SECTION Motion is not consciousness : And how either solid or unsolid extension, either space or matter, can have any consciousness or thought belonging to any part of it, or spread through the whole of it, I know not; or what any sort of extension can do toward thought or consciousness, I confess I understand not ; nor can I frame any more an idea of it, than I can of a blue motion, or a sweet - smelling sound. or of fire, air, or wa- ter reasoning or rejoicing ; and I do not affect to speak of things, or words, when I can form no correspondent ideas of what is spoken. So far as I can judge, the soul of man, in its own nature, is nothing else but a conscious and active principle, subsisting by itself, made after the image of God, who is all conscious activity; and it is still the same being, whether it be united to an animal body, or separated from it. If the body die, the soul still exists an active and conscious power or principle, or being ; and if it ceases-to be conscious and active, I think it ceases -to be ; for I have no conception of what remains. Now if the conscious prin- ciple continue conscious after death, it will not be in a mere conscious indolence : The good Loan, and the wicked, will not have the same indolent existence. Virtue or vice, in the very temper of this being, when absent from matter or body, will become a pleasure or a pain to the conscience of a sepa- rate spirit. I am well aware, that this is a subject, which has employed the thoughts of many philosophers, and I do hut just intimate my own sentiments, without presuming to judge for others. But the defence or refutation of arguments, on this subject, would draw me into a' field of philosophical discourse, which is very foreign to my present purpose : And, whether this reasoning stand or fall, it will have but very little influence on this con - troversy with the generality of christians, because it is a thing rather to be determined by the revelation of .the - word of God. I therefore drop this argument at once, and apply myself imme- diately to consider the proofs, that may be drawn from scripture, for the soul's existence in a separate state after death, and before the resurrection. SECT. II. Probable Arguments for the Separate State. There are several places of Scripture, in the. Old Testa- ment, as well as in the New, which may be most naturally, and properly construed to signify the existence of the soul in.a sepa- rate state, after the body is dead ; but since they do not carry with them such plain evidence, or forcible proof, and may possi- bly be interpreted to another sense, I shall not long insist upon them ; however, it may not be amiss just to mention a few of them, and pass away.
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