58 



3. A little afterwards, he hesitates not to affirm, 

 that in proportion as the matter decompounds itsdf, 

 it becomes more subtle, and that the swiftness of those 

 bodies increases in proportion to their littleness. He 

 ?ays, that tvery combination of matter reduces itself 

 at last to such simple parts, as those are of resistance 

 and motion ; that resistance and motive activity, are 

 the effect of simple energies ; and in short, that a 

 number of beings simple and unexiended, may con. 

 tribute to give us an idt a of an extended combination 

 of them, divisible and substantial. He says afterwards, 

 that the principles of matter are substances, in which 

 all essence, existence, and action terminate in their 

 last resort, and that there are active principles in the 

 universe, which are naturally productive of motion. 

 In short, he concludes with saying, that matter, car- 

 ried to its first principles, is no longer an unactive 

 mass, but becomes at length, activity itself, endowed 

 with the powers of repulsion, motion, and life, and 

 that every particle of it partakes of sensations ; and in 

 another place he says, that there is a perceivable life 

 in every particle ; and in short^ that there is a real 

 active force in matter.* 



4. If we compare this system with that of the an. 

 cients, we shall easily discover a striking conformity. 

 Pythagoras and Plato taught, that all nature was ani- 

 mated, and that matter had in itself a principle of mo- 

 tion and rest, th'at held it always in action ; which is 

 no other, according to the system of Mr. Needham, 

 than active, combined with repelling force. 



5. The Pythagoreans believed, that the world was 

 animated; that there was a principle of vitality infused 

 through the whole of nature, which extended itself 

 not only through the animal kingdom, but through 

 the vegetable, by a succession constant and perpe- 

 tual ;, they acknowledged a productive forcty an- 



i(\ to the last degiee, 



