thing doth she how is she employ'd or if there be none of all this in her what Good can there be without the same Again I wonld fain know where she resides after her Departure from the Body and what an infinite multitude of Souls like shadows would there be in so many Ages as well part as to come Now surely these are but fantastical foolish and childish Toys devised by Men that would fain live always the like foolery is there in preserving the Bodies Nor was the vanity if Democritus less who promis'd a Resurrection of the Body and yet himself could never rise again But what a folly of follies is it to think that Death should be the way to a second Life what Repose what Rest could ever the Sons of Men have if thier Souls did remain in Heaven above with sense whil'st their shadows tarry'd beneath among the infernal Spirits certainly these sweet Inducements and pleasing Persuasions this foolish Credulity and easiness of Belief destroyeth the benefit of the best gift of Nature Death It likewise doubleth the pains of a Man that is to dye if he does but consider what is to become of him hereafter how much more easie and greater security were it for each Man to ground his Reasons and Resolutions upon an Assurance that he should be in no worse a condition than he was before he was born Now these my Lord with what others I have mention'd in my Anima Mundi are the chief Opinions of the Moralists among the ancient Heathens In Answer to which some of our Moderns argue That if the Soul be not immortal the whole Universe would at this time be deceiv'd since all our Laws do now suppose it so But to this it has been reply'd That if the whole be nothing but the parts as must be allow'd then since there is no Man who is not deceiv'd as Plato saith it is so far from an Offence that it is absolutely necessary to grant either that the whole World is deceiv'd or at least the greater part of it for supposing that there be but three Laws viz. that of Moses that of Christ and that of Mahomet either all are false and so the whole World is deceiv'd or only two of them and so the greater part is deceiv'd But we must know as Plato and Aristotle well observe That a Politician is a Physician of Minds and that his Aim is rather to make Men good than knowing wherefore according to the deversity of Men he must render himself agreeable to the diversity of humors for the attainment of his end Now there are some Men so ingenuous and good-natur'd that they are induc'd to Virtue by the meer excellency thereof and withdraw themselves from Vice purely for the sake of its own deformity and these are Men the best disposed thoâ— rarely to be met with Others who are worse enclined notwithstanding the beauty of Virtue and turpitude of Vice do still practice virtuous things and refrain from those that are vicious meerly out of Rewards Praises Honours Punishments and Dispraises whom we may enrol in the second Rank Again others for hope of some good as well as for fear of corporal punishment are made virtuous wherefore Politicians that they may attain such virtue allure them with the hopes of Riches Dignity and Command at the same time to prevent their committing Vice they terrify them with some punishment either in Purse Honour or Body But others out of a savageness and ferocity of Nature are moved with none of these things as daily experience sheweth wherefore for such they have proposed to the Virtuous Rewards in another Life and to the Vicious Punishments which do most of all terrify since the greater part of Man if they do good do it rather out of fear of eternal Loss than hope of eternal Gain forasmuch as we have a more sensible Idea of Suffering and Losses than of Elyzium and the good entertainment there Now because this last Expedient may be profitable to all Men of what condition soever Lawgivers considering the proneness of Men to evil and themselves aiming at the Public Good establish'd the Immortality of the Soul perhaps at first not so much out of a regard to Truth as to Honesty hoping thereby to induce Men to Virtue Nor are Politicians to be so much blamed herein more than Physicians who many times for the benefit of their Patients are compell'd to feign and pretend divers things since in like manner Politicians devise Fables only to regulate the People notwithstanding in these Fables as Averroes saith Prolog in 3. Phys. there is properly neither Truth nor Falsehood Thus Nurses bring their Children to those things which they know are good for them after the like manner whereas if the Man or the Child were either sound in Body or Mind neither would the Physician or the Nurse stand in need of such contrivances Likewise if all Men were in that first Rank abovemention'd tho' we should admit the mortality of the Soul they would yet perhaps be virtuous and honest but such are rare to be found and therefore it is necessary to use other Expedients neither is there any Absurdity therein since almost all humane Nature is immerst in matter and partaketh but little of the Intellect whence Man is more distant from Intelligences than a sick Man from him that is sound or a Fool from a Wiseman so that it is no wonder if a Politician makes use of such ways or means for the publick establishment of good manners And therefore my Lord besides the Authority of the Holy Scriptures as also the innumerable other Arguments which may be deduc'd as well from Philosophy as Reason to prove the Immortality of the Soul together with its Rewards and Punishments tho' I determine not their duration yet there is no Argument of greater weight with me than the absolute necessity and convenience that it should be so as well to compleat the Justice of God as to perfect the happiness of Man not only in this World but in that which is to come And for this very Reason when I hear Seneca the Philosopher and others preaching up the Doctrine of the Souls Immortality with a Quid mihi Curae erit transfuga Tackt to the end of it nothing under Heaven to me seems more unaccountable or contradictory For as to suppose a huâ—-drum Deity chewing his own Nature a droning God sit hugging of himself and hoarding up his Providence from his Creatures is an Atheism no less irrational than to deny the very essence of a Divine Being so in my Opinion to believe an Immortality of the Soul without its due Rewards and Punishments is altogether as irrational and useless as to believe the Soul itself to be mortal by such a Faith we rob the Soul of its best Title to Immortality for what need is there of an Executor where there are no Debts to pay nor any Estate to inherit But Pomponatius and especially Cardan in
done is none of these Indeterminate is that which is in our power and to which part soever it inclines will be true or false Pythagoras of Fate and Fortune says All the parts of the World above the Moon are governed according to Providence and from Order the Decree of God which they follow but those beneath the Moon by four Causes by God by Fate by our Election by Fortune For instance to go abroad into a Ship or not is in our Power Storms and Tempest to arise out of a Calm is by Fortune for the Ship being under water to be preserved is by the Providence of God Of Fate there are many Manners and Differences it differs from Fortune as having a Determination Order and Consequence but Fortune is spontaneous and casual as to proceed from a Boy to a Youth and orderly to pass through other degrees of Age happens by one manner of Fate There is also Fate of all Things in general and in particular the cause of this Administration As for Zeno and some other Philosophers I will in my next send you their Opinions till then I rest Yours to Command AN. ROGERS TO THE Right Honourable THE MOST INGENIOUS STREPHON Ludgate-Hill Feb. 7 th 1679 80. Concerning the Immortality of the Soul My LORD I Had the Honour Yesterday to receive from the Hands of an Humble Servant of your Lordship's your most incomparable Version of that Passage of Seneca's where he begins with Post mortem nihil est ipsaque mors nihil c. and must confess with your Lordship's Pardon that I cannot but esteem the Translation to be in some measure a confutation of the Original since what less than a divine and immortal Mind could have produced what you have there written Indeed the Hand that wrote it may become Lumber but sure the Spirit that dictated it can never be so No my Lord your mighty Genius is a most sufficient Argument of its own Immortality and more prevalent with me than all the Harangues of the Parsons or Sophistry of the Schoolmen No subject whatever has more entangled and ruffled the Thoughts of the wisest Men than this concerning our Future State it has been controverted in all Ages by Men of the greatest Learning and Parts We must also confess that your Author Seneca has not wanted Advocates for the Assertion of his Opinion nay even such who would pretend to Justifie it out of the very Scriptures themselves Ex. gr as when Solomon says Eccles. 7.12 Then shall the Dust return to Dust as it was and the Spirit to God that gave it And Eccles. 3.20 21. when he declares All go to the same place all are of dust and all turn to dust again Who knoweth the Spirit of Man that goeth upward and the Spirit of the Beast that goeth downward to the Earth Again Eccles. 3.19 when he tells us That which befalleth the Sons of Men befalleth Beasts even one thing befalleth them both As the one dieth so doth the other yea they have all one Breath so that a Man hath no preeminence above a Beast Likewise to such who are desirous to know what their Friends are in the other World or to speak more properly their dead Friends know Solomon answers their inconsiderate Vtinam Eccles. 9.5 with these words The Living know they shall die but the Dead know not any thing Moreover others for the purpose cite that Passage of Luke 20.38 where it is said He is not a God of the Dead but of the Living All which Texts through the Weakness of Understanding have by some Men been misapplied as concurrent with the Anima Mundi of Pythagoras which has been since in great measure revived by Averroes and Avicenna although in one point they differ'd among themselves For that Averroes believed after Death our Souls return'd and mix'd with the common Soul of the World whereas Avicenna thought it a distinctâ— portion of the Anima Mundi which after our Deaths remain'd entire and separate till it met with some other Body capable of Receiving it and then being cloathed therewith it operated ad modum Recipientis Monsieur Bernier likewise gives us agreeable to Averroes an account of much the same Opinion held at this time by some of the Indians of Indostan whose Faith he Illustrates after this Manner They believe says he the Soul in Man's Body to be like a Bottle fill'd with Sea-water which being close stop'd and cast into the Sea tydes it up and down till by some Accident or other the unfaithful Cork or decrepit Bottle becomes disorder'd so as the Water Evacuates and Disgorges it self again into the common Ocean from whence it was at first taken Which agrees very well with what as Philostratus tells us lib. 8. chap. 13. Apollonius after his Death revealed to a Young Man concerning the Immortality of the Soul in these words as rendred from the Greek Est Anima immortalis incorrupta manebit Non tua res verum quae provides omnia Divae Quae velut acer equus corrupto corpore Vinclis Prosilit tenui miscetur flamine Caeli Cui grave servitium est atque intolerabile visum The Soul 's immortal and once being free Belongs to Providence and not to thee She like a Horse let loose doth take her flight Out of the Carcass and her self unite With the pure Body of the liquid Sky As weary of her former slavery But he among the Heathens who spake plainest and fullest of this matter was Pliny in his Natural History lib. 7 ch 4. where he writes to this purpose After the Interment of our Bodies there is great diversity of Opinions concerning the future state of our wandring Souls or Ghosts But the most general is this That in what condition they were before they were born men in the same they shall remain when dead forasmuch as neither Body nor Soul hath any more sense after our dying-day than they had before the day of our Nativity However such is the Folly and Vanity of men that it extendeth even to future Ages nay and in the very time of Death even flattereth it self with fine Imaginations and Dreams of I know not what after this Life For some crown the Soul with Immortality others pretend a Transfiguration thereof and others suppose that the Ghosts sequestred from the Body have sense Whereupon they render them honour and worship making a God of him that is not so much as a man As if the manner of mens Breathing differâ—d from that of other Living Creatures or as if there were not to be found in the World many more things that live much longer than man and yet no man judgeth in them the like immortality But shew me if you can what is the Substance and Body of the Soul as it were by it self what kind of matter is it apart from the Body where lieth the Cogitation that she hath how is her Seeing how is her Hearing perform'd what toucheth she Nay what one
Whereupon these poor Greek Bishops were in danger not to have understood the Pope's Latin till at length the Legates were content with Reason when it was evidenced to them that the major part could not understand one word of Latin But the pleasantest of all is Pope Caelestine's Excuse to Nestorius for his so long delay in answering his Letters because he could not by any means get his Greek construed sooner Also Pope Gregory the First ingeniously confesseth to the Bishop of Thessaly that he understood not a jot of his Greek wherefore 't is probable the Proverb of honest Accursius was even then in use Graecum est non Legitur and this was the Condition of Christianity in which Iustinian the Emperor found it A. C. 540. So that as Monsieur Daillâ—â— has demonstrated with how little certainty we can depend upon the Fathers I think I may safely averr there is as little Trust to be reposed in General Councils who have been Guilty of so much Ignorance and Interest as well as so frequently contradicting one another And to say that Councils may not Err though private Persons may is as Mr. Hales well observes all one as to say that every single Souldier indeed may run away but the whole Army cannot Sir Your Treatise having reviv'd these Meditations in me I hope you 'll pardon me if I have been too prolix and though I am not so vain to pretend to offer these Collections or indeed any thing for Mr. Hobb's Instruction who is of himself the great Instructor of the most sensible Part of Mankind in the noble Science of Philosophy yet I may hope for the Honour of your Correction wherein I am Erroneous the which will for ever oblige SIR Your most unfeigned Humble Servant C. BLOUNT Pardon Sir I beseech you my sending this trifle called Anima Mundi being commanded to do it by one whom 't is my duty as well as my happiness to obey To my Dear Friend Mr. Harvey Wilwood That felicity consists generally in Pleasure YOU often profess your self an Epicurean but sacrifice your health in pursuit of a mistaken happiness the pleasure the wise Epicurus plac'd happiness in was of another kind 't was more temper'd with Reason but hear what he says and then judg how far you are his Disciple Felicity seems plainly to consist in Pleasure this is first to be prov'd in general then we must shew in what Pleasure particularly it consists In general Pleasure seems to be as the beginning so the end also of a happy life since we find it be the first Good and convenient to our and to all animal Nature and is that from which we begin all Election and Avoidance and in which at last we terminate them using this affection as a rule to judg every good That Pleasure is the first and connatural good or as they term it the first thing suitable and convenient to Nature appeareth from that every animal assoon as born desires Pleasure and rejoyces in it as the chief good shunneth pain as the greatest ill and to its utmost ability repels it We see that ev'n Hercules himself tormented by a Poysonous Shirt could not with-hold from tears Thus does every undepraved Animal in its own nature judging incorruptly and intirely There needs not therefore any reasoning to prove that Pleasure is to be desired Pain to to be shunn'd for this is manifest to ones sense Fire is hot Snow white Honey sweet we need no arguments to prove this it is enough that we give notice of it for since that if we take away from man all his senses there is nothing remaining it is necessary that what is convenient or contrary to nature be judged by nature her self and that Pleasure is expetible in it self and Pain in its self to be avoided for what perceives or what judges eitherâ— to pursue or avoid any thing except Pleasure and Pain That Pleasure as being the first thing convenient to Nature is also the last of Expetibles or the end of good things may be understood even from this because 't is Pleasure only for whose sake we so desire the rest that it self is not desired for the sake of any other but only for its self for we may desire other things to delight or please our selves but no man ever demanded a reason why we should be delighted certainly no more than for what cause we desire to be happy since Pleasure and Felicity ought to be reputed not only in the same degree but to be the very same thing and consequently the end or ultimate and greatest good on which the rest depend but it self depends on time This is farther prov'd for that Felicity is no otherwise than because it is that state in which we may live most sweetly and most pleasantly that is with the greatest pleasure that may be for take from life this sweetness jucundity pleasure and where I pray will be your notion of Felicity Not of that Felicity only which I term'd Divine but even the other esteem'd human which is no otherwise capable to receive degrees of more or less or intension and remission than because addition or detraction of Pleasure may befal it To understand this better by comparing Pleasure with Pain let us suppose a man enjoying many great incessant Pleasures both in Mind and Body no pain hindring them nor likely to disturb them what state can we say is more excellent or more desirable than this For in him who is thus affected there must necessarily be a constancy of mind fearing neither death nor pain because death is void of sense pain if long uses to be light if great short so as shortness makes amends for its greatness lightness for its length When he arrives at such a condition as he trembles not at the horror of the Deity nor suffers the present pleasures to pass away whilst his mind is busi'd with remembrance of past or expectation of future good things but is daily joy'd with the reflecting upon them what can be added to better the condition of this person Suppose on the other side a man afflicted with as great pains of Body and Griefs of Mind as mans nature is capable of no hope that they shall ever be eas'd no pleasure past present or expected What can be said or imagin'd more miserable than he If therefore a life full of pains be of all things most to be avoided doubtless the greatest ill is to live in pain whence it follows that the greatest good is to live in pleasure Neither indeed hath our Mind any thing else wherein as its center it may rest all Sicknesses and troubles are reduced to pain nor is there any thing else which can remove Nature out of her place or dissolve her That Pleasure wherein consists Felicity is Indolence of Body and tranquility of Mind There being two kinds of Pleasure one in station or rest which is a placability calmness and vanity or immunity from trouble and grief The
less an Honour for a Country to be so well represented in Parliament as ours is by you Foreign Courts have no better a taste of the Wisdom and Grandeur of their Neighbouring Princes than from the Ambassadors they send norâ— can any thing be a greater Testimony of the Loyalties Prudence and Integrity either of Country City or Corporation than the Election of such Magistrates as are both Loyal Prudent and honest who like your self have no other Intrest but the true service of their King and those whom they represent as well maintaining the Prerogative of the one as supporting the Liberty of the other wherein as by the King's Prerogative I mean not his single Will or as Divines pretend a power to do what he list only the King's Law or a Law relating particularly to himself so likewise by the Peoples Liberty I mean not the Licentiousness of a Mobb but only a Liberty according to Law whereby we might assert our Rights and maintain our Freeholds which Liberty has been too lately in danger of being devour'd not so much by Foreigners and Papists as by our own Natives and those too who have the Impudence to call themselves Protestants even without blushing I mean our late Regulators of Corporations and Surrenderers of Charters in the two former Reigns upon whose account it is that I presume to give you this present trouble as hearing it will be the next Business upon which your House designs to fall and hope the Offences are not so long past but that Parthian like you may yet shoot back some punishments upon the Offenders since 't is but reasonable that they who mortgaged the Kingdom in the last Reign should pay the Intrest of their Crimes in this Therefore Sir with submission I do humbly conceive that to make the Church of England concern'd in the preservation of the late Regulators of Corporations or surrenderers of Charters is one of the greatest Indignities can be put upon her and something like reviving the old Popish Law of Sanctuaries making her once more become as it were an Asylum or place of Refuge for the most notorious Malefactors Pardon me if it be an Error to joyn â—hese Regulators Surrenderers together I do but imitate Nature herein and am unwilling to make a separation between the Arm that gives the strength and the Hand tâ—at gives the Blow The Charter of each Câ—rporation was the undoubted Right and Fâ—eehold of the same as well as of every â—ndividual Member of the same whereâ—â—re he that had any hand in Surrendring or delivering up such a Charter did what in him lay to betray nay to rob the people of their Inheritances And if the Church of England can be supported only by such ill men the Lord have mercy upon her if a Father of a Family has one Son that proves an Extravagant and sells his Birth-right may not that Son be disinherited without a total Ruin to the whole Family I hope the Church of England has many more Sons and many better Friends to stand by her than those who were concern'd in so foul an Actionâ— And that it does not follow by consequence If we seclude all ill men from the Government none but Fanaticks would be left in No I will not I cannot do so much honour to that Party as to admit of such an Objection Of how great importance an honest impartial and duly elected House of Commons is to this Nation every Body well knows and the ill effects of the contrary I think is unknown to no body My old Lord Burleigh us'd to say We can never be throughly ruin'd but by a Parliament They may cut the Throats of us and our Posterity by a Law whereas all other Arbitrary Acts of Violence or Tyranny in a Prince will either vanish by his Death or blow over with every adverse Gale of Fortune that attacks him And this undoubtedly was well known to those Instruments in the last Reigns who were so zealously affected for the regulating Corporations that they would not have left one man amongst them who should not Iurare in Verba Magistri have done as a Popish King and his Popish Councils had dictated to them So that I confess I cannot but couple these Regulators or Surrenderers together with those Judges and other Gentlemen of the Long Robe who were for the Annihilating and Dispencing Power Since these were the only sort of men who in those times laid the Ax to the Root of the Tree These were the men that were to have hewn down our Government and burnt both it and us in Smithfield Fire These were the men thaâ— should have plunder'd the Rights of each Corporation and then like so many Catalines to secure the Ills that they had done by doing greater still have sent up such Members to Parliament such Representatives such truly Representatives of themselves as should have confirm'd their own Iniquities by a Law in so much as the honest Subject of England was at that time but like a Traveller fallen into the hands of Thieves who first take away his Money and then to secure themselves take away his Life They Rob him by Providence and then murder him by Necessity The Casuists as one observes do well distinguish when they say He that lies with his Mother commits Incest but he who marries his Mother does worse by applying God's Ordinance to his Sin In like manner He that commits Murder with the Sword of Justice aggravates his Crime to the highest Degree As these Gentlemen of whom I have been speaking would have done in making the Government Felo de se and â—â—cessary to its own Ruin Sir all that I can say of this matter is 〈◊〉 certainly never was a greater Rape 〈◊〉 upon any Government and there 〈◊〉 doubt not of your Intrest to have the Delinquents brought to a Condign Punishment for the Exemplary Benefit of future Ages which that they may be is the hearty desire of SIR Your most obliged humble Servant BLOUNT Possibly Sir a motion of a General Punishment may produce a General Pardon wherefore it will be the surest way to rest satisfied with making Example of some few of the most notorious and Capital Offenders And further that all Persons how obnoxious soever in this case who yet refus'd to take away the Penal Laws and Test might be exempt from any Punishment whatever that at the same time you reprove an ill Action you may reward that which was good To Dr. R. B. of a God I Have perus'd your Arguments for the proof of a Deity but think that you undertook a needless trouble since I 'm confident there 's no man of sense that doubts whether there be a God or no. The Philosophers of Old of the Theodorean sect that had spent all their time and study to establish the contrary as a truth when they came to dye confuted all their Arguments by imploring some Deity as Bion in particular I know not whether the Idea