For as
to this point of being the same self, it matters not whether this
present self be made up of the same or other substances- I being as
much concerned, and as justly accountable for any action that was done
a thousand years since, appropriated to me now by this
self-consciousness, as I am for what I did the last moment.
17. Self depends on consciousness, not on substance. Self is that
conscious thinking thing,- whatever substance made up of, (whether
spiritual or material, simple or compounded, it matters not)- which is
sensible or conscious of pleasure and pain, capable of happiness or
misery, and so is concerned for itself, as far as that consciousness
extends. Thus every one finds that, whilst comprehended under that
consciousness, the little finger is as much a part of himself as
what is most so. Upon separation of this little finger, should this
consciousness go along with the little finger, and leave the rest of
the body, it is evident the little finger would be the person, the
same person; and self then would have nothing to do with the rest of
the body. As in this case it is the consciousness that goes along with
the substance, when one part is separate from another, which makes the
same person, and constitutes this inseparable self: so it is in
reference to substances remote in time.
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