palpable abfurdities of all the schoolmen, who maintained that there was a whole foul in every part of the body, and yet that one man had but one foul. And analogous to this is their other paradox concerning God, viz. that he is completely in every poffible place.

Mamertus's book is dedicated to Sidonius Apollinaris, who, in return, prefers him to all the writers of his time, as the most able philofopher, and the most learned man that was then among chriftians. As the compliment he pays him is a very fingular one, I fhall, for the entertainment of my readers, infert it in the note

PART III.

The State of Opinions from the Sixth Century to the Time of Defcartes.

THAT we may have a clearer idea of the ftate of opinions concerning the foul in what are generally called the dark ages, I fhall note thofe of the moft confiderable writers that have fallen into my hands.

Caffiodorus, who flourished in the beginning of the fixth century, in his treatise De Anima, in which he profeffes to bring into

*He fays that he was an absolute mafter of all the fciences, that the purity of his language equalled or furpaffed Terence's, Varro's, Pliny's, &c, that he knew how to

use

into one view what was moft approved, and best established on the fubject, maintains that the foul has neither length, breadth, nor thickness, that the whole foul is in all its parts (faculties) and that it is of a fiery nature. He inclines to the opinion of the derivation of fouls from fouls, because he could not otherwise account for the fouls of infants being contaminated with original fin. Opera, P. 429.

Gregory the Great, in the fixth century, fays (Opera, vol. ii. p. 209) that the queftion concerning the origin of the foul was much agitated among the Fathers; fome maintaining

ufe the terms of logic eloquently; that his fhort and concife way of writing contained the most deep learning in a few sentences, and he expreffed the greatest truths in a few words; that his ftyle was not fwelled with empty hyperboles, and did not degenerate into a contemptible flatness. In fine, he fcruples not to compare him with the most eminent philofophers, the most eloquent orators, and the moft learned Fathers of the church. He judges, fays he, like Pythagoras, he divides like Socrates, he explains like Plato, he puzzles like Ariftotle, he delights like Æfchines, he ftirs up the paffions like Demofthenes, he diverts with a pleafing variety like Hortenfius, he obviates difficulties like Cethegus, he excites like Curio, he appeafes like Fabius, he feigns like Craffus, he diffembles like Cæfar, he advises like Cato, he diffuades like Appius, he perfuades like Cicero. And, if we compare him to the Fathers of the church, he inftructs like St. Jerom, he overthrows error like Lactantius, he maintains the truth like St. Austin, he elevates himself like St. Hilary, he fpeaks as fluently and as intelligibly as St. Chryfoftom, he reproves like St. Bafil, he comforts like St. Gregory Nazianzen, he is copious like Orofius, and as urgent as Ruffinus; he relates a ftory as well as Eufebius, he excites like St. Eucherius, he ftirs up like Paulinus, he fupports like St. Ambrose.

that it defcended from Adam, and others that a foul was given to each individual; and it was acknowledged that this important question could not be folved in this life. If, fays he, the foul be of the fubftance of Adam, as well as the body, why doth it not die with the body? But if it have another origin, how is it involved in the guilt of Adam's fin? But as he concludes with faying, that the latter, viz. the doctrine of original fin, is certain, and the other, viz. the mortality of the foul, is uncertain, he seems inclined to think the foul defcended from the foul of Adam ex traduce, and therefore was poffibly mortal.

It is very evident that this writer had a notion that the foul was corporeal, as will be feen by a very curious circumftance in what follows. He confidered the fouls of faints and martyrs as continuing in or near their dead bodies and relicks. For he fays, that, as the life of the foul was discovered by the motion of the body while it was living, fo after death its life is manifefted by the power of working miracles. But he did not confider the foul as confined to the dead body; for he adds, that many perfons, whofe minds were purified by faith and prayer, had actually seen fouls going out of their bodies when they died; and he relates at large feveral hiftories of fuch fouls becoming visible. Among others, he fays, that the foul of Abbot Spes was feen by all the brothers of his monaftery, coming out of his mouth in the

shape

fhape of a dove, and flying up to heaven. ibid.

As we approach nearer the age of the schoolmen, we find lefs of materialism, but a language proportionably more unintelligible, though not quite fo remote from all conception, as that of our modern metaphyficians.

Damafcenus, inthe eighth century, fays (Opera, p. 282) that "the whole foul is prefent to the "whole body, and not part to part, nor is it "contained in the body, but contains it; as fire " contains the red-hot iron, and, living in it, performs its functions." Though this writer, as we have seen, confidered God as not existing in place, we fee here that he confines the foul of a man to his body.

86

From this time the philofophical opinion of the defcent of the foul was univerfally abandoned by chriftians. Agobard, who flourished in the ninth century, confiders it as a queftion decided by divines, that the foul is not a part of the divine fubftance, or nature, and had no being before its union with the body, being created when the body is formed. Dupin, vol. vii. p. 182. Fredegifus, in the fame century, fays, that fouls are created in and with the body, though the philofophers afferted the contrary, and Auftin doubted it. ib. p. 145.

Another doubt, however, continued in this century. For Rabanus Maurus fays, it was a dubious queftion, whether God created the foul

P-3

foul to be infufed into the body, or whether it was produced from the fouls of the father and mother. He maintained that the foul has no particular figure, but that it is principally feated in the head. ib. p. 164. Hincmarus, in the fame century, fays, that the foul does not move locally, though it changes its will, and ib. p. 50.

manners.

Barnard, in the twelfth century, fays, that the foul cannot be in corporeal place, for that things incorporeal cannot be meafured but by time. Opera, p. 466.

Many of the Fathers, we have seen, were of opinion that the foul is propagated like the body, and that the foul of Adam was an emanation from God. But Peter Lombard condemns those who fuppofed the foul to be a part of God, and fays that it was created out of nothing. Sententia, Dift. 17.

My reader muft excufe me if, in relating the opinion of the famous fchoolman Thomas Aquinas, I fhould not make myself perfectly understood. I fhall endeavour, however, to make his meaning as intelligible as I well can. He fays that the foul is not a body, but the act of the body (actus corporis) as heat, which is the principle of warmth; just as the foul which is the principle of life, is not a body, but the act of a body. This looks as if he confidered the foul as a mere property of body; but treating of the difference between the fouls of men and brutes, he fays, that the former is aliquid fubfiftens, but the latter was not

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