A39675:177
Pneumatologia, a treatise of the soul of man
Pneumatologia, a treatise of the soul of man wherein the divine original, excellent and immortal nature of the soul are opened, its love and inclination to the body, with the necessity of its separation from it, considered and improved, the existence, operations, and states of separated souls, both in Heaven and Hell, immediately after death, asserted, discussed, and variously applied, divers knotty and difficult questions about departed souls, both philosophical, and theological, stated and determined, the invaluable preciousness of humane souls, and the various artifices of Satan (their professed enemy) to destroy them, discovered, and the great duty and interest of all men, seasonable and heartily to comply with the most great and gracious design of the Father, Son, and Spirit, for the salvation of their souls, argued and pressed / by John Flavel ...Pneumatologia, a treatise of the soul of man wherein the divine original, excellent and immortal nature of the soul are opened, its love and inclination to the body, with the necessity of its separation from it, considered and improved, the existence, operations, and states of separated souls, both in Heaven and Hell, immediately after death, asserted, discussed, and variously applyed, divers knotty and difficult questions about departed souls, both philosophical, and theological, stated and determined, the invaluable preciousness of humane souls, and the various artifices of Satan (their professed enemy) to destroy them, discovered, and the great duty and interest of all men, seasonable and heartily to comply with the most great and gracious design of the Father, Son, and Spirit, for the salvation of their souls, argued and pressed / by John Flavel ...
London: printed for Francis Tyton, 1685
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.
But it is evident,1 souls spring not from the Parent, as one Plant or Animal doth from another: For they have their seed in themselves, apt and proper to produce their kind; but the seed of souls is not to be found in man: It is not to be found in his Body; for then (as was said before) a spiritual and nobler Essence must be produced out of a material and baser matter, (i.e.) the matter must give to the Soul that which it hath not in it self. Nor is it to be found in his Soul, for the Soul being a pure, simple, and indivisible Being, can suffer nothing to be discinded from it towards the production of another Soul. A spirit, as the Soul is, is Substantia simplex & impartibilis; an uncompounded and indiscerptible or impartible Being. Nor can it spring partly from the Body, and partly from the Soul, as from con-causes; for then it should be partly corporeal, and partly incorporeal as its causes are. So that there is no Matter, Seed, or principle of Souls found in man; and to be sure (as Baronius strongly argues) *he cannot produce a Soul without preexistent matter; for that were to make him Omnipotent, and assign a creating power to a creature. Besides, that which is generable is also corruptible, as we see Trees, Animals, &c. which are produced that way, to be; but the Soul is not corruptible, as hath in part been already proved, and will more fully in the following Discourse. So that Adam's Soul and the Souls of his posterity spring not from each other, but all from God by Creation.
But it is evident,1 souls spring not from the Parent, as one Plant or Animal doth from another: For they have their seed in themselves, apt and proper to produce their kind; but the seed of souls is not to be found in man: It is not to be found in his Body; for then (as was said before) a spiritual and nobler Essence must be produced out of a material and baser matter, (i.e.) the matter must give to the Soul that which it hath not in it self. Nor is it to be found in his Soul, for the Soul being a pure, simple, and indivisible Being, can suffer nothing to be discinded from it towards the production of another Soul. A spirit, as the Soul is, is Substantia simplex & impartibilis; an uncompounded and indiscerpible or impartible Being. Nor can it spring partly from the Body, and partly from the Soul, as from con-causes; for then it should be partly corporeal, and partly incorporeal as its causes are. So that there is no Matter, Seed, or principle of Souls found in man; and to be sure (as Baronius strongly argues)