ty should be attempted and unskilfully managed, for every failure has only a tendency to demonstrate the other way. But the truth of the immateriality or immortality of the soul is not without a demonstration, and that, too, of such clearness and force, as will, when fairly presented, for ever silence all cavilling objectors.

NOTE H.

§ 1. A venerable Doctor of divinity, respecting the soul of man, gives the following strange theory, viz.: "If we must speculate, and form a theory on this subject, the safest and most rational is to suppose that all souls were created at the beginning of the world; that they remain in a quiescent state, till the bodies which they are to inhabit are formed; that on union with these bodies, they receive all their original impressions, by means of the external senses; that the whole system of bodily appetites and propensities, with the fancy or imagination which is clearly connected with them having become irregular, excessive and perverted by the fall, do unavoidably corrupt the soul, and enslave it to sin."-(See Christian Advocate, III. vol., page 530.) This notion, although it is asserted to be "the safest and most rational," we desire to treat with all tenderness, and therefore shall refrain from making any remarks what

ever.

§2. We have never, in a single instance, indulged in visionary speculations; but in this place, we feel disposed simply to present a few thoughts on this subject. From the Scripture account, it seems that the entire work of creation

was completed in six days, and that a succession of plants and animals, agreeably to a certain constitution of things, is preserved by means of an established universal law. Within the seed, the vital spark is placed, and all that is necessary to insure the full development of its kind, is to plant it in its appropriate soil. If it be vegetable, it must be located in a place from which vegetable nutriment may be derived, so that, under appropriate influences acting on the vital spark, it may bring its energies to seize on the surrounding appropriate nutriment, and thus the vegetable germinates, and thus it advances unto perfection. In like manner, if it be animal, it must be appropriately located, to insure similar results. Thus the vegetable is dependent on the earth, under certain laws; and the animal on the vegetable, either directly or indirectly, for its nutriment and growth. By this constitution of things, wonderfully and mysteriously contrived, there is no need of any additional creation of either vegetables or animals. And in Genesis, ii. chap. 1, 2, 3 vers., it is clearly stated that the whole creation was completed. "Thus the heavens and the earth. were finished, and all the host of them. And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made [created;] and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made [created.] And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it; because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made." It is remarkable, that these last words, created and made, is in the original, created to make, and we do not think it a wrong interpretation, created to propagate its like or kind; that is, so created as to be capable of producing its kind. This idea is prominently expressed in the account of the creation, in the

following passages: "And God said, let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yield

ing fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself upon the earth." "And God said, behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit a tree yielding seed." The seed imbosoms the vital spark, and furnishes the first nutriment to the germen-the little atom, from which the living plants or animals spring into being; and thus, if individuals are sacrificed and perish, the species survive and are immortal; and by a constant and general law, animated bodies never die altogether, but are renewed and perpetuated by various modes of re-production. Some terminate their vital course while others are beginning it; and never, says Lucretius, does morning or night visit the globe, without having lamentation round a bier, and the plaintive cries of an infant in the cradle. Thus creation has ceased, and the law of re-production secures the continuance of all living creatures in their various species, down to the end of time.

§3. We have said that the vital spark of every seed constitutes the very foundation of a re-production, but that vital spark, as is observed in Phys. Edu. § 13, differs in its nature and qualities. The vegetable life possesses a species of instinct without intelligence. The lower animals, to say the least of them, possess an instinct connected with some intelligence, for they have many of the faculties of rational and immortal beings. That vital spark which calls animals into being, is necessarily different from the vital spark of vegetable life, at least so far as its operations are concerned, though it may be that the essential qualities of both may partake of the same nature. This vitality utterly perishes with the plant or animal, except in the former, in the instances where the seed has come to maturity at its death. Now the thought suggested to our mind is;-may not the

vitality that is in the seed of man, by a sovereign constitution of things, be the vital spark of immortality? Is there a necessity that God should renew the work of creation, in bringing into existence the souls of men, when he has instituted instrumentalities in other parts of creation, by a sovereign law, to secure a constant re-production of that which in the beginning he created to make or re-produce? While we attribute to the vital spark of every seed, the primary principle in the re-production of plants and animals, we, notwithstanding, fully recognize that this is under the agency of regular, immutable laws, established in every part of animated nature, appropriate to each kind, and controlled and influenced by the Omnipotent Governor of the universe.

§4. Let it not be said that this view of the subject exposes the vitality of the soul to a dependence on matter, and thus gives it a material quality, by which it is exposed to perish with matter. The position we have assumed is so much the reverse of all this, that it puts vitality far beyond the reach of the influence of matter, as a governing principle, and places matter, in reality, in a dependent condition on vitality. As the main-spring of a time-piece keeps in motion all the machinery, and by which alone in fact the machinery moves, so vitality gives to organized matter all its motion, as well as all its power. The vitality of plants and animals, is a spring that will necessarily run down and perish with the matter; but the vital spark of immortality is a spring derived from God himself, which, partaking of the nature of its source, is always wound up, and will act for ever. That matter may act on vitality, we have fully shown in note C, under universal law, but that action is like that produced in the interruption of the order of dependence, by which a part of the machinery,

46

thrown into disorder, may agitate the spring, and even hasten the exhaustion of its force.

§5. This hypothesis will necessarily place the soul, from the nature of its production, more under the influence of physical depravity, than the former hypothesis. One of these, we are satisfied, must be true, and we freely confess, we are inclined to the latter. The only additional hypothesis that can be advanced on any philosophic principles whatever, is, that the soul is derived from matter; but which position necessarily subjects it to perishable materiality, which is contrary to revelation, and certainly not in accordance with sound reason, and the principles of philosophy developed in the government of the universe by universal law.

NOTE.

Honour to whom honour is due.

Since penning note B, we have been induced to reexamine our library, and we have discovered, to our great gratification, as well as surprise, that the Elements of Euclid, by John Bonnycastle, late of the Royal Military Academy, gives the demonstration of the VIth Prop. of Book I., upon correct principles, and we believe he is the only one that has that honour. In referring to his notes to ascertain whether he had made any remarks on this proposition, we have been pleased to find the following:

BOOK I. PROP. 6.

The demonstration of this proposition, in Euclid, is immethodical, and defective. It is not sufficient to show that