11. 359 the Body made it more or lefs fit to receive the Communication of that Universal Soul; which Soul only (by the way) they held to be immortal; and that every particular Man, both in respect of Body and Spirit, was mortal: His Spirit being nothing else but a more refined Difpofition and Elevation of Matter.

Others detefting the Impiety of this Opinion, did allow to every Individual Perfon a diftinct immortal Soul, and that alfo endued with the Power and Faculty of Understanding and Discourse inherent in it. But then, as to the Soul's Ufe, and actual Exercife of this Faculty; upon their observing the great Difference between the fame Object, as it was fenfible, and affected the Senfe, and as it was intelligible, and moved the Understanding, they held alfo the Neceffity of another Principle without the Soul, to advance the Object, à gradu fenfibili ad gradum intelligibilem, (as they speak) and fo to make it actually fit to move and affect the Intellect. And this they called an Intellectus Agens; so that although the Soul was naturally endued with an Intellective Power; yet, by reafon of the great Distance of material, cor poreal Things from the spiritual Nature of it, A a 4

it

it could never actually apprehend them, till this Intellectus Agens did irradiate and shine upon them, and fo prepare and qualify them for an Intellectual Perception. And this Intellectus Agens, fome, and thofe none of the lowest Form in the Peripatetick School, have affirmed to be no other than God himself, that great Light which enlightens not only every Man, but every Thing (according to its Proportion) in the World.

The Result and Application of which Difcourse to my present Purpose is this, that certainly those great Masters of Argument . and

*

*For it is afcribed to no lefs Perfons, than to Plato, and Aristotle after him, (as borrowing it from him) and that by feveral of the most eminent Interpreters of the latter, both Ancient and Modern; all of them proceeding upon this Ground, that in order to the actual Intellection of any Object, there is a fpiritual Intellectual Light necessary to enable the Object to move, or affect the intellective Faculty, which yet the Object cannot give to itself, nor yet ftrike or move the faid Faculty without it. And therefore they fay, that there is required an Intellectus Agens, or Being diftinct both from the Object and the Faculty too, which may so advance and spiritualize the Object, by cafting an higher Light upon it, as to render it fit, and prepared thereby for an intellectual Perception. And forafmuch as every thing which is fuch or fuch Secondarily, and by Participation from another, fuppofes fome other to be fo Primarily, and Originally by and from itfelf; and fince

God

and Knowledge could not but have some weighty and confiderable Reasons thus to intereft an External Principle in the Intellectual Operations of Man's Mind. And fo much of Reason, do I, for my part, reckon

God is the Primum Intelligibile in the Intellectual World, as the Sun is the Primum Vifibile in the fenfible and material World; they affirm the fame Neceffity of a fuperiour and intellectual Light iffuing from God, in order to move the Intellett, and form in it an intellectual Apprehenfion of things, which there is of a Light beaming from the Sun, for the caufing an Act of Vision in the vifive Paculty. And this they infift upon, not only as a Similitude for Illustration, but as a kind of Parallel-Cafe, as to this particular Instance, how widely foever the things compared may differ from one another upon many other Accounts. This, I say, was held by several of the most noted of the Peripatetick Tribe, though others, I know, who are profeffedly of the fame, do yet in this Matter go quite another Way; allowing indeed, that there is, and must be an Intellectus Agens, but that it is no more than a different Faculty of the fame Soul, or a different Function of the fame Faculty; but by no means an Agent, or intelligent Being difinct from it. This, I confefs, is of very nice Speculation, and made fo by the Arguments producible on both Sides, and confequently not so proper to make a Part in fuch a popular Difcourfe as I am here engaged in; nor fhould I have ever mentioned it barely as a Philofophical Point, but as I conceived it improvable into a Theological Use, as I have endeavoured to improve it in the Difcourfe itself; to which therefore, I bave chofe rather to annex this by way of Annotation, than to insert it into the Body thereof,

to

to be at the Bottom of this Opinion, that I have been often induced to think, that if we fhould but ftrip things of mere Words and Terms, and reduce Notions to Realities, there would be found but little Difference (fo far as it refpects Man's Understanding) between the Intellectus Agens af ferted by fome Philofophers, and the univerfal Grace, or common Affiftances of the Spirit afferted by fome Divines; (and particularly by John Goodwin calling it, the Pagan's Debt and Dowry) and that the Affertors of both of them feem to found their feveral Affertions upon much the fame Ground; namely, upon their Apprehenfion of the Natural Impotence of the Soul of Man, immersed in Matter to raise itself to fuch fpiritual and fublime Operations, as we find it does, without the Affistance of some -higher, and divine Principle. And accordingly this being admitted, that the Soul is no otherwife able to exert its Intellectual Acts, than by a Light continually flowing in upon it, from the great Fountain of Light, (whether that Light affifts it by ftrengthening the Faculty itfelf, or brightening the Object, or both, it matters not, fince the Refult of both, as to the main Iffue of the Action, will

be

be the fame.) Ifay, this being admitted, that 'God beams this Light into Man's Understanding, and that, as a Free Agent, by voluntary Communications; fo that he may withdraw or fufpend, what he thus communicates, as he pleases; how natural, how agreeable to Reason it is to conceive, that God being provoked by grofs Sins, may deliver the Sinner to Delufion and Infatuation, by a Suspension and Substraction ofthis Light? For may not God blast the Understanding of fuch an one, by shutting up thofe Influences, which were wont to enliven his Reafon in all its Discourses and Argumentations. Certain it is, that this frequently happens; and that the Wit and Parts of Men, who hold the Truth in Unrighteousness, are often blafted, fo that there is a vifible Decay of them, a strange unufual Weaknefs and Failure in them; and this not to be ascribed to any known Cause in the World, but to the juft Judgment of God, stopping that eternal Fountain from which they had received their continual Supplies. This to me feems very intelligible, and equally rational. And accordingly may pass for the first Way, by which God may be faid to send Delusion into the Minds of Men. But

2. God may be faid to do the fame, by giving Commission to the great Deceiver, and