ESSAY III. 371 Now in these last ideas, we may suppose that the strokes or traces which are formed on the organs of sense, and which are conveyed thence to the brain, may in the shapes or motions thereof have some resemblance to the external objects which are the occasions of them. So the very figures of a triangle or square, of a house or tree, of a flying bird or falling hail, are traced upon the retina or inward net-work of the eye,_ and per- haps conveyed thence to thecommon sensory in similar or corres- pondent figures. VIII. 'Though the traces and impressions which are made on the brain should never so much resemble the external objects that strike and impress them there, that is, though a triangle drawn in a paper should form a triangle in the eye, and impress or convey the same figure to the common sensory, yet these im- pressions cannot of themselves have an efficacious and immediate influence upon a mind or spirit, to excite or form similar ideas in it : For since mind and body are two distinct beings so en- entirely different in their whole nature, since all contact between mind and body is impossible, we cannot conceive how any corporeal motions or figures impressed or traced in the brain, . should have an efficacious power in and of themselves to give any notices to the soul, or to raise perceptions or ideas in a mind or spirit. It is not therefore any corporeal traces, motions or impres- sions in the brain, whether similar or dissimilar to the objects or things which occasion them, that can be in a most proper sense the self-sufficient and effective causes of those special ideas or perceptions in the soul, which are occasioned by them. IX. Yet since it appears byuniversal experience, that when- soever these particular motions or traces are imprest by outward objects on the senses, and by them conveyed to the brain, suita- ble and peculiar ideas are also raised or formed in the mind_we have reason to suppose that God the Creator ordained by an al- mighty volition, that this should be the way whereby the mind should acquire or form these ideas : And it is God also who ordained, that whensoever the soul wills to move the limbs of the body, the body should exert those particular motions. And indeed it is in this divine decree or law of creation, which runs through all ages, and exerts its perpetual influence in all mankind, that the union or rather unition of a particular soul and particular body consists. When a human body is so far formed as to be fit to receive such impressions on the brain, and fit to exert such motions of the limbs, then it may be probably supposed the creating influence of God exerts itself in causing a spirit to exist, and in this manner to be united to this human body. Aa2
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