holy, the most high, the almighty, and the "immortal-Were Tertullian, Melito, &c. "who believed God to be corporeal, on that

account, the lefs good chriftians? Laftly, "what ought at least to moderate the rage of "those who are always ready to dart their "anathemas, is, that the wisest of the Fathers " acknowledge not only that the divine na"ture is inexplicable, but that we cannot speak of it without making use of ex"preffions which agree to corporeal fubftances only. Beaufobre, Vol. I, p. 485.

Obfervations on PERSONAL IDENTITY with refpect to the future ftate of Man.

T thinking

HE opinion of the mortality of the part of man is thought by fome to be unfavourable to morality and religion, but without the leaft reafon, as they who urge this objection at present must be unacquainted with the fentiments of christian divines upon the subject in ancient and prefent times. The excellent bishop of Carlisle has fufficiently proved the infenfibility of the foul from death to the resurrection (which has the fame practical confequences) to be the doctrine of the fcriptures, and the learned archdeacon Blackburne has traced the corruption of it from the earlieft ages.

In

In fact, the common opinion of the foul of man furviving the body was (as will be fhewn) introduced into chriftianity from the Oriental and Greek philofophy, which in many refpects exceedingly altered and debafed the true chriftian fyftem. This notion is one of the main bulwarks of popery; it was discarded by Luther, and many other reformers in England and abroad; and it was wifely left out in the laft correction of the articles of the church of England, though incautiously retained in the burial fervice. Now can it be fuppofed that the apofiles, the primitive Fathers, and modern reformers, should all adopt an opinion unfavourable to morality?

as it

It was objected to the primitive chriftians, may be at prefent, that if all our hopes of a future life reft upon the doctrine of a refurrection, we place it upon a foundation that is very precarious. It is even said, that a proper refurrection is not only, in the higheft degree, improbable, but even actually impoffible; fince, after death, the body putrefies, and the parts that compofed it are difperfed, and form other bodies, which have an equal claim to the fame refurrection.

And

where, they fay, can be the propriety of rewards and punishments, if the man that rifes again be not identically the fame with the man

that acted and died?

Now, though it is my own opinion that we fhall be identically the fame beings after the refurrection that we are at prefent, I fhall, for

the

the fake of those who may entertain a differ-. ent opinion, fpeculate a little upon their hypothefis; to fhew that it is not inconfiftent with a state of future rewards and punishments, and that it fupplies motives fufficient for the regulation of our conduct here, with a view to it. And, metaphysical as the fubject neceffarily is, I do not defpair of fatisfying those who will give a due attention to it, that the propriety of rewards and punishments, with our hopes and fears derived from them, do not at all depend upon fuch a kind of identity as the objection that I have stated fuppofes.

If I may be allowed, for the fake of diftinction, to introduce a new term, I would fay that the identity of the man, is different from the identity of the perfon; and it is the latter, and not the former, that we ought to confider in a difquifition of this kind. The diftinction I have mentioned may appear a paradox, but in fact fimilar diftinctions are not uncommon, and they may illuftrate one another.

Afk any perfon to fhew you the river Thames, and he will point to water flowing in a certain channel, and you will find that he does not confider the banks, or the bed of the river, to be any part of it. And yet though the water be continually and visibly changing, fo as not to be the fame any one day with the preceding, the use of language proves that there is a fenfe in which it may be called, to every real purpose, the fame river that it was a

thousand

thousand years ago. So alfo the Nile, the Euphrates, and the Tiber have an identity as rivers, independently of the water, of which alone they confift. In the fame manner forefts, which confift of trees growing in certain places, preferve their identity, though all the trees of which they confift decay, and others grow up in their places.

In like manner, though every perfon fhould be fatisfied of what I believe is not true, that, in the courfe of nutrition, digeftion and egeftion, every particle of the body, and even of the brain (and it fhould be taken for granted that the whole man confifted of nothing elfe) was entirely changed, and that this change, though gradual and infenfible, could be demonftrated to take place completely in the course of a year, we should, I doubt not, ftill. retain the idea of a real identity, and fuch a one as would be the proper foundation for probation, or felf reproach, with respect to the past, and for hope and fear with respect to the future. A man would claim his wife, and a woman her husband, after more than a year's abfence, debts of a year's ftanding would not be confidered as cancelled, and the villain who had abfconded for a year would not escape punishment.

ap

In fact, the univerfal and firm belief of this hypothefis would make no change whatever in our present conduct, or in our sense of obligation, refpecting the duties of life, and the propriety of rewards and punishments; and

con

confequently all hopes and fears, and expectations of every kind, would operate exactly as before. For notwithstanding the complete change of the man, there would be no change of what I should call the person.

Now if the water of a river, the trees of a forest, or the particles that constitute the man, fhould change every moment, and we were all acquainted with it, it would make no more difference in our conduct, than if the fame change had been confidered as taking place more flowly. Suppofing that this change fhould conftantly take place during fleep, our behaviour to each other in the morning would ftill be regulated by a regard to the transactions of the preceding day. In this cafe, were any perfon fully perfuaded, that every particle of which he confifted fhould be changed, he would, nevertheless, confider himself as being the fame perfon to-morrow, that he was yef- · terday, and the fame twenty years hence, that he was twenty years ago; and, I doubt not, he would feel himself concerned as for a future felf, and regulate his conduct accordingly.

As far as the idea of identity is requifite as a foundation for rewards and punishments, the fameness and continuity of consciousness seems to be the only circumftance attended to by us. If we knew that a person had by disease, or old age, loft all remembrance of his paft actions, we should, in moft cafes, immediately fee that there would be an impropriety in

4

punishing