Selected quad for the lemma: reason_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
reason_n	body_n	soul_n	union_n	2,456	5	9.5499	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A34554	A discourse written to a learned frier by M. Des Fourneillis, shewing that this systeme of M. Des Cartes, and particularly his opinion concerning brutes, does contain nothing dangerous, and that all he hath written of both seems to have been taken out of the first chapter of Genesis ; to which is annexed the Systeme general of the same Cartesian philosophy, by Francis Bayle ... ; Englished out of French.; Copie d'une lettre écrite à un sçavant religieux de la Compagnie de Jesus. English	Cordemoy, Géraud de, d. 1684.; Bayle, François, 1622-1709. Systema generale philosophica. English. 1670.; Grangeron, Henri.	1670 (1670)	Wing C6281; ESTC R7465	31,430	139

Tympanum or Drum The Sight hath for its Organ the Retina more particularly the other parts of the Eye making the Rayes of Light or Colours which come from divers points of the Objects to affect divers points of the Retina There are three inward particular Senses that of Thirst which hath its Seat in the Throat that of Hunger in the Stomach that of the Passions in the Heart The Sense called the Common Sense hath its Seat in the Brain and because the Animal Motion and the Functions of all the Senses depend upon the Spirits that come from the Bloud 't is therefore that the Scripture saith that the Soul of the Beasts is in the Bloud Of MAN MAn is made up not only of a Body which as that of Animals hath a peculiar structure of Organs wherein consists in some sense the Form of this Body but also of a Soul which is the true and essential Form of Man or of the Humane Body as such after the manner that Aristotle taketh this Word Form in his First Book of Generation Chap. 10. By reason of the Union which is between the Soul and the Body the Impressions which the Objects make upon the Senses are cause that there do result in the Soul certain Sensations And not only the Soul perceiveth many Motions that are made in the Body but she also is able to produce or to hinder them 'T is true that this is only done by variously determining the Motion of the Animal Spirits by her Thoughts Man hath as many Exteriour and Interiour Senses as Animals but with this difference that in these all the Action of the Senses consists in the Motion of the Corporeal Organ whereas in Man the motion of the Organ is accompanied with a Thought or Perception of the Soul which is called the Sentiment of Sound of Light of Colour c. Of the PASSIONS MAn hath also his Passions which are perceptions of the Sentiments or Commotions of the Soul which are referred particularly to her and which are caused entertained and fortified by some Motion of the Spirits Admiration is a sudden surprisal of the Soul which maketh that she is carried with attention to consider the Objects that seem rare and extraordinary to her Love is a perception or motion of the Soul caused by the motion of the Spirits inciting her to join her self by the Will to the Objects which appear agreeable to her Hatred is a motion caused by the Spirits which inciteth the Soul to a separation from the Objects which present themselves as disagreeable or hurtful to her Desire is an agitation of the Soul caused by the Spirits which disposeth her to will future things which she represents to her self as sutable and beneficial Joy is an agreeable commotion of the Soul caused by the enjoyment she finds in a good which the Impressions of the Brain represent to her as hers Sadness is an unpleasing Languor caused by the Incommodities which the Soul receiveth of the Evil of Defect which the Impressions of the Brain represent to her as concerning her self These six Passions are primitive and all the Genus's whose Species all the others are According to the Institution of Nature all the Passions refer to the Body and are not given to the Soul but forasmuch as she is joined to 〈◊〉 So that their natural use consists only in this that they fortisie and make lasting in the Soul those Thoughts which 't is good she should conserve and by which she is incited to consent and to contribute to the Actions that may serve to keep the Body or to render it in some manner more perfect As also all the Evil which they can occasion consists in that they strengthen and entertain thoughts more than needs or else that they keep others which it is not good to indulge to Of MORALITY Of the Soveraign Natural Good IF we consider Goodness with relation to our selves the Soveraign Good of the Soul of every one in particular consists in a firm and constant will to do well and in the contentment produced thereby And 't is herein that all Virtues do consist Justice for example is nothing but a constant Will to give to every one what we judge to belong to him Boldness nothing but a constant Will to execute things dangerous when we believe them to be the best Humility nothing but a constant Will never to prefer ourselves before others and to think that others have their Free Will as well as we can use it as well as we c. Now 't is this alone which deserveth Praise and Honour 't is from hence alone that the greatest and most solid Contentment of Life results and consequently wherein the Soveraign Good consists There are two sorts of Indifference which appertain to humane Liberty One is from the Object 's part and this is not Essential on the contrary we are never more free than when we are less indifferent The other consists in the real and positive faculty we have to determin our selves to the one or the other of two Contraries and this is always found in the Will and agreeth perfectly well with all the impressions that are caused in her from God's part although we do not conceive how this agreement is made The Angels and the Saints in Heaven do love God freely but their Liberty consists not as Ours doth in a positive faculty to determin themselves to the one or the other of two Contraries but only in this that seeing God Soveraignly Good they love him in such a manner that they feel not any exteriour force constraining them thereto FINIS

enough to say that God would have it so to let men know that it was so This Place teaching us that if it may be said that Fish and the other Brute Animals have Souls these Souls are produced by the Waters and the Earth M. Des Cartes had reason to believe that what is here called Soul is nothing else but little Bodies so adjusted to the Organs of Fishes and other Brutes that they make them live move and grow He hath admirably explained upon this Subject the Circulation of the Bloud the manner how it is heated in the Heart how it runs into the Arteries whose different pores let out the particles which their figure maketh fit for the nourishment of the Members and how the finest parts of all extricate themselves from the rest to go to the Brain whence they are distributed into Muscles where they serve for the motion of the whole Body He doth give such an accurate accompt of all these things only by the figure and the motion of the little Bodies and the disposition of the Organs that there can remain no doubt of them And that it may not seem a wonder what he saith of the heat of the Bloud which he maketh the chief Spring of all those Functions commonly called Vital and Animal he proves that they must necessarily be performed by Bodies without the need of any Soul adding to his Reasons the example of certain Liquors which are cold to the touch when they are asunder but grow presently hot even to a degree of ebullition when they are blended together As this effervescence happens to Liquors which are not so much as suspected to have Souls M. Des Cartes hath me thinks advanced nothing but what is rational when he saith That the heat of the Bloud joined to the disposition and the dependance of the Organs is able without a Soul to cause the nutrition and motion of Brutes Me thinks also that he had reason since what the Vulgar Translation calls a Living Soul was produced by the Waters and the Earth to believe that this kind of Souls were only Bodies And indeed there are so many places whereby we may know that this was the meaning of Moses that 't is a wonder to me to find men still doubting thereof I should tire you to recite them all to you let me only desire you to reflect a little on Lev. 17. 11. where you will plainly find what it is that enlivens Flesh and Beasts The Soul of all Flesh is in the Bloud The same saith M. Des Cartes But Deut. 12. 23. Moses expresseth himself yet more clearly to make us understand that Beasts have no other Souls than the Bloud Only be sure that thou eat not the Bloud for the Bloud is the Soul And that it might be yet more understood he adds And therefore thou maist not eat the Soul but shalt pour it upon the Earth as water Is there not then all the reason in the world that those Souls which the earth produceth which may be eaten and poured out upon the earth as water should be counted among Bodies I grant indeed that the bloud when it is heated is exhaled in very subtil parts and that these fine parts are those which do nourish and move But how subtil soever they be they are Bodies and they have nothing more of spiritual in them than flame composed of parts yet more subtil which yet never any man was so unadvised as to call spiritual I wonder for my part that those who have given Souls to all that is nourish'd have given none to a Flame which converts into it all the bodies it lays hold on And what is more I wonder how men could come to attribute to Souls the cause of Nutrition and Motion whereas we see nothing but Body that is capable to be moved and that Nutrition is nothing else but an addition of Bodies to Bodies But without insisting so much upon Ratiocination is it not visible that Moses who certainly ought to be believed acknowledges no other thing for the cause of the motion and nutrition of Beasts but the bloud I think not that any man who considers it will contend about it any longer But that you may the better know the force of all these passages which hitherto I have only taken according to the Vulgar Translation and which according to this version leave no difficulty although the word Soul have been there employed I shall now make use of a means which wil prevail upon your spirit and better perswade you than any other You know more than one Language and among others you know the Hebrew which I understand not I shall tell you then that a while ago reflecting on that place of Scripture where is described the work of the Fifth and that of the Sixth Day there appeared to me so great a difference betwixt the manner in which the formation of Brutes and that of Man was made that I believed what word soever was used in the Vulgar there must be used very differing Expressions in the Hebrew I saw that the Vulgar said that the Beasts have a Living Soul and that the same Translation used the same word to signifie the Life of Man But I found withal that besides that living Soul which the Vulgar gives to Man as it doth to Brutes 't is added that Man was made to the Image of his Maker whom I knew to be a pure Spirit Whence I concluded that since this Resemblance could not be drawn from the Body the Creator having none it must needs be taken from something of a superiour order and in a word from the Spirit To this I added what the Vulgar expresseth speaking of Man in the Second Chap. of Gen. Where I saw that the Lord who had made him a living Creature as the Beasts had breathed into him something which Beasts had not and which me thought should be in him the Principle of a Life altogether different from theirs and the cause of that advantageous resemblance which he was to have with his Maker All these things did already sway much with me for the advantage of Man but believing that I might yet better discover the sense of those places by getting the Interpretation of the Hebrew I consulted Monsieur de Compiegne who is known to be the ablest we have in this Language I prayed him to give me the Version of the first and second Chapter of Genesis and in this Version I found the full proof of what I always thought and of what M. Des Cartes had written on this Subject For I saw that in the place which speaks of the Production of Fishes and other Brutes where the Vulgar saith Let the Waters and the Earth bring forth Living Souls my Interpreter said Let the Earth and the Water produce Living Individuals which carrieth with it a very good sense and expresseth the thing in a far more conceivable manner For it is very intelligible that the Earth and Waters have

were to be disposed for that purpose Wherefore chusing from among all the Figures those which might be most proper for the little Bodies which cause Light and seeing that those which he had described as Globules being moved in a certain manner would be satisfactory to all that is known of the Rayes which are made by the Light M. Des Cartes hath supposed that there were formed divers Vortexes or Whirl-pools of these little round Bodies and that many of them turning round about one and the same Center a part of the matter which fills up their Intervalls was gathered towards the Center whence it did propel the Globules which surrounded it so that this pressure of the Globules made Light in all those places where was found a sufficient conflux and heap of subtile matter But he adds that as in this beginning there was not yet a great plenty of these more subtil parts in the Centers of the Whirlpools the action which pressed the Globules did not reach far so that the places which its effect could not reach to remained in darkness whilst the other were already enlightned which agreeth admirably with the effect which Moses ascribeth to the first Word of the Lord which did separate the Light from the Darkness from the time it began to form it From thence also we may say according to Genesis that the Night was where the Darkness had remained and the Day where the Light had begun You will observe that by the Word Light we are here to understand nothing else but that which is the cause that the Bodies called Luminous excite in us the sentiment which makes us perceive them and not the sentiment it self Men do often confound these two things and 't is certainly from thence that all the doubts proceed that are met with on this Subject But me thinks that in what Moses hath written of Light 't is evident that he would only speak of what is found on the part of the Bodies and not of the Effect which it produceth in such Subjects as are capable to have the sense of it since it is certain according to Moses that when that which is called Light was created there was yet none of the other Creatures which are esteemed capable to perceive it I desire you to observe by the by another thing which is That this sentiment which we have from Luminous Bodies is in such a manner on the part of our Soul and hath such a necessary respect to the motion of certain parts of our Brain that very often without the excitation of the nerves of our Eyes by any Luminous body we have the sense of Light Thus in Dreams the fortuitous course of the Spirits moving those parts of our Brain the agitation whereof is designed to excite in us that sentiment maketh us clearly see Objects that are not present And by the same reason those who marching in a very obscure place hurt their head against the Wall are subject to see a thousand Fires whence we are to conclude that those motions of the Brain which have nothing that resembleth the thoughts which arise in the Soul on their occasion may be excited by other Bodies than those we call Luminous But it was very proper not to give this name but to Bodies whose figure and motion were so proportionate to the fineness and tenderness of our Eyes that their nerves might be moved by them without pain and without danger to the other parts of our Body Wherein me thinks M. Des Cartes hath succeeded admirably well it being not possible to assign to Luminous Bodies a fitter Figure than that which he hath given them nor a motion more convenient than that which he hath ascribed to them The SECOND DAY MOses relating what passed the Second Day for the formation of the Firmament expresseth himself in these terms God said let the Firmament be in the midst of the Waters and let it separate the one from the other He adds that the Firmament was presently made and the Waters were separated from the Waters so that there were some of them above and some under the Firmament which he called Heaven To understand how the Waters were separated one from the other by the formation of the Firmament according to the sentiment of M. Des Cartes we shall need only to relate what he teacheth of the Waters and of the Firmament Those who have read what he hath written thereof do know that after he had considered all the effects of Water he conceived that the particles which compose it must be smooth long and pliant and that by this supposition alone he hath rendred a reason of all what is observed in Water whether it be running or whether it enlarge it self in a Vessel or whether we see it in drops or in the form of a Scum or whether it rise in Vapours or whether remaining without motion it appear in Ice or Snow We know also that he supposeth that there hath been a great number of these particles very smooth and very pliant mingled with other bodies a great part of which had figures so embarassing that their Aggregate could form no other but hard Masses Lastly We know that he supposeth these last particles have been the matter of many Masses almost like the Earth and forasmuch as these Masses could not be very solid very hard but by an extream pressing of the Branchy particles which compose them it is evident that the particles of water which were mixed therewith were driven out of it and that so the surfaces of those great Masses were to be altogether covered with it This being supposed it is now to be observed that according to M. Des Cartes the formation of the Firmament is nothing else but a perfect disposition and ranging of all the Whirlpools of which I have already spoken in the Subject of Light Their number is so great and the space they fill so vast that the word Firmament according to the truest interpretation signifieth a vast extension There is nothing that deserveth more this name than their Aggregate But as we ought to mark the time of the formation of every thing only from the moment which giveth it its perfection M. Des Cartes having supposed that the Aggregate of all the whirlpools was not yet well ordered when the Light began nor their motion very free doth mark the time of the formation of the Firmament then only when they were so well adjusted that the Ecliptick of the one answering to the Poles of the other they began to move among themselves with a motion altogether free and so proportioned that not any one received a Let from all those which encompassed it 'T is at this instant that according to Des Cartes's Hypothesis the Masses which were in the same Vortex where the Earth was began to be separated from it by the matter of that Vortex which insinuated it self betwixt them and which kept them more or less distant from the Center