A26976:380
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.
4. But indeed this is too high a Glory for the Soul of man to desire, or hope for. It is enough to have a blessed union with Christ, and the holy Society, consistent with our Individuation. Like will to like, and yet be it self. Rivers go to the Sea, and not to the Earth. Earth turns to Earth, and not to the Sun, or Fire. And the holy and blessed, go to the holy and blessed: And I believe, that their union will be nearer than we can now well conceive, or than this selfish state of man desireth: But as every drop in the Sea, is the ⟨p. 59⟩same Water it was, so every Soul will be the same Soul.
2. And as to the incapacity of misery which you talk of, why should you think it more hereafter than here? If you think all Souls now to be but one, doth not an aching Tooth, or a gouty Foot, or a calculous Bladder, suffer pain, tho it be not the body that feeleth; but the same sensitive Soul is pained in one part, and pleased in another. And if all Souls be now but God in divers Bodies, or the Anima mundi, try if you can comfort a man under the torment of the Stone, or other Malady, or on the Rack, or in terror of Conscience, by telling him, That his Soul is a part of God. Will this make a Captive bear his Captivity, or a Malefactor his Death? If not here, why should you think that their misery hereafter will be ever the less, or more tolerable for your conceit, that they are parts of God? They will be no more parts of him then, than they were here. But it's like, that they also will have an uniting inclination, even to such as themselves; or that God, will separate them from all true unity, and say, Go you cursed into everlasting fire, prepared for the Devil and his Angels, &c.
2. And as to the incapacity of misery which you talk of, why should you think it more hereafter than here? If you think all Souls now to be but one, doth not an aking Tooth, or a gouty Foot, or a calculous Bladder, suffer pain, tho it be not the body that feeleth; but the same sensitive Soul is pain'd in one part, and pleas'd in another. And if all Souls be now but God in divers Bodies, or the Anima mundi, try if you can comfort a man under the torment of the Stone, or other Malady, or on the Rack, or in terror of Conscience, by telling him, That his Soul is a part of God. Will this make a Captive bear his Captivity, or a Malefactor his Death? If not here, why should you think that their misery hereafter will be ever the less, or more tolerable for your conceit, that they are parts of God? They will be no more parts of him then, than they were here. But it's like, that they also will have an uniting inclination, even to such as themselves; or that God, will separate them from all true unity, and say, Go you cursed into everlasting fire, prepared for the Devil and his Angels, &c.