on have we to conclude that He could not order them as well to
be produced in a subject we cannot conceive capable of them, as well as
in a subject we cannot conceive the motion of matter can any way operate
upon? I say not this, that I would any way lessen the belief of the
soul's immateriality: I am not here speaking of probability, but
knowledge, and I think not only that it becomes the modesty of
philosophy not to pronounce magisterially, where we want that evidence
that can produce knowledge; but also, that it is of use to us to discern
how far our knowledge does reach; for the state we are at present in,
not being that of vision, we must in many things content ourselves
with faith and probability: and in the present question, about
the Immateriality of the Soul, if our faculties cannot arrive at
demonstrative certainty, we need not think it strange. All the great
ends of morality and religion are well enough secured, without
philosophical proofs of the soul's immateriality; since it is evident,
that he who made us at the beginning to subsist here, sensible
intelligent beings, and for several years continued us in such a state,
can and will restore us to the like state of sensibility in another
world, and make us capable there to receive the retribution he has
designed to men, according to their doings in this life. [And therefore
it is not of such mighty necessity to determine one way or the other, as
some, over-zealous for or against the immateriality of the soul, have
been forward to make the world believe. Who, either on the one side,
indulging too much their thoughts immersed altogether in matter, can
allow no existence to what is not material: or who, on the other side,
finding not COGITATION within the natural powers of matter, examined
over and over again by the utmost intention of mind, have the confidence
to conclude--That Omnipotency itself cannot give perception and thought
to a substance which has the modification of solidity. He that considers
how hardly sensation is, in our thoughts, reconcilable to extended
matter; or existence to anything that has no extension at all, will
confess that he is very far from certainly knowing what his soul is.
It is a point which seems to me to be put out of the reach of our
knowledge: and he who will give himself leave to consider freely, and
look into the dark and intricate part of each hypothesis, will scarce
find his reason able to determine him fixedly for or again