istence, during this life, as the situation in which he was placed could procure him, without troubling his head with any metaphysical researches concerning the deity, or with moral duties, except in so far as they would conduce to his well-being in this world. This, in my opinion, would exclude all notions of religion; because religion would hold forth no motives if there were no hopes beyond the grave. There might, indeed, be some sort of worship, as there was among the heathens, to procure worldly prosperity and temporal advantages, but it would go no further. It is, therefore, of the greatest moment to enquire what hopes of a future state we can derive from the light of nature.

One argument in favour of a future state is founded on the immateriality and spiritual nature of the soul. Much ink has been very unprofitably wasted in controversy about matter and spirit, which, after all that has been said, is little better than a verbal dispute. We know nothing of the substance, and are not acquainted with all the properties of matter; of spirit, we know nothing at all; it is an imaginary being, to which we ascribe whatever we judge incompatible with matter. The idea we have of it is merely negative. When we say the soul is spiritual, we only mean that it is different from matter; which explains nothing. If we should say, as we ought, that the soul being endowed with properties not to be found in other substances, must differ from them either in essence or modification, the question would be properly stated.

It might, to be sure, be argued, ad infinitum, whether the difference lay in the essence or the modification, which is the only point in dispute, and is a mere philosophical question. For, let the soul be material or spiritual, let it be a mode or a substance, it owes its existence to the Supreme Being, who may continue or extinguish it as he sees fit: nothing can exist independent of him, and there is nothing whose existence he cannot uphold.

But the immaterialists contend that the soul, being spiritual, must consequently be immortal, while the materialists assert that, as it depends on the organization of the body, it must dissolve and perish with it. Both these inferences are presumptuous and inconclusive. Will the advocates for the immortality of the soul contend that God cannot put an end to a being which he has created? and, whether we choose to call it spiritual or by any other name which conveys no determinate idea, that it must necessarily exist through all ages, whether he will or no? Besides, the metaphysical arguments which are urged in support of that system, if they prove any thing, prove a great deal too much, as they are equally applicable to the souls of the brute creation as to those of men, and extend, in a great degree, even to vegetable life.

On the other hand, it would be the height of presumption in the materialist to contend that, though the soul consisted of matter organized and modified in a particular manner, God could not, on the dissolution of the body, transfer this particle of organized

matter into another receptacle, and preserve its consciousness and identity in a future state of existence. Such a transfer and continuation are certainly no more inconceivable than its original creation.

It is, therefore, of little consequence whether the soul is a spiritual substance, different from the body and mysteriously united to it, or whether it is matter peculiarly organized. In either case it derives its origin or its organization from the Divine Being, who, to endue man with life and thought, could unite another substance to the body, or so organize its material parts as to enable him to move and to think. In either case it is the immediate act of the deity, and whether we call it matter or spirit, the properties of the soul remain the same, and must always continue subject to the will of him who created it. Immortality, therefore, is not the necessary consequence of the spirituality of the soul, neither will its dissolution unavoidably follow from its being material. The power of the Almighty extends to spirit, however we may define it, as well as to matter: both are the work of his hands, and subject to his will.

Setting aside, therefore, this verbal distinction, we must consider the frame and nature of man, and, from natural appearances, and the qualities and faculties of his body and mind, endeavour to form some conjecture with regard to his future destination.

The soul, whether material or spiritual, is so inti

mately connected with the body, that it is difficult to determine where the functions of the one end and those of the other begin. The ideas and sensations of the soul are communicated through the organs of the body. As those organs are developed and arrive at maturity, the soul expands, and keeps an equal progress with them, grows with their growth and strengthens with their strength; it sympathises with the body in health and sickness; and, as the faculty of thinking ripens, so it decays with the body, and, to all appearance, ceases at the time of death; and there is no more reason to believe that the soul continues to exist after the dissolution of the body, than that it existed previous to its birth. All appearances, therefore, are against the idea of the soul or any part of man continuing to subsist after death.

Another argument against the natural immortality of the soul may be adduced from the brute creation.

The mechanism of their bodies, though different in some respects, bears the strongest analogy to that of man; the manner in which they come into the world, their mode of subsistence while they live, and the causes and effects of their dissolution, appear to be exactly similar. Nor does their similarity to the human race end here: their faculties, though inferior in degree, are much the same in their nature. They have perception, feeling, the power of spontaneous motion, memory, and some degree of reflection. And, perhaps, in their intellectual powers, if I may so call them, brutes differ from one another as much as the most sagacious of them differs from the rudest

of the human species. That they are not destitute of ideas is evident from the strong proofs of intelligence they manifest, and their capacity of being trained and instructed, as dogs and various animals are: and there is no doubt that the wild part of them acquire sagacity by experience. by experience. In their birth, their life, and death, they resemble man; their bodies undergo exactly the same change and appearance when they are deprived of life: and where the phenomena are so exactly similar, it can hardly be concluded that the one is mortal and the other immortal.

But, notwithstanding these appearances, it may be urged, that a being so excellent as man, so superior in his intellectual and moral qualifications, cannot be the creature of a day, and that he would not have been endowed with such eminent qualities if his existence had been confined to this short and transitory life. That there is some weight in this argument I will not deny: but, on the other hand, may it not be suspected that, in this respect, we are not, perhaps, impartial witnesses, but that we behold our supposed perfections and imaginary importance through the magnifying medium of self-love?

If we but reflect that the Being who made us can, out of these stones raise up children unto Abraham,-that he formed us with as little expense or difficulty as the meanest worm that crawls upon the earth, from which, perhaps, we do not so much differ in his sight as our vanity leads us to imagine,-it will diminish the exaggerated ideas we are apt to enter