his motion. If, disentangled from prejudice--if, destitute of gratuitous
suppositions--if, throwing aside error, he would contemplate his soul,
or the moving principle that acts within him, he would be convinced that
it forms a part of its body, that it cannot be distinguished from it,
but by abstraction; that it is only the body itself, considered
relatively with some of its functions, or with those faculties of which
its nature, or its peculiar organization, renders it susceptible:--he
will perceive that this soul is obliged to undergo the same changes as
the body; that it is born with it; that it expands itself with it; that
like the body, it passes through a state of infancy, a period of
weakness, a season of inexperience; that it enlarges itself, that it
strengthens itself, in the same progression; that like the body, it
arrives at an adult age or reaches maturity; that it is then, and not
till then, it obtains the faculty of fulfilling certain functions; that
it is in this stage, and in no other, that it enjoys reason; that it
displays more or less wit, judgment, and manly activity; that like the
body, it is subject to those vicissitudes which exterior causes obliges
it to undergo by their influence; that, conjointly with the body, it
suffers, enjoys, partakes of its pleasures, shares its pains, is sound
when the body is healthy, and diseased when the body is oppressed with
sickness; that like the body, it is continually modified by the
different degrees of density in the atmosphere; by the variety of the
seasons, and by the various properties of the aliments received into the
stomach: in short, he would be obliged to acknowledge that at some
periods it manifests visible signs of torpor, stupefaction, decrepitude,
and death.

In despite of this analogy, or rather this continual identity, of the
soul with the body, man has been desirous of distinguishing their
essence; he has therefore made the soul an inconceivable being: but in