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II. Those who suppose the soul of man to have a real distinct existence when the body dies, but only to fall into a state of slumber without consciousness or activity, must, I think, suppose this soul to be material, i. e. an extended and solid substance.

If they suppose it to be inextended, or to have no parts or quantity, I confess I have no manner of idea of the existence or possibility of such an inextended being, without consciousness or active power, nor do they pretend to have any such idea as I ever heard, and therefore they generally grant it to be extended.

But if they imagine the soul to be extended, it must either have something more of solidity or density than mere empty space, or it must be quite as unsolid and thin as space itself: Let us consider both these.

If it be as thin and subtle as mere empty space, yet while it is active and conscious, I own it must have a proper existence; but if it once begin to sleep and drop all consciousness and activity, I have no other idea of it, but the same which I have of empty space; and that I conceive to be mere nothing, though it impose upon us with the appearance of some sort of properties.

If they allow the soul to have any the least degree of density above what belongs to empty space, this is solidity in the philosophic sense of the word, and then it is solid extension, which I call matter: and a material being may indeed be laid asleep, i. e. it may cease to have any motion in its parts; but motion is not consciousness: and how either solid or unsolid

extension, either space or matter, can have any consciousness or thought belonging to any part of it, or spread through the whole of it, I know not; or what any sort of extension can do toward thought or consciousness, I confess I understand not; nor can I frame any more an idea of it, than I can of a blue motion or a sweet smelling sound, or of fire or air or water reasoning or rejoicing: and I do not affect to speak of things or words, when I can form no correspondent ideas of what is spoken,

So far as I can judge, the soul of man in its own nature, is nothing else but a conscious and active principle, subsisting by itself, made after the image of God, who is all conscious activity; and it is still the same being, whether it be united to an animal body, or separated from it. If the body die, the soul still exists an active and conscious power or principle, or being; and if it ceases to be conscious and active, I think it ceases to be; for I have no conception of what remains.

Now, if the conscious principle continue conscious after death, it will not be in a mere conscious indolence: the good man and the wicked will not have the same indolent existence. Virtue or vice, in the very temper of this being when absent from matter or body, will become a pleasure or a pain to the conscience of a separate spirit.

I am well aware that this is a subject which has employed the thoughts of many philosophers, and I do but just intimate my own sentiments without presuming to judge for others. But the defence or re

futation of arguments on this subject, would draw me into a field of philosophical discourse, which is very foreign to my present purpose: and whether this reasoning stand or fall, it will have but very little influence on this controversy with the generality of Christians, because it is a thing rather to be determined by the revelation of the word of God. I therefore drop this argument at once, and apply myself immediately to consider the proofs that may be drawn from Scripture for the soul's existence in a Separate State after death, and before the resurrection.

SECTION II.

Probable Arguments for the Separate State.

THERE are several places of Scripture in the Old Testament, as well as in the New, which may be most naturally and properly construed to signify the existence of the soul in a Separate State after the body is dead; but since they do not carry with them such plain evidence, or forcible proof, and may pos sibly be interpreted to another sense, I shall not long insist upon them: however it may not be amiss just 'to mention a few of them, and pass away.

Psal. Ixxiii. 24, 26. "Thou shalt guide me with thy counsel, and afterward receive me to glory: my flesh and my heart faileth; but God is the strength of my heart and my portion for ever." In these verses receiving to glory seems immediately to follow

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à guidance through this world; and when the flesh and heart of the Psalmist should fail him in death, God continued to be his portion for ever, God would receive him to himself as such a portion, and thereby he gave strength or courage to his heart even in a dying hour. It would be a very odd and unnatural exposition of this text to interpret it only of the resurrection, thus, "Thou shalt guide me by thy counsel through this life, and after the long interval of some thousand years thou wilt receive me to glory."

Eccles. xii. 7. "Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was, and the spirit to God that gave it." It is confessed the word spirit in the Hebrew is the same with breath, and is represented in some places of Scripture as the spring of animal life to the body: yet it is evident in many other places, the word spirit signifies the conscious principle in man, or the intelligent being, which knows and reasons, perceives and acts. The Scripture speaks of being "grieved in spirit," Isa. liv. 6. Of" rejoicing in spirit," Luke x. 21. "The spirit of a man knoweth the things of a man," 1 Cor. ii. 11. "There is a spirit in man,” i. e. a principle of understanding, Job xxxii. 8. And this spirit both of the wicked and the righteous at death "returns to God," Eccl. xii. 7. to God who (as I hinted before) is the Judge of all in the world of spirits, probably to be further determined and disposed of, as to its state of reward or punishment.

Isa. lvii. 2. "The righteous is taken away from the evil to come, he shall enter into peace, they shall

rest in their beds, each one walking in his uprightness." The soul of every one that walketh uprightly shall at death enter into a state of peace while their body rests in the bed of dust.

Luke ix. 30, 31. "And behold there talked with him, (i. e. with Jesus) two men which were Moses and Elias, who appeared in glory, and spake of his decease which he should accomplish at Jerusalem." I grant it possible that these might be but mere visions which appeared to our blessed Saviour and his apostles: but it is a much more natural and obvious interpretation to suppose that the spirits of these two great men, whereof one was the institutor, and the other the reformer of the Jewish church, did really appear to Christ, who was the reformer of the world, and the institutor of the Christian church, and converse with him about the important event of his death and his return to heaven. Perhaps the spirit of Elijah had his heavenly body with him there, since he never died, but was carried alive to heaven; but Moses gave up his soul at the call of God when no man was near him, and his body was buried by God himself. See 2 Kings ii. 11. and Deut. xxxiv. 1, 5, 6. and his spirit was probably made visible only by an assumed vehicle for that purpose.

John v. 24. "Whoso heareth my word and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life; is passed from death to life." John vi. 47, 50, 51. "This is the bread which cometh down from heaven, that a man may eat thereof and not die. If any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever."

John

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