I know that people whose thoughts are immersed in matter,
and have so subjected their minds to their senses that they seldom
reflect on anything beyond them, are apt to say, they cannot
comprehend a thinking thing, which perhaps is true: but I affirm, when
they consider it well, they can no more comprehend an extended thing.
23. Cohesion of solid parts in body as hard to be conceived as
thinking in a soul. If any one says he knows not what it is thinks
in him, he means he knows not what the substance is of that thinking
thing: No more, say I, knows he what the substance is of that solid
thing. Further, if he says he knows not how he thinks, I answer,
Neither knows he how he is extended, how the solid parts of body are
united, or cohere together to make extension. For though the
pressure of the particles of air may account for the cohesion of
several parts of matter that are grosser than the particles of air,
and have pores less than the corpuscles of air, yet the weight or
pressure of the air will not explain, nor can be a cause of the
coherence of the particles of air themselves. And if the pressure of
the aether, or any subtiler matter than the air, may unite, and hold
fast together, the parts of a particle of air, as well as other
bodies, yet it cannot make bonds for itself, and hold together the
parts that make up every the least corpuscle of that materia subtilis.
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