Your faithful Friend
and Servant.
[1] In the Ch. the Position is demonstrated; and in the ch. called the Authority of the Duumvirate.
[XI.]
MADAM,
You will cease to wonder, that I am not altogether capable to understand your Authors opinions in Natural Philosophy, when you do but consider, that his expressions are for the most part so obscure, mystical and intricate, as may puzzle any brain that has not the like Genius, or the same Conceptions with your Author; wherefore I am forced oftentimes to express my ignorance rather, then to declare to you the true sense of his opinions. In the number of these is his discourse of a Middle Life,[1] viz. That the qualities of a middle life do remain in things that are transchanged: For I cannot understand what he means by a middle life; whether it be a life that is between the strongest and weakest, or whether he means a life between the time of production and dissolution, or between the time of conception and production; or whether he means a life that is between two sorts of substances, as more then an Animal, and not so high and excellent as an Angel; or whether he means a middle life for places, as neither in Heaven nor in Hell, but in Purgatory, or neither in, nor out of the world, or any other kind of life: Wherefore I'le leave this Hermaphroditical or neutral life to better understandings then mine. Likewise I must confess my disability of conceiving the overshadowing of his Archeus, and how it brings this middle life into its first life. For concerning Generation, I know of none that is performed by overshadowing, except it be the miraculous conception of the blessed Virgin, as Holy Writ informs us; and I hope your Author will not compare his Archeus to the Holy Spirit; But how a middle life may be brought again into the first life, is altogether unconceivable to me: And so is that, when he says, that the first life of the Fruit is the last of the seed; for I cannot imagine, that the seed dies in the fruit; but, in my opinion, it lives rather in the fruit, and is numerously increased, as appears by the production of seed from the fruit. But the most difficult of all to be understood, are his Ideas,[2] which he makes certain seminal Images, Formal Lights, and operative means, whereby the soul moves and governs the body; whose number and variety is so great, as it transcends my capacity, there being Ideas of Inclination, of Affection, of Consideration or Judgment, of Passion, and these either mild, or violent, besides a great number of Archeal and forreign Ideas. Truly, Madam, I cannot admire enough the powerful effects of these Ideas, they themselves being no substances or material Creatures; For how that can pierce, seal, and print a figure, which hath neither substance nor matter, my reason is not able to comprehend, since there can be no figure without matter or substance, they being inseparably united together, so, that where figure is, there is also substance, and where substance is, there is also figure; neither can any figure be made without a substance. You may say, Ideas, though they are not material or corporeal beings themselves, yet they may put on figures, and take bodies when they please: I answer, That then they can do more then Immaterial Spirits; for the Learned say, That Immaterial Spirits are Immaterial substances; but your Author says, that Ideas are no substances; and I think it would be easier for a substance to take a body, then for that which is no substance: But your Author might have placed his Ideas as well amongst the number of Immaterial Spirits, to wit, amongst Angels and Devils, and then we should not have need to seek far for the causes of the different natures and dispositions of Mankind, but we might say, that Ill-natured men proceeded from Evil, and Good-natured men from Good Spirits or Ideas. However, Madam, I do not deny Ideas, Images, or Conceptions of things, but I deny them onely to be such powerful beings and Principal efficient Causes of Natural effects; especially they being to your Author neither bodies nor substances themselves. And as for the Figure of a Cherry, which your Author makes so frequent a repetition of, made by a longing Woman on her Child; I dare say that there have been millions of Women, which have longed for some or other thing, and have not been satisfied with their desires, and yet their Children have never had on their bodies the prints or marks of those things they longed for: but because some such figures are sometimes made by the irregular motions of animate Matter, would this be a sufficient proof, that all Conceptions, Ideas and Images have the like effects, after the same manner, by piercing or penetrating each other, and sealing or printing such or such a figure upon the body of the Child? Lastly, I cannot but smile when I read that your Author makes a Disease proceed from a non-being to a substantial being: Which if so, then a disease, according to his opinion, is made as the World was, that is, out of Nothing; but surely luxurious persons find it otherwise, who eat and drink more then their natural digestive motions can dispose; for those that have infirm bodies, caused by the irregular motions of animate matter, find that a disease proceeds from more then a non-being. But, Madam, I have neither such an Archeus, which can produce, in my mind, an Idea of Consent or approbation of these your Authors opinions, nor such a light that is able to produce a beam of Patience to tarry any longer upon the examination of them; Wherefore I beg your leave to cut off my discourse here, and onely to subscribe my self, as really I am,
Madam,
Your humble and
faithful Servant.