Selected quad for the lemma: heaven_n
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A59810
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A defence of Dr. Sherlock's notion of a Trinity in unity in answer to the animadversions upon his vindication of the doctrine of the holy and ever Blessed Trinity : with a post-script relating to the calm discourse of a Trinity in the Godhead : in a letter to a friend.
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Sherlock, William, 1641?-1707.
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1694
(1694)
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Wing S3282; ESTC R33885
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67,085
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115
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this Compound which the Soul is essentially related to not the Body I hope for the Body is no more the Compound than the Soul Is it then the Man and where is this Man that the Soul is essentially related to Does he then mean that it is essential to the Soul to live in an earthly Body Then it cannot live in a State of Separation If it be of the Essence of the Soul to live in the Body it is evident That it can never live out of it and if it be not essential then the Soul may be a whole entire Person when it subsists separate from the Body But the Soul by its original Designation is related to the Body What so that it cannot live without it and never should live without it if not this original Designation does not prove an essential Relation But it has a natural Aptitude to be an Ingredient in the Constitution of a Compound What does he mean by the Soul 's being an Ingredient in a Compound Is the Soul and Body mixed and blended together to make a Man Is it the same thing to be a part of the whole and to be an Ingredient in a Compound Well but the Soul has a natural Aptitude to live in a Body and so it has to live out of the Body and what then then the Soul which is the same Person still is naturally fitted to live in different States and then its Relation to an earthly Body is not essential to it whatever strong Appetite and Inclination as he says it retains to return and be re-united to the Body which whoever says it no Man can know and if it be true of sensual Souls who were wholly immersed in Sense is demonstratively false of all holy and pure Spirits who are in a great measure weaned from this Body while they live in it and rejoyce at their Deliverance when they escape safe out of it who with St. Paul desire to be absent from the Body and to be present with the Lord. Holy Souls indeed in a State of Separation do earnestly desire the Completion of their Happiness in the Resurrection of their Bodies but not to be re-united to these vile earthly corruptible Bodies but to glorified immortal incorruptible Bodies when Christ shall at his Appearance change our vile Bodies and make them like to his own most glorious Body which though they had every individual Atome which belonged to them before are yet in their Nature and Constitution no more the same Bodies than Earth and Heaven are the same But the Spirits of just Men made perfect are in a more perfect State of Life and Happiness out of these Bodies than they enjoyed in them and therefore are more perfect Persons too are more perfectly themselves and enjoy themselves more perfectly and therefore are in a State more agreeable to the Perfection of their Natures and that I take to be a natural State than living in these Bodies The Animadverter will not allow this to be a natural but Supernatural Perfection which relates only to the Consummation of their Graces and not to the manner of their Subsistence But is not the Perfection of our Graces the Perfection of Humane Nature And is not the Perfection of Nature a natural Perfection And if the Soul be more perfect in a State of Separation is not this a more perfect manner of Subsistence This might have shamed the Animadverter had he had a little more Consideration and less Confidence to deny the Personality of the Soul which can subsist and act and be more perfect and happy out of the Body which shews that to be in the Body or out of it does not concern the Personality but the different States wherein the same Person lives To proceed The Dean had upon another occasion said That all the Sufferings and Actions of the Body are attributed to the Man though the Soul is the Person because it is the Superiour and Governing Power and constitutes the Person This I should have thought very true and safe but the Animadverter has made very tragical Work with it He says That this proves the quite contrary That the Man himself to whom these personal Acts are ascribed must indeed be the Person and that for the same Reason also the Soul cannot be so But does the Dean any where deny That the Man as consisting of Soul and Body is a Humane Person or when united to a Body affirm that the Soul is the whole Person He says indeed That the Soul is the seat of Personality the only Principle of Reason Sensation and a Conscious life which consequently in a State of Separation is the Person and when united to the Body constitutes the Person and therefore may both be the Person and constitute the Person When a Body is vitally united to a Soul Soul and Body are but One Person because they are but One voluntary Agent and have but One Conscious Life but it is the Soul constitutes the Person as being the Principle of all personal Acts Sensations and Passions which the Body is only the Instrument of but being a vital Instrument is united to the Person and becomes One Person with the Soul for the Person reaches as far as the same Conscious Life does but it is only this vital Union to the Soul which receives the Body into the Unity of the same Person not as part of the Person but as an animated Instrument of Life and Action which as it were cements Soul and Body into One Person A Soul vitally united to a Body is an embodied Person in a State of Separation it is the same Person still but without a Body which makes a great change in its Sensations and manner of acting but no more changes the Person than the Man would be changed cloathed or uncloathed were his Cloths as vitally united to his Body as his Body is to his Soul This is plain Sence and if the Animadverter knows not how to reduce it to Terms of Art I cannot help it The Soul I grant as he wisely observes Cannot constitute the Person efficiently by Creation or Generation nor formally as a constituent part for the Soul is not properly part of the Person but the Soul constitutes an embodied Person by living and acting in the Body which unites Soul and Body into one Life and that makes one embodied Person or Soul and Body one Man And now as for those Questions which with so much Triumph and Scorn he asks the Dean I leave to himself to Answer them and to you to laugh at them The rest of this Chapter is nothing but Ignorance and Raving and has been answered already If you will Pardon this long excursion about the Personality of the Soul which is nothing at all to the present Controversie having given you this one sufficient taste of the Wit and Philosophy of the Animadverter and his great exactness in speaking and reasoning I promise you to let pass an hundred other
can neither See nor Hear nor Taste nor Smell but only just lives and breathes you will not say this is a perfect Man but the Animadverter himself will acknowledge him to be a perfect Person compounded of Body and Soul but if a compleat Person may not be a compleat and perfect Man then the formal Reason of Personality and the natural Perfection of a Man are two things and though the vital Union of Soul and Body make a perfect Man yet the whole entire Personality must be in the Soul if a Man be a perfect Person who is united to a Body which is worse than none For where there is a perfect Humane Person there must be the radical Principle of all Humane Actions which can be no where but in the Soul when the Body is unfit for all the Actions of a Rational or Sensitive Life which is a much more imperfect State than to be out of the Body if we believe that the Soul lives and acts when separated from the Body Something in the Shape and Figure of a Man without the natural Powers of Reason and Sensation would very improperly be called a Man or a Humane Person and therefore we must confess that the Soul which under all these natural Impediments of acting has still these natural Powers to be the Person or there can be none The Soul is the Person the Body only the Organ or Instrument which at least in this state of Union is necessary to the exercise of our natural Powers both of Reason and Sensation but whatever change there be in the Body the Person is the same still which could not be were the Body part of the Person for then the change of the Body would be a partial Change of the Person too and yet our Bodies are in a perpetual Flux and change every day some Atoms fly away and others are united to us that we are no more the same for a Month or a Year than a River is whose Waters perpetually flow and change their place and yet we feel our selves to be the same Persons still and therefore certainly these fluid Atoms of which our Bodies are composed are no part of our Personality though they belong to our Persons while they are vitally united to our Souls Suppose it were possible that the Souls of Iohn and Peter could change Bodies that the Soul of Iohn should be vitally united to the Body of Peter and the Soul of Peter vitally united to the Body of Iohn I would ask the Animadverter whether he thinks that such a change of Bodies would make any change in their Persons Whether Iohn would not as much feel himself to be Iohn and Peter to be Peter as ever they did I believe indeed an innocent good-natured Soul would not be willing to venture a Change of Bodies with every Body for fear of some Moral Infection but the natural Person would be the same for nothing makes any Body ours but a vital Union and whose Body soever it was before it becomes our own when our Soul informs it and feels the Impressions of it Now if the Soul be the Person when united to the Body it can't lose its Personality by going out of it nay if the Soul can subsist in separation from the Body and live and perform all the Actions of a Rational Nature it must be a Person if an individual subsisting Rational Nature is a Person and if it be not I would know what to call it But this Animadverter is a very Wagg and Banters the poor Dean most unmercifully and demonstrates beyond all contradiction that The Soul in a State of Separation can't be a Person because it is neither the same Person which the Man himself was while he was living and in the Body nor another Person and therefore it can be no Person The wording of this is very observable and worthy of the Wit and Subtilty of its Author If the Soul in such a State of Separation be a Person it is either the same Person which the Man himself was while he was Living and in the Body Pray what is this Person which he calls the Man himself which lives in the Body I hope it is not the Body that lives in the Body and then I know no Man himself nor Person that lives in the Body but only the Soul and if it be the same Soul that lives out of the Body that lives in it it is the same Person the same Man himself in a state of Separation which lived in the Body And what does he mean by the same Person which the Man himself was while living For does the Man and his Person die Then the Man is not Immortal and if the Man and his Person live when the Body dies then the Soul is the Man and the Person and the very same Person out of the Body that it was in it So St. Paul thought when speaking of himself and his being taken up into the Third Heavens he thus expresses it I knew a Man in Christ fourteen years ago whether in the body I cannot tell or whether out of the body I cannot tell God knoweth such an one caught up into the third Heavens 2 Cor. 12. 2. but whether in the Body or out of the Body which he did not know yet he knew himself to be the same Man and the same Person that ever he was But the Animadverter very learnedly proves That the Soul out of the Body cannot be the same Person with the Man because the Soul is not the Soul and Body too as the Man is when the Soul and Body are united which is well observed That the Soul is not the Body nor a part the whole but yet if the Personality be not compounded of Soul and Body the Soul may be the whole and same Person in the Body and out of it There is no need then to say That the Soul in a State of Separation is another Person than the Man himself is while Soul and Body are united though this would serve the Dean's purpose as well if the Soul be but a Person and be a distinct Person by Self-consciousness And should the Dean prove cross and say this the Animadverter could not help himself for as for his absurd Consequence viz. That it is One Person that lives well or ill in this World to wit the Man himself while he was personally in the Body which by the way is down-right Nonsence if the Person of the Man be Soul and Body though we confess the Body belongs to his Person when united to his Soul for the personal Presence of the Man in the Body must distinguish the Person of the Man from the Body in which he is personally present and supposes that the same Man at other times may not be personally present in the Body however he thinks it a great Absurdity That One Person should live well or ill in this World and another Person pass out of the Body into Heaven or