A26976:191
Of the immortality of mans soul, and the nature of it and other spirits.…
Of the immortality of mans soul, and the nature of it and other spirits. Two discourses, one in a letter to an unknown doubter, the other in a reply to Dr. Henry Moore's Animadversions on a private letter to him, which he published in his second edition of Mr. Joseph Glanvil's Sadducismus triumphatus, or, History of apparitions by Richard Baxter.
London: printed for B. Simons, 1682
OF THE NATURE OF SPIRITS: › Section 29-31: Ad SECT. XXIX, XXX, XXXI.
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
§ 2. Now I that pretend not to a perfect definition repeat that which is the nearest to it that I understand.
And first I am for agreeing on the sense of words before we use them in definitions.
1. I take not the word [Spirit] to be of univocal signification here, but so analogical as to be equivocal. God and Creatures are not univocally called [Spirits.] ⟨p. 83⟩2. I know not (and I think no other) that all Created Spirits in the universe are so far of one substantial consistence as that the word [Spirit] univocally fits them all, as a Genus among the 15 senses of the word before said mentioned by Martinius; when we confine it to one, men are apt to boggle at the ambiguity: yet when we have defined it, the name is to be used.
3. Materia is as ambiguous as Spiritus; and is oft used for Res or Substantia, which is fundamental to modes and qualities and active forms: and oft for substance of such a consistence as is sensible (to the highest senses) and as a mind in the flesh can have an Idea of in its consistence; and if you will, such as you call Impenetrable and Discerpible.