Agitation of this Matter by what I have said of Gunpowder It will not be difficult to see that 't is absotutely necessary that the Matters acting infinitely more upon the Surface of hard Bodies that it encompasses and compresses than within the same Bodies it must be the Cause of their Inflexibility or the Resistance we feel when we endeavour to break them Now as there is always many Particles of this Invisible Matter which passes through the Pores of hard Bodies they make them not only hard as we have already explained but further are the Cause that some are Springy and Elastick others stand bent and that others are fluid and liquid and in fine that they are not only the Cause of the Force that hard Bodies have to continue united together but also that fluid Bodies have to separate that is are the Cause that some Bodies are hard and others fluid But because 't is absolutely necessary to know distinctly the Physicks of Descartes the Figure of his Elements and Parts which compose particular Bodies to give a Reason why certain Bodies are stiff and some others pliable I shall not stay here to explain it Those who have read the Works of this Philosopher will easily enough imagine what may be the Cause thereof which I could not explain without great Difficulty and those who are unacquainted with this Author would but confusedly understand the Reason that I might bring for it Nor shall I also stop here to resolve a great Number of Difficulties that I foresee may be brought against what I have established Because if those that raise them have no Knowledge of true Physicks I should only tire and displease them instead of satisfying them But if they are learned Persons their Objections being stronger I could not answer them but by a great Number of Figures and long Discourses so that I believe I ought to desire those that find any Difficulty in what I have advanced very carefully to read this Chapter over again for I hope if they do so and meditate on it as much as is necessary all their Objections will vanish But if they find my Request incommodious they may omit it for there is no great Danger in being ignorant of the Cause of Bodies inflexibility I speak not here of Contiguity For 't is plain Contiguous things touch so little that there is always much Subtle Matter which passes between them and which endeavours to continue its Motion in a right Line to prevent their uniting For the Union that is observed between Marbles which have been polished one upon another I have explained it and 't is easie to see that although this Subtle Matter always passes between these two Parts how united soever they may be the Air cannot pass it and therefore 't is that which compresses and binds those two Pieces of Marble together and causes some Trouble to disunite them if we do not make them slide off one another It is plain from all this that the Continuity Contiguity and Union of two Marbles will only be the same thing in a Void neither have we different Idea's of them so that 't is as much as to say we do not understand them if we make them absolutely differ without any Relation to the Bodies which surround them Here now follows some Reflexions upon Descartes's Sentiment and the Original of his error I call his Opinion an Error because I find no Expedient to defend what he says of the Rules of Motion and Cause of the Hardness of Bodies in many Places at the End of the Second Part of his Principles and it seems to me that I have sufficiently proved the Truth of the contrary Opinion This great Man very distinctly conceived that Matter could not move of it self and that the Natural moving Power of all Bodies was nothing else but the general Will of the Author of Nature and that the Communications of the Motions of Bodies at their mutual Meeting could only proceed from this same Will If we take this for granted we can give no Rules for the different Communication of Motions but by the Proportion that is found between the different Magnitude of Bodies which beat against them since it is impossible to penetrate the Designs of God's Will And because he judges that every thing had Power to continue in the State it was in whether in Motion or Rest because that God by his Will determined this Power always to act after the same manner he concludes that Rest has as much Power to act as Motion So he measures the Effects of the Power of Rest by the Magnitude of Bodies which possessed it as those of the Power of Motion and hence he gave the Rules for the Communication of Motion that are in his Principles and the Cause of the Hardness of Bodies which I have endeavoured to refute It is difficult enough not to be of Descartes's Opinion when we look upon it as he did for once more since the Communication of Motions proceed only from the Will of the Author of Nature and that we see all Bodies continue in the State they are once placed in whether it be Motion or Rest It seems we ought to seek the Rules of the different Communication of Motions at the meeting of Bodies not in the Will of God which is unknown to us but in the Proportion there is between the Magnitudes of these Bodies I do not therefore wonder that Descartes had this Thought but I only wonder that he did not correct it when he had made a farther Advance in his Discoveries and found both Existence and the Effects of the Subtle Matter which environs all Bodies I am surprized that in the 132 Article of the 4th Part he attributes the Elastick Force that certain Bodies have to this subtle Matter and that in Articles 55 and 43 of the Second Part and in other Places he does not attribute it to their Hardness or the Resistance they make when we endeavour to bend or break them but to the rest of their Parts It appears evident to me that the Cause of the Elasticity and Stiffness of certain Bodies is the same with that which gives them the Power of Resistance when we would break them for indeed the Force that we use to break Steel differs but insensibly from that by which we bend it I will not here bring all the Reasons that might be urged to prove these things nor answer to any Difficulties that we might form from hard Bodies making no Sensible Resistance and yet we have some Trouble to bend them For it will be enough to make these Difficulties vanish to consider that the Subtle Matter cannot easily take a new course in Bodies which break when we bend them as in Glass and in tempered Steel and that it cannot more easily do it in Bodies that are composed of branchy Parts which are not brittle as in Gold and Lead And indeed there is no hard bodies which make not some
designed either to maintain the Efficacy of Second Causes or the Nature of Aristotle For although they often spoke after such a manner as favoured Prejudices and the Judgments of the Senses Omnia quippe portenta contra Naturam dicimus esse sed non sunt quomodo enim est contra Naturam quod Dei fit voluntate Cum volantes tanti utique conditorio conditae rei cujusque Natura sit Portentum ergo fit non contra Naturam sed contra quam est nota Natura St. Aug. de Civitate Dei l. 21. c. 8. they sometimes so explained themselves as sufficiently discovered the disposition of their Mind and Heart St. Austin for instance believed the Will of God to be the Power or Nature of every thing as he declares when he speaks thus We are wont to say that Prodigies are against Nature but 't is not true For the Will of the Creator being the Nature of all Creatures how can what is performed by the Will of God be contrary to Nature Miracles or Prodigies therefore are not against Nature but only against what we know of Nature 'T is true St. Austin speaks in many places according to Prejudices But I affirm that proves nothing since we ought to explain literally only such passages as are opposite to Prejudices for the Reasons I have already given If St. Austin in all his Works had never said any thing against the Efficacy of Second Causes but had alwayes favoured this Opinion we might perhaps make use of his Authority to establish it Yet if it does not appear that he ever seriously examined this Question we should alwayes have had Reason to think that his Judgment was not determined upon this Subject and that 't was not impossible but he might be drawn by the impression of his Senses without Reflection to have believed a thing which appeared undoubted until it was carefully examined It is certain for instance that St. Austin alwayes spoke of Beasts as if they had a Soul I don't say a Corporeal one for that Holy Father too well knew the distinction between the Soul and Body to believe there were Corporeal Souls I say a Spiritual Soul for Matter is incapable of Sensation Yet I believe it more reasonable to make use of his Authority to prove that Beasts have no Souls than to prove they have any For from the Principles he has carefully examined and strongly establish'd it manifestly follows they have none Some of St. Austins Principles are these That what has not sinned can never suffer evil Now according to him Pain is the greatest evil and Beasts suffer it That the most noble cannot have the least noble for its end But with him the Soul of Beasts is Spiritual and more noble than the Body and yet has no other end than the Body That what is Spiritual is Immortal and the Soul of Beasts that 's Spiritual is subject to Death There are many such like Principles in the Works of St. Austin from whence it may be concluded that Beasts have no such Spiritual Soul as he admits in them See c. 22 23. de Anima ejus origine as is shown by Ambrose Victor in his Sixth Volume of Christian Philosophy But the Sentiment that Beasts have a Soul or feel Pain when they are beaten being agreeable to Prejudices for there 's no Child who does not believe it we have alwayes reason to think that St. Austin speaks upon this matter according to the general Opinion and never seriously examined the Question and that if he had but begun to doubt and make any reflection upon it he would not have said a thing which is so contrary to his Principles Thus although the Fathers should alwayes have favoured the Efficacy of Second Causes perhaps we should not have been obliged to have had any regard to their Opinion if it had appeared that they had not carefully examined the matter And that what they should have said had been only a Consequence of the Language which is formed and established upon Prejudice But 't is certainly the contrary For the Fathers the most Pious Persons and those who have been best instructed in Religion have commonly snown by some places of their Works what was the disposition of theis Mind and Heart in respect to this matter The most Learned and also the greatest number of Divines seeing on one side that the Holy Scripture was contrary to the Efficacy of Second Causes and on the other that the impression of the Causes publick Laws and chiefly the Philosophy of Aristotle established it For Aristotle thought that God did not concern himself in Sublunary Affairs because it was unworthy his grandeur And that Nature which he supposed in all Bodies was sufficient to produce what happened here below The Divines I say have found this Medium to reconcile Faith with the Heathen Philosophy and Reason with the Senses that Second Causes do nothing except God concurs with them But because this immediate concourse whereby God acts with Second Causes includes great difficulties some Philosophers have rejected it pretending that in order to their acting 't was enough if God preserved them with the same vertue he at first created them And because this Opinion is absolutely conformable to Prejudice and because the operation of God in Second Causes is not sensible it is therefore commonly received by the Vulgar and by those who apply themselves more to the Physicks of the Antients than to Divinity and the Meditation of the Truth The generality of the World believe that God at first Created all things and gave them all the necessary qualities or faculties for their preservation That he has for instance given the first Motions to Matter and afterwards left it to it self to produce by the Communication of its Motions this variety of admirable forms We commonly suppose that Bodies can move one another and even attribute this Opinion to Des Cartes although he expresly speaks against it in the 36th and 37th Articles of the Second Part of his Philosophical Principles Though Man cannot hinder himself from acknowledging that the Creatures depend upon God yet he lessens this dependence as much as possible either through a secret aversion to God or a wretched stupidity and insensibility in respect to his operation But as this Sentiment is chiefly received by those who have not much studied Religion and who often rather follow their Senses and the Authority of Aristotle than their Reason and that of the Holy Scriptures we have not so much reason to fear its establishment in the Minds of those who have any love for Truth and Religion For a little Application in the Examination of this Opinion will easily discover its falsity But that Notion of the immediate concourse of God to each action of Second Causes seems to agree with those passages of Scripture which often attribute the same effect both to God and the Creatures We must consider then that there are
places in Scripture where God is only said to act Ego sum Dominus sayes Isaiah faciens OMNIA extendens Coelos SOLVS stabiliens terram chap. 44.24 NVLLVS mecum A Mother animated with the Spirit of God sayes to her Children that it was not she who formed them Nescio qualiter in utero meo aparuistis singulorum membra NON EGO IPSA COMPEGI Mac. 7.22 23. sed Mundi Creator c. She does not say with Aristotle and the Peripatetic Schools that 't was she and the Sun who gave them birth but the Creator of the Vniverse Now this Opinion that 't is God only who works and forms Children in the Womb is neither conformable to Prejudices or the common Notions Therefore according to the Principle I have before established these passages must be explain'd literally But on the contrary the Opinion of the Efficacy of Second Causes being conformable to the common Notion and impression of the Senses Sol homo generant hominem Arist Phys ausc l. 2. c. 2. See St. Th. upon this Text. although we should find such passages as expresly tell us that Second Causes act of themselves alone they would be of no force when compared with these Concourse therefore is not sufficient to reconcile the different passages of the Scripture and all Force Power and Efficacy must be ascribed to God But although the immediate concourse of God with Second Causes should be proper to reconcile these different Texts I know not whether it ought to be admitted after all For the Sacred Books were not made for the Divines of these times but for the Jews So that if the Jews were not formerly sufficiently inlightened or subtle enough to imagine such a concourse as is admitted in our School-Divinity and to reconcile a thing that the most able Divines have had much trouble to explain it follows methinks that the Holy Scripture which attributed to God and to him only the production and preservation of all things would have thrown them into Error and that the Holy Penmen of these Books would have spoke to Men not only in an unknown but deceitful Language For by telling them that God does all things they would only have intended that God gives his concourse to all things and 't is probable the Jews never so much as thought of this concourse those amongst them that were not great Philosophers believing that God did all things and not that he concurred to all But that we may make a more certain Judgment about this Concourse it would be very proper carefully to explain the different Hypotheses of the Schools about it For besides the impenetrable obscurities which are common to all Opinions that we can explain or maintain only upon rambling and indeterminate terms there are upon this matter so great a variety of Opinions that it would not be very difficult to discover the cause of them But I will not ingage in a discussion which will be too tiresom both for my self and the greatest part of those who will read this Book I rather choose on the contrary to endeavour to show that my Opinions may in some respect be reconciled to the greatest number of the School Divines although I must not dissemble but confess their Language appears very equivocal and confused to me I will explain my self I believe as I have already said elsewhere that Bodies for instance have no power to move themselves and that their Moving Power is only the action of God Or to avoid a term which signifies nothing distinct their Moving Power is only the Will of God alwayes necessarily efficacious which successively preserves them in different places For I don't believe that God creates certain Beings to make them the Moving Power of Bodies Not only because I have no Idea of this kind of Being nor see how they could move Bodies but also since these Beings would themselves have need of some others to move them and so on ad infinitum For none but God is truly immovable and sole Mover together Which being supposed when a Body strikes and moves another I may say that it acts by the Concourse of God and that this Concourse is not distinct from its own action For a Body moves another which it meets only by its Action or Moving Power which at the bottom is nothing but the Will of God that successively preserves this Body in many places The transferring of a Body not being its Action or Moving Power but the effect of its Moving Power Most Divines likewise say That the Action of Second Causes differs not from the Action whereby God concurs with them For although they understand it variously they suppose that God acts in the Greatures in the same Action with the Creatures And they are it seems obliged to speak thus For if the Creatures acted by an Action which God did not produce in them their Action considered as such would as it appears to me be independant Now they believed as they ought that the Creatures depended immediately upon God not only as to their Being but also as to their Operation So in respect to Free Causes I believe that God continually gave the Mind an impression towards Good in general and that he also determined this impression towards particular Goods by the Ideas or Sensations he has given us as I have shewn in the First Explanation And 't is the same Thing with what the Divines believe when they say That God moves and prevents our Wills So that the power which puts our Minds in motion is the Will of God which animates and inclines us towards Good For God created not Beings to make them the Moving power of Minds for the same Reason that he did not create any to make them the Moving power of Bodies The Wills of God being Efficacious of themselves it is enough for him to Will a Thing to have it done And it is useless unnecessarily to multiply Beings Besides whatever is real in the determinations of our Motions likewise proceeds from the Action of God in us as is clear from the First Explanation Now we neither Act or produce any Thing but by our Wills I mean by the impression of the Will of God which is our Moving power For our Wills are Efficacious no farther than as they proceed from God even as Bodies put in motion impell not others but in as much as they have a Moving power which transfer them and this Moving power is only the Will of God which creates or successively preserves them in different places Then we Act only by the Concourse of God and our Action considered as Efficacious and capable of producing any Effect differs not from that of God's And is as most Divines say the very same Action Eadem numero Actio Now all the Changes which happen in the World See Suarez l. 1. de concursu Dei cum voluntate c. 1. have no other Natural Cause than the Motion of Bodies and
be in Rest just as in the Creation of the World it is not sufficient that God should will the World should exist but it is necessary that he positively wills the Manner in which it must exist And to annihilate it it must not be God's willing that it should not be because God cannot will nothing by a positive Will it is enough only that God ceases to will that it should exist I do not here consider Motion and Rest according to their Relative Being For 't is plain that Bodies in Rest have as real Relations to those which encompass them as those that are in Motion have I only conceive that Bodies which are in Motion have a moving Power and those that are in Rest have no Power to keep themselves in Rest because the Relation that Bodies moved have to those which encompass them always changing it must be a continual Power which produces these continual Changes For indeed 't is these Changes that cause whatsoever Revolutions we see in Nature But there is no need of Power to do nothing When the Relation of a Body to those that surround it is always the same there is nothing done and the Preservation of this Relation I mean the Action of the Will of God who preserves this Relation is not different from that which preserves the same Body By a Body in a Void I mean one so separated from others as well hard as liquid that there is none which helps or hinders the Communication of Motion If it is true as I conceive that Rest is only a Privation of Motion the least Motion I mean that of the least agitated Body includes more Force or Power than the rest of the greatest Body Thus the least Force or smallest Body that we should conceive moved in a Void against a great and vast Body would be capable of moving it since this great Body being in Rest it will have no Power to resist the little Body which will strike against it so that the Resistance that the Parts of hard Bodies make to hinder their Separation necessarily proceeds from some other Cause than that of Rest But we must demonstrate by Sensile Experiments what we have been proving by abstracted Reasonings to see if our Idee's agree with the Sensations that we receive of Objects For it often happens that such Arguments deceive us or at least cannot convince others and particularly such as are prejudiced on the contrary Side The Authority of Descartes has so much Power over the Reason of some Men that one must prove by all imaginable Ways that this great Man is deceived to be able to disabuse them What I have said will make a deep Impression on the Mind of those that are not prejudiced with the contrary Opinion and I plainly see they will blame me for proving things which appear indisputable to them But the Cartesians very well deserve that I should use my endeavour to satisfie them others may pass over this Discourse if they think it tedious Here then are some Experiments which sensibly prove that Rest has no Power to resist Motion and which consequently discover that the Will of the Author of Nature which gives the Power and Force that each Body has to continue in that State wherein it is respects only Motion and not Rest since Bodies have no Power of themselves Experience shews us that very great vessels which swim in the Water may be agitated by the least Bodies which hit against them From thence I pretend notwithstanding all the Evasions of Descartes and the Cartesians that if these great Bodies were in a Void they might yet be more easily agitated For the Reason why there is some little Difficulty to move a Vessel in Water is because the Water resists the Power of the Motion we impress on it which would not happen in a Void and what manifestly shews us that Water resists the Motion we impress on the Vessel is the Vessels ceasing to be agitated some time after it has been moved for this would not happen if the Vessel did not lose its Motion by communicating it to the Water or if the Water gave way without resisting it or in fine if it partook of its Motion Thus since a Vessel agitated in the Water by little and little ceases to move 't is an undoubted Mark that the Water resists its Motion instead of facilitating it as Descartes pretends and consequently it would yet be infinitely more easie to agitate a great Body in a Void than in Water since there is no Resistance from Bodies about it It is therefore evident that Rest has no Power to resist Motion that the least Motion contains more Power and Force than the grearest Rest Or at least that we ought not to measure the Force of Motion and Rest by the Proportion that is found between great Bodies which are in Motion and in Rest as Descartes has done It is true there is some Reason to believe that a Vessel is agitated as soon as it is in the Water because of the continual Change which happens to the Parts of the Water that encompass it although it seems to us that it does not change its Place It is that which has made Descartes and some others believe that 't is not the Force only of that which impels it that makes it advance in the Water but having already received much Motion from the little Parts of liquid Bodies which surround it and which equally push it on all sides This Motion is only determined by the new Motion of that which pushes it So that that which agitates a Body in Water could not do it in a Void Thus it is that Descartes and those that are of his Opinion defend the Rules of Motion that he has given us For instance let us suppose a Piece of Wood a Foot square in a Liquid Body All the little Parts of the Liquid Body acts upon it and moves against it and because they equally push it on all sides as well towards A as B It cannot advance nearer to one side than another But if I then push another Piece of Wood of half a Foot against the first toward the Side A I shall see it advance And from thence I conclude that it might be moved if in a Void with less Force than that whereby this Piece of Wood pushes it for the Reasons I have already brought But the Persons I speak of deny it and answer that what makes the great Piece of Wood advance as soon as it is pushed by the little one is because the little one which could not move it of it self being joyned with the Parts of the Liquid Body which are agitated determine them to push it and communicate to it one Part of their Motion But 't is plain that according to this Answer the Piece of Wood being once agitated must not diminish its Motion but on the contrary continually augment it Art 5. For by this Answer the Piece
of Wood is pushed more by the Water to the Side of A than to the Side of B therefore it must always advance towards it And because this Impulsion is continual its Motion must always increase But as I have already said the Water is so far from facilitating its Motion that it continually resists it and its Resistance always diminishes it and at last will make it perfectly cease We must now prove that the Piece of Wood that was equally pushed by the little Particles of the Water that surrounds it has no Motion or Power at all that is capable to move it although it continually changes its Place and though the Surface of the Water which encompasses it is different at different Times For if it is so that a Body equally pushed on all Sides as this Piece of Wood is has no Motion it is certain that 't is only the Forreign Force that strikes against it which communicates it since in the same Time that this forreign Force pushes it the Water resists it and by little and little destroys the Motion which is imprest on it for by degrees it ceases to move It is certain at least to those whom I speak to that there never is in Nature more Motion at one Time than at another and that Bodies in Rest are moved only by meeting with some agitated Bodies which communicate their Motion to them From thence I conclude that a Body which I suppose created perfectly at rest in the middle of the Water will never receive any Degree of Motion from the little Particles of Water which surround it and continually strike against it provided they push it equally on all Sides because all these little Particles which strike against it equally on all Sides reflecting with all their Motion they communicate none to it and consequently this Body must always be considered as in Rest and without any moving Power although it continually change its Surface Now the Proof I have that these little Parts reflect thus with all their Motion is that besides this that we cannot conceive the thing to be otherwise the Water that touches this Body must grow cold or even freeze and become very near as hard as the Wood upon its Surface since the Motion of the Particles of Water would be equally distributed to the little Parts of the Body they encompass But to accommodate my self to those that defend Descartes's Sentiment I grant we must not consider a Boat in the Water as in Rest I also allow that all the Parts of the Water which are about it agree to the new Motion that the Water-man imprints on it although it be but too visible by the Diminution of the Motion of the Boat that it resists it more on the Side it goes to than from that whence it was pushed This supposed I say that from all the Particles of Water that are in the River there is according to Descartes only those that immediately touch the Boat on the Side from whence it was pushed that can assist its Motion Art 63. For according to this Philosopher The Water being fluid all the Parts of which it is composed act not together against the Body we would move but only those that touching it conjoyntly bear upon it Now those which are conjoyntly born upon the Boat and the Waterman together are twenty times less than the Boat See Art 63. of the second Part of his Principles It is therefore plain by the Explanation that Decartes has given in this Article upon the Difficulty we have to break a Nail between our Hands that a little Body is capable of agitating a much greater than it self For indeed our Hands are not so fluid as Water and when we would break a Nail there is more Parts joyned together which act conjoyntly then in the Water which pushes a Boat But here is a more Sensible Experiment If we take a Board well plained or some other very hard Plane drive in it a Nail half-way and set the Plane in an inclining Position placing a Bar of Iron an hundred times thicker than the Nail above it and suffer the Bar to slide down I say this Nail will not break And we must further observe That according to Descartes all the parts of this Bar rest upon and conjoyntly act upon this Nail for this Bar is hard and solid If then there was no other Cement than rest to unite the parts of this Nail the Bar of Iron being an hundred times greater than the Nail Art 63. Art 50. would according to Descartes's fifth Rule and according to Reason communicate some of its Motion to the part of the Nail it fell upon that is break it and pass beyond it although even this Bar should slide but very slowly So that we must seek another Cause than the Rest of the parts to make Bodies hard or capable of resisting the Efforts that we make when we would break them since Rest has no power to resist Motion And I believe these Experiments suffice to shew that the abstracted Proofs we have brought are not false We must then examine the third thing we have before supposed might be the cause of the strict Union that is found between the parts of hard Bodies viz. An invisible Matter that environs them which being extreamly agitated with much Violence pushes the External and Internal Parts of these Bodies and compresses them after such a manner that to separate them more Force is necessary than this invisible and extreamly agitated Matter has It seems then I might reasonably conclude that the Union of the constituent parts of hard Bodies depends upon the subtle Matter which encompasses and compresses them Since the two other things that we can think to be the Causes of this Union are not truly so as we have already seen for since I find resistance enough in breaking a piece of Iron and that this resistance proceeds neither from the Iron nor the Will of God as I think I have proved it must necessarily proceed from some invisible Matter which can be no other than that which immediately encompasses and compresses it Nevertheless I shall further give some positive Proofs of this Opinion after I have explained it more at large by some Example Take a Globe of any hard Metal which is hollow within cut it into two Hemispheres and joyn these two Hemispheres with a little Wax at the place of their union and exhaust the Air out of it these two Hemispheres joyned one to the other after this manner if many Horses were fastened to them some on one side and some on the other could not be separated by them supposing the Magnitude of the Hemispheres to be in Proportion to the number of Horses Yet if we suffer the Air to re-enter one Person alone could separate them without any Difficulty It is easie to conclude from this Instance That what so strongly unites these two Hemispheres proceeds from their being compressed and surrounded
upon their External and Convex Surface by the Air which environs them whilst there was no Counterpressure in their Internal and Concave Surface So that the Action of the Horses that drew the two Hemispheres on both sides could not overcome the Efforts of an infinite Number of little Particles of the Air that resisted them by pressing these two Hemispheres together But the least Force is capable of separating them when the Air being entred again within the Sphere pushes the Concave and Internal Surfaces as much as the Air without presses the External and Convex ones But if on the contrary we take a Carps Bladder and put it in a Vessel from whence all the Air has been exhausted this Bladder being full of Air will crack and break because then there is no Air without the Bladder to resist that which is within 'T is likewise the same Reason that I have given for the first Experiment that two Planes of Glass or Marble having been used to be joyned one upon another so that in one Sense we find some resistance in the separating of them because these two parts of Marble are pressed and constring'd by the External Air which encompasses them and are not so strongly pushed by it within I might bring an infinite Number of other Experiments to prove that the gross Air which environs Bodies strongly unites their Parts but what I have said may suffice clearly to explain my Thoughts upon the present Question I say then that which so strongly unites the Parts of hard Bodies and these little Links I have before spoke on is other little external Bodies infinitely more agitated than the Air we breath in and these push and compress them and that which gives us some Trouble to separate them is not their Rest but the Agitation of these little Bodies which surround them So that what resists Motion is not Rest which is only a Privation and has no Power of it self but some contrary Motion This bare Exposition of my Opinion perhaps seems reasonable yet I well foresaw that many Persons would have some Difficulty to receive it Hard Bodies make so great an Impression upon our Senses when they strike us or when we make any Effort to break them that we are inclined to believe their Parts are united much more strictly than indeed they are And on the contrary the little Bodies which I have said encompasses them and to which I have given the Power of causing this Union makes no Impression upon our Senses seeming to be too weak to produce so Sensible an Effect But to destroy this Prejudice which is founded only upon the Impressions of our Senses and the Difficulty we have to imagine Bodies smaller and more agitated than those we see every Day we must consider that the Hardness of Bodies must not be judged of in Relation to our Hands or to the Efforts we are capable of making which vary at different Times For indeed if the greatest Force of Man is almost nothing in Comparison of that of the Subtle Matter we should be very much in the wrong to believe that Diamonds and the hardest Stones might not have for the Cause of their Hardness the Compression of little rapid Bodies which encompass them Now we may plainly discover that the Force of Man is very small if we consider that the Power he has of moving his Body into many different Ways proceeds only from a little Fermentation of his Blood which by agitating some few little Parts so produces the Animal Spirits For 't is the Agitation of these Spirits which gives Force to our Bodies and gives it a Power to make these Efforts that we unreasonably look upon as something very great and powerful But it must be well observed that this Fermentation of our Blood is only a very little Communication of the Motion of this subtle Matter we speak of for all the Fermentations of Visible Bodies are only Communications of the Motion of Invisible Bodies since every Body receives its Agitation from some other We must not therefore wonder if our Power is not so great as that of this Subtle Matter which we receive it from But if our Blood fermented as much in our Hearts as Gunpowder does when we put Fire to it that is if our Blood received as great a Communication of the Motion of this Subtle Matter as that of Gunpowder receives We might do extraordinary things very easily as break Iron throw down a House c. provided we suppose there was an agreeable Proportion between our Members and the Blood thus agitated We ought then to destroy our Prejudices and not to imagine according to the Impression of our Senses that the Parts of hard Bodies are so strongly united together because we have so much Trouble to break them But if we should consider the Effects of Fire in Mines in heavy Bodies and in many other Effects of Nature which have no other Cause than the Agitation of these Invisible Bodies as Descartes has proved in many Places we should manifestly discover that 't is not above their Power to unite and compress togeâ—her the Parts of hard Bodies as strongly as we see they are united For in fine I am not afraid to affirm that a Cannon-Bullet whose Motion appears so extraordinary does not even receive the Thousandth Part of the Motin of the Subtle Matter that is about it We should not doubt of what I advance if we first considered that Gunpowder is not all enkindled in the same Instant Secondly that although it should all take Fire at the same Instant it swims but a very little while in the Subtle Matter and Bodies which swim but a little while in others cannot receive much Motion from them as we may see in Boats that we abandon to the Course of the Water which receive their Motion but by little and little In the third Place and chiefly because each Particle of Powder can receive only the Motion which the Subtle Matter impresses for the Water communicates to the Vessel only the direct Motion which is common to all the Parts thereof which is generally very small in Relation to other Motions I could further show the Greatness of the Motion of the Subtle Matter to those that receive Descartes's Principles by the Motion of the Earth and Gravity of Bodie and could even from thence bring Proofs that are certain and exact enough but it is not necessary to my Subiect It 's enough without having read the Works of Descartes or having a sufficient Proof of the Agitation of this Subtle Matter which I ascribe as the Cause of the Inflexibility of Bodies to read with some Application what I have said of it in the 2d Chap. of the 4th Book Being then now delivered from the Prejudices which incline us to believe that our Efforts were very powerful and that that of the Subtle Matter which environs and compresses hard Bodies is very weak and being otherwise perswaded of the violent
only add together all the Degrees of Motion of two or many Bodies which must be considered only as one at the Time when they meer See Descartes's Rules in the second Part of his Principles and after divide the Sum of all the Motions in Proportion to the Magnitude of these Bodies From whence I conclude that of the Seven Rules that Descartes gives of Motion the Three first are good The Fourth is false and B must communicate its Motion to C in Proportion to the Magnitude of the same C and afterwards move together So that if C is double to B and B has Three Degrees of Motion it must communicate Two of them For I have sufficiently proved that Descartes ought not to have supposed Rest to have had any Force to resist Motion That the Fifth is true That the Sixth is false and that B must communicate the Half of its Motion to C. And that the seventh is false since B must always communicate its Motion to C in Proportion to the Magnitude and Motion of both B and C. That if according to the Supposition C is double to B and has three Degrees of Motion whilst C has but two they must necessarily move together since indeed C and B are but one Body at the Time of their Meeting and because we must add the Degrees of Swiftness which are five and afterwards divide them in Proportion to their Magnitude and so give 1â…” to B and 3â…“ to C the double of B. But these Rules although certain by what I have said are yet contrary to Experience because we are not in a Void The chief of all the Experiments which are contrary to what I have said of the Rules of Motion is that it always happens that hard Bodies which shock each other do still rebound different Ways or at least they do not follow one another after their meeting To answer to which we must call to mind what has been said about the Cause of Elactity that there is a Matter whose Agitation is strangely violent which continually passes between the Parts of hard Bodies and makes them so by compressing them as much upon the external as internal Parts For from thence 't is easily seen that in the Time of Percussion two Bodies which meet drive or divert the Course of this Matter from the nearest Places to those where they are shockt And this Matter resisting with a great Violence repels the two Bodies which meet and restores its Passage which the Percussion had stopt up That which proves yet more clearly what I have said is that if two Balls of Lead or some other less elastick Matter meet together they rebound not after their Shock but go on according to the Rules I have before established which they keep with so much the more Exactness as their Elasticity is less Bodies then rebound after their Percussion because they are hard that is as I have explained because there is a Sort of Matter much agitated which compresses them and which passing thro' their Pores with a great Violence repulses the Bodies which strike against one another But we must suppose that the Bodies which meet break not those they strike against by a Motion that conquers the Force which these little Parts of subtle Matter has to resist as when we discharge a Musket against a Piece of Wood It is true this subtle Matter compresses soft Bodies and passes very quickly thro' their Pores as well as it does thro' those of the hard and that nevertheless these soft Bodies make no Resistance The Reason is because the Matter which passes thro' soft Bodies can open its Passage on all Sides very easily because of the Smallness of the Parts which compose them or of some particular Configuration proper for this End which hard Bodies cannot suffer because of the Grossness and contrary Disposition of their Parts to this effect Thus when a hard Body shocks another that is soft it changes all the Ways by which the subtle Matter passes which is often visible as in a Musket Bullet that is flatted when we strike it But when a hard Body hits another like it self it produces none or very sew new Ways and the subtle Matter which is within its Pores is forced to return by the Way it came or else it repels those Bodies which shut up its little Passages Suppose A an hard and B a soft Body and C c the Channel of the subtle Matter I say that if A shocks B at the Point c the Channel C c is obstructed and the subtle Matter finds out new Ways in this soft Body Thus the subtle Matter having a free Passage it repels not the Bodies which hit against it but the Bodies themselves change their Figure and become a little flat And we must suppose that in the least hard Bodies there is an infinite Number of Channels like to C c. But if A and a are two hard Bodies which meet the Passage C c will be straightened and the subtle Matter which is there obstructed continuing its Motion in a right Line must for want of new Passages repel the Body which shocks it with so much the more Violence as its Difficulty is greater to find a Way or else the Parts of the Body A will break and separate from one another and be reduced into Powder or very small Pieces In short it appears evident that all Bodies in Motion continually endeavour to keep in a right Line and turning the least that is possible when they meet with any Resistance they must never reflect since by reflecting they deviate much from a right Line It must therefore be either that Bodies become flat or that the strongest overcome the weakest and make it move the same Way the other does But because Bodies are elastick and hard they cannot follow one another since if A pushes a a will repel A again and so they must keep asunder from one another Nevertheless if the two Bodies were in a Void altho' they were very Hard they would follow one another because having no Bodies about them they could have no elastick Force the shocked not at all resisting that which shocks it But Air Gravity c. resisting the great Motion that the striking Body gives to that it strikes the stricken resists the striking and hinders it from following it For Experience teaches us that Air and Gravity resists Motion and so much the more as the Motion is more violent It is easie to discover by what I have said why when different Bodies meet which are surrounded with Air or Water c. sometimes that which strikes rebounds and sometimes it communicates all its Motion and continues as if it were immovable and sometimes follows the stricken but always with less Swiftness if either of them is absolutely soft For the whole depends only upon the Proportion which is between their Magnitude Hardness and Gravity supposing they are moved with an equal Swiftness If they are very inflexible the
advance what they do not clearly conceive For if the Heathen Philosophers had a clear conception that Second Causes have a true Power to act and produce their like being a Man as well as they and with them partaking of the soveraign Reason I might probably discover the Idea which represented the Power to them but what efforts soever I make I can find no Strength Efficacy or Power but in the Will of the infinitely perfect Being Moreover when I think of the different Opinions of Philosophers upon this Subject I cannot doubt of what I advance For if they clearly saw what this Power of the Creatures is or what there is in them that is really powerful they would not differ in their Opinion about it When persons cannot agree and having no interested Reason which hinders them from it 't is a certain mark they have no clear Idea of what they say and that they understand not one another chiefly if they dispute upon such Subjects as are not complext or difficult to be discust like this Question before us For we should find no hard matter to resolve it if persons had but a clear Idea of a Created Power These are therefore some of their Opinions whereby we may see how little they agree amongst themselves For the most extraordinary of these Opinions see Suarez Metaph Disp 18. Sect. 2. Assert 2 3. Scot. in 4. sent dist 12.1 D. 37.2 D. 17. Paludan in 4. sent D. 12. Q. 1. Art 1. Peter 8. Phys Ch. 3. Conimb upon Aristotles Phys and many others which Suarez cites Some Philosophers here affirmed that Second Causes act by their Matter Figure and Motion and these in one Sense are in the right Others by a substantial Form Many by Accidents or Qualities Some by Matter and Form Others by Form and Accidents And some again by certain Vertues or distinct Faculties from all this There are others amongst them who maintain that Substantial Forms produce Forms and Accidental Forms Accidents Others that Forms produce both Forms and Accidents And some again that Accidents alone are capable of producing Accidents and Forms too See the Metaph. of Fonseca qu. 13. sect 3. That of Socin and Javell upon the same Question But we must not imagine that those for instance who say that Accidents can produce Forms by vertue of what they have received from the Form they are joyn'd to mean the same thing Some of them will have it that these Accidents themselves are only the Power or Vertue of the Substantial Form Others that they receive into themselves the influence of the Form and so act only by vertue of it And in fine some of them will only have them to be Instrumental Causes But these last are not perfectly agreed amongst themselves either what must be understood by Instrumental Cause or what is the vertue they receive from the Principal Cause The Philosophers don't so much as agree upon the action whereby Second Causes produce their Effects Some amongst them pretend that Causality ought not to be produced since that produces it self Others will have it that they act truly by their own action but find great difficulties in explaining precisely what this action is and there are about this so many different Opinions that I shall omit the reciting them Here is a great variety of different Sentiments although I have not related those of the Antient Philosophers or of such as were born in very remote Countries But we have reason enough to judge that they are not perfectly agreed amongst themselves upon the Subject of Second Causes no more than those we have already mentioned Avicen for instance thought Corporeal Substances could produce nothing but Accidents And this is his Hypothesis as Ruvio relates it He supposed that God immediately produced a most perfect Spiritual Substance and that this produced another less perfect and that a third and so on to the last which produced all Corporeal Substances and these Corporeal Substances Accidents But Avicembrom who could not apprehend how Corporeal Substances Ruvio l. 2. ph tract 4. qu. 2. which cannot penetrate one another should be capable of Alteration would have it that there were Spirits which were capable of acting on Bodies because they only could penetrate them For these Gentlemen not admitting a Void nor the Atoms of Democritus and the Subtil Matter of D' Cartes was unknown to them they could not think with Gassendus and the Cartesians That there were Bodies small enough to enter into the Pores of those which appear'd the most Hard and Solid It seems to me that this diversity of Opinions gives us a Right to judge That Men often spoke such Things as they did not understand and that the Power of the Creatures being a pure Fiction of the Mind of which we have no Natural Idea each Person imagined it what he pleased It is true in all Ages this Power was acknowledged as Real and True by most Men But it is as certain it was without any Proof I do not say Demonstration but even without such a Proof as was able to make any impression upon an Attentive Mind For the Confused Arguments which are maintained only upon the deceitful Testimony of the Senses and Imagination ought not to be received by those who make use of their Reason Aristotle speaking of what they call Nature sayes It is ridiculous to endeavour to prove That Natural Bodies have an Inward Principle of their own Motion and Rest Because sayes he it is self-evident He doubts not also but a Bowl which hits another has power to put it in motion It appears so to the Eyes and that 's enough for him for he commonly follows the Testimony of the Senses and rarely that of Reason never troubling himself whether it be intelligible or not Those who oppose the Opinion of some Divines that have writ against Second Causes say with Aristotle That the Senses convince us of their Efficacy This is their First and Principal Proof It is evident say they See Fonseca Ruvio Suarez and the rest already cited that Fire burns the Sun shines Water cools and he must be a Fool that doubts it The Authours of the contrary Opinion says the Great Averrors had their Brains disturbed We must say almost all the Peripatetics use Sensible Proofs to convince those who deny this Efficacy and so oblige them to confess They may be moved and hurt by Second Causes It is the Judgment which Aristotle has already pronounced against them and it ought to be executed But this pretended Demonstration cannot but produce pitty L. of his Topi. ch 1. since it discovers the Weakness of the Humane Mind and that even Philosophers themselves are infinitely more Sensible than Rational It discovers that those who glory in the Enquiry after Truth do not themselves know who they ought to consult to learn any thing of it Whether 't is the Soveraign Reason which never deceives them but always speaks Things as they
and gives us Motion and Life nor is it that which covers the Earth with Fruits and Flowers and which supplies us with Food and Nourishment This Philosophy teaches us with the Scripture that it is God only who gives Rain and regulates the Seasons who gives Nourishment to the Body and fills the Heart with Joy Acts 14.15 16. Ergo nihil agis ingratissimè Mortalium qui te negas Deo debere sed naturae quia nec natura sine Deo est nec Deus sine natura sed idem est utrumque nec distat Officium si quod à Seneca accipisses Annoeo te diceres debere vel Lucio Non creditorem mutares sed nomen Seneca l. 4. Of Benefits c. 8. Ego Dominus non est alter formans lucem creans tenebras faciens pacem creans malum Ego Dominus ficiens omnia haec Isa 45.7 Amos 3.6 That he only is capable of doing us good and thereby has given us a perpetual Testimony of what he is although in Ages passed he has permitted all Nations to walk in their own ways According to the Language of this Philosophy we must not say That it is Nature that fills us with Good nor that it is God and Nature together But that it is God alone speaking thus without Equivocation that we may not deceive the Simple For we must distinctly acknowledge him the onely Cause of our Happiness if we would make him the onely Object of our Love 'T is likewise an undoubted Truth That we ought to fear such Things as are able to hurt us and fear them in proportion to the Evil they can do us But this Philosophy tells us That it is God alone that can do us Evil that it is he as Isaiah says who creates Darkness as well as Light who makes peace and creates Evil and even that no Evil happens but from him according to the Prophet So that it is him alone we ought to fear We must not fear either Plague or War Famine our Enemies nor even Devils themselves but God alone We ought to fly a Sword when ready to wound us shun Fire and avoid a House that is likely to fall upon us yet must not fear these Things We may fly such Bodies as are Occasional or Natural Causes of Evil but we must fear only God as the True Cause of all Evils and Misfortunes and only hate Sin which necessarily provokes the Cause of all our Happiness to become the Cause of all our Evils And in short all the Motions of our Minds ought to tend only to God since He alone is Superiour to tend only to God since He alone is Superiour to it and the Motions of our Body may relate to those about it This is what we learn from that Philosophy which admits not the Efficacy of Second Causes But this Efficacy being supposed I cannot see but we have some reason to fear and love Bodies And that to regulate our Love according to Reason it is enough to prefer God above every Thing else the First and Universal to Second and Particular Causes Then it is not necessary to love God with all our strength Ex totâ mente ex toto corde ex tota anima ex totis viribus at the Scripture says Yet when we content our selves with preferring God to all other Beings and adore him with a Love of Esteem and Preference without continually endeavouring to honour and love him in all Things it often happens that we deceive our selves that our Charity is dissipated and lost and that we are more taken up with Sensible than the Soveraign Good For if the greatest Sinners and it may be even Idolaters were asked If they preferred not the universal to particular Causes They would not perhaps be afraid in the midst of their Debauches and Extravagancies to Answer That they failed not in so Essential a Duty and knew very well what they owed to God I confess they would deceive themselves but take away the Efficacy of Second Causes and they will have no probable pretext to Justifie their Conduct And if it be supposed they may say this for themselves when their passions blind them and they listen to the Testimony of their Senses Since I am made to be happy I neither can nor ought to forbear loving and respecting whaterver may be the Cause of my Happiness Why therefore should I not love and respect Sensible Objects since they are the True Causes of the Happiness I receive in their Enjoyment I acknowledge the Supream Being is alone worthy of our highest Adoration and I prefer him to every Thing but not seeing that he requires any Thing of me I enjoy the Goods he has given me by the means of Second Causes to which he has subjected me and I pay no Acknowledgments to him which perhaps would dishonour him As he does me no good immediately and by himself or at least without the Assistance of the Creatures it is a sign he does not require my Mind and Heart should be immediately applied to himself or at least he is willing that the Creatures should divide with him the Acknowledgments of my Heart and Mind Since he has communicated a part of his Power and Glory to the Sun has surrounded him with Brightness and Majesty Established him Supream over all his Works and 't is by the Influence of this Great Luminary that we receive all the Necessary Goods of Life Why should we not then employ a part of this Life in enjoying his Light and testifying the sense we have of his Greatness and Benefits Would it not be the utmost Ingratitude to receive the Abundance of all Things from this Excellent Creature and have no Sentiment of Gratitude for it And would it not likewise be an unaccountable blindness and stupidity to have no Motion of respect and fear for him whose absence freezes us to death and who by approaching too near us may burn up and destroy us I say it again that God is preferable to all Things that we must esteem and love him infinitely more than the Creatures but that we must also love and fear them For thereby we honour Him who made them merit his Favours and oblige him to bestow New Benefits upon us It is plain he approves of the Honour we pay his Creatures since he has communicated his Power to them and all Power merits Honour But as Honour ought to be proportioned to Power and that the Power of the Sun and all Sensible Objects is such that from them we receive all sorts of Goods it is just we should honour them with all our strength and next to God consecrate our whole Being to them Thus we naturally reason when we follow the Prejudice we have received from the Efficacy of Second Causes 't is probably after this manner that the first Authors of Idolatry reasoned Here is what he thought of it who is esteemed the most Learned of the Jews He thus begins a Treatise he
necessity of sending Dragoons into the Monasteries and Societies and to an infinite number of honest Men to cause them to abjure the Errours of the Cartesian Philosophy So true is it that Devotees do not always see the fatal Consequences of an Advice which impetuous Zeal dictates to those that are in Authority Monsieur Regis well known by the Philosophy he has Published having undertaken to oppose some Sentiments of F. Malebranch this Father neglected at first to Answer his new Adversary but when Monsieur Regis would have drawn an advantage from the silence of a Man who plainly perceived himself unfairly attack'd Father Malbranche published the last Year a short Answer to Monsieur Regis The name of Monsieur Arnaud was made use of in this Contestation which occasioned him to appear again upon the stage In the Journal des Scavans at Paris he Printed two Letters addrest to F. Malebranch who soon answered him and gave two Letters to the Journalist that were also Printed Monsieur Cousin left off his Correspondence with Monsieur Arnaud and refused to put in his Journal other Letters which M. Arnaud had written a little before his Death we shall doubtless see them in his Posthumous works for it is not probable that they will rob the Publick of the Remains of so great a man We shall be gainers thereby two wayes F. Malbranche will break that silence which he seems to have condemned himself to and we shall have new Explanations upon some important Difficult ties which M. Arnaud may have found in the VVorks of so hard an Adversary I have but one thing more to say of F. Malebranch It is that his Heart agrees perfectly with his Vnderstanding There is as much Vprightness in the one as Justness in the other He is a Christian Philosopher who acts as he thinks Never did any Man more perfectly regulate his Manners and Actions upon the Principles of his Philosophy Being perswaded that God is the only cause which acts truly upon our Body and in our Soul F. Malebranch accustoms himself upon every Sensation upon every Perception to elevate himself always towards the Supreme Being to humble himself in his Presence and to praise him continually VVith what assurance does not he as often as it 's possible approach to the Throne of Grace of the Eternal High Priest who continually intercedes for us VVith what fervour does he not beg to be admitted as a Living Stone in the Structure of the Mysterious Temple which this Divine Architect builds up to the Glory of his Father He is in a continual watchfulness and attention over himself to divert the Impressions which sensible Objects may make upon his Body and to stop whatever is capable of exciting the Passions He is the most sober and temperate Man in the World And if F. Malebranch so exactly observes his Duties towards God and himself he is not less regular in those which respect his Neighbour He is tender and compassionate to the unhappy courteous and affable to all the VVorld preventing and sincere in respect of his Friends good and indulgent to all those who injure him Being perswaded that the Love of his Neighbour ought to have for its principal end that Eternal Society to which we are called by the Gospel He endeavours to inspire all those who come near him with Sentiments of Piety and Religion to procure as much as he can their Eternal Happiness which he earnestly desires day and night In a word F. Malebranch has drawn his own Pourtraiture in his Treatise of Morality To compose the greatest part of which he had no need of long and new Reflexions upon the Duties of Man He hath told us without thinking of it what he exactly practiced after he had applied himself to the regulation of his Manners upon the Truths he had so attentively Meditated and so happily Explained A SEARCH AFTER TRUTH BOOK V. of the Passions CHAP. I. Of the Nature and Original of the Passions in general THE Mind of Man has two essential or necessary relations which are very different the one to God and the other to its Body as it is a pure Spirit it is essentially united to the Word of God to the Eternal Wisdom and Truth for 't is only by this Union that it is capable of thinking as has been shewn in the 3d Book as an humane Spirit it has an essential relation to its Body and because of this union it is sensible and imagines as has been explained in the First and Second Books I call that sense or imagination of the Mind when the Body is the natural or occasional cause of its thoughts and that understanding when it acts of it self or rather when God acts in it or when his light enlightens it after many different manners independantly of any thing whatever that passes in its Body 'T is the same in respect of the humane Will as a Will it essentially depends upon the Love which God bears to himself upon the Eternal Law in a word upon the Will of God 'T is only because God loves himself that we love any thing and if God did not love himself or if he did not continually imprint upon the Soul of Man a Love like to his I mean that motion of Love which we receive for good in general we should love nothing we should will nothing and consequently we should be without any will since the will is nothing else but the impression of Nature which carries towards good in general as we have often said before Book I. Ch. I. and elsewhere But the Will as it is an humane Will essentially depends upon the Body for 't is only from the motions of the Blood and Spirits that it perceives it self agitated with all sensible Emotions I therefore give the name of Natural Inclinations to all the motions of the Soul which are common to us with pure Intelligences and some of those in which the Body has a great share but whereof it is only indirectly the Cause and the End as I have explained in the preceding Book and here I design by the word Passions all the Emotions which the Soul naturally feels by means of the extraordinary Motions of the Animal Spirits and Blood These are the sensible Emotions which shall be the Subject of this Book Although the Passions are inseparable from the Inclinations and Men were no farther capable of sensible love or hatred than as they are capable of the mental yet I thought it would not be amiss to treat distinctly of 'em to avoid confusion Those that consider the Passions are much more strong and lively than the Natural Inclinations for other Objects and which are always produced from other Causes will acknowledge that 't is not without reason that I have separated things that are inseparable in their nature Men are only capable of Sensations and Imaginations as they are capable of pure Intellections the Senses and Imagination being inseparable from the Mind however
of which it is proper to change all the motions of the Passion suddenly determine the course of the Animal Spirits to the Nerves which encompass these Arteries that by their contraction they may shut up the passage whereby the Blood ascends into the Brain and by their dilating lay open that which disperses it self through all the other parts of the Body These Arteries which carry the Blood to the Brain being free and all those which disperse it through the rest of the Body being strongly tied by these Nerves the Head will be filled with Blood and the Face coloured with it But any circumstance changing the shaking of the Brain which caused this disposition in these Nerves the Arteries that were contracted are unloosed and the others on the contrary are strongly contracted Thus the Head is void of Blood a paleness diffused over the Face and the little Blood which goes out of the Heart and which the Nerves we spoke of admit into it to maintain life descend mostly into the lower part of the Body the Brain is defective of Animal Spirits and all the rest of the Body is seized with a weakness and trembling To explain and particularly prove what we have already said it would be necessary to give a general knowledge of Physics and a particular one of Human Bodies But these two Sciences are also too imperfect to be treated of with all the exactness I could wish besides if I should push this matter farther it would soon carry me from my subject and therefore I shall only give a general and gross Idea of the Passions and am satisfied provided this Idea be not false These Shakings of the Brain and Motions of the Blood and Spirits are the fourth thing that is found in each of our Passions and they produce the fifth which is the sensible Emotion of the Soul In the same time that the Animal Spirits are pushed from the Brain into the rest of the Body there to produce the Motions that 's proper to maintain the Passion the Soul is carried towards the good that it perceives and that so much the more violently as the Spirits go out of the Brain with the more force because it is the same shaking of the Brain which acts the Soul and Animal Spirits The Motion of the Soul towards good is so much the greater as the sight of good is more sensible and the Motion of the Spirits which proceed from the Brain to disperse themselves into the rest of the Body is so much the more violent as the shaking of the Fibres of the Brain caused by the impression of the Object or Imagination is stronger so this same shaking of the Brain rendring the sight of the good more sensible it is necessary that the Emotions of the Soul in the Passions should augment in the same proportion as the Motion of the Spirits do These Emotions of the Soul differ not from those which immediately follow the intellectual sight of the good we have spoke of They are only stronger and more lively because of the union of the Soul and Body and the sensibility of the sight which produces them The sixth thing which occurs is the Sensation of Passion the Sensation of Love Aversion Desire Joy Sorrow c. This Sensation is not different from that we have already spoke of it is only more quick because the Body hath a great share in it But it is always followed with a certain Sensation of Sweetness which renders all our Passions agreeable to us and is the last thing observed in every one of our Passions as has been already said The cause of this last Sensation is thus At the sight of the Object of the Passion or any new Circumstance some of the Animal Spirits are pushed from the Head to the extream parts of the Body to put it into the gesture the Passion requires and others forcibly descend into the Heart Lungs and Bowels from thence to draw necessary assistances which has already been explained Now it never happens that the Body is in the condition it ought to be but the Soul receives much satisfaction from it whereas if the Body is in an estate contrary to its good and preservation the Soul suffers much pain Thus when we follow the Motions of our Passions and stop not the course of the Spirits which the sight of the Object of the Passion causes in our Body to put it in the condition it ought to be in relation to this Object The Soul will by the Laws of Nature receive this Sensation of delight and inward satisfaction because the Body is in the state it ought to be in On the contrary when the Soul following the Rules of Reason stops the course of the Spirits and resists these Passions it suffers pain proportionably to the evil which might from thence happen to the Body For even as the reflexion that the Soul makes upon it self is necessarily accompanied with the Joy or Sorrow of the Mind and afterwards with the Joy or Sorrow of the Senses when doing its duty and submitting to the order of God it would discover that in a proper condition or abandoning it self to its Passions it is touched with remorse which teaches it that 't is in an ill disposition Thus the course of the Spirits excited by the good of the Body is accompanied with a sensible Joy or Sorrow and afterwards with a Spiritual one according as the course of the Animal spirits is hindered or favoured by the Will But there is this remarkable difference between the Intellectual Joy that accompanies the clear knowledge of the good estate of the Soul and the sensible Pleasure which accompanies the confused Sensation of the good disposition of the Body that the Intellectual Joy is solid without remorse and as immutable as the truth which causes it whereas sensible Joy is generally accompanied with Sorrow of the Mind or remorse of Conscience whence it is unquiet and as inconstant as the Passion or Agitation of the Blood which causes it In fine the first is almost always accompanied with a great Joy of the Senses when it is a consequence of the knowledge of a great good that the Soul possesses and the other is seldom accompanied with any Joy of the Mind although it be a consequence of a great good which only happens to the Body if it is contrary to the good of the Soul It is therefore true that without the Grace of JESVS CHRIST the satisfaction the Soul tastes in abandoning it self to its Passions is more agreeable than that it feels in following the Rules of Reason and it is this Satisfaction which is the cause of all the Disorders that have followed Original Sin and it would make us all Slaves to our Passions if the Son of God did not deliver us from their servitude by the delights of his Grace For indeed what I have said on the behalf of the Joy of the Mind against the Joy of the Senses is
to the carnal and most ignorant That he might instruct them by that which caused their blindness and encline them to love him and loose them from sensible Objects by the same things that had captivated them For when he had to do with Fools he made use of a kind of simplicity to make them wise so that the most Religious and Faithful have not always the greatest Understanding They may know God by Faith and love him through the assistance of his Grace without discerning him to be their All after the same manner as Philosophers do and without reflecting that the abstracted knowledge of Truth is a kind of union with him We must not therefore be surprized if there are but few Persons who endeavour to strengthen their Natural Union they have with God by seeking after the Truth since to this end it would be necessary constantly to oppose the impression of the Senses and Passions after a very different manner from that which is familiar to the most Virtuous Persons for most good Men are not always perswaded that the Senses and Passions deceive us after the manner we have explained in the precedent Books Those Sensations and Thoughts wherein the Body has any share are the true and immediate cause of our Passions because 't is only the shaking of the Fibres of the Brain that excites any particular emotion in the Animal Spirits so that only our Sensations can sensibly convince us that we depend on certain things which they excite us to love But we feel not the Natural Union we have with God when we discover the Truth nor so much as think upon him for he is within us and operates after such a secret and insensible manner that we perceive him not Our Natural Union with him therefore does not excite us to love him But our Union with Sensible Things is quite different All our Sensations declare this Union and Bodies present themselves to our Eyes when they act in us nor is any thing they do concealed Even our own Body is more present to us than our Mind and we consider it as the best part of our selves Thus the Union we have with our Body and through that with all sensible Objects excites a violent love in us which increases this Union and makes us depend upon things that are infinitely below us CHAP. VI. Of the most general Errors of the Passions Some particular Examples of them IT 's the part of Moral Philosophy to enquire into all the particular Errors wherein our Passions engage us concerning good to oppose the irregularities of Love to establish the sincerity of the Heart and regulate the Manners But our chief intent here is to give Rules for the Mind and to discover the causes of our Errors in respect of Truth so that we shall pursue no further those things already mentioned which relate only to the love of the true Good We will then proceed to the Mind but shall not pass by tne Heart because it has the greatest influence over the Mind We will enquire after the Truth in it self and without thinking on the relation it has to us only so far as this relation is the occasion that Self-love disguises and conceals it from us for we judging of all things according to our Passions deceive our selves in all things the Judgments of the Passions never agreeing with the Judgments of the Truth 'T is what we may learn from these admirable words of St. Bernard * Amor sicut nec odium veritatis judicium nescit Vis judicium veritatis audire Joan 5.30 Sicut audio sic judico Non sicut odi non sicut amo non sicut timeo Est judicium odii ut illud Nos legem habemus secundum legem Nostram debet mori Joan 19.7 Est timoris ut illud si dimittimus eum sic venient Romani tollent Nostrum locum gentem Joan 11.48 Judicium vero amoris ut David de filiô parricidâ Parcite inquit puero Absalom 2 Reg. 18.5 St. Bern. de grad humilitatis Neither love nor hatred says he know how to judge according to truth But if you will hear a true Judgment I judge according to what I hear not as I hate love or fear This is a Judgment of hatred We have a law and according to our law he ought to die This is a Judgment of fear If we let him alone the Romans will come and take away our Place and Nation This is a Judgment of love as David speaks of his parricide son Spare the young Man Absalom Our Love Hatred and Fear cause us to make false Judgments only and nothing but the pure Light of Truth can enlighten our Mind 'T is only the distinct Voice of our common Master that instructs us to make solid Judgments and he will infallibly do it provided we only judge of what he says and according to what he says Sicut audio sic judico As I hear I judge But let us see after what manner our Passions seduce us that we may the more easily resist them The Passions have so great a relation to the Senses that 't will not be difficult to discover after what manner they engage us in Error if we but remember what has been said in the First Book For the general Causes of the Errors of our Passions are entirely like those of the Errors of our Senses The most general cause of the Errors of our Senses is as we have shewn in the First Book our attributing to our Body or to External Objects those Sensations which belong to our Soul affixing Colours to the Surfaces of Bodies diffusing of Light Sounds Odours in the Air and assigning Pain and Pleasure to those parts of our Body which receive any change by the motion of other Bodies which meet them The same thing may be said of our Passions we imprudently attribute to those Objects which cause or seem to cause them all the dispositions of our Heart Goodness Meekness Malice Ill-nature and all the other Qualities of our Mind Whatever Object produces any Passion in us in some manner seems to include in it self what it stirs up in us when we think upon it Even as sensible Objects appear to us to include the Sensations their presence excites When we love any Person we are naturally inclined to believe they love us and 't would be difficult for us to imagine that they had either any design to hurt us or to oppose our desires But if hatred succeeds love we cannot believe that they design us any good we interpret all their actions in the worst sense and are always suspicious and upon our guard although perhaps they think not of us or else intend to do us some service In short we unjustly attribute all the dispositions of our Heart to those Persons who excite any Passion in us even as we imprudently ascribe all the qualities of our Mind to sensible Objects Moreover by the same
the greatness and perfection of my Being and therefore I have reason to admire it Others also ought to admire me if they would do me justice since I am something great through the relation I have to great things I in some measure possess them by the admiration I have for them and I feel the good by a foretaste that a kind of hope makes me enjoy Other Men would be happy as well as I if knowing my greatness they like me applied themselves to the Cause which produced it but they are blind and have no knowledge of either great or fine things and know not how either to raise or make themselves become consider able We may say the Mind naturally reasons after this manner without making any reflexion when it permits it self to be guided by the deceitful lights of its Passions These Arguments have some probability bus 'tis plain they have no solidity in them And this appearance or rather confused Sensation of it which attends these Natural Reasonings made without reflexion have so much power that if we don't take great care they will never fail of seducing us For instance when Poetry History Chimistry or any other Humane Science has struck the Imagination of a young Man with any Motions of Admiration if he don't carefully watch the efforts these Motions make upon his Mind If he does not throughly examine what the advantages of these Sciences are and compare the troubles he shall have in the learning with the profit he shall afterwards receive from them and in short if he is not as curious as is requisite to judge well there is a great deal of danger that his Admiration will not only shew him these Sciences with the fairest side outwards but seduce him also It is likewise very much to be feared that it will corrupt his Heart after such a manner that he shall not be able to destroy the illusion tho' he afterwards come to know it to be such because 't is impossible to efface such deep Traces out of his Brain as a continual Admiration shall have wrought there For that reason he must continually stir up the purity of his Imagination he must hinder these dangerous Traces from being formed which will corrupt the Mind and Heart I shall here prescribe a very useful way to prevent not only the excess of Admiration but also of all other Passions in general When the Motion of the Animal Spirits is violent enough to make such deep Traces in the Brain as corrupt the Imagination it is always attended with some emotion of the Soul Thus the Soul cannot be moved without being sensible of it it is sufficiently advertised to take care or it self and to examine whether it is advantageous that these Traces should be strengthned and made compleat But in the time of the emotion the Mind not being free enough to judge of the usefulness of these Traces because this emotion deceives and inclines it to favour them it must make its utmost endeavour to stop this emotion or else divert the motion of the Spirits which cause it and in the mean time it is absolutely necessary for it to suspend its Judgment Now it must not be imagined that the Soul can always barely by its own Will stop this course of Spirits which hinder it from making use of its Reason It s common powers are not sufficient to make such Motions cease which it has not excited So that it must make use of artifices to endeavour to deceive an Enemy that attacks it only by surprize As the motion of the Spirits stir up certain thoughts in the Soul so these Thoughts also excite certain motions in our Brain Thus when we would stop any motion of the Spirits which is stirred up in us it is not sufficient to will that it should cease for that is not always capable of stoping it We must make use of some Artifices and represent things contrary to those which excite and maintain this motion and this would cause a Revulsion But if we would only determine a motion of Spirits already excited to some other place we must not think of contrary things but only on such things as differ from those which produce it and this will undoubtedly divert them But because a Diversion and Revulsion will be great or little in proportion as our new thoughts shall be attended with a great or less motion of Spirits we must be very careful in observing well what those Thoughts are which agitate as most that in pressing occasions we may be able to represent them to our Imagination which seduces us and we must endeavour to form so strong an habit of resistance by this method that the motion which surprizes us may be no more excited in our Souls If we take care to make an intent application of the Idea of Eternity or any other serious Thoughts to these extraordinary motions which are excited in us those violent and great motions will never happen again without stirring up in us at the same time this Idea and which will consequently furnish us with the means to resist them Those things are proved both by Experience and the Reasons brought in the Chapter Of the Connection of Idea's So that we ought not to think it absolutely impossible by any Artifice to conquer the efforts of our Passions when our Wills are firmly determined to do it However we must not pretend that we can become Impeccable or shun all error by this manner of Resistance For first 't is difficult to acquire and preserve such an habit as that our extraordinary Motions shall stir up in us such Ideas as are proper to oppose them Secondly supposing we have acquired it these motions of the Spirits would directly excite those Ideas which we must oppose and but indirectly those which we must oppose to them So that the ill Idea's being the principal they will always have more power than those which are only accessary and it will be always necessary for the Will to assist the latter In the third place these motions of the Spirits may be so violent that they may fill the whole capacity of the Soul so that there remains no more room if we may be permitted so to speak to receive the accessary Idea that is fit to make a Revulsion in the Spirits or to receive it after such a manner as we may consider it with any attention In fine there are so many particulas circumstances which may make this remedy useless that we must not too much confide in it although on the other side we ought not to neglect it We must continually have recourse to Prayer that we may receive from Heaven those assistances as are necessary in the time of Temptations and also endeavour to present to the Mind some Truth that is so solid and strong that by this means we may conquer the most violent Passions For I must needs advertize by the way that several pious Persons often fall again
into the same Errors because they fill their Minds with a great number of such Truths as have more lustre than power and are fitter to dissipate and divide their Minds than to fortifie it against Temptation whereas unlearned and ignorant Persons are faithful in their Duty because they make some great and serious Truth familiar to them which fortifies and upholds them in all Occurrences CHAP. IX of Love and Aversion and of their principal kinds LOve and Aversion are the first Passions which succeed Admiration We do not long consider an object without discovering the Relations it has to us or to something that we Love The object that we Love and to which consequently we are united by Love being almost always present to us as well as that which we actually admire our Mind without any pain or great reflection makes the necessary Comparisons to discover the Relations they have to each other and to us or else it is naturally advertized of 'em by the preventing Sensations of Pleasure and Complacency And then the motion of Love we have for our selves and the object that we Love extends it self unto that we admire if the relation that it immediately has with us or with any thing we are united to appears advantagious to us either by Knowledge or Sensation Now this new motion of the Soul or rather motion of the Soul newly determined being joined to that of the Animal Spirits and followed with the Sensation which accompanies the new disposition that this new motion of Spirits produces in the Brain is the Passion that we here call Love But if we feel by any Pain or discover by a clear and evident Knowledge that the union or relation of the object we admire is disadvantageous to us or to any thing we are united to Then the motion of Love that we have for our selves and for what is united to us is limited in us or carried towards it and follows not the sight of the Mind nor employs it self on the object of our Admiration But as the motion towards good in general which the Author of Nature continually imprints in the Soul carries us towards what we know and feel to be so because what is intelligible and sensible is good in it self We may say that the resistance which the Soul makes against this natural motion that draws it away is a kind of voluntary motion which terminates in Nothingness Now this voluntary motion of the Soul being joyned to that of the Spirits and Blood That we may not be mistaken in respect to what I here call voluntary Motion it is requisite to read the first explanation upon the first Chapter and followed with the Sensation which accompanies the new disposition that this motion of Spirits produces in the Brain is the Passion that we here call Aversion This Passion is absolutely contrary to Love yet is never without Love It is wholly contrary because this separates I should only perplex the thought if I spoke whatever related to it to satisfie some difficult Persons and that unites The former has Nothingness for its object and the latter always some Being whereby 't is excited Aversion refists natural Motion and makes it of no effect whereas Love yields to it and makes it victorious But it is never separated from Love for if evil which is its object is taken for a privation of good to fly evil is to fly the privation of good that is to incline towards good and so that to hate the privation of good is to love good it self But if evil is taken for Pain and the aversion of Pain is not an aversion of the privation of Pleasure since Pain is as real a Sensation as Pleasure it is not therefore the privation of it but the aversion of Pain being the aversion to some inward Misery we should not have this aversion if we had not love Indeed evil may be taken for whatever causes Pain in us or deprives us of good and then aversion depends upon the love of our selves or of something to which we wish to be united Love and Hatred are then the two Mother Passions and opposite to each other but Love is the first chief and most Universal Being also since the Fall so far removed and separated from good as we are and looking upon our own being as the chief part of every thing we are united to we may in one Sense say that the motion of Love which we have to all things is only a consequence of Self-Love We love Honours because they raise us above others Riches because they defend and preserve us Our Relations Prince and Country because we are interested in their preservation The motion of love that we have for our selves extends to every thing that relates to us and to whatever we are united For 't is even this motion which unites and diffuses if I may so say our Being into those which encompass us in proportion as we discover by Reason or discern by Sensation that 't is advantageous to be united to them So that we must not think that since the Fall Self-Love is only the cause and rule of all other Loves but that most Loves are only kinds of Self-Love For when we say a Man loves a new object we must not think that a new motion of love is produced in this Man But rather that knowing that this object has some relation or union with him he loves himself in that object and by a motion of Love as old as himself For indeed without Grace there is only Self-Love in the Heart of Man For the love of Truth Justice and even of God himself and every other Love that has been in us from the first Inftitution of Nature is ever since the fall the Sacrifice of self-love We doubt not nevertheless but the most wicked and barbarous Men as Idolaters and even Atheists themselves are united to God by a Natural Love and of which consequently Self Love is not the cause By Love they are united to Truth Justice and Virtue They praise and esteem good Men and 't is not because they are Men that they love them but because they see good qualities in them which they cannot avoid loving since they cannot hinder themselves from admiring and judging them aimable Thus we love something else besides our selves but Self-Love is always predominant over all other loves Men abandon Truth and Justice for triffling Interests and if by their natural Powers they hazard their Lives and Fortunes to defend oppressed innocency or any other occasion They are induced by little else than Vanity and to make themselves considerable by the apparent possession of some Virtue which all the world reverences They love Virtue and Justice but never when 't is against themselves They may love them when they agree but never when they are opposite to their Interest for they can never without Grace gain the least conquest over Self-Love There are also many other natural
such things as others wou'd or wou'd not do in such occurrences by what they wou'd do themselves for they very well know that all men are not equally sensible of the same things nor equally susceptible of involuntary emotions so that 't is not by consulting the Sensations which the Passions excite in us but by hearkning to Reason that we must speak of the Judgments which accompany the Passions lest we shou'd only discover our selves instead of showing the Nature of the Passions in general CHAP. XI How all the Passions justifie themselves and of the judgments they cause us to make in their vindication IT will not be necessary to bring many Arguments to demonstrate that all the Passions justifie themselves This Principle is evident enough by the internal Sensation we have of our selves and the conduct of those whom we see agitated with any Passion it will be sufficient to expose it that we may afterwards take heed of it The Mind is such a slave to the Imagination that it always obeys it when it is heated by it It dares not answer it when 't is incens'd because it treats it ill if it makes any resistance and always recompences it with some pleasure when it acquiesses in its designs Those even whose imagination is so irregular that they believe themselves transformed into Beasts find some reasons to prove that they ought to live like them walk upon all four feed upon Grass and imitate all the actions which agree only to Beasts They find a great deal of pleasure in following the impressions of their Passions and feel themselves inwardly afflicted when they resist them and 't is enough if reason which accommodates it self and is commonly serviceable to pleasure argues after such a manner as is proper to defend the cause of it If therefore it be true that all Passions justifie themselves it is evident that desire of it self inclines us to judge advantageously of its Object if it is a desire of love and disadvantageously if 't is a desire of aversion The desire of love is a motion of the Soul excited by the Spirits to will the enjoyment or use of such things as are not in our power for if we desire the continuation of our enjoyment 't is because future things are not in our power It is therefore necessary to justifie desire that the Object which produces it should be judged good in it self or in relation to some other and we must think the contrary of that desire which is a kind of aversion It is true we cannot judge a thing to be good or bad if there is not some reason for it but there is no Object of our Passions which is not good in some sense If we can say that there is some of them which include no good and which consequently cannot be perceived as good by the sight of the Mind yet it cannot be said but they may be relished as good since we suppose our selves to be agitated by them and this taste or sensation is sufficient to incline the Soul to judge advantageously of an Object If we judge so easily that Fire contains in it self the heat we feel and Bread the savour we taste because of the sensations that these Bodies excite in us although it be wholly incomprehensible to the Mind since that can only conceive heat and savour to be the manners of being of a Body there is no Object of our Passions how vile and contemptible soever it appears to be that we do not judge to be good when we feel pleasure in the enjoyment of it For as we imagine that heat goes our of Fire when we feel it we blindly believe that the Object of the Passions cause the pleasure that we taste when we enjoy them and that therefore they are good since they are capable of doing us good the same may be said of those Passions which have evil for their Object But as I have just before said there is nothing which is not worthy of love or aversion either in it self or something else to which it has relation and when we are agitated by any Passion we soon discover the good or evil in its Object which favours or opposes it Thus by reason 't is easie to find out what Judgments these Passions whereby we are agitated form in us For if 't is a desire of love which acts us we soon apprehend that it will not fail to justifie it self by the advantageous judgments it will make upon its Object We easily see these Judgments will be so much the more extended as the desire is more violent and that they will be often full and absolute although the thing appears only good in part without we easily conceive that these advantageous Judgments will extend to every thing which has or seems to have any connection with the principal Object of the Passion and that so much the more as the Passion is stronger and the Imagination more extensive But if it be a desire of aversion the quite contrary will happen for Reasons as easily apprehended Experience sufficiently proves these things and therein it perfectly agrees with Reason but we will make these Truths more sensible by some Instances All Men naturally desire Knowledge for every Mind is made for the Truth But the desire of knowing how just and reasonable soever it may be in it self often becomes a very dangerous Vice through the false Judgments which attend it Curiosity often offers to the Mind the main Objects of its Meditations and Cares It often affixes false Ideas of greatness to these Objects It elevates them by the deceitful lustre of rarity and represents them so charming and attractive that 't is difficult to contemplate them without too much pleasure and application There is no trifle whatever but some Persons are wholly taken up about and their employment is always justified by the false judgments their vain curiosity induces them to make Those for instance who are curious about words imagine it to be a knowledge of certain terms wherein all Sciences consist They find a thousand Arguments to perswade themselves of it and the veneration paid them by those who are confounded by unknown terms is none of the weakest although it be the least reasonable Some Men are learning all their lives to speak who yet perhaps ought to be silent as long as they live for 't is evident we should hold our Tongues when we have nothing to say that is worth the hearing but they don't learn to speak to remain silent They do not sufficiently consider that to be able to speak well 't is requisite to think well have an exact judgment to discern truth from falsehood clear Ideas from those which are obscure and distinguish those of the Mind from such as proceed from the Imagination They think themselves uncommon and curious Wits because they know how to satisfie the Ear by an exact measure flatter the Passions by figures and agreeable motions and delight the
sensible It would be unnecessary here to give he Reasons that I had for it Since they would only serve to justifie the order that I have kept in what I have said which is not essential I have neither spoke of Arithmetick nor Algebra since the Numeral Figures and Letters of the Alphabet which are used in these Sciences are not so useful to increase the Attention as the Capacity of the Mind as shall be explained in the following Chapter These are the General Helps which may make the Mind more attentive I know no other except it be the will of being so which I do not treat of because it is supposed that all those who Study are willing to give Attention to what they Study Nevertheless there are many others which are peculiar to certain persons as some sort of Drinks certain Meats certain Places and certain Dispositions of Body with some other helps of which every one ought to be instructnd by his own Experience The Condition of our Imagination ought to be observed after Eating and we must consider what things they are that maintain or dissipate the Attention of the Mind What more general might be said is That the moderate use of such Food as creates many Animal Spirits is very fit to increase the Attention of th Mind and Strength of the Imagination in those who have them Weak and Languishing CHAP. V. Of the Means to increase the Extension and Capacity of the Mind That Arithmetick and Algebra are absolutely necessary to this end IT ought not immediately to be imagined that we can truly increase the Extension and Capacity of the Mind The Soul of Man is if we may so say a determined Quantity or Portion of Thought which hath limits that cannot be exceeded The Soul cannot become more Extensive or Capacious than it is It is not swelled nor enlarged after the same manner as we see Liquors and Metals are In fine It never Perceives more in one time than in another It is true this seems contrary to Experience for often we think upon many Objects and as oft but upon one only and we often say likewise that we think upon nothing at all Yet if we consider that Thought is to the Soul what Extension is to the Body we shall plainly discover that as a Body cannot be truly more extended at one time than another so if we conceive aright neither can the Soul think more at one time than another Whether it perceives many Objects or but one or even in the time that we say we think on nothing at all But the reason why we imagine we think more at one time than another is because we do not sufficiently distinguish between confused and distinct Perceptions without doubt there is more Thought required or the Capacity of Thinking is more fitted to perceive many things distinctly at once than to perceive but one only But there is not more Thought requisite to perceive many things confusedly than to perceive one distinctly So there is no more Thought in the Soul when it thinks of many things than when it thinks of but one since when it thinks of but one only it always perceives it much more clearly than when it applies it self to many For it must be observed that a pure simple Perception sometimes includes as much Thought or fills as much the Capacity that the Mind hath of Thinking as a Judgment nay even a compounded reasoning Since Experience teaches us That a lively clear and evident Perception but of one thing only imploys and takes up the Mind as much as a compounded Reasoning or an obscure and confused Perception of several Relations between many things For even as there is as much or more Sensation in the sensible view of an Object that I hold near my Eyes and carefully examine as in the prospect of a whole Field that I look upon negligently and without Attention so that the clearness o the Sensation that I have of the Object which is near my Eyes recompences the Extension of the confused Sensation I have of many things that I see without Attention in a Field Thus the Prospect the Mind has of one Object only is sometimes so lively and distinct that it includes as much or even more Thought than a Prospect of the Relations which are between many things It is true at certain times it seems to us that we think of but one thing and nevertheless we have some difficulty to comprehend it well and at other times we comprehend both this thing and many others with great Facility From thence we imagine that the Soul hath more Extension or a greater Capability of Thinking at one time than another but it is plain we deceive our selves The Reason why at certain times we have some Difficulty to conceive the most easie things is not because the Thought of the Soul or its Capacity of Thinking is diminished but because this Capacity is filled either by some lively Sensation of Pain or Pleasure or by a great number of weak and obscure Sensations which cause a kind of Vapor and which for the most part proceeds from a confused Sensation of a great number of Things A piece of Wax is capable of a very distinct Figure yet it cannot receive two but then one will confound the other for it cannot be entirely round and square at the same time indeed if it received a Million none of them would be distinct Now if this piece of Wax was capable of knowing its Figures it could not know by what Figure it must be determined if the number of them were too great It is the same with our Soul when a great number of Modifications fill its Capacity it cannot perceive them distinctly because it sees them not separately this makes it think it perceives nothing at all It cannot say that it is sensible Pain Pleasure Light Sound Taste it is none of all these and yet it is all these that it perceives But although we should suppose the Soul not to be subjected to the confused and irregular Motions of the Animal Spirits or so disingaged from the Body that its Thoughts should not depend upon whatsoever passed in it it might then happen that we should more easily comprehend certain things in one time than in another and yet the Capacity of the Soul be neither diminished nor increased The general Idea of Infinity is inseparable from the Mind and it wholly takes up its Capacity when it thinks not of some particular thing For when we say we think of nothing it does not follow that we do not think of this general Idea but simply that we do not think of any thing in particular Certainly if our Mind was not filled with this Idea we could not think of all sorts of things as we do for indeed we cannot think of those things that we have no knowledge of And if this Idea was no more present to the Mind when it seems to us that we think
enough to confound the most evident things and in these Questions where 't is necessary to remove the Equivocation they see nothing to distinguish If we consider that the greatest Part of the Questions of Philosophers and Physicians include some equivocal Terms like those we have spoken of we cannot doubt but that these learned Men who have not been able to define them have delivered nothing Solid in all the great Volumes they have composed and what I have said may suffice to overthrow almost all the Opinions of the Ancients But for Descartes he perfectly knew how to distinguish these things He resolved no Question by Sensible Idea's and if we take the Pains to read him we shall see he explained every thing after a more clear and evident Manner and almost always demonstrated them only by the distinct Idea's of Extension Figure and Motion The other kind of equivocal Terms which Philosophers make use of comprehend all these general Terms of Logick by which it is easie to explain things without having any Knowledge of them Aristotle has made the most use of them all his Books are full of them and some are a mere Logick He proposes and resolves all things by these Specious Words Genus Species Power Nature Form Faculty Quality Causa per se Causa per accidens His Followers have had no small Trouble to apprehend the meaning of these Words which signifie nothing at all nor are they more learned than before when they have heard say that Fire dissolves Metals because it has a Faculty of dissolving them and that a Man digests not because he has a weak Stomach or that his Faculty of Concocting does not perform its Functions well It is true those who have made use of these Terms and general Idea's to explain all things by do not commonly fall into so great a Number of Errors as those who only make use of them to stir up the confused Ideas of the Senses The Philosophers of the Schools are not so subject to Error as certain Dogmatical decisive Physicians who form Systems upon some Experiments which they know not the reason of because they speak so generally that they run no great Hazzard The Fire warms dries hardens and softens because it has such Faculties as produce these Effects Senna purges by its Purgative Quality Bread nourishes by its Nutritive Quality These Proportions are not subject to Error for a Quality is that which denotes a thing by such a Name and we cannot deny it to Aristotle for indeed this Definition is indisputable Such or the like manner of speaking are not false but only in Effect they signifie nothing These indetermined Idea's ingage us not in Error but they are wholy useless in the Discovery of Truth For although we know there is a substantial Form in Fire accompanied with a thousand Faculties like to those of heating dilating melting Gold Silver and all Metals of clearing burning and baking If this Difficulty be proposed to me to be resolved viz. whether Fire can harden Dirt and soften Wax The Idea's of Substantial Form and of those Faculties that produce Heat Ratification Fluidity c. would be of no use to me in resolving the Question for there being no Connexion betwen the Idea's of the Hardness of Dirt and Softness of Wax and those of the Substantial Form of Fire and the Qualities of producing Rarification Fluidity c. It is the same with all general Idea's so they are wholly useless for the Ends designed But if we know that Fire is nothing else but the Parts of Wood put into continal Motion and that 't is only by this Agitation that it excites the Sensation of Heat in us If we knew at the same Time that the Softness of Dirt consists only in a Mixture of Earth and Water as these Idea's are not confused and general but distinct and particular It would not be difficult to see that the Heat of Fire must harden Dirt because one Body can move another being it self in Motion We likewise easily discover that since Heat which is felt near the Fire is caused by the Motion of the invisible Parts of the Wood which strike against the Hands if we expose Dirt to the Heat of the Fire the Watery Parts which are joyned to the Earth being more lose and consequently sooner agitated by the Shock of the little Bodies which go out from the Fire than the gross Particles of the Earth they must separate and leave it dry and hard It would also evidently apppear that Fire cannot harden Wax if we knew that the Particles which compose it are branched and very near of the same Bigness Thus particular Idea's are very useful in an Enquiry after Truth And indeterminate Idea's are hot only useless but on the contrary insensibly lead us into Error These Philosophers content not themselves with making use of general Terms and indetermined Idea's that answer nothing But they will have those Terms signifie certain particular Beings They pretend that there is some Substance distinct from Matter which is the Form of Matter and an infinite Company of little Beings really distinct from Matter and Form of which they suppose as many of them as they have different Sensations of Bodies and they think these Bodies produce different Effects Yet it is plain to any Man that is capable of Attention that all these little Beings distinct from Fire for instance and which we suppose to be contained therein for the Production of Heat Light Hardness Fluidity c are only Fictions of the Imagination which are contrary to Reason For Reason hath no particular Idea which represents these little Beings If we ask the Philosophers what Sort of Entity that Faculty in the Fire is which gives Light they will only answer that 't is a Being which is the Cause why Fire is capable of producing Light So that the Idea they have of the Faculty of Light is not different from the general Idea of the Cause and confused Idea of the Effect which we see They have therefore no clear Idea of what they say when they admit these particular Beings Thus they say what they conceive not and what indeed is impossible to be conceived CHAP. III. Of the most dangerous Error in Philosophy Of the Ancients PHilosophers have not only spoke what they did not conceive when they explained the Effects of Nature by certain Beings which they have no particular Idea of but even establish a Principle from whence may directly be drawn most false and dangerous Consequences For if according to their Opinion we suppose that in Bodies there are some Beings distinct from Matter and not having any distinct Idea of these Entities we might easily imagine that they are the true or principal Causes of the Effects which we see produced 'T is even the common Sentiment of most Philosophers For 't is chiefly to explain these Effects that they make use of Substantial Forms Real Qualities and other the like Entities
But when we come to consider attentively the Idea we have of Cause or Power of acting we cannot doubt but that it represents something Divine For the Idea of a Sovereign Power is the Idea of Sovereign Divinity and the Idea of a Subordinate Power is the Idea of an inferiour but a true Divinity at least according to the Opinion of the Heathens if it be the Idea of a Power or true Cause We admit therefore something Divine in all Bodies which encompass us when we admit Forms Faculties Qualities Vertues and real Beings capable of producing certain Effects by the Power of their own Nature And thus they insensibly enter into the Opinions of the Heathens by the Respect they have for their Philosophy Faith indeed works it but it may perhaps be said that if we are Christians in our Hearts we are Heathens in our Minds Moreover it is difficult to perswade our selves that we ought neither to love or fear true Powers and Beings who can act upon us punish us with Pain or recompense us with Pleasure And as Love and Fear are a true Adoration 't is also difficult to perswade our selves that we ought not to adore them For whatever can act upon us as a real and true Cause is necessarily above us according to St. Austin and right Reason The same Father and the same Reason tells us 't is an immutable Law that Inferiour things should submit to superiour And from hence Ego enim ab animâ hoc corpus animari non puto nifi intentione facientis Nec ab isto quicquam illam pati Arbitror sed facere de illo in illo tanquam subjecto divinitus dominationi suae l. 6. mus c. 5. * this great Father concludes that the Body cannot act upon the Soul and that nothing can be above the Soul but God In the Holy Scriptures when God proves to the Israelites that they ought to adore him that is that they ought to fear and love him the chief Reasons he brings are taken from his Power to recompence and punish them He represents to them the Benefits they have received from him the Evils wherewith he hath chastised them and that he has still the same Power He forbids them to adore the Gods of the Heathens because they have no Power over them and can do them neither Good nor Hurt He requires them to honour him only because he only is the true Cause of Good and Evil and that there happens none in their City according to the Prophet which he has not done for Natural Causes are not the true Causes of the Evil that appears to be done to us 'T is God alone that acts in them and 't is he only that we must fear and love Soli Deo Honor Gloria In short this Opinion that we ought to fear and love whatsoever is the true Cause of Good and Evil appears so natural and just that it is impossible to destroy it so that if we suppose this false Opinion of the Philosophers which we endeavour here to confute that Bodies which encompass us are the true Causes of the Pleasures and Evils which we feel Reason seems to justifie a Religion like to that of the Heathens and approves of the universal Irregularity of Manners It is true that Reason does not tell us that we must adore Onyons and Leeks as the Sovereign Divinity because they cannot make us intirely happy when we have of them or intirely unhappy when we want them Nor have the Heathens ever done to them so much Honour as to the great Jupiter upon whom all their Divinities depend or as to the Sun which our Senses represent to us as the universal Cause which gives Life and Motion to all things and which we cannot hinder our selves from regarding as a Sovereign Divinity if with the Heathen Philosophers we suppose it includes in its being the true Causes of whatever it seems to produce not only in our Bodies and Minds but likewise in all Beings which encompass us But if we must not pay a Sovereign Honour to Leeks and Onyons yet we may always render them some particular Adoration I mean we may think of and love them in some manner if it is true that in some sort they can make us happy we must honour them in Proportion to the Good they can do us And certainly Men who give Ear to the Reports of their Senses think that Pulse is capable of doing them good for else the Israelites for instance would not have regretted their Absence in the Defect nor considered it as a Misfortune to be deprived of them if they did not in some manner look upon themselves happy in the Enjoyment of them These are the Irregularities which our Reason engages us in when it is joyned to the Principles of the Heathen Philosophy and follows the Impressons of the Senses That we may longer doubt of the Falseness of this Miserable Philosphy and the Certainty of our Principles and Clearness of the Idea's we make use of It is necessary clearly to establish those Truths which are opposite to the Errors of the ancient Philosophy and to prove in short that there is only one true Cause because there is only one true God That Nature or the Power of every thing proceeds only from the Will of God That all Natural things are not true Causes but only occasional ones and some other Truths which will be the Consequences of these It is evident that all Bodies both great and small have no power of removing themselves A Mountain an House a Stone a grain of Sand and in short the least or biggest Bodies we can conceive have no power of removing themselves We have only two sorts of Idea's that of Bodies and that of Spirits whereas we ought to speak only of those things which we conceive we should reason according to these two Idea's Since therefore the Idea we have of all Bodies shows us that they cannot move themselves it must be concluded that they are moved by Spirits only But when we examine the Idea we have of all finite Minds we do not see the necessary Connexion between their Wills and the Motion of any Body whatsoever it be On the contrary we see that there is none nor can be any whence we ought to conclude if we will argue according to our Knowledge that as no body can be able to move it self so there is no created Spirit can be the true or principal cause of the Motion of any body whatever But when we think of the Idea of God viz. of a Being infinitely Perfect and consequently Almighty we know that there is such a Connexion between his Will and the Motion of all Bodies that 't is impossible to conceive he should Will the Motion of a Body that should not be moved We must then say that his Will only can move Bodies if we will speak things as we conceive them and not as we feel them The moving
Spirits desire as we may think of Devils or some other Spirits who merit this Punishment we cannot say in this case that God communicates his Power to them since they can do nothing that they would do Yet the Wills of these Spirits would be the Natural Causes of whatever Effects should be produced as such Bodies should be moved to the Right Hand because these Spirits would have them moved to the Left and the desire of these Spirits would determine the Will of God to act as our Wills to move the parts of our Bodies determine the first Cause to move them So that the Wills of Spirits are only occasional Causes Yet if after all these Reasons we will still maintain that the Will of an Angel which moves any body should be a true Cause and not an occasional one it is plain that this same Angel might be the true Cause of the Creation and Annihilation of all things For God could as well communicate to him his Prower of Creating and Destroying Bodies as that of moving them if he will'd that things should be created and annihilated In a word If he will'd that all things should happen as the Angel wishes them even as he Wills Bodies should move as the Angel pleases If it be said that an Angel or a Man would be the true movers because God moves Bodies when they wish it it may also be said that a Man and an Angel may be true Creators since God can create Beings when they will it Nay perhaps it might be said that the molt Vile Animals or Matter of it self should be the effective Cause of the Creation of any Substance if we supposed as the Philosophers do that God produces substantial Forms whenever the Disposition of Matter requires it In fine Because God has resolved from all Eternity in certain times to create such or such things we might also say that these times should be the Causes of the Creation of these Beings as reasonably as to pretend that a Bowl which meets another is the true cause of the motion it communicates to it Because God has determined by his general Will which constituted the Order of Nature that when two Bodies should meet there should be such and such a Communication of Motion There is then but one only true God and he the one only true Cause And we must not imagine that which precedes an Effect to be the true Cause of it God cannot even communicate his Power to the Creatures if we follow the Light of Reason he cannot make them true Causes because he cannot make them Gods Bodies Spirits pure Intelligences can all do nothing 'T is he who hath made these Spirits that illuminates and acts them 'T is he who has created the Heavens and the Earth which regulates the Motions thereof In short 't is the Author of our Being that executes our Wills semel jussit semper paret He even moves our Arms when we make use of them against his Orders for he complains by his Prophets that we make him serve our unjust and criminal Desires All these little Heathen Divinities and all these particular Causes of the Philosophers are only Chymera's that the wicked Spirit endeavours to establish to ruin the Worship of the true God It is not the Philosophy they have received from Adam which teaches these things 't is that they have received from the Serpent for since the Fall the Mind of Man is perfectly Heathenish 'T is this Philosophy which joyned to the Errors of the Senses has made them adore the Sun and which is fall at this Day the universal Cause of the Irregularity of the Mind and Corruption of the Heart of Man By their Actions and sometimes by their Words why say they should we not love the Body since the Body is capable of affording us all Pleasures And why do we laugh at the Israelites which regretted the Loss of the Garlick and Onyons of Egypt since in Effect they were unhappy by being deprived of what in some Measure could make them happy But the new Philosophy which they represent as a dismal thing to affrighten weak Minds that is despised and condemned without being understood The new Philosophy I say since they are pleased to call it so destroys all the Arguments of the Libertines by the Establishment of the chiefest of its Principles which perfectly agrees with the * Haec est Religio Christiana fratres mei quae praedicatur per universum mundum horrentibus inimieis ubi vincuntur murmurantibus ubi praevalent saevientibus haec est Religie Christiana ut Colatur unus Deus non Dii qui facit Animam Beatum nisi unus Deus Aug. tr 23. in Joan. first Principle of the Christian Religion that we must love and fear but one God since there is only one God who can make us happy For if Religion teaches us that there is but one true God this Philosophy shews us there is but one true Cause If Religion informs us that all the Divinities of the Heathens are only Stones and Metals without Life and Motion This Philosophy discovers to us also that all second Causes or all the Divinities of their Philosophy are only Matter and inefficacious Wills In short if Religion teaches us that we must not bow our Knees to false Gods This Philosophy also tells us that our Imaginations and Minds ought not to be prostituted to the Imaginary Greatness and Power of Causes which are not true Causes That we must neither love nor fear them nor busie our selves about them but think upon God only see him adore him fear and love him in all things But this agrees not with the Inclination of some Philosophers They will neither see nor think upon God For since the Fall there is a secret Opposition between God and Man Men take Pleasure in erecting Gods after their own Fancy they voluntarily love and fear the Fictions of their own Imagination as they Heathens did the Works of their own Hands They are like Children who tremble at their Companions after they have daubed their Faces Or if they will have a more Noble Comparison although perhaps it be not so just they resemble those famous Romans who had some Fear and Respect for the Fictions of their own Minds and foolishly adored their Emperors after they had let loose the Eagle when they deified them CHAP. IV. An Explanation of the Second Part of the general Rule That Philosophers neglect it but Mr. Descartes has very exactly observed it WE have already shewed unto what Errors we are subject when we reason upon the false and confused Idea's of the Senses and upon the rambling and indeterminate Idea's of pure Logick We have sufficiently discovered that to preserve Evidence in our Perceptions it is absolutely necessary exactly to observe the Rule that we have prescribed if our Idea's are clear and distinct and then to reason according to these Idea's In this same general Rule which respects the Subject
Description of that the Centers of these Vortices are Stars which are as so many Suns That the Vortices encompass one another and are disposed after such a manner as to prejudice each others Motion as little as can be But things have not been able to come to that pass but the weakest Vortices have been drawn along and almost swallowed up by the strongest To apprehend which we need only reflect that the first Element which is in the Center of a Vortix may and continually does get out by the Spaces of the Balls towards the Circumference of the same Vortix and that at the Time that this Center or Star empties it self through its Equator the other first Element must re-enter by its Poles For neither the Star nor its Poles can be emptied on one side without being filled on the other since there is no Void in Extension But because an infinite Number of Causes can hinder much of the first Element from entring into this Star which we speak of It is requisite that the Parts of the first Element which are obliged to remain in it should be so disposed as to move the same Way 'T is that which makes them unite and joyn one with another and form Spots which condense into Crusts and by little and little cover the Center and make a solid and gross Matter of the most subtle and agitated of all Bodies 'T is this gross Matter that Mr. Descartes calls the third Element and it must be observed that as it proceeds from the first whose Figures are infinite it ought to be invested with an infinite Number of different Forms This Star thus covered with Spots and Crusts and become like the other Planets is no longer able to maintain and defend its Vortex against the continual Effort of those that environ it This Vortex therefore diminishes by little and little The Matter which composes it is dispersed on all sides and the strongest Vortex about it draws the greatest Part of it and at last swallows up the Planet which was the Center of it This Planet being encompassed with the Matter of the great Vortex it swims there to preserve it self with some little Matter of its own Vortex keeping the Circular Motion it had before And at last it takes a Situation there which puts it in Equilibrio with an equal Quantity of Matter in which it swims If it has but a little Solidity and Magnitude left it descends very near to the Center of the Vortex which swallowed it up because having some Power to continue its Motion in a right Line it must place it self in this Vortex in which an equal Quantity of the second Element has as much Power as it has to remove it self from the Center for it can be in Equilibrio only in this Place If this Planet is greater or more solid it will be in Equilibrio with a Place more distant from the Center of the Vortex And in short if in this Vortex there is any Place or equal Quantity of Matter that has as much Solidity as this Planet and consequently as much Power to continue its Motion in a right Line because this Planet will perhaps be very great and covered with very solid and thick Crusts it cannot stop in this Vortex since it cannot be put in Equilibrio with the Matter which composes it This Planet will pass then into some other Vortex and if it cannot be in Equilibrio it will not stay there neither So that we shall see it sometimes pass like Comets when they happen to be in our Vortex and near enough for us to discern them And we shall not see it again till a long time after when it is in other Vortices or in the Extremity of ours If we how think that one Vortix alone by its Magnitude Force and Advantagious Situation can by little and little undermine attract and swallow up many Vortices and such Vortices which before had swallowed some others it would be necessary that the Planets which are in the Centers of these Vortices being entered into the great Vortex which has swallowed them up should be there put in Equilibrio with an equal Quantity of Matter in which they swim So that if these Planets are unequal in Solidity they will be in an unequal Distance from the Center or the Vortex in which they swim And if it be found that two Planets have near the same Power to continue their Motion in a right Line or that one Planet draws into its little Vortex one or many other less Planets which according to our Manner of conceiving the Formation of things it has swallowed up then this little Planet shall turn about the great one while that turns upon its Center and all these Planets shall be carried along by the Motion of the great Vortex in almost an equal Distance from its Center We are obliged by the Light of Reason so to dispose the Parts which compose the World that we imagine to have been formed by the most simple Ways For all that we have said is grounded only upon the Idea we have of Extension the Parts of which we suppose to incline to the most simple Motion which is that of a right Line And when we examine by the Effects whether we are not deceived by endeavouring to explain things by their Causes we areas much surprized to see the Phenomena of Celestial Bodies so perfectly agree with what we have said For we see that all the Planets that are in the Middle of a little Vortex turn upon their own Center like the Sun that they swim all in the Vortex of the Sun and about the Sun that the smallest or least solid are nearest the Sun and the more solid are at the greatest Distance from it and that there is also some amongst them like Comets which cannot remain in the Vortex of the Sun In short there are many Planets which yet have many little ones that turn about them as the Moon does about the Earth Jupiter has four of them and Saturn three It may be also that Saturn has so great a Number of small ones that they form a continued Circle which seems to have no Thickness because of its great Distance These Planets being the greatest that we see we may consider them as having been engendered of Vortices large enough to have swallowed up others before they were involved in the Vortices we are in All these Planets turn upon their Center the. Earth in Twenty Four Hours Mars in Twenty Five or near Jupiter in Ten Hours or thereabouts c. They turn about the Sun Mercury which is the nearest in about Four Months Saturn which is the farthest off in Thirty Years near and those which are between both in more or less Time but not perfectly in the Proportion of their Distance For all the Matter in which they swim turns swifter when it is nearest the Sun because the Line of its Motion is then shorter When Mars is opposite
Truth enquired after I make it speak positively like one who pretends to have resolved the Question he has examined CHAP. IX The last Example to shew the Vsefulness of this Work in which the Cause of the Vnion of the Parts of Bodies and also the Rules of the Communication of Motion are examined BOdies are united together after three different ways by Continuity Contiguity and a third way which has no particular name because it rarely happens and which I call by the general Term of Vnion By Continuity or the Cause of it I mean that I know not what which links together the Parts of a Body so strongly that they cannot easily be separated and which we look upon as making altogether but one whole By Contiguity I mean that I know not what which makes me suppose two Bodies touching after such a manner so that there is nothing between them but which I judge not strictly united because I can easily separate them By this third Term Vnion I mean that I know not what which is the cause that wo Glasses or two Marbles whose Surfaces having been polished by rubbing one against another are joyned together in such a manner that although we can very easily separate them by making them slip off one another we shall nevertheless have some trouble to do it by any other Method Now this is not Continuity since these two Glasses or Marbles being united after this manner are not conceived as making but one Body because in one Sense we can separate them so easily Nor is it simply Contiguity although it comes very near it because these two pieces of Glass or Marble are strictly enough united and even much more than the Parts of soft and liquid Bodies as those of Butter and Water These Terms thus explained we must afterwards enquire into the Cause which unites Bodies and the Differences between Continuity Contiguity and the Vnion of Bodies according to the Sense I have determined I first seek the Cause of Continuity or that I know not what which keeps the Parts of a Body so strictly united together that some Force must be used to separate them and which we look upon together as making one whole I hope this Cause being found we shall have no great Difficulty to discover the rest It seems now necessary to me that this I know not what that ties even the smallest Parts of a piece of Iron together which I hold in my Hand should be something very powerful since I must use a great Force to break off one little part of it But I deceive my self May not this Difficulty that I find in breaking the least piece of Iron proceed from my Weakness and not the resistance of the Iron For I remember that I have formerly used more Violence than I do now to break a piece of Iron like that I hold in my Hand and if I fall Sick perhaps I could not even do it by the utmost Power I could use I therefore see plainly I must not absolutely judge of Firmness whereby the parts of Iron are knit together by the Endeavours I make to dis-unite them I must only judge that they keep very strongly together in relation to my Weakness or that they keep more strongly together than the parts of my Flesh since the Sensations of Pain that I have whilst I make too great Efforts advertises me that I shall rather dis-unite the parts of my Body than those of Iron I discover then that as I am not absolutely Strong or Weak Iron or other Bodies are not absolutely hard or flexible but only in relation to the Cause which acts upon them and that the Efforts I make cannot serve me as a Rule to measure the greatness of the Force that must be imployed to overcome the Resistance and Hardness of Iron For Rules ought to be invariable and these Efforts change according to time the abundance of actual Spirits and hardness of my Flesh since I cannot always produce the same Effects by using the same Endeavours This Reflection delivers me from a Prejudice that I had which made me imagine the Links were strong which united the parts of Bodies which Links perhaps are nothing at all and I hope it will not be useless to me in the Consequence for I have a strange Inclination to judge of every thing in relation to my self and to follow the Impressions of my Senses which I would more industriously avoid But to proceed After having thought some time and with some application enquired the cause of this strict Union without having discovered any thing of it I find my self carried by my Negligence and Nature to judge with many others that 't is the Form of Bodies which preserves the Union between their Parts or the Amity and Inclination they have for their likeness for there is nothing more commodious than to suffer our selves sometimes to be seduced and so to become Learned at little Cost But since I will not believe any thing I do not know I must not suffer my self to be thus overcome by my own Idleness nor give my self up to bare Appearances Let us quit therefore these Forms and Inclinations whereof we have no distinct and particular Idea's but only confused and general ones that it may be we form only in relation to our Nature and even in the Existence of which many Persons and perhaps whole Nations agree not It seems to me that I see the Cause of this strict Union of Parts which compose hard Bodies without admitting of any other thing than what all the World grants to be in them or at least all that the World conceives distinctly to be there for every one distinctly conceives that all Bodies are or may be composed of little Particles Thus it may be there are some of them which are crooked and branched and like little Links capable of holding others strongly together or else that they intermix all their Branches so that we cannot easily dis-unite them I have a great Mind to permit my self to espouse this Thought and so much the more as that I see the visible Parts of great Bodies hold and unite themselves together after this manner But I cannot too much distrust my Prejudices and the Impression of my Senses I must therefore yet examine the Matter more closely and see the Reason why the smallest and utmost Parts of Solid Bodies in a word even the Parts of each of these Links hold together for they cannot be united by other Links yet smaller since I suppose them solid Or else If I say they are united after this manner they may reasonably demand what shall unite these others together and so on ad infinitum So that now the Difficulty of the Question is to know how the parts of these little Links or branched parts can be so strictly united together as they are A for instance with B which I suppose parts of a little Link Or else which is the same thing Bodies being so
little Resistance It is difficult enough to perswade our selves that Descartes positively believed the Cause of Hardness was different from that of Elasticity And what appears most probable is that he has not sufficiently reflected upon the Matter When we meditate long upon any Subject and are satisfied in things we would know we often think no more of them We believe that the Thoughts that we have had are undoubted Truths and 't is useless to examine farther But in Men there are many things which disgust them against Application incine them to a rash Assent and make them subject to Error and although the Mind continues apparently satisfied it is not always because it is well informed of the Truth Descartes was a Man like us I confess we never saw more Solidity Exactness Extension and more Penetration of Mind than what appears in his Works yet he was not infallible So that it is probable he was so very strongly perswaded of his Opinion from not sufficiently reflecting that he asserted something elsewhere in nis Principles contrary to it He maintained it upon very specious and probable Reasons but such however as were not of sufficient Force to make us submit and therefore he might and ought to have suspended his Judgment It is not enough to examine in a hard Body what might be the Cause that made it so We ought also to think of the invisible bodies which might render them hard as he has done at the End of his Philosophical Principles when he attributes the Cause of Resistance to them He ought to have made an exact Division which comprised whatsoever might contribute to the Inflexibility of bodies It is not sufficient still to seek the Cause in God's Will he ought also to have thought of the Subtle Matter which environed them For although the Existence of this extreamly agitated Matter was not yet proved in that Place of his Principles where he speaks of Hardness it was not then rejected He ought then to have suspended his Judgment and to have remembered that what he had writ of the Cause of Hardness and Rules of Motion ought to have been reviewed anew which I believe he did not do carefully enough Or else he did not sufficiently consider the true Reason of a thing that is very easie to discover and which yet is of the utmost Consequence in Physicks I will explain it Descartes well knew that to maintain his System of the Truth which he could not reasonably doubt It was absolutely necessary that great bodies should always communicate their Motion to the lesser bodies they should meet and the less reflect at their meeting with the greater without a like Loss on their Side For without that the First Element would not have all the Motion that it is necessary it should have above the Second nor the Second above the Third and his whole System would be absolutely false as is sufficiently known to those that have but thought a little upon it But in supposing that Rest had Force enough to resist Motion and that a great Body in Rest could not be moved by another that is less than it although it strike it with a furious Agitation It is plain that great Bodies must have much less Motion than a like Mass of little Bodies since according to this Supposition they can always communicate what they have and cannot always receive from the lesser Thus this Supposition not being contrary to whatsoever Descartes has said in his Principles from the Beginning unto the Establishment of his Rules of Motion and agreeing very well with the Sequel of his Principles he believed that the Rules of Motions which he thought he had demonstrated in their Cause were also sufficiently confirmed by their Effects I agree with Descartes that great Bodies communicate their Motion much more easily than little Bodies do and therefore his First Element is much more agitated than the Second and the Second than the Third But the Cause of it is clear without having any Regard to his Supposition Little and fluid Bodies as Water Air c. can only communicate to great Bodies an uniform Motion which is common to all their Parts The Water in a River can only communicate to a Boat the Motion of Descent which is common to all the little Parts of which the Water is composed and every one of these Parts besides this common Motion has also an infinite Number of other Particulars Thus by this Reason 't is plain that a Boat for instance can never have so much Motion as an equal Bulk of Water since the Boat can only receive from the Water that Motion which is direct and common to all the Parts that compose it If Twenty Particles of a fluid Body push any other Body on the one Side and as many on the other it will continue immoveable and all the little Particles of the fluid Body in which it swims rebound up without losing any thing of their Motion Thus great Bodies whose Parts are united can only receive the Circular and Uniform Motion of the Vortex of the Subtle Matter which environs them This Reason seems sufficient to them to make it comprehended how great Bodies are not so much agitated as the lesser and that there is a Necessity for an Explanation of these things to suppose any Force in Rest to resist Motion The Certainty of Descartes's Principles cannot be a sufficient Proof to defend his Rules of Motion and we may believe that if Descartes himself had again without Prejudice examined his Principles and compared them with such Reasons as I have brought he would not have believed that the Effects of Nature had confirmed his Rules nor have fallen into a Contradiction by attributing the Hardness of Bodies only to the rest of their Parts and their Elasticity to the Force of a Subtle Matter Here follows now the Rules of the Communication of Motions in a Void which are only the Consequences of what I have established about the Nature of Rest Bodies not being hard in a Void since they are only hard by the Pressure of the Subtle Matter which surrounds them if Two Bodies meet they would flatten without rebounding we must therefore give these Rules Suppose them hard of themselves and not by the Pressure of this Subtle Matter Rest having no Power to resist Motion and many Bodies before being considered as one only in the moment of their meeting it is plain they ought not to rebound when they are equal in Magnitude and Velocity or that their Velocity supplies the Desect of their Magnitude or their Magnitude the Defect of their Velocity And it is easie from thence to conclude that in all other Cases they must always communicate their Motion A general Rule for the Communication of Motion so that they may afterwards proceed with an equal Swiftness So that to know what must happen in all the different Suppositions of Magnitude and Swiftness of Bodies which meet one another we need
those of which we actually think I suppose nevertheless that our Sensations do not fill all the capacity of our Mind for that we may be free with the liberty I speak of it is necessary not only that God should not invincibly impel us towards particular goods but also that we may make use of the impression we have towards good in general to love some other thing than that we actually love Now as we can love no Object but those we may think of nor actually think of any other but those that cause too quick Sensations in us it is evident that the dependance we have upon our Body lessens our liberty nay does on many occasions take away the use of it So our Sensations destroying out Ideas and the union we have with our Body by which we only see or rather feel our selves weakening that which we have with God by which all things are present to us the Mind must not suffer it self to be divided by confused Sensations if it be willing always to have the principle of its determinations to be free It appears from all this that God is not the Author of Sin and that Man does not give himself new Modifications God is not the Author of Sin since he continually imprints a motion to go farther on him who Sins or stops at a particular good and he gives him the power to think of other things and to apply himself to other goods than that which actually is the Object of his thought and of his love that he commands him not to love those things which he can forbear loving without being troubled by any remorses and he continually calls him to himself by the secret reproaches of his Reason Is is true Gob does in one sense impel the Sinner to love the Object of his Sin if this Object appears to be good to the Sinner for as most Divines say all that is positive in Sin or what there is of act or motion proceeds from God But it is only through a false judgment of our Mind that the Creatures appear good to us that is capable of acting in us and making us happy The Sin of a Man lies in this that he does not refer all the particular Goods to the Soveraign Good or rather in that he does not consider nor love the Severaign Good in the particular Goods and so does not regulate his Love according to the Will of God or according to the essential and necessary order of which all Men have a knowledge and which is so much the more perfect as they are more strictly united to God and are less sensible of the impressions of their Senses and Passions See the Explanations upon the Third Chapter of the Second Part of the Sixth Book towards the end where I explain my thoughts more distinctly For our Senses diffuse our Souls through our whole Bodies and our Passions transport them if I may so say into those Objects which are about us they remove us from the light of God which enlightens us Neither does Man give himself new Modifications for the motions of love that God continually imprints upon us increases or diminishes not whether we actually love or not I mean although this natural motion of love be or be not determined by any Idea of our Mind This motion does not cease even by its acquiescence in the possession of Good as the motion of Bodies ceases by their rest 'T is probable that God always impels us with an equal force towards him for he inclines us towards good in general as much as we are capable of and we are at all times equally capable of it because our Will or Natural capacity of Willing is always equal in it self Thus the impression or Natural motion which carries us towards good neither increases or diminishes I confess we have no clear Idea nor even any internal Sensation of this equality of impression or natural motion towards Good But 't is because as I have elsewhere proved that we know not our selves by a clear Idea not are we conscious of our own Faculties whilst they don't actually operate we do not feel in our selves what is natural common and always the same as we are not sensible of the heat and motion of our Hearts We are not likewise sensible of our Habits and whether we are worthy of the Love or Wrath of God There is perhaps in us an infinite number of Faculties which are absolutely unknown to us for we have no internal Sensation of what we are but only of what we feel If we had never felt Pain nor a desire for particular Goods we could not by the internal Sensation we have of our selves discover whether we should be capable of feeling Pain or willing such Goods 'T is our Memory and not our internal Sensation that teaches us we are capable of feeling what we no longer feel or of being agitated by Passions which at present we feel no motions of Thus there is nothing which hinders us from believing that God always inclines us towards him with an equal force although after a very different manner He always preserves in our Souls an equal capacity of willing or one and the same will as in all matter he preserves an equal quantity of motion But although it were not certain I don't see how we can say that the encrease or diminution of the natural motion of our Souls depends upon us since we cannot be the cause of the extension of our own Will It is however certain by what I have said before that God produces and also preserves whatsoever is real and positive in the particular determinations of the motions of our Souls whether Ideas or Sensations For 't is he who determines our motions for a general Good towards particular Goods but not after an invincible manner since we have a tendency to go farther So that all we do when we sin is that we do not all that we are able to do by means of the impression we have towards him who includes all Goods For we can do nothing but by the power that we receive from our Union with him who does all things in us Now what chiefly makes us Sin is because we choose rather to enjoy than to examine because of the Pleasure we feel in enjoying and the Pain we find in examining We cease to make use of the motion that is given us to enquire after Good and examine it and we stop in the enjoyment of such things as we ought only to make use of But if we narrowly observe we shall see there is nothing real on our part but a defect and cessation from enquiry which if we may so say corrupts the action of God in us but which however cannot destroy it Thus What do we when we do not Sin We do then whatever God does in us for we limit not to a particular or rather to a false Good the love that God imprints on us for the true
that are so opposite Nevertheless I am willing to suppose that Men see clearly that God by an absolutely indifferent Will has established Eternal Truths and Laws for all times and places and that they are now immutable by his Decree But where do they see this Decree Has God Created any representative Being of that Decree Will they say that this Decree is a Modification of their Souls They see this Decree clearly for they have learnt by it that immutability is annexed to Eternal Truth and Laws But where do they see it Certainly unless they see it in God they see it not at all For that Decree can only be in God and it is only to be seen where it is Therefore Philosophers can be certain of nothing unless they consult God and unless God answers them Let them exclaim never so much at this they must submit to it or be silent But after all this Decree is an imagination without any foundation When we think on Order on Eternal Truths and Laws we inquire not Naturally into their Cause for indeed they have none We see not the necessity of that Decree clearly we never think immediately on it On the contrary we perceive at first sight and that with evidence that the Nature of Numbers and of intelligible Ideas is immutable necessary and independent We see clearly that it is absolutely necessary that 2 times 4 should be 8 and that the Square of the Diagonal of a Square should be the double to that Square If any question the absolute necessity of these Truths it is because they turn their eyes from them because they reason upon a false Principle and look elsewhere and not into these Truths to find their Nature their Immutability and Independence Therefore the Decree of the Immutability of those Truths is a Fiction of the Mind which supposing it sees not what it really perceives in the Wisdom of God yet knowing that God is the cause of all things thinks it self obliged to fancy a Decree to assert an immutability to Truths which it cannot forbear to acknowledge immutable But 't is a false supposition which we ought to beware of Eternal immutable and necessary Truths are only seen in the Wisdom of God We can see no where but in that Wisdom the Order which God himself is obliged to follow as aforesaid The Mind is only made for that Wisdom and in one sense it can see nothing else For if it can see Creatures it is because he whom it sees though after a very imperfect manner in this Life comprehends them all in the Immensity of his Being after an intelligible manner proportionate as I have said elsewhere Had we not the Idea of Infinity in our selves and did not wee see all things by the Natural Union of our Mind with the Universal and Infinite Reason it seems evident to me that we should not have the Liberty to think on all things For the Mind can never have any desire to apply it self to any thing but such as it has some Idea of and it can never think actually on any thing but such to which it can have a desire to apply it self Thus we deprive Man of the Liberty of thinking on all things in separating his Mind from him who includes all things Moreover as we can Love only what we see if God gave us only particular Ideas it is evident he should determine all the Motions of our Will after such a manner as that we would be necessitated only to Love particular Beings For if we had no Notion of Infinity we could not Love it and if those who affirm positively that they have no Idea of God spoke as they thought I should not scruple to say they have never Loved God for it appears very certain to me that we cannot Love what we do not See In fine if Order and the Eternal Laws were not immutable by the necessity of their Nature the clearest and strongest proofs of Religion in my opinion would be destroyed in their Principle as well as Liberty and the most certain Sciences For it is most evident that the Christian Religion which proposes Jesus Christ to us as a Mediator and Redeemer supposes the Corruption of Nature by Original Sin Now what proof can we have of that Corruption The Flesh wars against the Mind some may say It subdues and enslaves it I grant it But a Libertine will say this is no Disorder It is God's pleasure he has ordained it so he is Master of his Decrees he puts what Order he pleases among his Creatures How shall we prove to him that the Mind 's being subjected to the Body is a Disorder unless we have a clear Idea of Order and Necessity And unless we know that God himself is obliged to follow it by the necessary Love he has for himself Besides if the said Order depends on a free Decree of God we shall still be obliged to have recourse to God to be informed of it We shall be obliged to consult God notwithstanding the aversion which some of the Learned have to have recourse to him We shall be obliged to submit to this Truth That we stand in need of God's Assistance to be instructed But this free Decree which has caused Order is a Fiction of the Mind for the Reasons I have already alledged If it were nor a necessary Order that Man should be made for his Author and that our Will should be subject to the Order which is the Essential and necessary Rule of the Will of God If it be not true that Actions are good or ill according as they are consonant or contrary to an immutable and necessary Order and that this Order requires that the first should be rewarded and the other punisht In fine unless Men have naturally a clear Idea of Order nay of such an Order as God himself cannot will the contrary of that which this Order prescribes certainly I see no longer any thing but Confusion among us For what fault can be found with the most infamous and unjust Actions of the Heathens to whom God hath given no Laws What Reason will dare to Judge them if there is no Supream Reason to Condemn them Nec natura potest justo secernere iniquam Lucre. Diog. A Poet hath said It is impossible to discern what is just from what is unjust A Philosopher has said that it is a Weakness to be concern'd at or ashamed of infamous Actions Men often speak those kind of Paradoxes out of a fury of Imagination and in the heat of their Passions But why should those Sentiments be condemned unless there be an Order a Rule a General Reason which always presents it self to those who know how to look within themselves We freely Judge our selves and others on many Occasions But by what Authority do we do it if the Reason which Judges within us when we think we pronounce Judgments against our selves and against others be not Supream and common to all
are in themselves or the Body which speaks only out of interest and in relation either to the preservation or conveniency of Life For in fine What Prejudices will not be justified if we take the Senses for Judges to whom almost all Prejudices owe their birth As I have already shewn in the Search after Truth When I see one Bowle hit another my Eyes tell me or seem to tell me that it is truly the Cause of the Motion it impresses For the true Cause which moves Bodies does not appear to my Eyes Bur when I ask my Reason I see evidently that Bodies cannot move themselves and their Moving power depending only upon the Will of God which successively preserves them in different places they cannot communicate a power which they have not nor could communicate if they had it For 't is plain there is a Wisdom requisite and one that is infinite too to regulate the Communication of Motions with the exactness proportion and uniformity that we see A Body moved cannot know the infinite number of Bodies it meets at every moment It is farther clear That although we should even suppose knowledge in it it could not have enough to regulate in the instant of the Shock the distribution of the Moving power it self is carried with If I open but my Eyes it appears plain to me that the Sun is very gloriously bright and seems not only to be visible it self but makes all the World so too 'T is that which covers the Earth with Flowers and Fruits which gives Life to Animals and which by its Heat penetrates into the very Bowels of the Earth and produces Stones Marbles and Metals there But when I consult Reason I see nothing of all this and if I consult it faithfully I clearly discover that my Senses seduce me and that it is God who performs all in all Things For knowing that whatever changes happen in the Body they have no other principle but the different communication of Motion which occur in visible or invisible Bodies I see that it is God who does all Things since it is his Will which Causes and his Wisdom which Regulates all these Communications I suppose that Local Motion is the principle of Generations Corruptions Alterations and generally of all the Changes which happen in the Body which is an Opinion that is now sufficiently received amongst the Learned But whatever Opinion they have about it signifies little for it seems much more easie to conceive that a Body drives another when it meets it than to apprehend how Fire produces Heat and Light and draw from the power of Matter a Substance which was not there before And if it be necessary to acknowledge That God is the True Cause of the different Communications of Motions by a much stronger Reason we ought to conclude That none but he can Create and Annihilate Real Qualities and Substantial Forms I say Create and Annihilate because at least it seems as difficult to me to draw from Matter a Substance which was not in it or to cause it to re-enter again as to Create or Annihilate it But I shall not stand upon Terms I only make use of them because there is no other which I know of that clearly and without Equivocation express the Changes which the Philosophers suppose every Moment to happen through the power of Second Causes I had some difficulty here to relate the other Proofs which they commonly give for the Power and Efficacy of Natural Causes for they appear so weak to those who are able to resist Prejudices and prefer their Reason to their Senses that it does not seem likely that reasonable Men should be perswaded by them Yet I will produce and Answer them since there are many Philosophers who make use of them The first Proof If Second Causes do effect nothing we could not says Suarez In his Metaph. Disp 18. Sect. 1. Assert 1. In Metaph. Arist qu. 7. Sect. 2. Fonseca and some others distinguish Animate from Inanimate Things for neither of them would have an inward principle of their Actions ANSWER I Answer That Men would have the same Sensible Proofs that have convinced them of the distinction they put between Animate and Inanimate Things They would alwayes see Animals perform Certain Actions as Eating Growing Crying Running Leaping c. Nor would they observe any thing like this in Stones And it is this only which makes the common Philosophers believe that Beasts live and Stones do not for it must not be imagined that they know by a clear and distinct View of the Mind what the Life of a Dog is It is their Senses which regulate their Decisions upon this Question If it were necessary I could here prove That the Principal of a Dog's Life differs very little if at all from that of the Motion of a Watch. For the Life of Bodies whatever they be can only consist in the motion of their parts and it is not difficult to judge that the same Subtil Matter which in a Dog causes the Fermentation of the Blood and Animal Spirits and is the principle of his Life is not more perfect than that which gives Motion to the Springs of a Watch or causes Gravitation in the Weights of a Clock which is the principle of their Life or to speak as others do of their Motion The Peripatetics ought to give to those whom they stile Cartesians a clear Idea of what they call The Life of Beasts Corporeal Soul Body which perceives desires sees feels wills and afterwards we will clearly resolve their difficulties if they continue to propose them The Second Proof We could not discover the Differences nor Powers of the Elements So that Fire might cool as Water does and the Nature of nothing would be settled and fixed ANSWER I Answer That Nature continuing as it is that is whilst the Laws of the communication of Motions remain constantly the same it is a contradiction that Fire should not burn or not separate the parts of certain Bodies Fire cannot cool like Water except it becomes Water For Fire being only fewel whose parts have been agitated with a violent Motion by an invisible Matter which incompasses them as is easie to be demonstrated it is impossible these parts should not communicate some of their Motion to the Bodies which they meet Now as these Laws are constant the Nature of Fire its vertues and qualities cannot change But this Nature and these Vertues are only consequences of the general and efficacious Will of God who does all in all things as we learn from the Scripture So that the study of Nature is false and vain in every respect when we seek for any other true Causes than the Will of the ALMIGHTY I own we must not have recourse to God or the Universal Cause when we inquire into the reason of particular Effects For we should make our selves ridiculous if for instance we said that 't was God who dryes the wayes or
God makes him will and continually inclines him towards Good and gives him all the Ideas and Sensations which determine him I also acknowledge that Man of himself commits sin But I deny that in that he does any thing for Sin Error and even Concupiscence are nothing Which Point I have sufficiently cleared in the First Explanation Man wills but his Determinations are weak in themselves they produce nothing nor hinder God from doing all Things for it is even he who causes our Wills in us by the impression he gives us towards God Man of himself is only capable of Errour and Sin which are nothing There is a great deal of difference between our Minds and the Bodies which are about us Our Mind in one sense wills Nemo habet de suo nisi mendacium peccatum Conc. Araus 2. Can. 22. acts and determines I grant it Of which we are convinced by the inward sensation we have of our selves To deny our Liberty would be to take from us future rewards and punishments for without Liberty there is neither good nor bad Actions So that then Religion would be an Illusion and a Fancy But that Bodies have any power to Act is what we do not clearly see but appears incomprehensible and is also what we deny when we reject Second Causes Even the Mind does not act so much as we imagine I know that I Will and Will freely I have no reason to doubt of it which is stronger than that inward sensation I have of my self I likewise don't deny this But I deny that my Will is the True Cause of the Motion of my Arm the Ideas of my Mind and other Things which attend my Determinations for I see no relation between Things which differ so much On the contrary I clearly discover that there can be no relation between the Will I have to move my Arm According to the sense discussed in the Chapter upon which this Explanation is made and between the Agitation of some little Bodies of which I neither know the Motion nor Figure which make choice of certain Nervous passages amongst a Million of others I know not to cause that Motion in me which I wish by an infinite Number of Motions I wish not I deny that my Will produces my Ideas in me for I do not so much as see how it could produce them For since my Will cannot Act or Will without knowing it supposes my Ideas but does not make them Nay I do not so much as precisely know what an Idea is I cannot tell whether they are produced out of nothing or become nothing again as soon as we cease to behold them I speak according to the Opinion of some persons I produce they will tell me my Ideas by the Faculty God hath given me of Thinking And move my Arm because of the Union God has placed between my Mind and Body But Faculty and Vnion are Logical Terms rambling and indeterminate Words There is no Being whatever nor Manner of Being which is either a Faculty or an Vnion Therefore these Terms must be explained If they will say That the Union of my Mind with my Body consists in Gods Willing that when I wish my Arm should be moved the Animal Spirits are then dispersed into the Muscles of it to move it according to my desire I clearly understand this Explanation and receive it But it is the same Thing which I maintain For if my Will determine that of God it is evident my Arm will be moved not by my Will which is impotent in it self but by that of Gods which can never fail of its effect I always mean a true and efficacious power But if it be said That the Union of my Mind with my Body consists in Gods having given me the power to move my Arm as he has given my Body the power of feeling pleasure and pain that I might be assiduous about my Body and interest my self in its preservation Certainly by this we should suppose the Matter in dispute and make a Circle on 't We have no clear Idea of this power that the Soul has over the Body nor of that the Body has over the Soul Nor very well know what we say when we positively affirm it Prejudice first gave rise to this Opinion we believed it from Infants as soon as we were capable of sensation But the Understanding Reason and Reflection have no share in it as sufficiently appears by what I have said in the Search after Truth But they will say I know by the inward sensation of my Action that I truly have this power So that I shall not be deceived in believing it To which I Answer When we move our Arm we have an inward sensation of the Actual Will whereby we move it and are not mistaken when we believe we have this Will And further We have an inward sensation of a certain Effort which accompanies this Will and we ought likewise to believe that we make this Effort In short I mean that we have an inward sensation that the Arm is moved in the very instant of the Effort Which supposed I consent to what is said That the Motion of the Arm is performed in the same instant we feel this Endeavour or that we have a practical Will to move it It appears evident to me that the mind does not so much as know by inward sensation or Conscience the Motion of the Arm which it animates It knowes by Conscience only what it feels or thinks We know the sense we have of the Motion of our Arm by inward Sensation or Conscience But Conscience does not inform us of the Motion of our Arm or the pain we suffer in it any more than the Colours we see upon Objects Or if this will not be granted I say that inward sensation is not infallible for Errour is often found in Complex Sensation as has been shewed in the First Booke of the Search after Truth But I deny that this Effort which is only a Modification or Sensation of the Soul given us to make us apprehend our Weakness and which affords us but an obscure and weak discovery of our power should be capable of moving or determining the Animal Spirits I deny that there is any relation between our Thoughts and the Motions of Matter or that the Soul has the least knowledge of the Animal Spirits it makes use of to move the Body it Animates In fine although the Soul should exactly know the Animal Spirits and should be capable of Moving them or determining their Motion I deny that with all this advantage it could be capable of making choice of those Nervous Canals of which she is wholly ignorant so as to impel the Spirits into them that thereby the Body might be moved with that quickness exactness and strength as we observe in those who are least acquainted with the Structure of their Bodies For even supposing our Wills were truly the Moving power of
Wills of Spirits For First According to the General Laws of the Communication of Motions the invisible Bodies which surround the visible ones by their divers Motions produce all these various Effects the Cause of which does not appear to us Secondly According to the Laws of the Union of the Soul and Body when Bodies which are about us Act upon ours they produce in our Souls an infinite variety of Sensations Ideas and Passions Thirdly Our Mind produces by its Wills a great many different Ideas in it self For it is our Wills which apply and modifie our Minds as Natural Causes whose Efficacy nevertheless proceeds from the Laws which God has Established Lastly When our Mind Acts upon our Body many Changes are therein produced by vertue of the Laws of its Union with it And by the means of our Body it also produces in those about it a great Number of Changes by vertue of the Laws of the Communication of Motions Thus all Natural Effects have no other Natural or Occasional Cause than the Motions of Bodies and Wills of Spirits which will easily be granted by any who will use but a little application supposing he is not already prepossessed by such as know not what they say who instantly imagine Beings which they have no clear Idea of and pretend to explain Things they understand not by what is absolutely incomprehensible So that God executing by his Concourse or rather by his Efficacious Will whatever the Motions of Bodies or Determinations of Spirits perform as Natural or Occasional Causes it 's plain God does every Thing by the same Action of the Creature Not that Creatures of themselves have any Efficacious Action but because the Power of God is in some sort communicated to them by the Natural Laws which God has Established in their favour This is all that I can say to reconcile my Thoughts with the Opinion of those Divines who maintain the necessity of immediate Concourse and that God does All in all Things by the same Action as that of the Creatures For as to the rest of the Divines I believe their Opinions are indesensible every way and chiefly that of Durandus See Durand in 2. Dist 1. Qu. 5. Dist 37. de Genesi ad Litteram l. 5. c. 20. and some Ancients whom St. Austin refutes who absolutely denyed the necessity of Concourse and would have Second Causes do every Thing by a Power which God had given them at the Creation For although this Opinion be less perplexed than that of the other Divines yet it appears to me so opposite to Scripture and conformable to Prejudices to say no more that I believe it cannot be maintained I confess that the Schoolmen In 4. Sent. Dist 1. q. De aliaco ibid. who say the immediate Concourse of God is the same Action as that of the Creatures do not absolutely understand it according to my Explanation And except Biel and Cardinal D' Ailly all those I have read think that the Efficacy which produces Effects proceeds from the Second Cause as well as the First But as I determined with my self not to say any thing but what I conceive clearly and always take that Side which best agrees with Religion I believe it will not be taken amiss if I forsake an Opinion which to many persons appears so much the more intricate as they endeavour more assiduously to apprehend it And since I have established another which agrees perfectly not only with Reason but also with the Holiness of Religion and Christian Morality 'T is a Truth I have already proved in the Chapter upon which I make these Reflection but it will be very proper for me to offer yet something more fully to Justifie what I have already said upon the present Question Reason and Religion convinces us than God would be loved and rever'd by his Creatures Loved as good and Rever'd as powerful Which is a Truth we cannot doubt of without impiety and folly To love God as he requires and deserves to be loved we must according to the First Command both of the Law and Gospel and even of Reason as I have elsewhere shown do it with all our strength or according to the utmost Capacity we have of Loving It is not enough to prefer him to all Things but we must also love him in all Things Else is not our Love so perfect as it ought to be l. 4. ch 1. nor do we give to God all the Love he has impressed upon us and that only for himself since all his Actions center in himself Likewise to render to God all the Reverence due to him it is not enough to adore him as the Soveraign Power and fear him more than any of his Creatures We must also fear and adore him in all his Creatures and all our Actions must tend towards him for Honour and Glory are due only to him Which is what God has commanded us in these Words Diliges Dominum Deum tuum ex toto corde tuo ex tota anima tua Deut. 6. ex tota fortitudine tua And in these Dominum Deum tuum timebis illi soli servies Thus the Philosophy which teaches us That the Efficacy of Second Causes is a Fiction of the Mind that the Nature of Aristotle and some other Philosophers is a Chimera that God only is strong and powerful enough not only to Act in our Souls but also to give the least Motion to Matter This Philosophy I say agrees perfectly with Religion the design of which is to unite us to God after the strictest manner We commonly love such Things only as are capable of doing us some good This Philosophy therefore only Authorises the Love of God and absolutely condemns the Love of every Thing else We ought to fear Nothing but what is able to do us some Evil This Philosophy therefore only permits us to fear God and positively forbids our fearing any Thing else So that it Justifies all the Motions of the Soul which are Just and Reasonable and condemns all those that are contrary to Reason and Religion For this Philosophy will never Justifie the Love of Riches the Desire of Greatness nor the Extravagance of Debauchery since the Love of the Body appears mad and ridiculous to the Principles established by this Philosophy 'T is an Undoubted Truth a Natural Opinion and even a common Notion that we ought to love the Cause of our Pleasure and love it in proportion to the Felicity it does or can make us enjoy It is not only Just but it is also very Necessary that the Cause of our Happiness should be the Object of our Love Thus following the Principles of this Philosophy we ought only to love God for it tells us that He alone is the True Cause of our Happiness that the Bodies which are about us cannot Act upon that which we Animate consequently much less upon our Minds 'T is not the Sun which enlightens us
is Just and Wise that He loves not Disorder that Nature is Corrupted that the Soul of Man is Immortal and the Soul of Beasts is Mortal Because indeed 't is not a Substance distinct from their Bodies Therefore in the Language of Monsieur de la Ville which condemns Men from Consequences which he draws from their Principles the Cartesians may represent him as criminal and all Mankind besides because they believe that Beasts have Souls What would Monsieur de la Ville say if from his own way of Arguing we should accuse him of Impiety because he maintains Opinions from whence we deduce That God is not Just Wise Powerful Sentiments which overthrow Religion which oppose Original Sin which take away the only Demonstration that Reason furnishes us with to prove the Immortality of the Soul What would he say if we should treat him as unjust and cruel for making innocent Souls suffer and even Annihilating them for the Nourishment of Bodies which they Animate He is a Sinner they are innocent 'T is only to nourish his Body that he kills Bodies and Annihilates their Souls which are of more value than bodies Again If his Body could not subsist but by the Flesh of Animals or if the Annihilation of one Soul could make him immortal this Cruelty however unjust it is might perhaps be pardonable but how many Substances wholly innocent does he Annihilate only to preserve for a few days a Body justly condemned to death for sin Would he be so little a Philosopher as to excuse himself upon the Custom of the places where he lives But if his Zeal had carried him to the Indies where the Inhabitants build * Linsch ch 37. Hospitals for Beasts where the Philosophers and many of the best Sort of Men are so charitable even in respect to Flies that for fear of killing them by breathing or walking they wear a fine Cloath before their Mouths and fan the Ways in which they pass would he then be afraid to make innocent Souls suffer or Annihilate them for the preservation of a Sinners Body Would he not rather choose their Opinion who allow the Soul of a Beast to be no more Noble than their Body nor distinct from it and by publishing this Sentiment acquit himself of the Crimes of Cruelty and Injustice whereof these People would accuse him if having the same Principles he followed not their Custom This Example might be sufficient to show That we ought not to treat Men as Heretics and dangerous persons because we may draw impious Consequences from their Principles even when they disavow these Consequences But be it as it will I think it is infinitely more difficult to Answer these Consequences that I have now drawn than these of Monsieur de la Ville The Cartesians would ve very ridiculous if they treated Monsieur de la Ville and other persons who are not of their Opinion as Impious and Heretical 'T is only the Authority of the Church which may decide in Matters of Faith and the Church has not obliged us and probably whatever Consequences shall be drawn from Common Principles will not oblige us to believe That Dogs have a Soul more Noble than their Bodies that they know not their Masters that they neither Fear Desire nor suffer any thing Because it is not necessary that Christians should be instructed in these Truths The Second Proof Almost all Men are perswaded that sensible Objects are true Causes of the Pleasure and Pain which is felt by their means They believe that Fire disperses that agreeable Heat which rejoyces us That Nourishments act in us and give us the agreeable Sensations of Tasts They doubt not but 't is the Sun which ripens Fruits that are necessary for Life and that all Sensible Objects have a Vertue which is proper to them by which they can do us much Good or Evil. Let us see whether we cannot draw from these Principles such Consequences as are contrary to what Religion obliges us to believe A Consequence impugning the First Principle of Morality by which we are obliged to love God with all our Power and to fear him only 'T is a Common Notion according to which all Men act That we should love or fear whatever has Power to do us good or hurt to make us sensible of Pleasure or Pain to make us Happy or Unhappy This is a supposed Principle we ought therefore to love and fear them This is a Reasoning which all the World Naturally makes and which is yet a general Principle of the Corruption of Manners It is evident by Reason and the first of Gods Commandments that all the Motions of our Soul whether Love or Fear Desire or Joy should tend towards God and that all the Motions of our Body should be regulated and determined by External Objects By the Morion of our Body we may approach to Fruit avoid a Blow fly a Beast that would devour us But we ought to love and fear God only All the Motions of our Soul ought to tend towards him alone We ought to love him with all our Power This is an indispensible Law We can neither love nor fear what is below us without being disordered and corrupted To be afraid of a Beast ready to devour us or to fear the Devil is to do them honour To love Fruit to desire Riches to rejoyce in the Heat of the Sun as if it were the true Cause thereof nay even to love ones Father Protectour Friend as if they were capable of doing as good this is to give them that honour which is due to God only We must not love any one in this sense 'T is permitted and we ought to love our Neighbour by wishing or procuring for him as a Natural or Occasional Cause whatever may conduce to his Happiness but not otherwise We must love our Brethren not as capable of doing us good but as of enjoying with us the true Good These Truths appear evident to me but Men strangely obscure them when they suppose that Bodies which are about us can act in us as true Causes Indeed the greatest part of Christian Philosophers pretend that Creatures can do nothing if God did not concur to their Action and so Sensible Objects cannot act in us without the Efficacy of the First Cause We ought neither to fear nor love them but God only on whom all things depend This Explication shows Men condemn the Consequences which I have drawn from their Principle But if I should say with Monsieur de la Ville that 't is a slight of Philosophers to cover their Impiety if I should charge them with the crime of maintaining at the expence of Religion Aristotles Opinions and the Prejudices of their Senses if by examining their Heart I should impute to them a secret desire of debauching Mens Morals by the defence of a Principle which justifies all sorts of disorders and opposes the first Principle of Christian Morality by the Consequences
which I have drawn Should I be very Reasonable thus to be willing to condemn all Men as impious because of the Consequences which I might draw from their Principles Certainly Monsieur de la Ville would say my Consequences were not fairly deduced and I say the same thing of his But to destroy all these Consequences I need only explain his Equivocations which I shall sometime or other do as I see it necessary But how will Monsieur de la Ville justifie the Common Opinion about the Efficaciousness of Second Causes See the Explanation about Second Causes in Vol. 2. of the Search after Truth And by what kind of Concourse will he render to God all that is due to him Will he show clearly that one and the same Action is wholly of God and wholly of the Creature Will he demonstrate that the Power of the Creature is useless though without its Efficacy the sole Action of God would produce the same Effect Will he prove that Spirits ought neither to love nor fear Bodies although Bodies have a true Power of acting upon them And will he from hence convince many whose Mind and Heart is wholly possest with Sensible Objects because they judge these Objects are capable of making them happy or miserable Let him confess then that if it were permitted to treat as Impious and Heretical all those who maintain such Principles from which Impious and Heretical Consequence may be deduced that then no one can be secure from having his Faith suspected The Third Proof The Consequence of a Principle proposed by Monsieur de la Ville as matter of Faith That the Essence of Bodies consists not in Extension This Negative Principle overthrows the only demonstrable and direct Proof of the Souls being a substance distinct from the Body and consequently Immortal When this Truth is received which I think I have demonstrated after many others and which Monsieur de la Ville attacks nevertheless as a Principle contrary to the decisions of the Church That the Essence of Matter consists in Extension in length breadth and depth It is not difficult to prove That the Soul or that which is capable of thinking is a distinct substance from the Body For 't is manifest the Extension of any matter conceived as divisible or movable can never reason will nor even perceive so that that in us which thinks is a substance distinct from our Body Actual Knowledges Wills and Sensations are actually manners of the existence of some substance Now all divisions that happen to Extension can produce nothing but Figures as all Motions relations of distance Extension is incapable of other Modifications Therefore our Thought Desire Sensations of Pleasure and Pain are manners of some substances existence which is not Body Therefore the Soul is distinct from the Body and this being asserted we prove likewise that it is Immortal No Substance is ever annihilated by the common Power of Nature for as Nature cannot produce something out of nothing so it cannot reduce any thing that is to nothing Manners of Being may be annihilated Roundness in a Body may be destroyed for what is Round may become Square but this Roundness is not a Being a Thing a Substance 't is only a relation of inequality in the distance which is between the parts that terminate this Body and that which is at the Center Thus the relations changing Roundness is no more but the substance cannot be annihilated Now by the Reasons above the Soul is not a manner of the Bodies existence it is therefore Immortal and although the Body be dissolved into a thousand parts of different Nature and the Construction of the Organs be broken the Soul consists not in this Construction nor in any other Modification of Matter It 's evident then that a dissolution and even an annihilation of the substance of Mans Body if the annihilation were real could not annihilate the substance of our Soul But there is yet another Proof of the Souls Immortality built upon the same Principle Although a Body cannot be reduced to nothing because it is a substance it may nevertheless dye and suffer a dissolution of all its parts for Extension is divisible Now the Soul being a substance distinct from Extension it cannot be divided One can divide a Thought a Desire a Sensation of Pain or Pleasure as one may divide a Square into two or four Triangles Then the substance of the Soul is indissoluble incorruptible and consequently Immortal because unextended But if Monsieur de la Ville supposes that the Essence of Body consists in something else besides Extension how will he convince Libertines that 't is neither Material nor Mortal They will maintain to him that this something in which the Essence of Body consists is capable of thinking and that the substance which thinks is the same with that that is extended If Monsieur de la Ville denyes it they will show him that 't is unreasonable since according to his Principle a Body being something else besides Extension he has no distinct Idea of what that can be and therefore cannot know whether this unknown thing is not capable of thinking Will he pretend to convince them by maintaining as he does in his Book that the Essence of Body is to have parts without Extension Certainly they will not believe him upon his word for finding so much difficulty in conceiving parts without Extension as indivisible Atomes and Circles without two Semi-Circles they must have more deference for him than he himself has for the Word of God For Monsieur de la Ville in the last Part of his Book pretends That even God cannot oblige us to believe things that are contradictory such as are the parts of Body without any actual Extension But Libertines will not be wanting on their part for probable Reasons to confound the Soul with the Body Experience they will say teaches us That a Body is capable of feeling thinking and reasoning That 't is the Body which feels Pleasure and Pain That 't is the Brain which thinks and reasons The weight of the Body depresses the Mind Folly is a true Distemper and those who have most Wisdom lose it when that part of the Brain in which it resides grows infirm The Essences of Beings are unknown to us we cannot by Reason discover of what they are capable so that Reason wills we should consult Experience and Experience confounds the Soul with the Body and teaches us that it is capable of thinking Thus Libertines will reason And indeed those who tell us we know not the Essenees of Beings and who quarrel with Philosophers for demonstrating that Extension is not the Manner of Being but the very Essence of Matter ought to think upon the mischievous Consequences that are deducible from their Principles and not go about to overthrow all the demonstration we have brought about the distinction that is between the Soul and Body For in fine the distinction