422 STRENGTH AND WEAKNESS GE HUMAN REASON. Thus all things arebut alter'd, nothing dies: And here, and there th'unhody'd spirit flies. By time, or force, or sickness dispossess'd, And lodges where it lights, in man or beast, Or hunts wiìhout till ready limbs it find, And actuates those according to their kind ; From tenement to tenement is tqs'd, The soul is still the same,the figure only lost." And Lucan saysof the northern countries, lib. I. Pilot's. thatthey had the opinion of transmigration of souls, and therefore they feared not death : -- P.opuli quos despicît árctos Felices errore suo, quos ille timoium Maximus, haud urget lethi metus.", And on this account they esteemed it a very cowardly thing in war, " Reditura parcere vita," that is, to be fond of this life, or solicitous to save it, when it would be so soon restored again. Casar tells us this was the doctrine of the Druids, our ancestors, in Britain, Disciplina Druic4una in Britannia reperta imprimis hoc volunt per- suadere, non interire animas ; sed ab aliis post mortem transire ad alios, 4e. Lib. VI. De gelle Gall. " The doctrine of the Druids Was found in Britain. This is one of the prime articles of it, that souls .do not die ; but after the death Of the body they pass from one to another." The ancient Bract-mini were known to be professors and teachers of this opinion ; and in the country of Malabar, in the East-Indies, their successors, the Bramins, teach the people the same notion still; and es- pecially, that the souls of men, who have behaved ill in this world, are sent at their death into brute animals, partly to make atonement for sins past, and partly for a new trial. Now, Sir, if tho.se among the ancient heathens, in various nations of Europe and Asia, who professed to be wise above their neigh- bours, and who endeavoured to use their reason in matters of religion and a future state, were led into such wild errors, and had so little certainty about pardon of sin, and future rewards or punishments, what hope can you have, that untaught reason, in the wilds of America; and in African deserts, should have better success in their roving and loose enquiries about religions affairs, and the future state' of men ? Loe. I know not well what to reply to some of these doubts and queries of yours. Upon the whole, 1 do not see how the mere reason of 'man without any assistance, can got through all these difficulties, so as to assure a sinner of certain restoration to divine favour and the enjoyment of immortal blessedness at death, upon such poor, sorry, and interrupted repentances as will ba, found among these heathens : And I am now ready to
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