$ER M. hended except by a greater. Speculations

XVII.

therefore of meer Curiofity I fhall wave and decline. It is enough for us and the Purpose I aim at in this Difcourfe, if I fhew that, come it whence it will, we have a Soul with

in

us, a Soul I mean immaterial and spiritual that subsists of itself, distinct from the Body. And to do this we need not make use of many Arguments, or many Words: It is done to our Hands in a very few, by one who has comprized all that need to be faid of it in a fhort Compafs: "It is a thing (faith he) cc felf-evident, that there is fomething in our Compofition, that thinks and apprehends, "and reflects and deliberates; that deter"mines and doubts, confents and denies; "that demurs and refolves, that chooses and.

rejects; that receives various Senfations from "external Objects, and produces voluntary "Motions in several Parts of the Body. This

every Man is conscious of; nor can the greatest Sceptick doubt of or deny it. That very doubting or denying being Part of the thing we would have supposed, and includ

ing feveral of the reft in their Ideas and "Notions. And yet that these several Fa"culties we have mentioned are not inherent in the Matter itself of which our Bodies

' are

XVII.

are compounded, is plain, because we then SER M. "fhould have as much feeling upon the "clipping of a Hair, as upon the pricking "of a Nerve: Or rather as Men, i. e. as "complex Beings, compounded of many vi"tal Parts, we should have no Feeling or Perception at all. For every fingle Par "ticle of our Bodies would upon this Suppo"fition be a distinct Animal, endued with "Self-consciousness and perfonal Sensation of Confequently a great Number "of fuch living and thinking Particles united together, however close that Union may be, could never compofe one greater "individual Animal, with one fingle Mind "and Understanding; any more than a "Swarm of Bees, or of Men and Women,

"its own.

can be conceived to make up one particu"lar living Creature, compounded and con"ftituted of the Aggregate of them all*.

"If therefore what we call our Soul or "thinking Part cannot be the Refolution of "that Matter itself, of which our Bodies are "compounded; it muft follow that if it re"refults from our Bodies at all it must refult "from the particular Modification, Difpofi

Bently's Boyl's Lect. Serm. II. p. 46.

Cc 3

❝tion,

SERM. " tion, or Motions of fuch Mater. * But here XVII. "again, how ftupid muft it be to believe

"that all the natural Powers and acquired "Habits of the Mind, that penetrating Understanding and accurate Judgment, that Strength of Memory and Readiness of Wit, "that Liberality, and Juftice, and Prudence, "and Magnanimity, that Charity and Bene"ficence to Mankind, that ingenuous Fear " and awful Love of God, that comprehen"five Knowledge of the Hiftories and Languages of fo many Nations, that experien"ced Infight into the Works and Wonders of "Nature, that rich Vein of Poetry and in

exhauftible Fountain of Eloquence, thofe "lofty Flights of Thought, and almost intui"tive Perception of abftrufe Notions, thofe "exalted Discoveries of Mathematical Theo

rems and Divine Contemplations; how stu"pid, I fay, muft it be to conceive that all "these admirable Endowments and Capaci

ties of Human Nature, which we fometimes fee actually exifting in the fame Per"fon, can proceed from the blind Shuffling, * or 'cafual Clashing of Atoms, or from any "Modification of Matter! That a little fenfelefs Flesh and Blood, by whirling round * Bently ibid. p. 57. 58.

"the

XVII.

"the Channels of the Body should justle one S ER M "another into Life and Understanding. We "cannot without Indignation go about to "refute fuch an abfurd Imagination, fuch a grofs Contradiction to unprejudiced Reason. That the Spirit or Soul is indeed in its prefent State exceeding nearly united to the Body, we do not deny; we fee it in Fact, and Reafon tells us it is very needful that fo it fhould be: We are placed here to communicate with a material and fenfible World; to partake of its feveral Pleasures and Pains and therefore material and fenfible Bodies, Members that are capable of Affections and Senfations from outward things, are neceffary to render the Soul of Man an Inhabitant of this Earth: But ftill that the Soul is in its own Nature spiritual and active, that it is independent, for its Subfiftence and Being, on Flesh and Blood, even Reason, we fee, and Philosophy alone is enough to difcover. But if we think fit to call in the Evidence of holy Writ, the Question is clear and foon determined. And certainly this is the best and safest Judge in the Cafe: God who made us, best can tell, of what it is and how we are made; and therefore if we will be decided by what he has been pleased to reveal, we need not

SER M. look far into the facred Writings before we XVII. have our Question answered in full.

The first Scripture that gives us an Account of the Formation of Man, gives us an Account of the different Principles of which he was compounded. The Lord God formed Man of the Duft of the Ground, and breathed into his Noftrils the Breath of Life, and Man became a living Soul, Gen. ii. 7. a Text that does not more evidently prove that the Body of Man was made of Duft, than that his Soul proceeded from a different Principle, the Breath of Life; by this Breath of Life we fee he is made a living Soul, and a living Soul from the Breath of Life, must surely be a living Spirit. Which is enough to make good the First Head of my Difcourfe, viz. that the Soul is a fpiritual Subftance distinct from the Body, especially when the fame Pofition will ftill be more confirmed by every Proof I fhall bring for the Truth of my

II. SECOND Head, to which I proceed, viz. that the Soul continues to live and exift by itself when the Body dies. And this will follow partly from what has already been said of the Spirituality of its Nature. For fince it neither depends on the Body nor on any Motion or

Modifi