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.
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