Fancy and understanding; whence the soul
Reason receives, and reason is her being,
Discursive, or intuitive — — —.”
This sort of hylozoism is more expanded in a particular system of cosmogony of the same Vahed,[171] according to which the materials of the world existed from the very beginning, which signifies from the first appearance of afrad, “rudimental units.” We can never think meanly of this opinion, when we find it coinciding with that of Leibnitz in our seventeenth century, contemporary of Mohsan Fani. According to the celebrated German philosopher,[172] there exists already an entirely organical preformation in the seeds of the bodies which are born, and all souls had always pre-existed in some sort of organized body, and shall after death remain united with an organic whole; because in the order of nature souls are not likely to exist entirely separated from any kind of body. In the eighteenth century Bonnet, a great physiologist, maintained,[173] that all was preformed from the beginning, nothing engendered; all organized bodies were pre-existing in a very small compass in the germs, in which souls may also pre-exist, these indestructible germs may sojourn in such or such a body until the moment of its decomposition, then pass, without the least alteration, into another body, from this into a third, and so on; each of the germs incloses another imperishable germ, which will be developed but in a future state of our planet, which is destined to experience a new revolution.
We see here the very same ideas, without any mutual communication, entertained in the East and the West, in ancient and modern times.
Vahed Mahmud combines his cosmogony with periods of 8000 years, eight of which form a great cycle of 64,000 years, at the completion of which the world is renovated. This sect is said to have been widely spread in the world; in Persia the persecution of Shah Abbas forced them to lie concealed.
[168] Vol. III. p. 1-11.
[169] The Druids, among the ancient Britons, believed the progressive ascent of the soul, beginning with the meanest insect, and arriving through various orders of existence at its human stage. The soul, according to its choice during terrestrial life, progressed, even after death, in good and happiness, or evil and misery; the virtuous could return to earth and become prophets among mankind: in which belief the ancient Britons agreed with the Indian Buddhists.
[170] Paradise Lost, V. v. 470-488.
[171] The Dabistán, vol. III. p. 17.