De natura substant. Energetic. c. 27. p. 379.
3. Dr Moore maketh substance to be the genus, and spirit and body to be the two species, so that body and spirit are of one generical Identity, and so there must of necessity some certain specific difference betwixt them be assigned and proved, or else the division is vitious, and the property of spirit not proved, and so their opinion of spirit falls totally to the ground. For we affirm (and shall prove) that though a difference be imagined and supposed, yet it was never yet sufficiently proved, for omnia supposita, non sunt vera, otherwise all the impossible figments and vain Chimæras of melancholy and doting persons might pass for true Oracles: but it is one thing truly to understand, and another thing to imagine and fancy what indeed is not, nor ever was. And though the supposition seem never so probable and like, yet it will but at the best infer the possibility of such an imagined difference, but not prove it really to be so, and therefore here we shall retort the Doctors Axiom against him, which is this: “Whatsoever is unknown to us, or is known but as meerly possible, is not to move us or determine us any way, or make us undetermined; but we are to rest in the present light and plain determination of our own faculties.” Now that a spirit is penetrable and indiscerpible, may be imagined as possible to the fancies of some, but cannot be clearly intelligible to any sober mind; for to imagine, and to understand, are faculties that are very different, and however if such a difference be conceived as possible (which cannot enter the narrow gate of my Intellect) yet the difference of being penetrable and indiscerpible, is not to move us to determine that a spirit hath those distinct properties from bodies, because they are but known to us as meerly possible. And therefore that these two differences of penetrability and indiscerpibility assigned by Dr Moore, are not sufficiently proved to be so, we shall give these reasons. 1. If bodies in the ultimate act of nature can penetrate themselves and one another, as Helmont and Dr Glisson do strongly labour to prove, then penetrability is not the proper difference of spirit from body, because then common to them both. 2. But if it be taken for a truth (and the one of necessity must be true) that bodies do not, or can possibly penetrate themselves or one another, as the common tenent holdeth, and seemeth most agreeable to verity, for it is simply unintelligible and impossible to conceive, that two Cubes (suppose of Marble or Metal) should penetrate one another, and yet but to have the dimensions of one, and to possess no greater space than the one did formerly fill: And if this be impossible and unintelligible in respect of bodies, whose properties, aptitudes, affections and modifications are apparent to our senses, then must it be more impossible and unintelligible in substances supposed to be meerly incorporeal, because they must needs be more pure and perfect, and therefore less subject to such unconceiveable affections; and however, it can be no wayes known to our faculties or cognitive powers, that they have any such specifical property or affection. 3. As it is not any way manifest to any of our senses, nor can be proved by any sound deductions of reason, so it cannot be manifested to be any innate notion shining from the Intellect it self, and we ought not to take adventitious ones instead of those that are innate, nor fictitious ones for either, but to make a due distinction of each of them one from another. 4. Neither is indiscerpibility a proper difference of a spiritual substance from a corporeal one, because the visible species of things do in the air intersect one another, and suffer not discerpibility: and that these are bodies is manifest, because they affect the senses; and therefore that which is a property of some bodies cannot be the proper difference to distinguish a spirit from a body. 5. This is only an arbitrary and feigned supposition, and cannot be proved either by the testimony of any of the senses, by sound reason, or innate notions; and what is or cannot be proved by some of these (according to his own position) ought to be rejected. And therefore as indiscerpibility is no proper difference of a spirit from a body, no more is penetrability, which can no more be in a spiritual substance, than either in discreet quantity one can be two, or two one, or in continuate quantity one inch can be two, or two can become one. Dr Glisson from his much admired Suarius the great Weaver of fruitless Cobwebs, hath devised another difference of spirit from body which he thus layeth down, as we give it in this English. “I assign (he saith) a twofold difference betwixt the substance of matter and that of spirits. The first is taken from the substantial (à substantiali materiæ mole) heap or weight of the matter. For I (he saith) besides the actual and accidental extension, do attribute to the matter this substantial heap or weight which is denied to spirits. But the sign of this heap or weight is, that if the matter in the same space be duplicated, triplicated, or centuplicated, that it will be made more dense twofold, threefold, or an hundred fold. And concludeth thus: I answer (he saith) that matter and spirit in this do agree betwixt themselves, that they both are finite, and from thence that they have this common, that neither of them can reduce themselves into a littleness that is infinite, or into an infinite magnitude. Therefore the difference betwixt them doth not consist in this; but in this, that a spirit whether it be contracted or dilated, is not made more dense or rare; but on the contrary, matter, whether it be contracted or expanded, is made more dense, or more rare.” To which we return this responsion. 1. It is usual with men, when by their wills and fancies they would maintain an opinion that is weak and groundless, finding they cannot clearly perform it, to bring in some strange, obscure or equivocal word, thereby to make a flourish, though they prove nothing: So here this learned person to make a shew to prove the difference of spirit doth assign moles substantialis as peculiar to body, but not to spirit; but what is to be understood by moles, he might know his own meaning, but I am sure there are few others that do or can understand it, and therefore is but a devised subterfuge to stumble and blind mens intellects, and not to prove the thing intended. 2. If by the word moles he intend weight or gravity (and what else it can signifie is not intelligible) then it will not be a difference betwixt body and spirit, because gravity and levity are differences of bodies in respect of one another, and therefore can be none as he assignes it. 3. To assert that a spirit when contracted or dilated is not made more dense or more rare, but that matter whether it be contracted or expanded, is made more dense or more rare, is easily spoken, but not so easily proved: and rude assertions without sound proof, are of no validity, and may with as good reason be denied and rejected, as affirmed or received. 4. We have no density in bodies but in respect of the paucity and parvity of the pores, so that less of another body is contained in them, and that is accounted rare that hath many or greater, and so containeth more of another body in them, and are qualities or modifications that only belong unto bodies, and not at all unto spirits, and is but precariously taken up by the Doctor without any proof or demonstration at all. 5. If spirits cannot expand themselves into an infinite space, nor contract themselves into an infinite littleness, then where are bounds and limits of this contraction and expansion, or how is it proved that they can do either? seeing they are properties and affections of bodies and matter, and never were proved to be peculiar to spirits.
Argum. 4.
4. Those that are much affected to and zealous for experimental Philosophie, do often run into that extream, as utterly to condemn and throw away all the ancient Scholastick Learning, as though there were nothing in it of verity or worth: But this is too severe and dissonant from truth, as might be made manifest in many of their Maximes; but we shall only instance in one as pertinent to our present purpose, which is this: Imaginatio non transcendit Continuum. And this if we perpend it seriously, is a most certain and transcendant truth; for when we come to cogitate and conceive of a thing, we cannot apprehend it otherwise than as continuate and corporeal; for what other notions soever we make of things, they are but adventitious, arbitrary, and fictitious, for even non entia ad modum entium concipiuntur. And therefore those that pretend that Angels are meerly incorporeal, must needs err, and put force upon their own faculties, which cannot conceive a thing that is not continuate and corporeal: But if they will trust their own Cogitations and faculties rightly disposed, and not vitiated, then they must believe that Angels are Corporeal, and not meerly and simply spirits, for absolutely nothing is so but God only.
Argum. 5.
Vid. Rob. Fludd. utri. Cosm. Hist. Tract. 1. l. 4. c. 2. p. 110.
5. If the Angelical nature were simply and absolutely spiritual and incorporeal, then they would be of the same essential Identity with God, which is simply impossible. For the Angels were not Created forth of any part of Gods Essence, for then he should be divisible, which he is not, nor can be, his Essence being simplicity, unity, and Identity it self, and therefore the Angels must of necessity be of an essence of Alterity, and different from the essence of God. Now God being a simple, pure, and absolute spirit in the Identity of his essence, if the Angels were simply and absolutely spiritual and incorporeal, then they must be of the same essence with him, which is absurd and impossible; and therefore they have Alterity in them, and so of necessity must be Corporeal, and not simply and meerly spiritual. And that as much as we contend for here is granted by Dr Moore in these words: “For (he saith) I look upon Angels to be as truly a compound Being consisting of soul and body, as that of men and brutes.” Whereby he plainly asserteth their Composition, and so their Alterity, and therefore that they must needs have an Internum and externum, as the learned and Christian Philosopher Dr Fludd doth affirm in these words: Certum est igitur inesse ipsis (scilicet Angelis) aliud, quod agit, aliud autem, quod patitur; nec verò illud secundùm quod agunt, aliud quam actus esse poterit, qui forma dicitur; neq; etiam illud secundum quod patiuntur, est quicquam præter potentiam, hæc autem materia appellatur.
Argum. 6.
Serm. 6 sup. Cantic. p. 505.
Lib. 5.