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their error.

with it the effential and moft obvious proper- SERM. ties of all matter, this would have corrected IV. But the cafe is very different of those who therefore exclude fpirit, because they exclude original contrivance and agency; who not only profess, but their scheme neceffarily requires them to do fo, as the chief fecurity of their grand principle against the exiftence of God, that there is no being in the universe but matter, from the modifications whereof all appearances arife, even intelligence itself. Which scheme is effectually refuted, if it be prov'd that the fimpleft and moft common qualities of matter upon which its appearances depend, must be attributed to energy of an active immaterial principle. Secondly, The beings which are endu'd with life, sense and understanding, in a limited degree of perfection, are spiritual; that is, the vital, fenfitive and intelligent principles in them are spiritual. Indeed it would feem impoffible in the nature of things, that matter should by any modification, that is, any motion and change of the figure and order of its parts, be exalted even into animal fenfation, much less into pure intellection abstracted from any fenfible quality. The reasoning of fome ancient writers is very ftrong to prove that the percipient of material objects and their VOL. I. H · fenfible

the

SERM. fenfible qualities cannot be itself material. IV. For if it were, the perceptive faculty muft either be lodg'd in one fingle indivifible point; or in every point of the extended fubftance; or

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every part muft receive only a feveral part of the image or impreffion, and the perception be the refult of the whole compar'd and united together. The first of these fuppofitions is an evident abfurdity, there being no fuch thing as an indivifible point or particle of matter; and if there were, how can it be conceiv'd that a fingle atom in every animal should be only fenfitive, the reft wholly incapable of that privilege; that it should alike receive the impreffion of all magnitudes; and that it should be invariably permanent through the whole life, when the other particles of matter which enter into the conftitution are in a perpetual flux. That the whole perceptive power or the entire fenfation, is not in every part of the supposed material soul, is as manifest; for upon that fuppofition, an animal would be, not a fingle percipient, but a collection of them; and the perception itself must be various, compounded of many; contrary to what we know it is by our own consciousness of its perfect fimplicity. And Laftly, to say that every part of the perceiving extended substance, receives a feveral part of the image or impreffion

impreffion of the external object, will no way SER M. account for perception; because perception IV. being fingle, it must, on that supposition, be the refult of the whole united; and in order to that union, the parts must be brought to an indivisible point, properly the percipient, which has been already fhewn to be abfurd. If this reafoning be thought not obvious enough, (I have however fet it in the clearest light I could,) yet it will naturally appear to any attentive perfon, very unreasonable to think, if not altogether unconceivable, that a body put into any form, (being really no more than an aggregate of parts void of life and fenfe,) fhould by any poffible difpofition of its parts, be rais'd to a capacity of animal fenfation, the idea of which has not the least affinity with divifibility, magnitude, figure or any quality of matter. If it be fo, we must

conclude that there are beings in the world effentially different from matter. But the argument for the immateriality of the human foul will appear ftill ftronger, if we confider the exercise of its purely intellectual powers. We have the ideas of matter by our senses, representing to our minds its fenfible qualities, from which we infer its particular kind of existence, as the occafion, or fomewhat which has the power of exciting thofe ideas. But attending

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SER M. attending to the exercises of our own minds,. IV. and reflecting on them, we have ideas of an intirely different kind, which do not take in

any
of the properties of matter, fuch as foli-
dity, divifibility and figure, nor its fecondary
qualities, as hardness, colour and the like,
nor the idea of motion. Of this fort are per-
ception, consciousness, the affections of the
mind, its defires and volitions or felf-deter-
minations, and the more complex qualities of
gratitude, juftice, generofity, mercy, and other
virtues; the fubject of these we call fpirit. Now
these two kinds of ideas are as different as any
can poffibly be, without any mutual relation
or agreement at all; and if we may not from
thence infer a real difference between the sub-
jects of the properties which are represented
by fuch effentially distinct ideas, there can be
no certainty of human knowledge.

If these two points be fettled upon clear evidence, that the active principle which form'd and governs the corporeal world is a fpirit, and that the animating principles of the fenfitive and rational life are spirits, we muft infer that God alfo is a Spirit. For either he himself is the immediate forming and directing Caufe of the corporeal system and its appearances; or the active principle, which is the immediate Caufe, is deriv'd from him;

and

and all the intelligent agents in the universe, SER M. not abfolutely perfect nor eternal and unori- IV. ginated, (of which there is a numberless variety,) being spirits, cannot be the accidental or neceffary refult of certain difpofitions in the parts of matter, but muft proceed from an original intelligent and powerful Spirit: For that no perfection can belong to the effect which does not, in the fame, or a more eminent degree belong to the Cause. But even upon fuppofition that the argument were not conclufive with respect to fenfitive and inferior rational beings, and that it were not impaffible for a particular fyftem of matter to be endu'd with all the faculties of the human foul, yet ftill it holds concerning the fupreme original Cause of all things. For that supposed poffibility, (which some learned men allow, at the same time firmly believing that the Deity is, and neceffarily must be immaterial,) means no more than that we are fo ignorant of the effences and properties of things, as not to be fure of an utter inconfiftency, in fuppofing that Omnipotence may endue a part of matter with the capacity of thought: But that matter merely of itself, and without the agency superior power, has not that capacity, and confequently, that original intelligence cannot be corporeal, is fufficiently evident.

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