion from it And as for those that have more refined Notions of Immaterial Substances I envy not their improvements let them rejoice in their greater Light provided they take not up with Arbitrary Conceits instead of solid Knowledge nor injure more plain and certain Truths by pretending to know these things which to a Soul in Flesh are hardly if at all intelligible how true soever It seems clear to me that our Author hath over-shot himself by pretending to prove the Soul Mortal because he fancied it was hard to prove it immaterial and this he thought gave him the advantage but to use his own phrase pag. 12. I judge he hath taken a wrong Sow by the ear And tho' I desire not to contend with any man yet if he himself or any of those who have espoused his Sentiments shall think it convenient to Answer what I have written they may expect a Reply if they deserve it For as on the one hand I think not my self obliged to follow any one who impertinently rambles from the matter and seeks sorry little Shifts and Evasions to avoid the force of plain evidence So on the other hand I think it worth my while to allot a considerable part of my remaining Life if just occasion be given me to the Defence of the Soul's Immortality and the running down of these unmanly Notions which ought to be exploded and hiss'd out of the World by the meanest of Human Race FINIS