I.

our Capacities, and Sphere of Perception and CHAP. of Action, may be much greater than at prefent. For as our Relation to our external Organs of Sense, renders us capable of existing in our present State of Senfation; so it may be the only natural Hindrance to our exifting, immediately and of course, in a higher State of Reflection. The Truth is, Reafon does not at all shew us, in what State Death naturally leaves us. But were we fure, that it would fufpend all our perceptive and active Powers; yet the Sufpenfion of a Power and the Destruction of it, are Effects fo totally different in Kind, as we experience from Sleep and a Swoon, that we cannot in any wife argue from one to the other; or conclude even to the lowest Degree of Probability, that the fame Kind of Force which is fufficient to fufpend our Faculties, though it be increased ever fo much, will be fufficient to destroy them.

These Observations together may be fufficient to fhew, how little Prefumption there is, that Death is the Destruction of human Creatures. However there is the Shadow of an Analogy, which may lead us to imagine

Opinion perhaps Antoninus may allude in these Words, w‹ vữn περιμένεις, πότε έμβρυον εκ τῆς γατρὸς τῆς γυναικός σε ἐξέλθῃ, ὕτως ἐκδέχεως τὴν ὥραν ἐν ᾗ τὸ ψυχάριον σε τῇ ἐλύτου τότε ἐκπε Tal. Lib. IX. c. 3.

it

PAR Tit is; the fuppofed Likeness which is obfer I. ved between the Decay of Vegetables, and of living Creatures. And this Likeness is indeed fufficient to afford the Poets very apt Allufions to the Flowers of the Field, in their Pictures of the Frailty of our prefent Life. But in Reason, the Analogy is fo far from holding, that there appears no Ground even for the Comparison, as to the prefent Queftion because one of the two Subjects compared, is wholly void of That, which is the principal and chief thing in the other, the Power of Perception and of Action; and which is the only thing we are inquiring about the Continuance of. So that the Destruction of a Vegetable, is an Event not fimilar or analogous to the Deftruction of a diving Agent.

But if, as was above intimated, leaving off the delufive Custom of fubftituting Imagination in the Room of Experience, we would confine ourselves to what we do know and understand; if we would argue only from That, and from That form our Expectations; it would appear at first Sight, that as no Probability of living Beings ever ceafing to be so, can be concluded from the Reafon of the thing; fo none can be collected from the Analogy of Nature; because we cannot trace any living Beings beyond Death. But as we

are

are confcious that we are endued with Capa- CHAP. cities of Perception and of Action, and are I. living Perfons; what we are to go upon is, n that we shall continue fo, till we foresee fome Accident or Event, which will endanger thofe Capacities, or be likely to destroy us: which Death does in no wife appear to be.

And thus, when we go out of this World, we may pass into new Scenes, and a new State of Life and Action, juft as naturally as we came into the prefent. And this new State may naturally be a focial one. And the Advantages of it, Advantages of every Kind, may naturally be bestowed, according to fome fixt general Laws of Wisdom, upon every one in Proportion to the Degrees of his Virtue. And though the Advantages of that future natural State, fhould not be bestowed, as these of the present in some Measure are, by the Will of the Society; but entirely by his more immediate Action, upon whom the whole Frame of Nature depends: Yet this Distribution may be juft as natural, as their being distributed here by the Inftrumentality of Men. And indeed, though one were to allow any confused undetermined Senfe, which People please to put upon the Word natural, it would be a Shortnefs of Thought scarce credible, to imagine, that no Syftem or Course of things can be fo, but only what we fee

at

o

PAR Tat prefenth: efpecially whilft the Probabilit I. of a future Life, or the natural Immortalit] of the Soul, is admitted upon the Evidence Reason; because this is really both admitting and denying at once, a State of Being different from the present to be natural. But the only diftinct Meaning of that Word is, ftated, fixed, or fettled: fince what is natural, as much requires and prefuppofes an intelligent Agent to render it fo, i. e. to effect it continually or at ftated Times; as what is fupernatural or miraculous does to effect it for once. And from hence it muft follow, that Persons Notion of what is natural, will be enlarged in Proportion to their greater Knowledge of the Works of God, and the Difpenfations of his Providence. Nor is there any Abfurdity in fuppofing, that there may be Beings in the Universe, whofe Capacities, and Knowledge, and Views, may be fo extenfive, as that the whole Christian Dispensation may to them appear natural, i. e. analogous or conformable to God's Dealings with other Parts of his Creation; as natural as the visible known Course of things appears to us. For there seems scarce any other poffible Sense to be put upon the Word, but that only in which it is here used; fimilar, ftated, or uniform.

* See Part II. Ch. ii. p. 238, &c. & Part II. Ch. iii. p 276.

I.

This Credibility of a future Life, which has CHAP. been here infifted upon, how little foever it may fatisfy our Curiofity, feems to anfwer all the Purposes of Religion, in like manner as a demonftrative Proof would. Indeed a Proof, even a demonstrative one, of a future. Life, would not be a Proof of Religion. For, that we are to live Hereafter, is just as reconcileable with the Scheme of Atheism, and as well to be accounted for by it, as that we are now alive, is: and therefore nothing can be more abfurd than to argue from That Scheme, that there can be no future State. But as Religion implies a future State, any Prefumption against fuch a State, is a Prefumption against Religion. And the foregoing Obfervations remove all Prefumptions of that Sort, and prove, to a very confiderable Degree of Probability, one fundamental Doctrine of Religion; which, if believed, would greatly open and difpofe the Mind seriously to attend to the general Evidence of the whole.

CHAP.