wherein all the reason and philosophy of atheism is confuted, and

46 7/5^ Senftive Soul not Corporeal. Book I^to unlawful lufts and undue conjunftions •, but efpejcially than the continualdecreation and annihilation of the fouls of brutes ; we fhall notbe very unwilling to acknowledge thus much to them, that indeed of thetwo this opinion is more reafonable and tolerable than that other extravagancyof thofe, who will either make all fouls to be generated, and confequentlyto be corporeal, or at lead the fenfitive foul, both in men and brutes.For befides the monilrofity of this latter opinion, in making two diftindtfouls and perceptive fubftances in eveiy man, which is a thing fufficientlyconfuted by internal fenfe, it leaves us alfo in an abfolute impofTibility ofprovipg the immortality of the rational foul, the incorporeity of any fubilance,and by conlequence, the exiftence of any Deity diftind from the corporealworld.And as for that pretence of theirs, that fenfelefs matter may as well becomefenfitive, and, as it were, kindled into life and cogitation, as a body,that was devoid of light and heat, may be kindled into fire and flame ; thisfeems to argue too much ignorance of the doftrine of bodies in men otherwifelearned and ingenious •, the beft naturalifts having already concluded,that fire and flame is nothing but llich a motion of the infenfible parts of abody, as whereby they are violently agitated, and many times diffipated andfcattercd from each other, begetting in the mean time thofe fancies of lightand heat in animals. Now there is no difficulty at all in conceiving, thatthe infenfible particles of a body, which were before quiefcent, may be putinto motion ; this being nothing but a new modification of them, and noentity really diftihct from the fubftance of body, as life, fenfe and cogitationare. There is nothing in fire and flame, or a kindled body, differentfrom other bodies, but only the motion or mechanifm, and fancy of- it.And therefore it is but a crude conceit, which the Atheilts and Corporealiftsof former times have been always (o fond of, that fouls are nothing but firyor flammeous bodies. For though heat in the bodies of animals be a neceffaryinftrument for foul and life to aft by in them, yet it is a thing reallydiftincl from life; and a red-hot iron hath not therefore any nearer approximationto life than it had before, nor the flame of a candle than the extinguifli'dfnuff" or tallow of it ; the difference between them being only in theagitation of the infenfible parts. We might alfo add, that, according to thishypothefis, the fouls of animals could not be numerically the fame throughoutthe whole fpace of their lives ; fince that fire, that needs a pabulum to preyupon, doth not continue always one and the fame numerical fubflrance.The foul of a new-born animal could be no more the fame with thefoul of that animal feveral years after, than the flame of a new lightedcandle is the fame with that flame that twinkles laft in the focket ; whichindeed are no more the fame, than a river or ftream is the fame atfeveral difbances of time. Which reafon may be alfo extended further toprove the foul to be no body at all, fince the bodies of all animals are in 3perpetual flux.XXXVIII.