Part 39

Your desire is to know, since I say Nature is Wise, Whether all her parts must be wise also? To which, I answer; That (by your favour) all her parts are not fools: but yet it is no necessary consequence, that because Nature is infinitely wise, all her parts must be so too, no more then if I should say, Nature is Infinite, therefore every part must be Infinite: But it is rather necessary, that because Nature is Infinite, therefore not any single part of hers can be Infinite, but must be finite. Next, you desire to know, Whether Nature or the self-moving matter is subject to err, and to commit mistakes? I answer: Although Nature has naturally an Infinite wisdom and knowledg, yet she has not a most pure and intire perfection, no more then she has an absolute power; for a most pure and intire perfection belongs onely to God: and though she is infinitely naturally wise in her self, yet her parts or particular creatures may commit errors and mistakes; the truth is, it is impossible but that parts or particular Creatures must be subject to errors, because no part can have a perfect or general knowledg, as being but a part, and not a whole; for knowledg is in parts, as parts are in Matter: Besides several corporeal motions, that is, several self-moving parts do delude and oppose each other by their opposite motions; and this opposition is very requisite in Nature to keep a mean, and hinder extreams; for were there not opposition of parts, Nature would run into extreams, which would confound her, and all her parts. And as for delusion, it is part of Natures delight, causing the more variety; but there be some actions in Nature which are neither perfect mistakes, nor delusions, but onely want of a clear and thorow perception: As for example; when a man is sailing in a Ship, he thinks the shore moves from the ship, when as it is the ship that moves from the shore: Also when a man is going backward from a Looking-glass, he thinks, the figure in the Glass goeth inward, whereas it is himself that goes backward, and not his figure in the glass. The cause of it is, That the perception in the eye perceives the distanced body, but not the motion of the distance or medium; for though the man may partly see the motion of the visible parts, yet he doth not see the parts or motion of the distance or medium, which is invisible, and not subject to the perception of sight; and since a pattern cannot be made if the object be not visible, hence I conclude, that the motion of the medium cannot make perception, but that it is the perceptive motions of the eye, which pattern out an object as it is visibly presented to the corporeal motions in the eye; for according as the object is presented, the pattern is made, if the motions be regular: For example; a fired end of a stick, if you move it in a circular figure, the sensitive corporeal motions in the eye pattern out the figure of fire, together with the exterior or circular motion, and apprehend it as a fiery circle; and if the stick be moved any otherwise, they pattern out such a figure as the fired end of the stick is moved in; so that the sensitive pattern is made according to the exterior corporeal figurative motion of the object, and not according to its interior figure or motions. And this, _Madam_, is in short my answer to your propounded questions, by which, I hope, you understand plainly the meaning of,

Madam,

_Your Faithful Friend_

_and Servant._

XXIX.

_MADAM,_

The scruples or questions you sent me last, are these following. First, you desire to be informed what I mean by _Phantasmes_ and _Ideas_? I answer: They are figures made by the purest and subtilest degree of self-moving matter, that is to say, by the rational corporeal motions, and are the same with thoughts or conceptions. Next, your question is, what I do understand by _Sensitive Life_? I answer: It is that part of self-moving matter, which in its own nature is not so pure and subtil as the rational, for it is but the labouring, and the rational the designing part of matter. Your third question is, _Whether this sensitive self-moving matter be dense or rare?_ I answer: density and rarity are onely effects caused by the several actions, that is, the corporeal motions of Nature; wherefore it cannot properly be said, that sensitive matter is either dense, or rare; for it has a self-power to contract and dilate, compose and divide, and move in any kind of motion whatsoever, as is requisite to the framing of any figure; and thus I desire you to observe well, that when I say the rational part of matter is purer in its degree then the sensitive, and that this is a rare and acute matter, I do not mean that it is thin like a rare egg, but that it is subtil and active, penetrating and dividing, as well as dividable. Your fourth question is, _What this sensitive matter works upon?_ I answer: It works with and upon another degree of matter, which is not self-moving, but dull, stupid, and immoveable in its own nature, which I call the inanimate part or degree of matter. Your fifth question is, _Whether this inanimate Matter do never rest?_ I answer; It doth not: for the self-moving matter being restless in its own nature, and so closely united and commixed with the inanimate, as they do make but one body, will never suffer it to rest; so that there is no part in Nature but is moving; the animate matter in it self, or its own nature, the inanimate by the help or means of the animate. Your sixth question is, _If there be a thorow mixture of the parts of animate and inanimate matter, whether those parts do retain each their own nature and substance, so that the inanimate part of matter remains dull and stupid in its essence or nature, and the animate full of self-motion, or all self-motion?_ I answer: Although every part and particle of each degree are closely intermixed, nevertheless this mixture doth not alter the interior nature of those parts or degrees; As for example; a man is composed of Soul, and Body, which are several parts, but joyned as into one substance, _viz._ Man, and yet they retain each their own proprieties and natures; for although soul and body are so closely united as they do make but one Man, yet the soul doth not change into the body, nor the body into the soul, but each continues in its own nature as it is. And so likewise in Infinite Matter, although the degrees or parts of Matter are so throughly intermixed as they do make but one body or substance, which is corporeal Nature, yet each remains in its nature as it is, to wit, the animate part of matter doth not become dull and stupid in its nature, but remains self-moving; and the inanimate, although it doth move by the means of the animate, yet it doth not become self-moving, but each keeps its own interior nature and essence in their commixture. The truth is, there must of necessity be degrees of matter, or else there would be no such various and several effects in Nature, as humane sense and reason do perceive there are; and those degrees must also retain each their own nature and proprieties, to produce those various and curious effects: Neither must those different degrees vary or alter the nature of Infinite Matter; for Matter must and doth continue one and the same in its Nature, that is, Matter cannot be divided from being Matter: And this is my meaning, when I say in my _Philosophical Opinions, There is but one kind of Matter_: Not that Matter is not dividable into several parts or degrees, but I say, although Matter has several parts and degrees, yet they do not alter the nature of Matter, but Matter remains one and the same in its own kind, that is, it continues still Matter in its own nature notwithstanding those degrees; and thus I do exclude from Matter all that which is not Matter, and do firmly believe, that there can be no commixture of Matter and no Matter in Nature; for this would breed a meer confusion in Nature. Your seventh question is, _Whether that, which I name the rational part of self-moving Matter makes as much variety as the sensitive?_ To which I answer: That, to my sense and reason, the rational part of animate or self-moving Matter moves not onely more variously, but also more swiftly then the sensitive; for thoughts are sooner made, then words spoke, and a certain proof of it are the various and several Imaginations, Fancies, Conceptions, Memories, Remembrances, Understandings, Opinions, Judgments, and the like: as also the several sorts of Love, Hate, Fear, Anger, Joy, Doubt; and the like Passions. Your eighth question is, _Whether the Sensitive Matter can and doth work in it self and its own substance and degree?_ My answer is, That there is no inanimate matter without animate, nor no animate without inanimate, both being so curiously and subtilly intermixt, as they make but one body; Nevertheless the several parts of this one body may move several ways. Neither are the several degrees bound to an equal mixture, no more then the several parts of one body are bound to one and the same size, bigness, shape, or motion; or the Sea is bound to be always at the high tide; or the Moon to be always at the Full; or all the Veins or Brains in animal bodies are bound to be of equal quantity; or every Tree of the same kind to bear fruit, or have leaves of equal number; or every Apple, Pear, or Plum, to have an equal quantity of juice; or every Bee to make as much honey and wax as the other. Your nineth question is, _Whether the Sensitive Matter can work without taking patterns?_ My answer is, That all corporeal motion is not patterning, but all patterning is made by corporeal motion; and there be more several sorts of corporeal motions then any single Creature is able to conceive, much less to express: But the perceptive corporeal motions are the ground-motions in Nature, which make, rule, and govern all the parts of Nature, as to move to Production, or Generation, Transformation, and the like. Your tenth question is, _How it is possible, that numerous figures can exist in one part of matter? for it is impossible that two things can be in one place, much less many._ My answer in short is, That it were impossible, were a part of Matter, and the numerous figures several and distinct things; but all is but one thing, that is, a part of Matter moving variously; for there is neither Magnitude, Place, Figure, nor Motion, in Nature, but what is Matter, or Body; Neither is there any such thing as Time: Wherefore it cannot properly be said, _There was_, and _There shall be_; but onely, _There is_. Neither can it properly be said, from this to that place; but onely in reference to the several moving parts of the onely Infinite Matter. And thus much to your questions; I add no more, but rest,

Madam,

_Your faithful Friend_

_and humble Servant._

XXX.

_MADAM,_

In your last, you were pleased to express, that some men, who think themselves wise, did laugh in a scornful manner at my opinion, when I say that every Creature hath life and knowledg, sense and reason; counting it not onely ridiculous, but absurd; and asking, whether you did or could believe, a piece of wood, metal, or stone, had as much sense as a beast, or as much reason as a man, having neither brain, blood, heart, nor flesh; nor such organs, passages, parts, nor shapes as animals? To which, I answer: That it is not any of these mentioned things that makes life and knowledg, but life and knowledg is the cause of them, which life and knowledg is animate matter, and is in all parts of all Creatures: and to make it more plain and perspicuous, humane sense and reason may perceive, that wood, stone, or metal, acts as wisely as an animal: As for example; Rhubarb, or the like drugs, will act very wisely in Purging; and Antimony, or the like, will act very wisely in Vomiting; and Opium will act very wisely in Sleeping; also Quicksilver or Mercury will act very wisely, as those that have the French disease can best witness: likewise the Loadstone acts very wisely, as Mariners or Navigators will tell you: Also Wine made of Fruit, and Ale of Malt, and distilled Aqua-vitæ will act very subtilly; ask the Drunkards, and they can inform you; Thus Infinite examples may be given, and yet man says, all Vegetables and Minerals are insensible and irrational, as also the Planets and Elements; when as yet the Planets move very orderly and wisely, and the Elements are more active, nay, more subtil and searching then any of the animal Creatures; witness Fire, Air, and Water: As for the Earth, she brings forth her fruit, if the other Elements do not cause abortives, in due season; and yet man believes, Vegetables, Minerals, and Elements, are dead, dull, senseless, and irrational Creatures, because they have not such shapes, parts, nor passages as Animals, nor such exterior and local motions as Animals have: but Man doth not consider the various, intricate and obscure ways of Nature, unknown to any particular Creature; for what our senses are not capable to know, our reason is apt to deny. Truly, in my opinion, Man is more irrational then any of those Creatures, when he believes that all knowledg is not onely confined to one sort of Creatures, but to one part of one particular Creature, as the head, or brain of man; for who can in reason think, that there is no other sensitive and rational knowledg in Infinite Matter, but what is onely in Man, or animal Creatures? It is a very simple and weak conclusion to say, Other Creatures have no eyes to see, no ears to hear, no tongues to taste, no noses to smell, as animals have; wherefore they have no sense or sensitive knowledg; or because they have no head, nor brain as Man hath, therefore they have no reason, nor rational knowledg at all: for sense and reason, and consequently sensitive and rational knowledg, extends further then to be bound to the animal eye, ear, nose, tongue, head, or brain; but as these organs are onely in one kind of Natures Creatures, as Animals, in which organs the sensitive corporeal motions make the perception of exterior objects, so there may be infinite other kinds of passages or organs in other Creatures unknown to Man, which Creatures may have their sense and reason, that is, sensitive and rational knowledg, each according to the nature of its figure; for as it is absurd to say, that all Creatures in Nature are Animals, so it is absurd to confine sense and reason onely to Animals; or to say, that all other Creatures, if they have sense and reason, life and knowledg, it must be the same as is in Animals: I confess, it is of the same degree, that is, of the same animate part of matter, but the motions of life and knowledg work so differently and variously in every kind and sort, nay, in every particular Creature, that no single Creature can find them out: But, in my opinion, not any Creature is without life and knowledg, which life and knowledg is made by the self-moving part of matter, that is, by the sensitive and rational corporeal motions; and as it is no consequence, that all Creatures must be alike in their exterior shapes, figures, and motions, because they are all produced out of one and the same matter, so neither doth it follow, that all Creatures must have the same interior motions, natures, and proprieties, and so consequently the same life and knowledg, because all life and knowledg is made by the same degree of matter, to wit, the animate. Wherefore though every kind or sort of Creatures has different perceptions, yet they are not less knowing; for Vegetables, Minerals, and Elements, may have as numerous, and as various perceptions as Animals, and they may be as different from animal perceptions as their kinds are; but a different perception is not therefore no perception: Neither is it the animal organs that make perception, nor the animal shape that makes life, but the motions of life make them. But some may say, it is Irreligious to believe any Creature has rational knowledg but Man. Surely, _Madam_, the God of Nature, in my opinion, will be adored by all Creatures, and adoration cannot be without sense and knowledg. Wherefore it is not probable, that onely Man, and no Creature else, is capable to adore and worship the Infinite and Omnipotent God, who is the God of Nature, and of all Creatures: I should rather think it irreligious to confine sense and reason onely to Man, and to say, that no Creature adores and worships God, but Man; which, in my judgment, argues a great pride, self-conceit, and presumption. And thus, _Madam_, having declared my opinion plainly concerning this subject, I will detain you no longer at this present, but rest,

Madam,

_Your constant Friend_

_and faithful Servant._

XXXI.

_MADAM,_

I perceive you do not well apprehend my meaning, when I say in my _Philosophical Opinions,_[1] _That the Infinite degrees of Infinite Matter are all Infinite:_ For, say you, the degrees of Matter cannot be Infinite, by reason there cannot be two Infinites, but one would obstruct the other. My answer is; I do not mean that the degrees of Matter are Infinite each in its self, that is, that the animate and inanimate are several Infinite matters, but my opinion is, that the animate degree of matter is in a perpetual motion, and the inanimate doth not move of it self, and that those degrees are infinite in their effects, as producing and making infinite figures; for since the cause, which is the onely matter, is infinite, the effects must of necessity be infinite also; the cause is infinite in its substance, the effects are Infinite in number. And this is my meaning, when I say,[2] that, although in Nature there is but one kind of matter, yet there are Infinite degrees, Infinite motions, and Infinite parts in that onely matter; and though Infinite and Eternal matter has no perfect or exact figure, by reason it is Infinite, and therefore unlimited, yet there being infinite parts in number, made by the infinite variations of motions in infinite Matter, these parts have perfect or exact figures, considered as parts, that is, single, or each in its particular figure: And therefore if there be Infinite degrees, considering the effects of the animate and inanimate matter, infinite motions for changes, infinite parts for number, infinite compositions and divisions for variety and diversity of Creatures; then there may also be infinite sizes, each part or figure differing more or less, infinite smallness and bigness, lightness and heaviness, rarity and density, strength and power, life and knowledg, and the like: But by reason Nature or Natural matter is not all animate or inanimate, nor all composing or dividing, there can be no Infinite in a part, nor can there be something biggest or smallest, strongest or weakest, heaviest or lightest, softest or hardest in Infinite Nature, or her parts, but all those several Infinites are as it were included in one Infinite, which is Corporeal Nature, or Natural Matter.

Next, you desire my opinion of _Vacuum_, whether there be any, or not? for you say I determine nothing, of it in my Book of _Philosophical Opinions_. Truly, _Madam_, my sense and reason cannot believe a _Vacuum_, because there cannot be an empty Nothing; but change of motion makes all the alteration of figures, and consequently all that which is called place, magnitude, space, and the like; for matter, motion, figure, place, magnitude, &c. are but one thing. But some men perceiving the alteration, but not the subtil motions, believe that bodies move into each others place, which is impossible, because several places are onely several parts, so that, unless one part could make it self another part, no part can be said to succeed into anothers place; but it is impossible that one part should make it self another part, for it cannot be another, and it self, no more then Nature can be Nature, and not Nature; wherefore change of place is onely change of motion, and this change of motion makes alteration of Figures.

Thirdly, you say, You cannot understand what I mean by Creation, for you think that Creation is a production or making of Something out of Nothing. To tell you really, _Madam_, this word is used by me for want of a better expression; and I do not take it in so strict a sense as to understand by it, a Divine or supernatural Creation, which onely belongs to God; but a natural Creation, that is, a natural production or Generation; for Nature cannot create or produce Something out of Nothing: And this Production may be taken in a double sence; First, in General, as for example, when it is said, that all Creatures are produced out of Infinite Matter; and in this respect every particular Creature which is finite, that is, of a circumscribed and limited figure, is produced of Infinite Matter, as being a part thereof: Next, Production is taken in a more strict sense, to wit, when one single Creature is produced from another; and this is either Generation properly so called, as when in every kind and sort each particular produces its like; or it is such a Generation whereby one creature produces another, each being of a different kind or species, as for example, when an Animal produces a Mineral, as when a Stone is generated in the Kidneys, or the like; and in this sence one finite creature generates or produces another finite creature, the producer as well as the produced being finite; but in the first sence finite creatures are produced out of infinite matter.

Fourthly, you confess, You cannot well apprehend my meaning, when I say,[3] that the several kinds are as Infinite as the particulars; for your opinion is, That the number of particulars must needs exceed the number of kinds. I answer: I mean in general the Infinite effects of Nature which are Infinite in number, and the several kinds or sorts of Creatures are Infinite in duration, for nothing can perish in Nature.

Fifthly, When I say,[4] that ascending and descending is often caused by the exterior figure or shape of a body; witness a Bird, who although he is of a much bigger size and bulk then a Worm, yet can by his shape lift himself up more agilly and nimbly then a Worm; Your opinion is, That his exterior shape doth not contribute any thing towards his flying, by reason a Bird being dead retains the same shape, but yet cannot fly at all. But, truly, _Madam_, I would not have you think that I do exclude the proper and interior natural motion of the figure of a Bird, and the natural and proper motions of every part and particle thereof; for that a Bird when dead, keeps his shape, and yet cannot fly, the reason is, that the natural and internal motions of the Bird, and the Birds wings, are altered towards some other shape or figure, if not exteriously, yet interiously; but yet the interior natural motions could not effect any flying or ascending without the help of the exterior shape; for a Man, or any other animal, may have the same interior motions as a Bird hath, but wanting such an exterior shape, he cannot fly; whereas had he wings like a Bird, and the interior natural motions of those wings, he might without doubt fly as well as a Bird doth.

Sixthly, Concerning the descent of heavy bodies,[5] that it is more forcible then the ascent of light bodies, you do question the Truth of this my opinion. Certainly, _Madam_, I cannot conceive it to be otherwise by my sense and reason; for though Fire that is rare, doth ascend with an extraordinary quick motion, yet this motion is, in my opinion, not so strong and piercing as when grosser parts of Creatures do descend; but there is difference in strength and quickness; for had not Water a stronger motion, and another sort of figure then Fire, it could not suppress Fire, much less quench it. But Smoak, which is heavier then Flame, flies up, or rises before, or rather, above it: Wherefore I am still of the same opinion, that heavy bodies descend more forcibly then light bodies do ascend, and it seems most rational to me.