Selected quad for the lemma: state_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
state_n	body_n	soul_n	union_n	1,547	5	9.5555	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A52424	Letters concerning the love of God between the author of the Proposal to the ladies and Mr. John Norris, wherein his late discourse, shewing that it ought to be intire and exclusive of all other loves, is further cleared and justified / published by J. Norris.	Norris, John, 1657-1711.; Astell, Mary, 1668-1731.	1695 (1695)	Wing N1254; ESTC R17696	100,744	365

utterly impracticable For after all if I were not to take away my Hand from the Fire till I had entered into the Philosophy of it examined the Figure and Motion of its little Particles and considered the several Relations they had to the Configuration of my Body I should be burnt before I had a quarter ended my Speculation It is necessary therefore that there should be a quicker and a shorter Way of advertizing the Soul of the several Relations that other Bodies bear to her own and of the Conveniency or Disconveniency of their Impressions Which can be only by a suitable Sentiment either of Pleasure or Pain according as the Impression happens to be But this is an Advertisement I must in vain expect from Bodies They can give me no Intelligence of what even themselves do to me They can indeed change the Situation of the Parts of my Body but they cannot give any Sentiment to my Mind or new modifie my Soul GOD only is able to do this and accordingly being willing that I should know the Relations that other Bodies bear to mine with as little Trouble as may be it being not fit that a Soul made for the Contemplation of an infinite Good should be occupied and taken up with anxious Disquisitions about Bodies he leaves it not to my Reason to explore and sift out the Congruities or Discongruities of other Bodies with mine which would not only be a laborious but after all a very fallacious and uncertain Way but in Wisdom thinks fit to go another way to work and to give me due Information of these things by the short incontestable Proof of Sentiment And because Pleasure and Pain are the natural Marks of Physical good and evil and withal the strongest and most quickning Motives to incline me to seek or shun the Use of Bodies accordingly these are the two general Sensations he raises in my Soul according as the Impressions are which are made upon my Body Thus for Instance when the Motion of the Fire is moderate and temperate upon my Body and serves only to open and supple its Parts to quicken my Blood and to cherish and recreate my Spirits I feel a Sentiment of Pleasure But when it comes to be intemperate so as to indanger the Rupture of any of its Fibres I feel a contrary sentiment of Pain which admonishes me of the imminent Evil and in a Language that even Children and Idiots understand bids me remove my self at a greater Distance And all this with a great deal of Reason For though there be nothing in the Motions themselves resembling those sensations which attend them and though the Motion which occasions Pleasure differ only in Degree from that which occasions Pain which by the way is a plain Argument that those Motions do not properly cause or produce those sensations yet since as far as they respect the Preservation of the Machine and the good of the Bodily Life or State they differ essentially or in their whole Kind it is fit they should be attended with sensations essentially different such as Pleasure and Pain which therefore GOD raises in the soul in Consequence of those general Laws of Union which he has established between it and the Body touching it as it ought to be touched in relation to the Difference of sensible Objects The Wisdom and Goodness of which Conduct we can never sufficiently meditate upon or admire And now Madam I can no sooner suppose you to have gone over in your Thoughts this account concerning the Manner of sensation than to have formed within your self a satisfactory solution of the Difficulties you propose For though these sensible Objects are not the true Causes of those Sensations which we feel in our Souls upon the Impressions they make in our Bodies but only Conditions determining the Agency of the true Cause yet it does by no means follow from hence that therefore they serve for nothing and are wholly unnecessary No the contrary appears from the Account before given For though these Objects do not act upon our spirits or truly and properly speaking produce any sensation there yet they do really make an Impression upon our Bodies and according to the different Measure or Manner of that Impression minister to GOD the true efficient an apt and proper Occasion to act upon our spirits and so in this respect are not merely positive and arbitrary Conditions 'T is true indeed if by positive and arbitrary Conditions you mean that there is no real Analogy or necessary Connexion abstracting from all Will or Constitution of GOD about it between such Impressions and such sensations so they are mere positive and arbitrary Conditions For most assuredly there is nothing in those Motions that either answers the following sensations or naturally and necessarily infers them But if by positive and arbitrary Conditions you mean that there is no greater Reason why GOD in Consideration of the Welfare of the Body should give the Soul such a Sentiment rather than another upon such an Impression so they are not mere positive and arbitrary Conditions For though that Motion which is followed with Pleasure has no Physical Analogy with Pleasure as differing only in Degree from that which is followed with Pain whereas Pleasure and Pain differ essentially and so though GOD might if he pleased exchange sensations giving me suppose a sentiment of Pain when the Motion of the Fire is temperate and according to the present Order of things ought to be followed with a sentiment of Pleasure and so likewise giving me a sentiment of Pleasure when the Motion of the Fire is intemperate and so according to the present Establishment ought to be followed with a sentiment of Pain I say though he might thus transpose cur sensations for any Physical Proportion or Connexion that is between them and their respective Motions yet in regard to the good State of the Body it is not so fit and reasonable that he should as is obvious to conceive And this is all the Sensible Congruity I can allow you For in short if by sensible Congruity you mean only that considering the Good or Evil that arrives to the State of the Body from such an Impression there is an antecedent Aptness or Reason in the thing why GOD should touch the Soul with such or such a Sentiment rather than with its contrary I readilly acknowledge that there is such a sensible Congruity But if by sensible Congruity you mean as you seem to do that there is any natural similitude or Proportion between such an Impression and such a sentiment as to the things themselves or that by virtue of this Analogy such an Impression has any natural Efficacy to produce or in your Language to draw forth such a sentiment in this sense I deny that there is any such thing as a sensible Congruity that is I deny that sensible Objects have any such Congruity with our sensations as to be able to contribute any thing by way

be capable of different Sentiments Being modified thus it shall be affected with Grief and being modified thus it shall be affected with Pain which will be sufficiently distinguished from each other by saying that Pain is a Modification of the Soul that anticipates and prevents all Reason and Reflection and that Grief is a modification that follows it and proceeds from it Thus I choose to distinguish them rather than by subjecting as you these two Sensations in two parts of the Soul whereof I have no Idea or by calling as others that Pain which the Soul suffers by the mediation of the Body and that Grief which the same Soul suffers in and by her self without the Mediation of the Body For though according to the Law of this State Pain be always occasioned by some Motion or Change in the Parts of the Body yet since 't is the Soul that truly feels it and GOD that truly raises it I can easily conceive that GOD can if he pleases raise the Sensation of Pain in her though no Change be made in the Body nay though she had no body at all That GOD for instance can raise the Sensation of Burning in the Soul without any Impression of Fire upon her Body Which by the way may serve to shew the Impertinency of that Question among the School-men how the Soul that is an immaterial Substance can suffer when separate by by a material Fire For let them tell me how Fire affects the Soul now she is in the Body and I 'll tell them how it may torment it when out of the Body But this by the by The thing I directly intend is that since the Soul may be capable of Pain as well without the Mediation of the Body as with it this cannot be its Distinction from Grief that it affects the Soul by the Mediation of the Body But to go on as I am not satisfied with the Ground of your Distinction so neither am I with the Use and Application you make of it Mental Pain say you is an Evil but such as GOD does not cause Again sensible Pain GOD does indeed cause but then that is not properly the Evil of Man Now I cannot accord with you in either of these As to the first I think it very certain that mental Pain being a real Modification of the Soul is caused by GOD who alone is able to new modifie our Souls who only acts upon them and is able to make them happy or miserable as I have sufficiently proved in my Discourse of Divine Love and as you will evidently perceive if you retire within your self and attentively consult your Reason And I wonder why you should stick to allow GOD to be the Author of mental Pain or Grief when you allow him to be the Cause of mental Pleasure or Ioy. If he be the Cause of our Happiness why cannot he be as well the Cause of our Misery And if of Pain why not of Grief For as to the other Part that sensible Pain which God causes is not properly an Evil you will find it very hard to perswade any one that has felt it to this Paradox That I suppose which perswaded you to it was your distinguishing the Soul of Man into two Parts a superiour and an inferiour Part the Latter of which being not properly the Man that Pain which is lodg'd there cannot be said to be the proper Evil of Man Thus the Stoicks reasoned of old and thus you now But besides that this Distinction of the Soul into a superiour and inferiour Part which is the Ground of this Supposition wants it self a good Foundation I further consider that if there were such a thing as an inferiour Part of the Soul yet since the higher is conscious of and affected with what is transacted in the other I do not see what Advantage accrues from this Distinction And since 't is the same Soul that feels Pain and Grief I see no Possibility of conceiving but that Pain must be as truly an Evil as Grief And if 't were put to my Choice there are several Degrees of Grief that I would chuse to indure rather than some Pains And I would fain know whether Pain be not against the Happiness of Man or whether Happiness can consist with it You your self imply that it cannot when you say that Indolence is necessary to perfect Felicity And must not that then be an Evil that is contrary to Happiness And should you not think your self guilty of offending against that Charity which you owe to your Fellow-Creatures and which obliges you to wish and seek their Welfare if you should put any of them without Cause to Bodily Pain Or would you try to bring your self off by your Distinction of the superiour and inferiour Part of the Soul That the Pain which you inflicted was only in the inferiour Part which being not properly the Man you could not be said to have done any real Evil to him and so not to have trespassed against Charity I believe you have too much good Nature as well as Discernment to use such a Plea as this But now if Pain be not a proper and real Evil how can it be against Charity to cause it in any one For what but willing an Evil to a Man can be contrary to wishing well to him It must therefore be concluded that sensible Pain is truly an Evil as well as mental evil I mean in it self formally and simply considered and that it can become good only occasionally and consequentially as it may be a Means to avoid a greater Evil or procure a greater Good and so may mental Pain too which when all is done I think the best Apology that can be offered for God's being the Author of it and to salve him from being the Object of our Aversion upon that Account viz. to say that though sensible Pain be truly an Evil as well as mental and that though GOD be the true Cause of both yet GOD does not will our Pain as he does our Pleasure and Happiness for it self and as such but merely for the sake of something else as it is a means to our greater good And is therefore so far from meriting our Hatred for the Pain which he causes in us that he ought for that very reason to be loved by us since 't is for the sake of Pleasure that he causes Pain This I take to be the most satisfactory Account of the Difficulty which as it resolves into what I offered in my last so 't is what you your self think fit after all to take up with as your last Expedient toward the latter Part of your Letter where indeed you deliver your self very nobly upon this Occasion Madam I have now done with the Body of your Notion and have now only to consider some looser Parts that relate to it You say you think it an unquestionable Maxim that all our Good is wholly and absolutely from GOD and all our Evil

Servant All-Saints Eve 1693. LETTER IV. Mr. Norris's Answer Madam THE sincere Love you seem to have for Truth and the great Progress you have made in it together with that singular Aptness of Genius that appears to be in you for further Attainments makes me not only willing to enter into a Correspondence with you but even to congratulate my self the Opportunity of so uncommon a Happiness For the better Improvement of which and that our Correspondence may be the more useful I would desire that it may be continually imployed upon serious and important Subjects such as may deserve the Time and reward the Pains that shall be bestowed on them and may occasion such Thoughts and Reflections to pass between us as may serve to give true Perfection and Inlargement to the Rational and right Movements and Relishes to the Moral Part of our Natures And since I have taken upon me to prescribe I would have these Subjects well sifted and examined as well as well chosen that so we may not enter upon a new Argument till that which was first undertaken be throughly discharged whereby we shall avoid a Fault very incident to common Conversation wherein new Questions are started before the first is brought to an Issue and which makes the Discoursings of the most intelligent Persons turn to so little an account But this Fault so frequent and almost unavoidable in the best Companies is easily remedied in Letters and therefore since we are now fallen upon a noble and sublime Subject I desire we may go to the Bottom of it and not commence any new Matter till we have gone over all that is of material Consideration in this of Divine Love So much by way of Proposal I proceed now to consider the Contents of your present Letter in which I find very great and extraordinary things and such as will deserve more and more studied Reflections than my present Leisure I fear will permit me to bestow upon them However I shall go as far as my Time and Paper will allow and if you think I leave any thing considerable omitted the Defects of this shall be supplied in another Letter I observe then that though you declare your self satisfied with the Account I gave in my last why GOD's being the Author of Pain should not strike off that Obligation of Love which was grounded upon his being the Cause of the opposite Sensation of Pleasure yet so greatly are you concerned to have that ill Consequence effectually shut out you advance another Hypothesis for the Solution of the Difficulty And because it is very ingenious and worth our considering I shall therefore first of all set down what by comparing the several Parts of your Letter together I take to be your Notion Which when I have stated and considered I shall reflect upon some single Passages in your Letter that relate to it And in this you have the Model of the Answer that I intend To begin then with an Account of your Notion You distinguish of two Sorts of Pain that which is sensible or bodily and that which is mental By sensible Pain meaning that which is in the inferiour Part of the Soul that which is exercised about Objects of Sense and by mental Pain that which affects the superiour and intellectual Part. Now as for mental Pain that you allow to be an Evil and the only proper Evil of Man but then you say GOD is not the Cause of that And as for sensible or bodily Pain that you allow GOD to be the Cause of But then you say that is not truly and really an Evil as not affecting what is properly the Man And therefore though GOD be the true Cause of Pian as well as Pleasure yet since the Pain which he causes is not of the first Sort viz. mental Pain which is an Evil but of the second Sort viz. sensible Pain which is not the proper Evil of the Man this ought to be no Bar to our Love of him much less a Reason of making him the Object of our Aversion This I think is in short your true System which lying thus in a regular and compendious Draught may be the more distinctly considered which is the Advantage I aim at by casting it into this Form My first Remark upon this is that your Distinction of sensible and mental Pain in the general is right and founded in the Nature of things For certainly the Ideas of Joy and sensible Pleasure Grief and bodily Pain are very distinct Some I know that pretend to Philosophy confound these making that Pleasure or Pain suppose which a Man feels upon his drawing near the Fire to be all one with Joy or Grief The Soul knowing say they or feeling that the Body which she loves is well or ill disposed that there happens some good or ill to its mechanical Frame either rejoyces or is grieved at it The one is our Pain the other our Pleasure But this I take to be gross Philosophy though the Authors of it think it fine It is true indeed that as often as the Sentiments of Pleasure or Pain do give us notice that our Bodies are well or ill disposed we are affected with Joy or Grief but a little Reflection may help us to perceive that this Joy and Grief that are the Consequences of our knowing how 't is with the State of our Bodies differ exceedingly from those antecedent Pains and Pleasures whence the Information is receiv'd For these prevent our Reason whereas the other follow upon it Pain anticipates all Thought or Reflection but Grief supposes it and is grounded upon it I grieve because I know my self to be in Pain or because I expect or fear it whence it is evident that my Grief and my Pain are not one and the same but two very different and distinct Sentiments I therefore allow your Distinction though I am not so well satisfied with the Ground of it You ground your Distinction of mental and sensible Pain upon a double Part of the Soul the superiour and the inferiour The Distinction is authorised by Custom and what is more by you but I must own to you sincerely that I do not understand it I have heard much talk of this superiour and inferiour Part of the Soul and have thought much about it but cannot for my Life form to my self a clear Idea of any such Parts For besides that I think the Soul has no Parts at all if it had sure they are not such dissimular and heterogeneous Parts as superiour and inferiour intellectual and sensitive The Soul I take to be an intire simple uniform Essence Intellectual throughout without any Parts at all much less such heterogeneous Parts Nor is there any need that it should be supposed to have any such for the Establishment of the present Distinction The Distinction of Sentiments does not need Distinction of Parts in the Soul The same Essence of the Soul being variously modified may be variously affected and