Whereas the being of my Self, that is,
my own soul, mind, or thinking principle, I evidently know by
reflexion. You will forgive me if I repeat the same things in
answer to the same objections. In the very notion or definition
of
, there is included a manifest repugnance
and inconsistency. But this cannot be said of the notion of
Spirit. That ideas should exist in what doth not perceive, or be
produced by what doth not act, is repugnant. But, it is no
repugnancy to say that a perceiving thing should be the subject
of ideas, or an active thing the cause of them. It is granted we
have neither an immediate evidence nor a demonstrative knowledge
of the existence of other finite spirits; but it will not thence
follow that such spirits are on a foot with material substances:
if to suppose the one be inconsistent, and it be not inconsistent
to suppose the other; if the one can be inferred by no argument,
and there is a probability for the other; if we see signs and
effects indicating distinct finite agents like ourselves, and see
no sign or symptom whatever that leads to a rational belief of
Matter.
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