Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	body_n	join_v	soul_n	5,534	5	5.9786	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A28444	The oracles of reason ... in several letters to Mr. Hobbs and other persons of eminent quality and learning / by Char. Blount, Esq., Mr. Gildon and others.	Blount, Charles, 1654-1693.; Burnet, Thomas, 1635?-1715. Archaeology philosophicae.; Gildon, Charles, 1665-1724.; H. B.	1693 (1693)	Wing B3312; ESTC R15706	107,891	254

perception it could scarce have been possible that they should have been wrested from their habitations and first state For pray where were the places that these pre-existent Angels did inhabit Basilius says they dwelt in the Heavens and Light● Many of the Ancients did as is well known attribute to the Angels 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 thin Bodies and not gross Terrestrial ones like ours And the second Nicene Council would have this Doctrin proposed out of the Book of Iohn Bishop of Thessalonica to be confirmed these are the words Concerning the Angels Archangels and their Powers to which I also joyn our own souls This is the opinion of the Catholic Church that they are 't is true intelligible yet not wholly Incorporeal and Invisible as you Gentiles say but endowed with a thin and Aerial or Fiery Body as it is written Who makes his Angels Spirits and those that minister unto him a flaming fire This we know to have been the opinion of many Holy-Fathers amongst whom are Basilius Sirnamed the Great St. Athanasius Methodius and those that follow them not that they suppose Angels to be Bodies but like human Souls to be invested with Bodies yet not such as are moulded up of the same Clay with our Modern ones but thin and pure like Air or Fire Of the same nature as those we shall one day have when we come to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 equall to the Angels Lastly those who interpret that passage Gen. 6.2 c. of the Angels joyning themselves with the Daughters of Men which not a few of the Fathers and others do must necessarily assert that the Angels have Bodies proper and agreeable to their own nature from all which we may conclude that together with the Angels some Coelestial Matter did exist before the Earth But of whatever kind this thin subtle and lucid Matter was it could not exist by it self and before the remaining part of the Mass of Matter For all Matter was together and at once produced out of Nothing Neither ●ay we conceive the action of the Creation as divided into parts and distant ages whilst the rest of the Regions and Tracts of the World remained empty For my part if an Atom or the smallest Particle of Matter existed before the Mosaical Epocha I am of opinion that the whole Mass of the Universe did the same and by the same Rule if that Angelical Matter or Vehicle of the Angels preceded the beginning of the Earth all Matter in general did as the Greek Fathers argue in some measure precede it but its disposition and order according to its different parts scituations and forms have by the Decree of Providence been from time to time varied sometimes after one manner and sometimes after another Thus by the Authority of the Fathers we have hitherto treated of the pre-existence of Angels and of Matter it self as it hath a connection with the Angels let us now therefore return to the nature of things and to the visible World for in the Corporeal we have as many Arguments to confirm the same antiquity of Matter and to sufficiently demonstrate that the Mosaical Epocha of about six thousand years does not comprehend the Original of the whole Universe but the Age of our present Earth and the time since it was formed out of its Chaos If we again consider the Phaenomenaes of the Heavens and the Companies of both erring and fixed Stars we shall easily believe that so numerous a progeny and which was worthy of a better Parent could not be the off●spring of one Earthly Chaos nor admit of their Ages and Histories being included within the limits of so small a time wherefore let us if you please call to mind a thing which is now no longer doubted of viz. that the Earth is a Planet and that besides the Earth there are many Planets of the same nature as well as of a like matter and form All which 't is probable have had the same manner and principle of birth that is every one out of its own Chaos Moreover since the Creation of the Earth we have not seen the birth of any one new Planet for which reason certainly they are all either older than the Earth or as old now If you grant the former 't is all we desire and if you make them of the same age with the Earth you must suppose as many Chaos's as there are Primary Planets since for example 't is certain that Iupiter who wheels about his own Satellites or Tendours is a Center to himself and does not any ways depend on our Earth as do none of the rest except it be the Moon Again the fixed Stars seem ancienter than the Planets and to be each of them the Center of its own Orb or Vortex as many Systems therefore must be constituted in the Heavens as there are fixed Stars which being very great both as to number and bulk would swallow up this little point of Earth as if it were less than nothing wherefore whoever has any favour for the Heavens and is an unbiassed observer of God's Works will not easily consent to have their Originals deduced from the Earth or dependent on it Lastly 't is probable that the Planets were formerly fixed and that the Earth it self ought to be numbred in the same rank 't will be no easie matter for you to solve the Originals of the Planets by any other Hypothesis at least not if they have fire in their Center which 't is very probable they have Besides we sometimes see the face of the Sun overgrown with thick spots and perceive him for some days pale obscure and as it were in the pangs of death but he that is sick may die and what happens to one may happen to others of the same kind now all the fixed Stars are homogeneous therefore the fixed Stars are perishable Now a fixed Star perishes and is extinguished when being crusted over with a thick shell of scurf which it cannot break through it degenerates into an obscure and opake body such as is a Planet Finally the new Stars that have of late years appeared in the Heavens have not 't is probable I mean in respect to their Originals had any connection or communication with the Earth neither have the Comets which although in some things they are dubious and hard to be explained do to me seem nothing else but as one may say the dead bodies of the fixed Stars unburied and not as yet composed to rest they like shadows wander up and down through the various Regions of the Heavens till they have found out fit places for their residence which having pitcked upon they stop their irregular course and being turned into Planets move Circularly about some Star Whereas if according to another Hypothesis Comets are held to have been just the same from the beginning they take such vast Tours make such immense Circles and Periods that no man can prove we ever saw the same Comet

least to be what they are not I hope you 'l pardon this freedom of SIR● Your friend and humble Servant CHAR. GILDON To Charles Blount Esq. AFter so many Favors you must think me a very impudent Beggar indeed to importune you for more but as I 'm sensible the Benefits you bestow are the effects of a generous Nature so I persuade my self that the pleasure you have in conferring them lessen the assurance of my asking especially in a disquisition of this Nature which may afford a more substantial profit to my Mind than Favors of another kind which I must always acknowledge I owe to you and none wou'd be a greater than your employing me in something that may be serviceable to you for then I shall be able to convince you that my Will extends beyond a bare Acknowledgment I have often doubted whether there were any such thing as a pure Spirit independant of all Body and Matter And I must own I think that there can be no such thing as 't is vulgarly apprehended For what Idea can we form of it Thought generally taken for the Essence of the Soul seems only the Action or an Accident of it since the Mind is often without it as Body without Motion or any particular Modification of it So that we may consider the Soul without Thought but not Thought without some Subject to in here in unless by Abstraction no more than roundness without some round Body And why the Intima Natura that composes the Matter which goes to the making up that definition of Body as Extension Divisibility Impenetrability shou'd be incapable of receiving the accident of Thought I can find no Reason for being ignorant of the nature of those contiguous Particles of Matter that are extended divisible and impenetrable how can we pretend to decide it magisterially against this Opinion especially since Memory Wit and Judgment the noblest Qualities of the MIND are agreed by the Naturalists as is evident from Physic to have so great a dependance on the Mechanism of the Brain c. And to shew plainly that we are ignorant of this inmost nature of things one Example may suffice since we take the definition from certain general Qualities we discover in Matter As for Example a Seed of Pepper we see 't is extended divisible and impenetrable but we discover not what that quality of heating the mouth is compos'd of or proceeds from or what secret power those Particles have to affect the Sense in that manner So in all other things 't is not Extension c. that compose the Body but some other occult thing we know not what of which Extension c. are the consequence whether it be the congregation of Atoms or other invisible Particles of Matter solid or subtle tho' it must be confess'd that even the least of these Atoms has the same Qualities but yet it must be also granted they have other Qualitys probably not less in number which we know nothing of so that when I term Extension c. the consequence of those occult Qualities we know not I mean a co-existent consequence as the consequence of a self-evident Principle But if the Soul be not Matter tho' more fine and subtle than the Body 't is very strange the chief Part of us shou'd be of such a nature that we can form no Idea of it But 't is stranger yet that Men shou'd think it so necessary to believe so when a more obvious and intelligible Opinion wou'd answer all the ends of Religion as well They must acknowledge the Soul a Substance and we have no Idea of Substance distinct from that of Body If they have any they would do well to impart it to the grosser understandings of the rest of the World But these Gentlemen that advance this Opinion of pure immaterial Substances trust to Fancy and meer Conjectures which they can give no account at all of but by one only Accident viz. THOVGHT which they can never demonstrate incapable of inhering in Body modefy'd to that purpose tho' not in all Bodies for I think Mr. Bently's far from Demonstrations since they rise only to a Probability But by making Thought the Essence of the Soul they distinguish it not from that of Beasts for they think and have perhaps something equivalent to Reason or must at least be granted equal to Idects Nay this proves that either Thought and Matter are not incompatible or that the Essence of the Souls of Men and Beasts is the same and by consequence both mortal or both immortal for they both think Besides since 't is evident from this uncontrovertible Maxim Nemo dat quod non habet that the Qualities of all things and therefore of Body are in God himself that is in an infinite degree of perfection the most pure of Spirits 't is not likely that Body shou'd be derogatory to the purity of infinitely inferior Spirits On this Corporiety of Spirits depends a more obvious Explanation of two Texts of Scripture than I have met with in any of the vulgar and general Comments supposing the Book of Genesis a true History of matter of Fact and no Parable as Dr. Burnet contends in his Archiologiae If the Angels have Bodies we may without Absurdity suppose them to generate with Women and so the Sons of God might enter with the Daughters of men and beget a Race of Gyants on them For 't is unaccountable to me that none but the Daughters of Iniquity as the vulgar Interpreters will have it shou'd be capable of bearing so robust a Generation The other place is in the Epistles of St. Paul where he enjoins the Women to be cover'd in the Church because of the Angels For the Church being the more peculiar place of the Ministry of Angels they might perhaps by the beauty of that Sex be diverted from their Duty This Opinion wou'd restore the Free-will to the Angels which I' can't conceive shou'd be so absolutely necessary for the justification of Man as the Clergy woud persuade us and yet not at all requisite to that of Angels If Free-will was taken from them on the Fall of one part of 'em they met with a more indulgent Fate than Man who still possesses it to his Ruine These Considerations suggest an odd extravagant Thought which I must set down if it be but to make you laugh and I hope you 'l pardon my impertinent freedom The Thought is this Who knows but this Race of Men was first of Angelic Degree till by the bewitching Smiles of Woman the most lovely Brute of the Universe betray'd to Mortality i● her Embraces And then perhaps Columb●● might be the first of the Sons of Noah tha● enter'd the new discover'd World of America which might be a Race deriv●d from some other deluded Angels won by the same destructive Bait. Pardon me if I think the Pandora of the Heathens to say nothing of our Eve may favour this Imagination But these are only indigested

Thoughts I dare neither yield nor deny my Assent to till I know your Judgment which has a very great Influence over SIR Your much obliged Friend And humble Servant CHARLES GILDON To Mr. B. Fellow of Colledge IN the last you honoured me with you said you were now giving your self to the study of Philosophy which makes me desire you to give me your Thoughts upon these following Heads in as brief a manner as may be 1. Whether there be a Succession in Eternity or i● be as Boe●●us de●ines it Interminabiles vitae to ●a si ●nd perfecta possessi● ●ut be building his Opinion with the rest of the old Platonists on a false Supposition seems to me in the wrong For they imagin'd that it would be incompatible with the Immutability of God not to have his whole Existence to be all once his duration measur'd as Mr. Cowly does by the Phrase of An Eternal now because they thought by succession he must loose those parts that are past and gain those that are to come and only enjoy the present But the Imperfection of Succession in Creatures is no good Argument that it must be so in God for 't is true that they both receive and loose by it because as they grow old they acquire or are depriv'd of some property which cannot happen in God But that which makes most for this Opinion is that since the contrary is not built on Revelation there is no Reason we should implicitly yield our assent to it on the bare Authority of the Platonists unless they could make us understand it for I defy any one to think of Eternity without the Idea of Succession 2. As to the Origin of Good and Evil methinks 't is less contradictory and unreasonable to believe as the Antient Peastans did that there were two beginnings of things the one Good and the other Evil. For how can Evil proceed from a Being infinitely Good and without whom nothing is if Evil be not And if Dr. Burnet has prov'd Genesis but a Parable why may not the Persians be as much in the right as the Iews 3. Supposing the Soul Immaterial why may not Material Fire have an operation on it since the Body so much influences it in this Life 4. I would fain know what Reason some men have and those Philosophers to term any one quality in God more excellent than an other for certainly let the number be infinite so must the perfection of each be else the Infinite Being would in some be less Infinite or rather Finite for I think there 's no medium betwixt Infinite and Finite nor any difference can I discover betwixt two equally infinite Qualities If therefore the Qualities of all things are and by consequence originally were for God's Qualitys can neither encrease nor suffer diminution in God as it may be evidently prov'd then it follows that those of Body are of equal excellency with those of Spirits since equally in him and all the Qualities of God are infinitly perfect 5. The opinion of the Plurality of Worlds seems more agreeable to God's infinite for so must all God's Qualities be communicative Qve Quality to be continually making new Worlds since other ways this Quality or Act of Creating would be only once exerted and for infinite duration lie useless and dormant But it seems strange that only once this Infinite desire of Communicating his Infinite Glory should be put in practice and that only to so little and inconsiderable a Number as all the Sons of Adam can make up in comparison of Infinity The opinion of Plurality of Worlds does at least give us a more August Idea of the Wisdom and Power of God and of his infinit● Perfections than to imagine all that Infinite Extension should be like a barren Heath without any Productions of the Infinite Being and not fill'd with Infinite and Endless Worlds But these are Doubts enough to be resolv'd in one better if you will answer them I shall be extreamly oblig'd to you since they are design'd for the publick view and I would willingly have them resolv'd of which I 'm sensible you are very capable I am Your oblieg'd humble Servant C. GILDON To CHARLES BLOUNT Esq Of Natural Religion as opposed to Divine Revelation NAtural Religion is the Belief we have of an eternal intellectual Being and of the Duty which we owe him manifested to us by our Reason without Revelation or positive Law The chief Heads whereof seem contain'd in these few Particulars 1. That there is one infinite eternal God Creator of all Things 2. That he governs the World by Providence 3. That 't is our Duty to worship and obey him as our Creator and Governor 4. That our Worship consists in Prayer to him and Praise of him 5. That our Obedience consists in the Rules of Right Reason the Practice whereof is Moral Virtue 6. That we are to expect Rewards and Punishments hereafter according to our Actions in this Life which includes the Soul's Immortality and is proved by our admitting Providence Seventhly That when we err from the Rules of our Duty we ought to Repent and trust in God's mercy for Pardon That Rule which is necessary to our future Happiness ought to be generally made known to all men But no Rule of Revealed Religion was or ever could be made known to all men Therefore no Revealed Religion is necessary to future Happiness The Major is thus prov'd Onr Future Happiness depends upon err obeying or endeavouring to fulfil the known Will of god But that Rule which is not generally known cannot be generally obey'd Therefore that Rule which is not generally known cannot be the Rule of our Happiness Now the Minor of the first Syllogism is matter of Fact and uncontrovertible that no Religion supernatural has been conveyed to all the World witness the large Continent of America not discover'd till within this two Hundred Years where if there were any Revealed Religion at least it was not the Christian. And if it be objected to the whole That the ways of God's dealing with the Heathen as to Eternal Mercy are unknown to any and that he will Judge them by the Law of Nature or in other terms the Rules of Natural Religion or Morality We urge again that either those Laws of Natural Religion are sufficient if kept to Happiness or they who could know no more are out of a possibility of a future state of Blessedness because they could not comply with Laws they know not And in saying this they deny God's Infinite Goodness which provides for all his Creatures the means of attaining that Happiness whereof their Natures are capable Again if they urge that Natural Religion is sufficient but not possible to be lived up to The same answer falls more heavy upon them That then there is no visible means left for the greater part of Mankind to be happy And to do our duty according to what we are able is but a cold comfort