it does not
think.

Is there another life for this creature, or is there none? The question
has been posed, and has not yet been completely answered.

Some say that this creature must have a soul, because its father and
mother had one. But by this reasoning one would prove that if it came
into the world without a nose it would be deemed to have one, because
its father and its mother had noses.

A woman gives birth to child with no chin, its forehead is receding and
rather black, its nose is slim and pointed, its eyes are round, it bears
not a bad resemblance to a swallow; the rest of its body, nevertheless,
is made like ours. The parents have it baptised; by a plurality of votes
it is considered a man and possessor of an immortal soul. But if this
ridiculous little figure has pointed nails and beak-like mouth, it is
declared a monster, it has no soul, and is not baptised.

It is well known that in London in 1726 there was a woman who gave birth
every week to a rabbit. No difficulty was made about refusing baptism to
this child, despite the epidemic mania there was for three weeks in
London for believing that this poor rogue was making wild rabbits. The
surgeon who attended her, St. Andre by name, swore that nothing was
more true, and people believed him. But what reason did the credulous
have for refusing a soul to this woman's children? she had a soul, her
children should be provided with souls also; whether they had hands,
whether they had paws, whether they were born with a little snout or
with a face; cannot the Supreme Being bestow the gift of thought and
sensation on a little I know not what, born of a woman, shaped like a
rabbit, as well as to a little I know not what, shaped like a man? Shall
the soul that was ready to lodge in this woman's foetus go back again
into space?

Locke makes the sound observation, about monsters, that one must not
attribute immortality to the exterior of a body; that the form has
nothing to do with it. This immortality, he says, is no more attached to
the form of his face or his chest, than to the way his beard is dressed
or his coat cut.

He asks what is the exact measure of deformity by which you can
recognize whether or no a child has a soul? What is the precise degree
at which it must be declared a monster and deprived of a soul?

One asks still further what would be a soul which never has any but
fantastic ideas? there are some which never escape from them. Are they
wort