of thesoul confidered. 367

however they may seem at first view to per-plex the point; yet they leave the asiertors atlast under a necessity of maintaining the fameUndisguised absurdities, and of undertakingthe defence of all the contradictions just nowMentioned, in N° 2. For either they mustfay, that all and every part of matter is free,thinks, reasons; which is (hewn before (Sect.3. N° 8 .) from the endless divisibility of it,to be monstrously absurd (c ); as every one isconscious from his own experience ; andWhich therefore the Epicureans durst not as-sert ; but strongly maintained the contrary ( d ).Or else they must fay, that the bare puttingtogether atoms dead and senseless, is the onlyCause why the compound becomes enduedWith all the powers of a human foul; whichis really to return to the Epicurean scheme,2nd to be pressed with all the nonsensical con-tradictions above. It is the very fame thingas to assert, that the repetition of the negation

fctNo matter can de one thinking substance; because,as Dr. Clarke observes, no matter is one substance, buta heap of substances.

{d) Lucretius fays, in the place last cited, at ver. 864,Nunc ea, qua fenfire videmus cunque necejfe ’JlEx infenflibus tamen cmnia confiteurePrincipiis conjlan ——

of