(seq. 5)

to us) which is by nature capable of possessing (place) Since
admitting the existence of the Soul (of which we have
an intuitive consciousness) it must exist some where,
which is the same as to exist in some place, for an ex-
istence no where, is a contradiction to existence it self.

We must therefore ascribe substance
to the nature of the Soul, a property by which only (it) is ca-
pable of place, or whereness, and consequently of exis-
tence; for otherwise, we only amuse ourselves with
the empty notions of nonentity (for the Soul), which is the same
as for an intelligent conscious being, in actual posses-
sion of place and existence, to imagine that he is
nothing; which, if true, we query how he ever came
to imagine anything about entity or nonentity, or
to have exercised any reflection or consciousness at
all; since nothing, or the mere absence of being, could
not have done it. I suppose that writers and speak-
ers have confounded themselves more or less, in their
arguments on this subject, by denominating the Soul,
to be (either) material or immaterial, and by examining the
proportion of incogitative and s(t)upid matter, which is
illegible capable of division, figure and motion, with the
effects and combinations, which, to our senses and con-
ceptions, appear to be (in) those kinds of beings; and finding
that there is none of the properties or affections that are
natural to an intelligent Soul, except the property of
possessing place, which is co(m)mon (to) senseless as well as to
moral beings, we are apt to run into the absurd
conclusion