other will succeed, and another that, and so on for ever. For when a God of infinite truth and goodness becomes the objective happiness of a finite nature, which cannot 'comprehend and enjoy him but in an infinite succession; every new delight the enjoyment of him creates in us must necessarily raise a new desire, and every new desire immediately find a new delight, and so round again to all eternity. Of what a vast capacity therefore is this soul of ours, in which there is room enough successively to entertain all the ravishing joys and pleasures that make an everlasting heaven! that can drink in those deep rivers of pleasure, as fast as they spring up, and flow from God's right hand for evermore! What tongue can express the innumerable joys that such a soul can hold, whose capacity is so large as heaven, and so near to infinite, as to be able to contain all those joys and pleasures that infinite truth and goodness can create?

4. And lastly, The soul of man is of vast worth, in respect of its capacity of immortality. For by its operations it is evident that the soul is not composed of corruptible matter, but is a spiritual and immaterial substance; for if it were matter, it would act and move only when other matter presses upon it, and not be able to determine the course of its own motion, but would be forced to move backwards or forwards, according as it was thrust on by that outward matter that continually moves and presses upon it; and all its motions would be as necessary as that of a stone in the air, when it is thrust up by an impressed force, and pressed down again by the weight of the air above it: whereas in this soul of ours we sensibly feel and experience a natural li

berty of acting, a power to move itself, and to determine its own motions which way it pleaseth; when it is pressed forward never so vigorously by the strong impulses of outward objects, it is in its power to go on or retreat, and to divert the current of its thoughts into a quite contrary channel to that whereinto it is thrust and directed by all the impressions of its sense. For thus in the midst of the alarms and shoutings of an army, of the noises of drums and trumpets ringing in our ears, our soul can recollect itself, and reduce its scattered thoughts into profound contemplations of a sweet and blessed peace; and when it is pressed from without, with never so much importunity to this or that particular choice, it is in its power to reject the motion, and to choose the quite contrary. By all which it is apparent, that the soul hath an innate liberty of acting; that she is not necessitated from without by the different concourses and motions of the several particles of matter; but that all the diversity of her wills and opinions is principally owing to her own freedom and power of self-determination: and to make the least doubt of it, is to question the common sense and experience of mankind. Since therefore the soul is not determined in its motions by the different pressures of material things, as all other matter is, but hath power to swim against the torrent, and move quite counter to all foreign impressions, it hence necessarily follows that it is immaterial. And indeed, considering how much its operations do exceed the utmost power of dull and passive matter, I cannot but wonder that any man should be so forsaken of his reason, as to rank it among material things; for how is it possible that a

piece of dull unactive matter, that a little grass, or dirt, or mire, after all the refinings, macerations, and maturations that can be performed by the help of motion, should ever be able to make a thinking being, or grow up into the soul of a philosopher? that a company of dead atoms, which cannot move unless they are moved, can ever be capable of framing syllogisms in mood and figure, and disputing pro and con, whether they are atoms or no? that such inert and sluggish bodies should by their impetuous jostling together awaken one another out of their senseless passiveness, and make each other hear and feel their mutual knockings and jostlings; and then from this sense into which they have thus awakened one another, and (which they are as incapable of as a musical instrument is of hearing its own sounds, or taking pleasure in the harmonious airs that are played upon it) should proceed and consult together to make wise laws, and contrive the best models of government; to investigate the natures of things, and deduce from them the several systems of arts and sciences? In a word, how is it possible that a company of fluid motes and particles of matter should ever be so artificially complicated and twisted one with another, as to form an understanding that can lift up its eyes, and look beyond all this sensible world, into that of immaterial beings, and conceive abstracted notions of things which can never be objects to any material senses such as a pure point, equality and proportion, symmetry and asymmetry of magnitudes, the rise and propagation of dimensions, infinite divisibility, and the like notions, that never were in matter, nor consequently could ever be extracted out of it: that can

correct the errors of all our material perceptions, and demonstrate things to be vastly different from what they apprehend and report them; can prove the sun, for instance, to be one hundred and sixty times bigger than the earth, when to our eye and imagination it appears no bigger than a bushel: that can lodge within itself all that mass of sensible things which taketh up so much room without it, and when it hath piled them up upon one another, in vast and most prodigious numbers, is still as capacious of more, as when it was altogether empty: in a word, that can grasp the universe with a thought, and comprehend the whole latitude of heaven and earth within its own indivisible centre. How senseless is it to imagine that such noble operations as these can be performed by a mere complex of dead atoms and senseless particles of matter! And if they cannot, as doubtless they cannot, then from hence it will necessarily follow, that the soul of man is an immaterial thing. Furthermore we see, that though the soul takes in objects of all sizes, yet when once they are in, they are not as bodies in a material place, in which the greater take up more room than the less for the thought of a mile, or ten thousand miles, doth no more fill or stretch a soul, than that of a foot, or an inch, or a mathematical point. And whereas all matter hath its parts, and those extended one without another, into length, and breadth, and thickness, and so is measurable by inches, yards, or solid measures; there is no such thing as measurable extension in any thing belonging to the soul: for in cogitation, which is the essence of a soul, there is neither length, nor breadth, nor thickness; nor is it possible to have

any conceit of a foot of thought, or a yard of reason, a pound of wisdom, or a quart of virtue. And if what belongs to a soul be immaterial, it will necessarily follow that the soul itself is immaterial too, and as such capable of immortality. For immaterial natures being pure and simple, having neither contrary qualities nor divisible parts in them, as material things have, can have no principles of alteration and corruption in them; and being devoid of these, they must needs be capable of living and subsisting for ever. What noble beings therefore are the souls of men, which, together with those vast capacities of understanding, of moral perfection, of joy and pleasure, are naturally capable of immortality, and consequently of improving in knowledge, in goodness, and in joy and pleasure, unto all eternity! And therefore, certainly a soul must needs be a most precious thing, that can thus outlive all sublunary beings, and subsist for ever in so sublime a state of glory and beatitude.

Having thus shewn you the invaluable worth of the soul in respect of its own natural capacities, I proceed,

2. To shew you of what vast esteem it is in the judgment of all those who we must needs suppose to best understand the worth of it; and that is, the whole world of spirits. For to be sure, spirits must best understand the excellency of spirits, because they have a clearer insight into each other's natures, and a more immediate prospect of the virtue, power, and excellency of each other's faculties. For as for us, whilst we are in this embodied state, and do understand by corporeal organs, we generally judge of