befet and cling to her, to rub off tho disguise her original form, and to reg val ftate and first notions: Hence, al struggle to recover the loft region ardent thirst and endeavour after lectual ideas, which fhe would neit tain, nor rejoice in, nor know whe cept fhe had fome prænotion or them, and they had lain innate an habits and fciences in the mind, or which are called out and roufed by reminifcence. So that learning fe reminiscence. 315. The Peripatetics themfe between reminifcence and mere n miftius obferves that the beft mem go with the worst parts; but that moft perfect in the moft ingeniou notwithstanding the tabula rafa (a yet fome of his followers have unde him fpeak Plato's fenfe. Thus Pl patetic teacheth as agreeable to hi trine, that learning is reminifcenc vs xat is in children. Sim his commentary on the third bod wei Juxus, fpeaketh of a certain in the foul, acting of it felf, and it's own proper notions, gy πλήρη οἰκείων γνωςῶν. 316. And as the Platonic phil intellectual notions to be original innate in the foul (e), fo likewise fible qualities to exift (though not o foul, and there only. Socrates faith You must not think the white col is in any thing without your eyes, (d) 308. (e) 309, 314. ers, that r primæ. perpetught, that and intel Teek to atLained, excipation of rmant like ngs laid up, Lollection or th in effet s diftingui mory. The es commonly minifcence is minds. And of Ariftot aken to make rch the Peri mafter's doc and that the cius allo, in of Ariftotle teriour reafon iginally full of Tophy fuppofed inexiftent a fuppofed fen iginally) in the to Theaterus ur that you f r in your eye or in any place at all. And in the Timæus Plato teacheth, that the figure and motion of the particles of fire dividing the parts of our bodies produce that painful fenfation we call heat. And Plotinus, in the fixth book of his fecond Ennead, obferves that heat and other qualities are not qualities in the things themselves, but acts: that heat is not a quality, but act, in the fire: that fire is not really what we perceive in the qualities light, heat, and colour. From all which it is plain, that whatever real things they fuppofed to exift independent of the foul, thofe were neither fenfible things, nor cloathed with fenfible qualities. 317. Neither Plato nor Ariftotle by matter, An, understood corporeal substance, whatever the moderns may underftand by that word. To them certainly it fignified no pofitive actual being. Ariftotle defcribes it as made up of negatives, having neither quantity nor quality nor effence. And not only the Platonifts and Pythagoreans, but also the Peripatetics themselves declare it to be known, neither by fenfe, nor by any direct and just reafoning, but only by fome fpurious or adulterine method, as hath been obferved before. Simon Portius, a famous Peripatetic of the fixteenth century, denies it to be any fubftance at all, for, faith he, nequit per fe fubfiftere, quia fequeretur, id quod non eft in actu effe in actu. If Jamblichus may be credited, the Egyptians fuppofed matter fo far from including ought of fubftance or effence, that, according to them, God produced it by a feparation from all fubftance, effence or being, ἀπὸ ἐσιότητα αποσχισθείσης υλότης. That matter is actually nothing, but potentially all things, is the doctrine of Ariftotle, Theophraftus, and all the antient Peripatetics. 318. According to thofe philofophers, matter is U only only a pura potentia, a mere poffib imander, fucceffor to Thales, having thought the fupreme Dei matter. Nevertheless though P matter, yet it was fimply To Te no more than infinite or indefinite the moderns teach that fpace is r extended; yet if we confider that tual notion, nor yet perceived by fes, we fhall perhaps be incline Plato in his Timæus, that this al λογισμὸς νόθο or fpurious reafonin waking dream. Plato obferves as it were, when we think of pl it neceffary, that whatever exifts fome place. Which place or obferves is μετ' αναιθησίας ἁπλὸν, as darkness is feen, or filence hea privation. 319. If any one fhould think t or actual being of matter from th that gravity is always propor quantity of matter, let him but modern demonftration of that te find it to be a vain circle, concl more than this, that gravity is weight, that is to it felf. Since m only as defect and mere poffibility is abfolute perfection and act; it the greatest distance and oppof between God and matter. Infor terial God would be altogether ind 320. The force that produce that orders, the goodness that p is the fupreme being. Evil, def not the object of God's creative ei (ƒ) 250, 270. Gut Anax -hich means of our fer- hould exift i nfer the real , and fince G moti motion the Peripatetics trace out a firft immo, veable mover. The Platonics make God author of all good, author of no evil, and unchangeable. According to Anaxagoras there was a confused mass of all things in one chaos, but mind fupervening, tv, diftinguished and divided them. Anaxagoras, it feems, afcribed the motive faculty to mind, which mind fome fubfequent phi, lofophers have accurately difcriminated from foul and life,afcribing to it the fole faculty of intellection, ἐπελθὼν, 321. But ftill God was fuppofed the first agent, the fource and original of all things, which he produceth, not occafionally or inftrumentally but with actual and real efficacy. Thus, the treatife, De fecretiore parte divinæ fapientiæ fecundum Ægyptios, in the tenth book, faith of God, that he is not only the first agent, but also that he it is who truly acts or creates, qui verè efficit. 322. Varro, Tully, and St. Auguftin understand, the foul to be vis, the power, or force that acts, moves, enlivens. Now although, in our conception, vis, or fpirit might be diftinguished from mind, it would not thence follow, that it acts blindly or without mind, or that it is not clofely connected with intellect. If Plutarch is to be trufted in his account of the opinions of philofophers, Thales held the mind of the world to be God: Democritus held the foul of the world to be an igniform deity (g): Pythagoras taught that God was the monad and the good, or 'a'yator: Socrates alfo and Plato pronounced him to be thev (b), the fingle, felf originate one, effentially good. Each of which appellations and forms of speech directly tends to, and determines in mind, eis Tov voy aréudes faith Plutarch. 323.Whence that author concludes, that in the fenfe (g) 166, 168, 277. (b) 287. U 2 of of those philofophers God is a m hot an abstract idea compounded and prefcinded from all real thi derns understand abstraction; bu fpirit, diftinct or feparate from a poreal beings. And although prefented as holding a corporeal very fyftem of the world is Go they did not, at bottom, diffe mentioned doctrine; inafmuch as world to be an animal, (a) con mind as well as body. 324. This notion was derive goreans, who held the world, a teacheth, to be one perfect ani foul and reason: but then they been generated: whereas the the world as the fupreme God, mind or intellect. For the elem one may so speak, the animal f feemeth, according to them, to hicle of the foul (b), the vehicle fince they styled the Divinity avg lectual fire. 325. The Ægyptians, if we m maic writings, maintained God not only actual but poffible. He that which is made and that whic therein it is faid, fhall I praise th thou haft made manifeft, or fo haft hidden? therefore, in their was to create; the things create fore hidden in God. 326. Now whether the vas b the fenfible world, and confid diftinct from, and prefiding ov (a) 276.279. (6) 277. 284. |
