idea upon the brain, the impreffion may be so strong as to overpower all other impreffions. This we know is actually the cafe with the eye. Let a man look attentively upon any very bright object, and immediately afterwards turn his eyes upon whatever other objects he pleases, and he either will not fee them at all, or they will all appear to be of the fame colour; fo that, in this violent affection of the eye, fainter impreffions are not fenfibly perceived, though they cannot but be made upon the eye in thofe circumstances, as well as others. Now the brain is of the very fame fubftance with the retina, and optic nerves; and therefore must be fubject to a fimilar affection.

This writer explains these cases by fuppofing that the mind "voluntarily employs "itfelf, while it is thus inattentive to things prefent, in the earnest confideration of fome

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things that are abfent." But voliti n is not at all concerned in the case; for nothing can be more evident than that this abfence of mind is altogether an involuntary thing. It is not choice that either leads to it, or prolongs it; for this would imply that the mind had been aware of other objects having folicited its attention, and that it had peremptorily refused to give any attention to them. Whereas at the clofe of a reverie of this kind, the mind is always inconfcious of any foreign objects having obtruded themselves upon it at all, juft as in the cafe of found fleep.

OB

OBJECTION XV. From the corruptibility of Matter.

The greatest cause of that averfion which we feel to the fuppofition of the foul being material, is our apprehension, that it will then be liable to corruption, which we imagine it cannot be if it be immaterial. But, for any thing that we know, neither of these inferences are just, and therefore no advantage whatever is, in fact, gained by the modern hypothefis. All things material are not liable to corruption, if by corruption be meant diffolution, except in circumftances to which they are not naturally expofed. It is only very compound bodies that are properly liable to corruption, and only vegetable and animal fubftances ever become properly putrid, and offenfive, which is the real fource of the objection.

It is poffible, however, that even a human body may be wholly exempt from corruption, though thofe we have at prefent are not, as is evident from the account that the apoftle Paul gives of the bodies with which we shall rife from the dead; when from earthly they will become fpiritual; from corruptible, incorruptible; and from mortal, immortal.

Befides, how does it follow that an immaterial fubftance cannot be liable to decay or diffolution, as well as a material one? In fact, all the reason that any person could ever

have for imagining this, must have been that an immaterial fubftance, being, in all refpects, the reverse of a material one, must be incorruptible, because the former is corruptible. But till we know fomething positive concerning this fuppofed immaterial fubftance, and not merely its not being matter, it is impoffible to pronounce whether it may not be liable to change, and be diffolved, as well as a material fubftance. Neceffary immutability, is an attribute that cannot be demonftrated except of God only; and he who made all things, material or immaterial, may have fubjected them to whatever laws he pleafes, and may have made the one as much fubject to change and decay as the other, for any thing that we know to the contrary: fo that all our flattering notions of the fimplicity and incorruptibility of immaterial fubftances are mere fancy and chimera, unfupported by any evidence whatever. The foul has been fupposed to be neceffarily incorruptible, because it is indivifible, but that argument I prefume was fufficiently answered, when it was fhewn that ideas which have parts, as most of our ideas manifeftly have, cannot exist in a foul that has no parts; fo that the fubject of thought in man cannot be that fimple and indivifible, and confequently not that indif cerptible thing that it has been imagined to

be.

SECTION

SECTION IX.

Of the Objection to the Syftem of Materialifm derived from the Confideration of the DIVINE ESSENCE.

T will be faid, that if the principle of

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thought in man may be a property of a material fubftance, the divine Being himself may be material alfo; whereas, it is now almost universally believed to be the doctrine of revelation, that the Deity is, in the ftricteft fense of the word, an immaterial fubftance, incapable of local prefence; though it will be fhewn in its proper place, that the facred writers fay nothing about such a substance.

Confidering how much this fubject is above all human comprehenfion, it is no wonder that the most oppofite opinions fhould have been maintained with refpect to it. But this confideration, at the fame time that it ought to check our boldness, ought, likewise, to have taught us mutual candour and indulgence.

I am fully aware how difficult it is to exprefs myself with clearnefs on a fubject fo extremely obfcure, and how hazardous it is to advance the very little that any man can fay on this fubject. But I fhall not, on this account, decline fpeaking freely and fully to every difficulty that either has been urged against

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against the fyftem of the materiality of man, or that has occurred to myfelf with respect to it; and the objections which arife from the confideration of the divine effence, are of such particular confequence, that I shall treat of them in this separate section. I only beg those who are friends to freedom of thought and inquiry, to attend to the few confiderations that I fhall offer on this very difficult fubject.

In the first place, it must be confeffed, with awful reverence, that we know but little of ourselves, and therefore much less of our Maker, even with refpect to his attributes. We know but little of the works of God, and therefore certainly much lefs of his ef fenie.

In fact, we have no proper idea of any effence whatever. Our afcribing impenetrability to matter might make us imagine that we had fome kind of idea of its fubftance, though this was fallacious; but now that, by a rigid attention to the phenomena, and a trict adherence to the laws of philofophizing, we have been obliged to deny that matter has any fuch property, but merely powers of attraction and repulfion, it will hardly be pretended that we have any proper idea of the fubftance even of matter, confidered as divefted of all its properties. The term fubftance, or effence, therefore, is, in fact, nothing more than a help to expression, as we may say, but not at all to conception,

We