Chap. IV. AN TIE NT METAPHYSICS. 169 



his meaning fhould have been miftaken by any of his commentators; 

 and yet the eldeft of them, Alexander Aphrodifienfis, was pf opi- 

 nion, that Ariftotle believed the Soul to be mortal, and to perilh with 

 the Body. Of this we are informed by Philoponus, in his commen- 

 tary upon the Sixth Chapter of the Third Book, De yln'wia; and that 

 he does no injnftice to the Aphrodifian, is evident from a work of 

 his, ftill extant, upon the fubjed: of Mind, in which he pretends to 

 deliver the dodrine of Mind upon the principles of Ariftotle's philo- 

 fophy. I cannot fee any other ground for his error, except that 

 Ariftotle fays, that Mind is the «iJ'of, or Form, of the Animal; which 

 is faying no more, than that it is the Mind which makes any Animal 

 of a Species diftindt from a Vegetable or an unorganized Body. 

 But, furely, it does not follow from thence, thaf Mind is not a di- 

 ftind: Subftance fromBody : For two Subftances, united together, will 

 make a Species diftindl from either ; and, according to Plato, all the 

 feveral Forms and Speciefes of things are Subftances, which have a 

 feparate exiftence, not only out of Matter, but out of the Mind of 

 any Intelligent Being ; which Subftances, being united to Matter, 

 compofe the feveral Speciefes of Corporeal Things. 



I will conclude this Chapter with a few obfervations. — However 

 extraordinary this philofophy of Ariftotle's may, at firft fight, appear, 

 yet, if we attend carefully to what pafles in our Minds even in this 

 life, we fliall be difpofed to believe that his notions of the feparate 

 ftate of the Soul are not ill founded. 



And, in xh.tjirfl place, it muft be admitted, that our moft perfect 

 knowledge, at prefent, is our knowledge of Axioms or Self-evident 

 Propofitions, of which we perceive the truth intuitively, without any 

 difcourfe of Reafoii. Now, in a more perfed; ftate of our Intelli- 

 gence, it is evident that we muft perceive the truth of more propofi- 

 tions in the fame way; and, in a more perfedl ftate ftill, we muft 

 Vol. II. Y perceive 



