by way of natural refultancy from the body, but by way of inspiration from the Lord; not from the warm bofom of the matter, but from the breath of its Maker.

4. Laftly, We have here the nexus, copula, the tie or band by which it is united with the body of man, viz. The breath of bis (i. e. of man) noftrils. It is a moft aftonishing mystery, to fee heaven and earth married together in one perfon; the dust of the ground, and an immortal spirit clasping each other with fuch dear embraces, and tender love; such a noble and divine gueft to take up its refidence within the mean walls of flesh and blood. Alas, how little affinity, and yet what dear affection is found betwixt them!

Now, that which fo fweetly links these two different natures together, and holds them in union, is nothing else but the breath of our noftrils, as the text speaks: it came in with the breath; whilst breath stays with us, it cannot go from us; and as foon as the breath departs, it departs also. All the rich elixirs and cordials in the world cannot persuade it to stay one minute after the breath is gone. One puff of breath will carry away the wifeft, holiest, and most defirable foul that ever dwelt in flesh and blood. When our breath is corrupt, our days are extinct, Job xvii. 1. "Thou takest away their breath, they die, and re"turn to their duft," Pfal. cxiv. 19.

Out of the text thus opened, arife two doctrinal propofitions, which I fhall infist upon, viz.

Duct. 1. That the foul of man is of divine original, created and infpired immediately by the Lord.

Doct. 2. That the fouls and bodies of men are link'd, or knit

together, by the feeble band of the breath of their noftrils. In the profecution of these two propofitions, many things will come to our hands, of great use in religion; which I fhall labour to lay as clearly and orderly in the reader's understanding, and prefs as warmly upon his heart as I can. And first, Doct. 1. That the foul of man is of divine original, created and infpi ed immediately by the Lord.

In this first propofition, two things are to be diftinctly pondered, viz.

i. The nature

2. The original

} of

of the foul.

Or, what it is, and from whence it came.

I. The first thing which arreft our

The nature of thoughts, and requires their attention and exercife, is the nature of the foul, or what kind of being it is.

the foul.

Thofe that are most curiously inquifitive into all other beings, and put nature upon the rack to make her confefs her fecrets, are in the mean time found fhamefully flight and negligent in the study of themselves. Few there are that can prevail with themselves to fit down and think clofe to fuch questions as thefe. What manner of being is this foul of mine? whence came it? why was it infufed into this body? and where must it abide, when death bath diflodged it out of this frail tabernacle? There is a natural averfation in man to fuch exercises of thought as these, although in the whole univerfe of beings in this lower world, a more noble creature is not to be found *.

The foul is the most wonderful and astonishing piece of divine workmanship; it is no hyperbole to call it the breath of God, the beauty of men, the wonder of angels, and the envy of devils. One foul is of more value than all the bodies in the world.

The nature of it is so spiritual and fublime, that it cannot be perfectly known by the most acute and penetrating understanding, affifted in the fearch by all the aids philofophy can contri

bute.

It is not my defign in this difcourfe to treat of the feveral faculties and powers of the foul, or to give you the rife, natures, or numbers of its affections and paffions: but I shall confine my discourse to its general nature and original. And feeing "none can fo well discover the nature of it, as he who is "the author of it," as Tertullian + fpeaks, I therefore juftly expect the best light from his words, though I will not neglect any other aid he is pleased elsewhere to afford.

The foul is variously denominated from its feveral powers

* Therefore they who at any time have difputed concerning the foul, must be reckoned to have difputed 'not of a vain thing, that has nothing but a name, but about a very weighty subject, of the greatest moment, than which nothing under heaven is more excellent. Zanch. on the foul.

+ Si quid de anima certandum eft, ad Dei regulas dirigat: certe nullum alium potiorem animæ demonftrationem, quam Auctorem. Tertul. de anima, &c.

As it quickens the body, it is called anima, i. e. the life; as it exerts acts of the will, it is called animus, i. e. power of volition; as it is the fubject of knowledge, it is called the mind; when it re collects, it is called the memory; when it judges right, it is called reafon; as it produces breathing, it is called fpirit. Ifidor. Etym.. ย. 5.

and offices, as the fea from the feveral fhores it washes. I will not spend time about the feveral names by which it is known to us in fcripture, but give you that defcription of it, with which my understanding is most fatisfied, which take thus:

The foul of man is a vital, fpiritual, and immortal fubftance, endowed with an under- The description Aanding, will, and various affections; created of the foul. with an inclination to the body, and infufed

thereinto by the Lord.

In this defeription we have the two general parts into which I diftributed this difcourfe: viz. its general nature, and divine original. The nature of the foul is expreffed to us in thefe following terms.

1. It is a fubfiance.

That is to fay, not a quality, or an accident inhering in another being, or fubject; as whitenefs doth in the fnow: but a being by * itfelf. Qualities and accidents have no exiffence of their own, but require another being, or fubject to their exif tence; but the foul of man is a fubftantial being of itself, which will evidently appear upon the following grounds.

t

(.) Because it is, in a strict and proper fenfe, created by God." He formeth, or createth the fpirit in man," Zech, xii. 1. To him we are advised to "commit it, as to a faithful "Creator," 1 Pet. iv. 19. The fubftantial nature of the foul is implied in the very notion of its creation; for whatsoever "is created, is a fubftance, an ens per fe t. Accidents are not faid to be created, but con-created;" the crafis of humours, and refuits of matter, are not fubftances created, but things' rifing in a natural way from created fubftances. They flow from, and, as to their effence, depend upon pre-exiflent, matter; but the foul was created out of nothing, and infused into, the body after it was formed and organized; which evidenceth. its fubftantial nature.

L

(2.) This evidenceth the foul to be a fubftance; that it can, and doth exift, and fubfift by itself alone, when feparated from the body by death, Luke xxiii. 43. " To day fhalt thou, (i.c.. "thy foul) be with me in paradife;" end Mat. x. 20. "Fear "not them that kill the body but cannot kill the foul." Were

*The foul is a being by itself, i. e. it does not exist in any object, as a part or form of it, depending on it, as to its being. Colleg Conimb..in lib. ir.

+ Quicquid a Deo proprie creatum eft ; accidentia enim non di-cuntur creari, fed cancreari. Polani Synt. p. 319.

the foul but an accident, a quality, or a refult, he that kills the body, muft needs kill the foul too; as he that cafts a fnow. ball inte the fire, must needs deftroy the whiteness with the fnow. Accidents fail and perifh with their fubjects: but feeing it is plain in thefe and many other fcriptures, the foul doth not fail with the body; nothing can be more plain and evident, than that it is of a fubftantial nature.

When the Spaniards came firft among the poor Indians, they thought the horse and his rider to be one creature; as many ig. norant ones think the foul and body of man to be nothing but breath and body: whereas indeed they are two diftinct creatures, as vastly different in their natures as the rider and his horfe, or the bird and his cage. While the man is on horfeback, he moves according to the motion of the horfe; and whilft the bird is incaged, he eats and drinks, and fleeps, and hops and fings in his cage. But if the horse fail, and die under his rider, or the cage be broken, the man can go on his own feet, and the bird enjoy himself as well, yea, better in the open fields and woods, than in the cage: neither depend, as to being, or action, on the horse or cage.

(3) Both fcripture and philofophy confent in this, that the foul is the chief, most noble, and principal part of man, from which the whole man is, and ought to be denominated. So Gen xlvi. 26. "All the fouls that came with Jacob into Egypt," i. e. all the perfons; as the Latins fay, tot capita, fo many heads or perfons. The apoftie, in 2 Cor. v. 8. feems to exclude the body from the notion of perfonality, when he faith, We are willing rather to be abfent from the body, and to be prefent with the Lord: That we, a term of perfonality, is there given to the foul, exclufively of the body, for the body cannot be absent from itfelf: But we, that is, the fouls of believers, may be both abfent from it, and prefent with Chrift,

To this we may add, 2 Cor. iv. 16. where the foul is called the man, and the inner man too, the body being but the exter Bal face, or (hadow of the man. And to this philofophers agree The best philofophers are so far from thinking that the body is the fubftantial part of man, and the foul a thing dependens on it; that contrarily they affirm, that the body depends upon the foul; and that it is the foul that conferves and fulains it

Q2

The foul preferves and fuftains the animated body, but whe it leaves the body, the nature of an animated body fubfifts no more: the foul exifts not in the body, as in a place, feeing it cannot be

circum

and that the body is in the foul, rather than the foul in the body, and that which is feen not the man, but that is the man which is invifible, that the body might be killed and the man not hurt ; meaning the foul, which only deferves the name of man. Now if it be the chief part of man, and that which is only worthy the name of a man, and from which therefore the whole is, and ought to be denominated a man; if it be fo far from depending on the body, or being contained within the body, that the body rather depends on it, and is in it, then furely the foul muft be, what we defcribe it to be, a fubftantial being.

(4.) It is paft all controverfy, that the foul is a fubftance, because it is the fubject of properties, affections and habits; which is the very strict and formal notion of a substance. All the affections and paffions of hope, defire, love, delight, fear, forrow, and the reft, are all rooted in it, and fpringing out of it; and for habits, arts and fciences, it is the foul in which they are lodged and feated. Having once gotten a promptitude to act, either by fome strong, or by fome frequently repeated acting, they abide in the foul, even when the acts are intromitted, as in fleep a navigator, fcribe or musician, are really artifts, when they are neither failing, and writing or playing; because the habits ftill remain in their minds, as is evident in this, that when they awake, they can perform their feveral works, without learning the rules of their art anew,

Il. The foul is a vital fubftance, i. e.

A fubftance which hath an effential principle of life in itself: a living, active being. A living foul, faith Mofes in the text; and hereby it is distinguished from, and opposed to matter or body. The foul moves itself and the body too; it hath a selfmoving virtue or power in itself; whereas the matter, or body is wholly paffive, and is moved and acted, not by itself, but by this vital fpirit. Jam. ii. 26. “The body without the fpirit is "dead." It acts not at all, but as it is acted by this invisible fpirit. This is fo plain that it admits of fenfible proof and demonftration, Take mere matter, and compound or divide it, alter

circumfcribed by place. The whole foul pervades the whole body; nor is there any part of it, in which it is not prefent: for it is not contained in the body, but rather itself contains the body; neither is it in the body, as in a veffel or bottle, but rather the body is in it. Nyf. on the foul. b. 2. c. 11. 8x Ésiv AvoρWños to opressor, i. e That which is feen, is not the Man, but every man's foul is himself. * The foul is the fubject and feat of all the virtues and vices, arts and Iciences. Buchan. loc. com. p. 86..