Part 5

XLI. I may be told, that the corporeality of Angels has been condemned, and their incorporeality defined, in the second Council of Nice, and the fourth Lateran one. But in the first place, is it certain, that these Councils declared the incorporeality of angels to be undeniable, and that they declared affirming the contrary is erroneous; for it is somewhat doubtful, whether the incorporeality was defined in them or not; because, although mention was made in these Councils of this matter, it was not done with an express design to discuss the point, but was only touched upon, as we may say by _incidence_; which is an exception that all eminent theologians admit, to our being bound to observe things that are canvassed in that way even in Councils; as we are not obliged to suppose any matters defined in them, that are not debated and settled with an express intention. For which reason, the most learned Cano (_lib. 5. de Considerat._) took the liberty of saying, that the opinion that angels were corporeal, although it might be false, was not heretical; and long before him, St. Thomas in his book _de Malo_, (_quæst. 16. art. 1._) had said, that this question was no part of the Catholic Dogmas. My father Saint Bernard (_lib. 5. de Considerat._) goes further; for he seems to think, the opinion which denies the corporeality of angels, to be void of probability; and it will not be improper to remark here, that he was much posterior to the second Council of Nice, and Saint Thomas, not only to the second Council of Nice, but to the fourth Lateran one also. This may likewise be alledged as an answer, to the objections that are made in consequence of some texts of Scripture, which give the epithet of spirits to the angels; for it is certain, that the fathers who considered it as defensible to maintain the corporeality of angels, were not ignorant of those texts; the exposition of which, in truth is not difficult, for we may fairly conclude, the Scripture calls them by this name, on account of their being airy or light bodies, and we may also suppose, that it is for this reason, that in various places it gives the name of spirit to the air. _Spiritus procellarum. Advenientis spiritus vehementis, &c._

XLII. The second reply I shall make, is, that supposing it to be determined that the angels are incorporeal, this truth is not established by philosophy, but by faith; and as upon the knowledge of this truth, depends the certainty, that the definition of a rational animal does not belong to an angel; it follows, that by the help of philosophy alone, we should never have hit upon giving a definition of a man; and with respect to defining other things besides a man, its insufficiency is admitted. What sort of philosophy is this? It ought rather to be called a total want of philosophy.

XLIII. Not only with regard to the angels, but on the part of brutes also, we find motives for doubting, whether the definition of _rational animal_, may not be applied to them as well as to man. If _rational animal_ signifies an animal capable of reflexion, the brutes are rational animals in the opinion of all those, who suppose them to be endowed with reason and reflexion: and as this sentiment may be supported by strong arguments, it remains somewhat doubtful, whether rationality is not diffused in different proportions to other animals as well as men, or whether it is confined to them only. It is true, that if this opinion should be admitted, we should grant, that the reason of man is distinct from, and of a superior nature to that of brutes; but if in the definition, we do not point out the character which distinguishes them, we are reduced to assign as the difference, a generical idea.

SECT. X.

XLIV. As we ascend the predicamental tree, and advance from the species, to the genuses or kinds; we perceive, that philosophy does not discern these more clearly, than it did the others; for we find in both cases, equal ignorance, and equal uncertainty. If we ought to have scientific certainty of any one genus in preference to another, it should be of that under which we ourselves are comprehended, which is the animal kind, for that is the thing which most immediately relates to us, and because also, we employ more consideration and attention upon that, than we do upon the others. We call the order animal, which comprehends man, and every other species of terrestrial and aquatic brutes, as likewise every kind of fish or fowl. And what do we know of animals according to this general description? Why that they are _sensitive living beings_; for that is the definition we give of them. But do we know this with any degree of certainty? By no means; for it has been doubted whether every animal is sensitive; and it has also been doubted, whether the sense of feeling does not belong to other entities as well as to animals.

XV. The first doubt is built upon the opposition and arguments of the Cartesians, who pretend, that all brutes are inanimate machines, and that there is no other sensible animal but man; for which reason, in their opinion, a sensible being is not a generical entity, but a specific one, and proper to the human species in a quarter proportion. I am thoroughly persuaded, that this opinion of the Cartesians is a false one; but I have not yet seen any evident argument or demonstration to confront it; nor has any person hitherto, hit upon one that evinces the falsity of it; for their principal foundation is not so weak, but that it has puzzled the most able Aristotelites to give an answer to it. But I do not find, that this is any obstacle to our giving our firm assent to the sensibility of brutes; although we have no reason to glory in our proofs of this matter, when the contrary opinion, besides the arguments that are produced to support it, finds so many partizans; and among them some of excellent ingenuity. Nor have we any reason to suppose, what I have known many people maintain, that all the Cartesians, think differently from what they speak in this matter; for some of them, are as full of the caprice that brutes are insensible, as we are of the persuasion that the contrary is the fact. A few years ago, certain ladies who were present at a bull-feast, seemed to express great concern for the sufferings of one of the bulls, which the people employed for that purpose, worried excessively. A French lady, who was a Cartesian philosopher, that sat near them, begged they would not grieve, for says the good Cartesian with great gravity, _I believe as firmly as I do in God and this cross, that the bull feels no more pain than the bench I sit on_. I do not know whether the other ladies believed her, but I am persuaded, that many are stedfastly of the same opinion with the French lady.

XLVI. The second doubt, whether other entities besides animals are not sensible, is patronized by Campanela, who labours by a variety of arguments, to prove in divers parts of his Works, that all elemental things are sensible. This doubt is also supported, and with more colour of reason, by those philosophers, who allow feeling to plants. And that this opinion may not appear extravagant; for the information of those who adopt the common sentiment, it will not be amiss to let them know, that Aristotle did not look upon this thing in that light, for he rather inclines to patronize the doubt; for in his first book _de Plantis_, he says, there is no certainty whether plants are, or are not, endued with feeling, appetite, and knowledge: _Nec enim constat, habeant ne plantæ animam, appetendique facultatem, doloris item, & voluptatis, & rerum discretionis._ In the third place, the naturalists, who build upon experimental observations, attribute feeling to some determined species of plants, which on that account, they call sensitive plants.

SECT. XI.

XLVII. If of our own proper genus, we know nothing with certainty, what must our knowledge be of others? The genus most immediately next to our own, is that of plants, and in this, notwithstanding our proximity, we can discern nothing but our ignorance; for we cannot venture even by conjectures, to point out the constitutive difference between them. This is not only invisible to the eyes of evidence, but impalpable to the essays of opinion. We commonly define the genus of a plant, by the term insensible living entity. But the word insensible, which we use to describe the difference, only signifies want of sensibility; and a positive entity, such as a plant is, cannot be ascertained by a negative. Besides this, as we observed before, it is somewhat doubtful, whether plants are, or are not sensible. We call them also _living vegetables_. But by this idea, we do not assign to the plant a different nature from the animal, for that this also is a living vegetable. If I am told, that the difference consists, in that the life of the animal is vegetative and sensitive, and that that of the plant is purely vegetative, I reply, that the adverb _purely_ in this place, signifies nothing but the want of sensitive life, which is meant to be expressed in the extreme, and a want, cannot be made use of as a descriptive term, to point out the constitutive difference between positive entities. Nor will it be of any use to answer, that the term want, means a want or defect in the mode of explanation, and does not apply to the thing signified; for till it can be ascertained what the thing signified is, we must remain totally in the dark; and it is also false, that this term _want_, is not applicable to the thing signified; for negative expressions are positive with respect to the thing signified, when they are used to deny any imperfection in the object they relate to; for the want of an imperfection, is the want of a want, it being certain, that all imperfection consists in the want of positive perfection; for which reasons these words, infinity, immensity, indivisibility, although negative with respect to the mode of expression, are positive with respect to the thing signified; but the term insensible, or insensibility, applied to a plant, signifies want of perfection, and thus is negative with respect to the thing signified.

XLVIII. Besides this, some express a doubt, whether plants are vegetable or not; and some are also doubtful, whether the property of vegetation does not likewise belong to stones and metals. If we consult the Cartesians upon this point, they will tell us, that all we call vegetation or nutrition of plants, is pure mechanism, and that the attraction of the nutritious juice which we attribute to them, is a solemn chimera. If we forsake the Cartesians, and apply to the experimental philosophers, we shall find many of them, who will tell us, that metals and stones grow by means of vegetation; which is an opinion, that not long ago, was illustrated by Joseph Pitton de Tournfort, a celebrated naturalist of the Academy Royal of Sciences at Paris, and more especially, by the celebrated observations he made upon marble in the wonderful cave of Antiparos; and with respect to metals, we, to the authority of others, shall add that of Aristotle, who in his book _de Mirabilibus Auscultationibus_, says, that in a territory of the island of Cyprus, they were used to sow iron, and that it grew and vegetated like other plants.

XLIX. And now we are speaking of Aristotle, we will not omit mentioning an authority of his, which is very applicable to our present subject, because it is totally opposite to a received opinion in the schools, to wit, that plants and animals are of two different genuses, and that the distinction between them is, that the animal is a living sensible entity, and the plant a living insensible one. Aristotle in his book _de Plantis_ says, that oysters and other shell-fish, are both plants and animals: _scimus autem, quod conchyla animalia sunt cognitione carentia: quapropter plantæ sunt, & animalia_. I ask now, how one species can be classed under two diametrically opposite genuses? and how an oyster can be both sensible and insensible? for as an animal, it ought to be a living sensible entity, and as a plant, a living insensible one. Nor can it be said, that Aristotle, when he called an oyster a plant, spoke in a metaphorical sense, for this mode of speaking is not allowed to philosophers, but is only permitted to poets and orators. Besides, the cause he assigns, shews, that he spoke in a rigorous philosophical sense; although, to speak the truth, I do not comprehend who could reveal to Aristotle, that oysters and other shell-fish are destitute of that sort of knowledge, which is proper and natural to the most stupid brutes.

SECT. XII.

L. From the lowest species, we proceed to the next above, and enquire, what is the nature of a living entity; what we are to understand by the term living, and what is life? To this, we shall be answered from the schools, that life is motion _ab intrinsico_, and that living, means that which moves _ab intrinsico_; that is, its motion is produced by some intrinsic faculty, or virtue, which it has within itself.

LI. This definition is incumbered with greater difficulties than the antecedent ones. All the modern philosophers oppose it, although for distinct and contrary reasons. Gassendo, father Maignan, and the other atomists, attribute motion _ab intrinsico_ to atoms, from which dogma it will follow, that motion _ab intrinsico_, is not distinctly peculiar to living animals. The Cartesians are very positive in maintaining, that nothing can give motion to itself, but that all motion in the universe, proceeds from that impulse, which God in the beginning gave to matter, which does, and ever will subsist, without being impaired or injured; and that by virtue of that impulse, motion is communicated from one part of matter to another; so that all which was before at rest, upon its beginning to move, received its impulse from some other body which was in motion before, and transferred its influence to that which was then at rest; and either partly, or in the whole, gave it the power of beginning to move; and they say further, that man, which is the only living corporeal entity they admit, when he moves, cannot be properly said to give motion to his members, but only directs their motion by his will, in virtue of the power antecedently impressed by the impulse of other bodies on the animal spirits.

LII. It cannot be denied, that this doctrine is terribly fortified, by the celebrated maxim of Aristotle, which says, _that every thing that moves, is set in motion by something else_: and although the followers of the common opinion, explain this maxim, so as to render it not incompatible with the definition they give of living entities, there results from this explanation, the inconvenience, that it weakens the principal force of the axiom which they avail themselves of to prove the existence of a first mover, to stimulate a body at rest; for if we suppose, that a living entity has the power of moving itself, we cannot maintain the necessity of a divine influence to produce this motion, without admitting at the same time, the existence of a first mover in other respects, to be established. Thus it seems to me, that the Cartesians can with some colour of reason pretend, that religion is interested in understanding the axiom in all the rigour, which they profess to understand it themselves.

LIII. But be it as it may, with respect to this difficulty, and all others, which the moderns by virtue of their principles can oppose to the doctrine of Aristotle; it is certain, that there may be very serious ones urged against their definition of living entities. Heavy bodies move _ab intrinsico_, and are not living entities. Fire moves _ab intrinsico_, and is not a living entity. The fermentative motion also, according to common physics, is understood to be _ab intrinsico_. And I have remarked and proved in another part of this work, that what the Aristotelites say of heavy bodies being moved by communicated impulse, in the form this explanation is intelligible, is also applicable to the motion of living entities.

SECT. XIII.

LIV. There now only remains within the compass of the predicamental scale, one other thing to consider, which is the highest, and most sublime within the reach of physics, and that is, the nature and composition of the body; but where will this lead us to, the point being equally doubtful with all the rest? The composition of the body, is divided into elemental and mixed; but as this last is composed of the other, unless we know what the elemental is, it is impossible to know of what the mixture consists. Very well; but who knows the nature and number of the elements? To this question, methinks I hear four answers, from four sects of philosophers, which are all different, although each pretends to exclude the others from a competent knowledge of the matter. The Aristotelites say, that they are air, fire, earth, and water. The chymists, that they are salt, sulphur, mercury, earth, and water. The Cartesians insist, that they are composed of the subtil, the globulous, and another matter which is more gross, and which they call the third element; and the atomists, that they consist of the atoms. These are the opinions, which are at present the most prevailing, although there are numbers of others which I shall omit to mention, because they have but few votaries. Now which of these opinions is the true one? Perhaps neither. At least there is but one sect out of the four that admits either of them to be true, and whichever that sect adheres to, the other three assert to be false; which amounts to the same, as saying that one witness deposes to the truth of the matter in question, and that three give testimony against it. Thus no judge to whom the decision is confided, can give sentence in favour of either of the parties; it being out of his power to affirm, that any one of their systems is right and true.

LV. As the audience before whom I propound this reflection, is composed chiefly of the followers of Aristotle, methinks I hear them exclaim, that if we were to collect the suffrages of the academic professors, we should find most votes in favour of his opinion. To this, I reply in the first place, that although a plurality of sectaries, gives greater extrinsic probability to an opinion, still it does not afford certainty, nor intrinsic probability; and the question here, is not whether Aristotle’s opinion is the most probable, but whether it is certain. I reply secondly, that it is doubtful, if we were to include the professors who teach physics in all nations, whether we should in reality find a majority of votes in favour of Aristotle; and unless we could prove by some authentic instrument, that God has limited the knowledge of philosophy to our nation only, and has excluded all others from inheriting the science, I do not know upon what pretension we can ground a right, of admitting none but Spaniards to vote in the question. Some of our antient professors say, that we should not regard the opinions of strangers, because they are novelists; but at the same time, strangers reply, that we should take no account of what the Spaniards assert, because they are obstinate and wrong-headed, and that there is no proof, be it ever so clear, that will make them depart from their old opinions; to which they add, that in Spain, they do not follow Aristotle from choice, but from necessity; for that it requires an heroic spirit, to contradict any thing that has been advanced by Aristotle in that kingdom, where whoever dares venture to oppose him, is instantly assailed by tempests of injuries, which fall on his head like violent hail storms. Nor is even an heroic spirit, sufficient to enable a man to support such an opposition, because the duty of obedience, obliges people not to depart from the line of their school; and this is also frequently the case, in other countries; and from hence, some Anti-Aristotelites have insisted, that the plurality of votes in favour of Aristotle should not prevail, because they cannot be supposed to be free.

LVI. But abstracted from the quantum of extrinsic probability, contained in the doctrine of Aristotle respecting the elements; I assert, that upon a strict examination, you will not find more truth contained in his sentiments, than in those of his adversaries. This opinion, I deduce from the position, that his first qualities consist of four, to wit, heat, cold, wet, and dry, from which in exact proportion, he attributes one to be impregnated in the highest degree with each element, and another near to the highest. This proof, goes lame in innumerable particulars. First, the giving to these qualities the title of first, is conferring a mere voluntary dignity on them, and especially, when we know the invincible difficulty, that attends establishing, that all the others result from them. Secondly, it is very doubtful, whether all the four beforementioned, can properly be called qualities; for many Aristotelites, and with great colour of reason, deny humidity and dryness to be such. That which is humid, is not so from any quality it possesses in itself, but because it has imbibed into its pores some foreign liquid substance, and let that be evaporated, and it will remain dry; from which we may conclude, that humidity is a substance, and that dryness consists in the want of that substance. Thirdly, the appropriating these as two of the four elements, is done without any foundation or reason. In the next place, how can they prove that water is cold in the highest degree? If this was true it would kill us; neither can they prove it so, in a more moderate, or secondary degree, for we are taught by experience, it is indifferent to both cold and heat, according to the agent that is applied to it. It is heated by the fire; and remove it from the fire, and it becomes cool again, not because it has any propensity or natural disposition to be cold, but because it is made so, by the cool atmosphere which surrounds it. There are many other very grave objections to be urged against this doctrine of the four qualities; and therefore the foundation upon which it is built, and the reasoning deduced from it to establish the quaternian system of the elements, are both very slight and futil.