§ 1.
This is rather a more delicate subject to handle than the last which we
had occasion to treat of, viz: Heaven and Hell. For the reader's sake,
therefore, it must be treated at greater length; but before defining
it, an exposition of the opinions of the most celebrated philosophers
is necessary, which will be given in a few words, in order that the
reader may be the better enabled to carry it along with him.
§ 2.
Their opinions are exceedingly varied. Some have pretended that the
soul is a spirit or immaterial essence; others have maintained that
it is a part of the Divinity; others assert that it is the concord of
all parts of the body; and some uphold that it is the most subtle
part of the blood, separated into the brain, and thence distributed
through the nervous system. If this is established, the soul must
take its origin from the heart which creates it; and the place where
it exercises its noblest functions must be the brain, as that organ
is the most purified from the grosser parts of the blood.
Such are a few of the different opinions which have been given to
the world in regard to the soul. The better to develop them, we shall
divide them into two classes. In the one will be found the statements
of those philosophers who considered the soul as material; and in
the other those of the opposite party, who maintained the doctrine
of its immateriality.
§ 3.
Pythagoras and Plato have both maintained the doctrine that the
soul was immaterial in its nature; that is, a being existing without
aid from the body, and capable of action uncontrolled by any thing
corporeal. They hold that all the individual spirits of animals were
emanations from the universal Soul of the World, and that these
off-givings were incorporeal, immortal, and of the same nature as
the pervading Essence itself. They illustrated their doctrine well,
by the analogy of a thousand little lights which are all of the same
nature as the great flame at which they were kindled.
§ 4.
These philosophers believed that the universe was animated by an
immaterial Essence, immortal and invisible, knowing everything,
and acting always; and which is the cause of every movement, and the
origin of all spirits, these being merely emanations from it. Then, as
spirits are very subtle, they cannot unite (they observe) unless they
can find a body subtle as the light, or as that expanded air which the
vulgar take for heaven. They therefore assume a body less subtle, then
another somewhat gross; and thus by degrees they come to be enabled to
unite themselves to the bodies of animals, into which they descend as
into dungeons or sepulchres. The death of the body, according to them,
is the life of the soul, which was in a manner buried, and could only
in a feeble way exercise its noblest functions. At the death of the
body, the soul shakes off materiality, comes forth of its prison-house,
and unites itself to the Soul of the World from which it emanated.
According to this opinion then, all the spirits of animals are of the
same nature; and the diversity of their functions and faculties arises
solely from the difference of the bodies into which they descend.
Aristotle supposes an universal intelligence, acting on particular
intelligences, as light acts upon the eye; and that as light renders
objects visible, so does this universal intelligence render the
others intelligent.
This philosopher defines the soul as that whereby we live, feel,
think, and move; but he is unsatisfactory as to the nature of that
Being which is the source of its noblest functions. It is needless,
therefore, to search in his writings for a solution of the difficulties
which exist upon this subject.
Dicearchus, Asclepiades, and Galienus, have also, to a certain extent,
believed that the soul was immaterial, but in a different way from
that already alluded to. They suppose that the soul is nothing else
than the harmony of all the parts of the body: that is, the result
of an exact blending of its elements and disposition of its parts,
its humours, and its essences. Thus, they say, as health is not a part
of that which is healthy, although it is connected with it, so neither
is the soul a part of the animal, although it be within it, but simply
the harmony of all those parts which go to form the containing body.
On these opinions we must, remark, that their defenders believe
in the immateriality of the soul on self-contradictory principles;
for to maintain that, the soul is not a body, but merely something
inseparably attached to a body, is to say that it is corporeal. We
not only term that corporeal which is a body, but everything which
has form and accident, and which cannot be separated from matter.
Such are the opinions of those philosophers who maintain that the
soul is incorporeal or immaterial. We see that they are discordant and
contradictory to each other, and consequently little to be heeded as
points of faith. We now come to the opposite party, who have upheld
the doctrine of its materiality.
§ 5.
Diogenes believed that the soul was composed of air, whence he deduces
the necessity of respiration. He defines it as an air which passes
through the mouth into the pulmonary vessels, whence it becomes warm,
and whence it is distributed to every part of the system.
Leucippus and Democritus assert that it is fire, and that, like fire,
it is composed of atoms which readily penetrate all parts of the body,
and communicate motion to it.
Hippocrates said that it was composed of water and of fire. Empedocles
thought that it was compounded of the four elements. Epicurus believed
with Democritus that the soul is composed of fire, but he adds that
there enter into its composition, air, a vapour, and an indescribable
substance, which is the principle of thought. Out of these four
different substances he makes to himself a very subtle spirit,
pervading all the body, and which, he says, we ought to term the soul.
Descartes reasons also, but in a very wretched manner, that the
soul is not material. I say in a very wretched manner, for never
did philosopher reason so badly on this subject as did this great
man. Here is his argument. He sets outs by saying that he must doubt
in the existence of his own body, believing that there exists no such
thing as a body at all, and then he reasons in this fashion: "There
exists no body; I exist nevertheless: I am therefore not a body,
and consequently I can only be a substance which thinks." Although
this fine reasoning destroys itself sufficiently, I will yet take
the liberty of giving my opinion of it in two words.
1. The doubt which M. Descartes assumes is indefensible; for although
one may sometimes think that he does not think that he has a body,
it is true nevertheless that he has a body, since he thinks of it.
2. Whoever believes that there exists no body, ought to be well
assured that he is not one himself; for no one can doubt in his own
existence. If he is assured in this matter, his doubt is useless.
3. When he says that the soul is a substance which thinks, he tells
us nothing new. Every person agrees in this; but the difficulty is
to ascertain the nature of that substance which thinks, and in this
respect M. Descartes is no wiser than his predecessors.
§ 6.
That we may not go crooked as he has done, and that we may form the
soundest conception possible of the soul of all animals, without
excepting man, who is of the same nature, and who only exercises
different functions from the difference in his organization, it is
important to attend to the following remarks.
It is certain that there exists in the universe a very subtle fluid,
a substance extremely attenuated, whose source is the sun, and which
pervades all other bodies, less or more, according to their nature
and their consistence. Such is the soul of the world, which governs
and vivifies it, and of which some portion is distributed to all the
creatures in the universe. [60]
This soul is the purest fire. It burns not of itself, but by different
movements, which it communicates to the particles of other bodies
into which it enters, it burns and makest its warmth be felt. Our
visible fire contains more of this matter than air; air, more than
water; and earth, considerably less than any of them. Plants have
more of it than minerals, and animals more than either. In fine,
this fire pervading the body renders it capable of thought, and is
that properly termed the soul, although it sometimes receives the
appellation of animal spirits, which permeate the whole body. It is
certain therefore that this soul being of the same nature as that
of animals, is annihilated at the death of man, as it is at that of
the other creatures. It follows that whatever poets and divines have
told us of a future state, is only the chimerical offspring of their
own brain, begotten and nourished by them for purposes which is by
no means difficult to fathom.