페이지 이미지
PDF
ePub

let not that Inchanter Confciaufnefs put afunder or difunite. This may ferve for an Answer to all you have faid concerning Confcioufness, which does not injure our Scheme, nor benefit your's. For Consciousness cannot divide the Subftance. I have already proved your supposed three Substances to be indivifible: And you unfortunately grant, that divifible and diftinguishable are the fame; and so it cannot diftinguish them either without dividing them, which is impoffible. Thus you have got a Trinity of Gods, which are neither divifible nor diftinguishable. Diftinct without being divided is, you are pleased to fay, unintelligible fargon.

And now having difpatched your Scheme, what hinders but I might indulge my fatirical Vein after your Example, which I fhall be proud to follow in every Thing elfe? But I fcorn to infult the Dead-Peace, everlasting Peace be to the Shade of your moft lamented, and indeed most lamentable Hypothefis! O darling Offspring of a worthy Sire! Could either my generous Pity (For thou waft, vel Priamo miferanda) or thy Father's Prowess in War have faved thee, thou hadft not died. But when there are mala Stamina Vita; when the Vitals are unfound, all Human Endeavours are vain and ineffectual;

[ocr errors]

Evandro, qualem meruit, Pallanta remitto;"

I fend you back the dead Corpfe to be buried in eternal Oblivion. I allow you, as you have an inexhauftible Fund of Wit, to say a World of fine Things upon it; to ftrew the Flowers of your Oratory upon it's lifeless Carcafe, and to pay the last fad unavailing Office to it's Manes

"Manibus date lilia plenis"

"His faltem accumulem Donis & fungar

inani

"Munere"

Let not your paternal Tenderness carry you any farther. Have no Recourfe to magic Arts to call up it's fleeting Shade; or, if You do, do not expect that I should wage War with an unbodied Phantom.

"Irruit ac ferro fruftra diverberat Umbras."

It would undoubtedly have been barbarous to rob you of your unfortunate Infant, if your Imagination had been barren. But you may well bear the Lofs. Your happy and inventive Fancy, which is married to fo masculine and regular a Judgment, will foon repair the Damage with a numerous Race of beautiful and lafting Productions,

"Pulchra faciat Te Prole Parentem."

[blocks in formation]

To return; I never affirmed, that "Per"fon and Subftance were únintelligible." All this whole Paragraph turns upon that Mistake; and upon confounding Unintelligible with Incomprehenfible.

In the next Paragraph you will not admit the Notion of an infinitely-extended Deity, for Fear it should draw along with it fome Confequences, which would be injurious to your late dear departed Hypothefis. Well; will you admit the Words of the Pfalmift? Whither fhall I go then from thy Spirit, or whither fhall I go then from thy Prefence? If I climb up into Heaven, thou art there: If I go down to Hell, thou art there alfo. If I take the Wings of the Morning, and remain in the uttermoft Parts of the Sea; even there alfo fhall thy Hand lead me, and thy RightHand fhall hold me. Is not acting in Heaven diftant and diftinct from acting in Hell, or in the Sea? And does not diftinct, diftant Action prove diftant, diftinct Subftance; or a local Diftinction of Substance? "Can'

[ocr errors]

a Thing," say you, "be diftinct from "itfelf?" No; if by Self you mean Perfonality, and the whole of that Perfonality. For then the Question would be; Can the whole, as whole, be diftinct from the whole? But Substance effentially united to Substance, and therefore one, may admit of Distinction. Answer me this Question: Is the Substance, which is in Heaven, one individual Subftance

3

ftance with that which filleth all Things? And it will be an eafy Matter to answer your's. God exifts wholly in Heaven; or elfe there is only Part of God there. Well then; according to the Scheme of NonExtenfion, to which you are a late Convert, can the fame numerical Being be confined, and yet unconfined? "Can there be a Diffu"fion of it," to use Dr. WATERLAND'S Words, "every-where, and yet nothing "be diffufed?" For it is fuppofed that the whole Effence is diffused all over the Universe, and yet remains whole and undiffused in Heaven. According to the Scheme of Non-Extenfion we have fo many distinct, numerical Wholes, which make one numerical, diftinct Whole, becaufe effentially united. According to the Scheme of Extenfion, we have so many distinct numerical Parts, which have the whole Attributes refiding in them, and yet make one numerical Subftance, for the fame Reason. Both agree, that the Divine Nature is diftinct, though undivided.

Suppofing my Soul had exactly the fame Perfections as your's, (by the Way, I wish mine had) and were, by the Power of God, unalienably united; fo that you became, in a literal Senfe, Dimidium Anima mea, which you are now in a figurative one; it is plain they would be one, as far as we understand any Thing of Unity. For when we perceive Hh 2

[ocr errors]

any

any Object in a continued Pofition, fenced out from other Things, we never fcruple to give it the Name of One; and being incapable of Separation, and being of the fame Kind and Degree, they might not only be called, but would really be strictly One. But it is not fo plain, that this Unity` between us would be a Bar to all Diftinction: You might exert yourfelf in a diftinct Manner; You might be adorning Morality, while I was employed in dry Metaphyficks. "If three intelligent Acting Subftances "can be made out to be one intelligent

[ocr errors]

Acting Subftance, then, etc." Anfwer: This fuppofes Unity of Perfon and Unity of Subftance to be equivalent. Whereas Plurality of Perfons implies the Substance, though united, to be diftinguished after fuch a Manner; Plurality of Substances implies. the Substance to be divided. So many feparable Perfons are fo many Substances; but Perfons having no poffible Detachment the one from the other, are one Substance. The Perfons then are each Subftance, but not A Subftance; because we never give the Name of A Subftance but where the Subftance is aliene, and independent of another. Perfon then, each Divine Perfon, as I faid before, is Being, because it exifts; but not A Being, because the Perfons do not exist separate.

I

« 이전계속 »