no action; but an object used by a rational soul, as it can use the shadow of a tree or house, that yet doth nothing. 3. And so a book doth nothing at all, but is a mere objective ordination of passive signs, by which man's active intellect can understand what the writer or orderer did intend; so that here is nothing done beyond the power of the agent, nor any thing in the effect which was not in the cause, either formally or eminently. But for a company of atoms, of which no one hath sense or reason, to become sensitive and rational by mere conjunct motion, is an effect beyond the power of the supposed cause.

But as some think so basely of our noblest acts as to think that contempered agitated atoms can perform them, that have no natural, intellective, or sensitive virtue or power in themselves, so others think so highly of them as to take them to be the acts only of God, or some universal soul, in the body of man; and so that there is no life, sense, or reason in the world but God himself; (or such an universal soul;) and so that either every man is God, as to his soul, or that it is the body only that is to be called man as distinct from God. But this is the self-ensnaring and self-perplexing temerity of busy, bold, and arrogant heads, that know not their own capacity and measure. And on the like reasons they must at last come, with others, to say that all passive matter also is God, and that God is the universe, consisting of an active soul and passive body. As if God were no cause, and could make nothing, or nothing with life, or sense, or reason.

But why depart we from things certain by such presumptions as these? Is it not certain that there

are baser creatures in the world than men or angels? Is it not certain that one man is not another ? Is it not certain that some men are in torment of body and mind? And will it be a comfort to a man in such torment to tell him that he is God? or that he is part of an universal soul? Would not a man on the rack, or in the stone, or other misery say, call me by what name you please, that easeth not my pain; if I be part of God, or an universal soul, I am sure I am a tormented miserable part! And if you could make me believe that God hath some parts which are serpents, toads, devils, or wicked or tormented men, you must give me other senses, and perceptive powers, before it will comfort me, to hear that I am such a part. And if God had wicked and tormented parts on earth, why may he not have such, and I be one of them hereafter? And if I be a holy and happy part of God, or of an universal soul on earth, why may not I hope to be such hereafter?

We deny not but that God is the continued first cause of all being whatsoever; and that the branches and fruit depend not as effects so much on the causality of the stock and roots, as the creature doth on God; and that it is an impious conceit to think that the world, or any part of it, is a being independent and separated totally from God, or subsisting without his continued causation. But cannot God cause as a Creator, by making that which is not himself? This yieldeth the self-deceiver no other honour nor happiness but what equally belongeth to a devil, to a fly or worm, to a dunghill, or to the worst and most miserable man!

As man's soul is a SUBSTANCE, so is it a substance differenced formally from all inferior sub

stances by an innate (indeed essential) power, virtue, or faculty of vital action, intellection, and free will: for we find all these acts performed by it, as motion, light, and heat are by the fire or sun. And if any should think that these actions are like those of a musician, compounded of the agent's (principal and organical several) parts, could he prove it, no more would follow, but that the lower powers (the sensitive or spirits) are to the higher as a passive organ, receiving its operations; and that the intellectual soul hath the power of causing intellection and volition by its action on the inferior parts, as a man can cause such motions of his lute as shall be melody (not to it, but) to himself; and consequently, that as music is but a lower operation of man, (whose proper acts of intellection and volition are above it,) so intellection and volition in the body are not the noblest acts of the soul, but it performeth them by an eminent power, which can do greater things. And if this could be proved, what would it tend to the unbeliever's ends, or to the disadvantage of our hopes and comforts?

That man's soul at death is not annihilated, even the Atomists and Epicureans will grant, who think that no atom in the universe is annihilated. And we that see not only the sun and heavens continued, but every grain of matter, and that compounds are changed by dissolution of parts, and rarefaction or migration, &c., and not by annihilation, have no reason to dream that God will annihilate one soul, though he can do it if he please, yea, and annihilate all the world: it is a thing beyond a rational expectation.

And a destruction by the dissolution of the parts of the soul we need not fear: for either an intel

lectual spirit is divisible and partible, or not; if not, we need not fear it; if it be, either it is a thing that nature tendeth to, or not. But that nature doth not tend to it is evident: for there is naturally so strange and strong an inclination to unity, and averseness to separation in all things, that even earth and stones, that have no other known natural motion, have yet an aggregative motion in their gravitation; but if you will separate the parts from the rest, it must be by force. And water is yet more averse from partition without force, and more inclined to union than earth, and air than water, and fire than air; so that he that will cut a sunbeam into pieces, and make many of one, must be an extraordinary agent. And surely spirits, even intellectual spirits, will be no less averse from partition, and inclined to keep their unity, than fire or a sunbeam is; so that, naturally, it is not a thing to be feared that it should fall into pieces.

And he that will say, that the God of nature will change, and overcome the nature that he hath made, must give us good proofs of it, or it is not to be feared. And if he should do it as a punishment, we must find such a punishment somewhere threatened, either in his natural or supernatural law, which we do not, and therefore need not fear it.

But if it were to be feared that souls were partible, and would be broken into parts, this would be no destruction of them, either as to their substance, powers, form, or action, but only a breaking of one soul into many: for being not compounded of heterogeneal parts, but as simple elements of homogeneal only, as every atom of earth is earth, and every drop of water in the sea is water, and ever

particle of air and fire is air and fire, and have all the properties of earth, water, air, and fire; so would it be with every particle of an intellectual spirit. But who can see cause to dream of such a partition, never threatened by God.

And that souls lose not their formal powers or virtues we have great reason to conceive, because they are their natural essence, not as mixed but simple substances. And though some imagine that the passive elements may, by attenuation, or incrassation, be transmitted one into another, yet we see that earth is still earth, and water is water, and air is air; and their conceit hath no proof: and, were it proved, it would but prove that none of these are a first or proper element. But what should an intellectual spirit be changed into? How should it lose its formal power? not by nature, for its nature hath nothing that tendeth to deterioration, or decay, or self-destruction. The sun doth not decay by its wonderful motion, light, and heat; and why should spirits? Not by God's destroying them, or changing their nature; for though all things are in constant motion or revolution, he continueth the natures of the simple beings, and showeth us that he delighteth in a constancy of operations, insomuch that hence Aristotle thought the world eternal. And God hath made no law that threateneth to do it as a penalty. Therefore to dream that intellectual spirits shall be turned into other things and lose their essential formal powers, which specify them, is without and against all sober reason. Let them first but prove that the sun loseth motion, light, and heat, and is turned into air, or water, or earth. Such changes are beyond a rational fear.

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