Or, would this ingenious writer, have his Leader affix the idea of materiality to his curious ratiocinations and metaphyfical difcuffions of his fubject? are not those abilities, he therein displays, much above the reach of the mechanical system?

To proceed, I am extremely willing to allow him his opinion, that the whole current of the fcriptures, is, that the whole perfon, and not the feparate existence of the Soul is intend. ed, in God's being the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Their perfons were living with God.a

The notion of a separate state, with me, feems not at all defenfible, either from fcripture, or the nature of man. The refurrection, methinks, must be of the proper perfon that furvives the death of the body.

e

The platonic philosophy which, he complains, did so much debauch the fentiments of the FATHERS; and therefore will allow him to pay them but little regard; has alfo thus far my hearty concurrence. Yet, I cannot reject those rational fublime things, faid, by Socrates and Plato, about the future existence of man. e. g. how ftriking that of Socrates! I am in good

good hopes that fomething will exist to the dead, and that that state is much better for the good, than the bad. Again, I believe that God and the very image of life, are the only things that must be confeffed to be immortal and indiffolvable.

But after all, should we admit the propagation of Soul, or rather of life, it will not, upon his own hypothefis, be any thing material; but the afflatus feu fpiritus vivificans materium &c.-The plastic power in the fecondary caufes or immediate agents in the production of living creatures, derived originally from the divine afflatus, the λoy λογα Tλατinos referred unto, Pf. cxix. 73. and defcribed Job x. 9, 10, 11, 12.—Not made out of matter, as its conflituent principle, but made, as it were, in the lap, or bofom of matter: The divine quickning afflatus with which men are endowed and actuated. Thefe reprefentations compared with the very notion of life centered in God, muft unavoidably infer immortality. For our life is bid in God until the refurrection, when it shall again Spring from him, as an emanant ray of omnipotence." -Once more,—And fo indeed is life or the

human pow

breath of life, as light is called the light of the fun, diftinguished from the body as much as motion is from matter, and it is likewife uncapable of diffolution by any er, because it centers in God. And yet, be will not allow the Soul to be, a fpiritual fubftance united to the body.

The above definitions of life or Soul, will nevertheless confift with its being immaterial and capable of becoming immortal; as Job fais, there is a Spirit in man. Call it this plaftic power, divine afflatus, or what you will; whatever it be in propagation, it only becomes moral and immortal, by its advanced ability to converfe with truth and embrace its evidence: for the inspiration of the almighty gives man understanding. Or as life finally centers in God, so it must be excited and exercifed in all its intelligence. and rationality, by the will of God; elfe it cannot attain to understanding. WisDOM describes and determines the man to be a fool, who does not follow religioufly her divine precepts. And the prophet fais, men will perijh for lack of knowledge. Hof. iv. 6. If. xxvii. 11. Job xxxvi. 12. Prov.

xix. 2.

D

What

a P. 414.

e P. 415.7

What is there so very wide, in the definitions of Dr. Coward, from the universal opinion of the human Soul being a spiritual fubftance united to a body? he himself sais, it is not matter.—that life is as diftinguishable from body, as motion from matter, and uncapable of diffolution by any human power. That it is the divine afflatus, or vivifying spirit of matter. The diftinctions are, with me, without a difference.

Indeed there is a notion of life or Soul advanced by this Philofopher, Metaphyfitian, and Ethic, which I do not understand; and that is, the Souls of children being of a supereminent innocence and goodness; he can fuppofe an immediate tranflation of these to bappiness among the favourites of Almighty God. -This has the idea of rational and moral excellence, or ability annexed, which does not come within the compafs of my conceptions. For I should suppose them, in no fenfe moral agents, or accountable. And fo indeed fais this fame writer,-Infants, at firft, feem to be mere machines.

But why all this conteft about the Soul as material and mortal, because the animal life

is

eP. 109.

a P. 423. 424.

is propagated? and why fo much difficulty imagined about the refurrection-body? whilft we are affured, that the animalcula or flamina of the man, is, in the original state of its existence, but as a point! even the whole of that system, in the lap of which, the afflatus, or plastic, vital power is placed. And whilst also we are affured, that the body, in its growth, has nothing added but what was foreign to that original ftamina, in the perpetual acceffions and enlargements, or fupplies of that organized fyftem. And when it is likewife confeffed, that the refurrectionbody will be a changed one.