396 OF TILE PLACE AND MOTION OF SPIRITS. any part of matter whatsoever, without the same divine ap- pointment. Consideration I. If spirit be entirely void of all solidity, that is, if a spirit be not matter, it is hard to conceive how it should originally, or in its own nature, havea power of itself to move matter. It cannot do -it by impulse; for there can be no contact, whether immediate or mediate. Nor /lath it origi- nally or naturally in itself a power to move bodies by volition; for there is no natural connection betwixt my willing a stone to move, and its motion : I may will it ten thousand times, and it lies quiescent still : Nay, though it be but a feather or a grain of dust, I cannot conceive. how my own volition, or even the strongest volition of an angel, should excite motion in it, unless he has a particular commission from the Almighty Spirit : And if it be so, thence it will follow, that the motion of the stone or feather, which is owing to such a divine commission, depends not so strictly and properly ou any native essential power or influence of the angel'sown volition, but rather on the divine volition as the prime or efficacious cause. And this perhaps is the true reason why our animal spirits, nerves, muscles and limbs, are moved at the command of our thoughts or will, viz. because God the Creator has efficaciously decreed or willed from the beginning, and appointed it now as a law of nature, that such aparticular machine of matter or flesh, or any of the limbs of it, should move when such a particular . spirit willed it : And if we add here, that God has also appointed that this spirit should have such special ideas or consciousnesses according to such peculiar motions or impressions on thisanimal body, we have the chief part, if not the whole union between soul and body described, as I have shewn in a foregoing Essay. II. That a spirit cannot of itself originally move any part of matter, will appear more probable, if we enquire of our oppo- nents, what quantity of matter, or what particular parts of matter; any spirit Can be supposed to move. Surely a created spirit of itself, and by its own essential or native powers, cannot move all matter or the whole material world ; that would put the universe of bodies into the power of every single spirit, which is very absurd, and contrary to all experience and reason. If its power of motion be confined to a limited quantity of matter, what is it that limits this quantity ? It cannot be the dimensions or shape of the soul ; for a soul is not supposed to have any shape, dimensions or magnitude: Or if it had, I have shewn already, and shall shew further, that this cannot give any power to move matter, because these dimensions have no solidity, and cannot touch or impel a body. What is it then but the will of God, that determines what quantity of matter every spirit shall have power to move ? And this is the very point which we are proving,
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