The first-
1. Obliterates the distinction between the mineral or vegetable, and the spiritual, world.
2. Makes it a sin to eat and drink.
Both-
3. Confuse the moral choice.
4. Make heaven the cradle of vice, and earth of virtue.
5. Contradict the truth that they assume, that there is no change in heaven.
6. Attribute every birth to a vice, and therefore are either Atheist or Manichaean.
7. Make a life a chapter of accidents.
8. Contradict facts of moral character.
God is the cause of our life, both in body and soul.
But when and how does the soul come into existence?
The how we can never know.
There are objections to seeking the material for any created thing either in God, or outside God. But we may regard the whole Creation as the realized thoughts of God. (Anticipation of Malebranche.)
The when may be determined. Objections to the existence of soul before body have been given above. But soul is necessary to life, and the embryo lives.
Therefore soul is not born after body. So body and soul are born together.
As to the number of souls, Humanity itself is a thought of God not yet completed, as these continual additions prove. When it is completed, this "progress of Humanity" will cease, by there being no more births: and no births, no deaths.
Before answering objections to the Scriptural doctrine of the Resurrection, the passages that contain it are mentioned: especially Psalm cxviii. 27 (LXX.).
The various objections to it, to the Purgatory to follow , and to the Judgment, are then stated; especially that
A man is not the same being (physically) two days together. Which phase of him, then, is to rise again, be tortured (if need be), and judged?
They are all answered by a Definition of the Resurrection, i.e. the restoration of man to his original state . In that, there is neither age nor infancy; and the "coats of skins" are laid aside.
When the process of purification has been completed, the better attributes of the soul appear-imperishability, life, honour, grace, glory, power, and, in short, all that belongs to human nature as the image of Deity.
On the Soul and the Resurrection
Basil, great amongst the saints, had departed from this life to God; and the impulse to mourn for him was shared by all the churches. But his sister the Teacher was still living; and so I journeyed to her , yearning for an interchange of sympathy over the loss of her brother. My soul was right sorrow-stricken by this grievous blow, and I sought for one who could feel it equally, to mingle my tears with. But when we were in each other's presence the sight of the Teacher awakened all my pain; for she too was lying in a state of prostration even unto death. Well, she gave in to me for a little while, like a skilful driver, in the ungovernable violence of my grief; and then she tried to check me by speaking, and to correct with the curb of her reasonings the disorder of my soul. She quoted the Apostle's words about the duty of not being "grieved for them that sleep"; because only "men without hope" have such feelings. With a heart still fermenting with my pain, I asked-
How can that ever be practised by mankind? There is such an instinctive and deep-seated abhorrence of death in all! Those who look on a death-bed can hardly bear the sight; and those whom death approaches recoil from him all they can. Why, even the law that controls us puts death highest on the list of crimes, and highest on the list of punishments. By what device, then, can we bring ourselves to regard as nothing a departure from life even in the case of a stranger, not to mention that of relations, when so be they cease to live? We see before us the whole course of human life aiming at this one thing, viz. how we may continue in this life; indeed it is for this that houses have been invented by us to live in; in order that our bodies may not be prostrated in their environment by cold or heat. Agriculture, again, what is it but the providing of our sustenance? In fact all thought about how we are to go on living is occasioned by the fear of dying. Why is medicine so honoured amongst men? Because it is thought to carry on the combat with death to a certain extent by its methods. Why do we have corslets, and long shields, and greaves, and helmets, and all the defensive armour, and inclosures of fortifications, and ironbarred gates, except that we fear to die? Death then being naturally so terrible to us, how can it be easy for a survivor to obey this command to remain unmoved over friends departed?