A26976:349
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
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.
§. 17. The case of failing memories is answered before, in the case of Infancy and Apoplexies, &c. Our memory faileth in our sleep: and yet when we awake, we find that there remains the same knowledge of Arts and Sciences. They did not end at night, and were not all new made the next morning. The Acts ceased, because the receptivity of the passive Organ ceased: but the Habit and Faculty continued. And when memory in old men faileth about names, and words, and little matters, their judgments about great things are usually stronger (by better Habits) than young mens.
§. 17. The case of failing memories is answered before, in the case of Infancy and Apop•exies, &c. Our memory faileth in our sleep: and yet when we awake, we find that there remains the same knowledg of Arts and Sciences. They did not end at night, and were not all new made tne next morning. The Acts ceased, because the receptivity of the passive Organ ceased: but the Habit and Faculty continued. And when memory in old men faileth about names, and words, and little matters, their judgments about great things are usually stronger (by better Habits) than young mens.
§. 28. You say, You know nothing wherein Man excels Beasts, but may be referred to the benefit of speech and hands, capable of effecting its Conceptions.
Ans. This is answered before. Those Conceptions are the cause of words and actions: and is there no cause of those Conceptions? And if mans Conceptions differ from the beasts, the causes differed. And if the first Conceptions did not differ, the Subsequent would not differ neither, without a difference in the causal Faculties. Why do not Beasts speak as well as Men? Parrots show, That it is not in all for want of a speaking Organ. If one be born dumb, and not deaf, he will know but little the less for his dumbness. If he be born deaf and dumb, and not blind, he will still be rational, as Dr. Wallis can tell you, who hath taught such to talk and converse intelligibly by their fingers, and other signs, without words. I confess, if all the outward Senses were stopped from the Birth, I see not how the Soul could know outward sensible things, as being no Objects to it. And how it would work on it self alone, we know not; but understand, and will, we are sure it doth: and therefore can do it. And it's one thing to prove Beasts to be men, or rational, and another thing to prove Men to be Beasts, or irrational. If you could prove the former, viz. That Beasts have Souls that can think of God, and the Life to come, if they could but speak, this would rather prove