IX THE DOCTRINE OF IMMORTALITY 203 



or existences ; dissolves after a time each modification, and 

 from its substance erects a new form. As the same material 

 substance may successively compose the bodies of all animals, 

 the same spiritual substance may compose their minds : Their 

 consciousness, or that system of thought which they formed 

 during life, may be continually dissolved by death, and 

 nothing interests them in the new modification. The most 

 positive assertors of the mortality of the soul never denied 

 the immortality of its substance ; and that an immaterial 

 substance, as well as a material, may lose its memory or con- 

 sciousness, appears in part from experience, if the soul be 

 immaterial. Reasoning from the common course of nature, 

 and without supposing any new interposition of the Supreme 

 Cause, which ought always to be excluded from philosophy, 

 what is incorruptible must also be ingenerdbU. The soul, there- 

 fore, if immortal, existed before our birth, and if the former 

 existence noways concerned us, neither will the latter. Animals 

 undoubtedly feel, think, love, hate, will, and even reason, 

 though in a more imperfect manner than men : Are their souls 

 also immaterial and immortal ? " x 



Hume next proceeds to consider the moral argu- 

 ments, and chiefly 



"... those derived from the justice of God, which is sup- 

 posed to be further interested in the future punishment of the 

 vicious and reward of the virtuous." 



But if by the justice of God we mean the same 

 attribute which we call justice in ourselves, then 

 why should either reward or punishment be 



1 " None of those who contend for the natural immortality of 

 the soul ... have been able to extricate themselves from one 

 difficulty, viz. that all their arguments apply, with exactly the 

 same force, to prove an immortality, not only of brutes, but even 

 of plants ; though in such a conclusion as this they are never 

 willing to acquiesce." Whately, I.e. p. 67. 



