CHAPTER XVI.
_Of Miracles; and of Curing by the Imagination._
Next Morning, so soon as I awoke, I went to call up my Antagonist. "Itis," said I, accosting him, "as great a Miracle to find a great Wit,like yours, buried in Sleep, as to see Fire without Heat and Action:"He bore with this ugly Compliment; "but," (cryed he, with a Cholerickkind of Love) "will you never leave these Fabulous Terms? Know, thatthese Names defame the Name of a Philosopher; and that seeing the wiseMan sees nothing in the World, but what he conceives, and judges maybe conceived, he ought to abhor all those Expressions of Prodigies,and extraordinary Events of Nature, which Block heads have invented toexcuse the Weakness of their Understanding."
I thought my self then obliged in Conscience, to endeavour to undeceivehim; and therefore, said I, "Though you be very stiff and obstinate inyour Opinions, yet I have plainly seen supernatural Things happen:""Say you so," continued he; "you little know, that the force ofImagination is able to cure all the Diseases which you attribute tosupernatural Causes, by reason of a certain natural Balsam, thatcontains Qualities quite contrary to the qualities of the Diseasesthat attack us; which happens, when our Imagination informed by Painsearches in that place for the specifick Remedy, which it appliesto the Poison. That's the reason, why an able Physician of yourWorld advises the Patient to make use of an Ignorant Doctor whom heesteems to be very knowing, rather than of a very Skilful Physicianwhom he may imagine to be Ignorant; because he fancies, that ourImagination labouring to recover our Health, provided it be assistedby Remedies, is able to cure us; but that the strongest Medicines aretoo weak, when not applied by Imagination. Do you think it strange,that the first Men of your World lived so many Ages without the leastKnowledge of Physick? No. And what might have been the Cause of that,in your judgement; unless their Nature was as yet in its force, andthat natural Balsam in vigour, before they were spoilt by the Drugswherewith Physicians consume you; it being enough then for the recoveryof ones Health, earnestly to wish for it, and to imagine himself cured:So that their vigorous Fancies, plunging into that vital Oyl, extractedthe Elixir of it, and applying Actives to Passives, in almost thetwinkling of an Eye they found themselves as sound as before: Which,notwithstanding the Depravation of Nature, happens even at this day,though somewhat rarely; and is by the Multitude called a Miracle: Formy part, I believe not a jot on't, and have this to say for my self,that it is easier for all these Doctors to be mistaken, than that theother may not easily come to pass: For I put the Question to them;A Patient recovered out of a Feaver, heartily desired, during hissickness, as it is like, that he might be cured, and, may be, madeVows for that effect; so that of necessity he must either have dyed,continued sick, or recovered: Had he died, then would it have beensaid, kind Heaven hath put an end to his Pains; Nay, and that accordingto his Prayers, he was now cured of all Diseases, praised be the Lord:Had his Sickness continued, one would have said, he wanted Faith;but because he is cured, it's a Miracle forsooth. Is it not far morelikely, that his Fancy, being excited by violent Desires, hath doneits Duty and wrought the Cure? For grant he hath escaped, what then?must it needs be a Miracle? How many have we seen, pray, and after manysolemn Vows and Protestations, go to pot with all their fair Promisesand Resolutions."
"But at least," replied I to him, "if what you say of that Balsam betrue, it is a mark of the Rationality of our Soul; seeing without thehelp of our Reason, or the Concurrence of our Will, she Acts of herself; as if being without us, she applied the Active to the Passive.Now if being separated from us she is Rational, it necessarily followsthat she is Spiritual; and if you acknowledge her to be Spiritual, Iconclude she is immortal; seeing Death happens to Animals, only by thechanging of Forms, of which Matter alone is capable."
The Young Man at that, decently sitting down upon his Bed, and makingme also to sit, discoursed, as I remember, in this manner: "As forthe Soul of Beasts, which is Corporeal, I do not wonder they Die;seeing the best Harmony of the four Qualities may be dissolved, thegreatest force of Blood quelled, and the loveliest Proportion ofOrgans disconcerted; but I wonder very much, that our intellectual,incorporeal, and immortal Soul should be constrained to dislodge andleave us, by the same Cause that makes an Ox to perish. Hath shecovenanted with our Body, that as soon as he should receive a prickwith a Sword in the Heart, a Bullet in the Brain, or a Musket-shotthrough the Chest, she should pack up and be gone? And if that Soulwere Spiritual, and of her self so Rational that being separated fromour Mass she understood as well as when Clothed with a Body; why cannotBlind Men, born with all the fair advantages of that intellectual Soul,imagine what it is to see? Is it because they are not as yet deprivedof Sight, by the Death of all their Senses? How! I cannot then make useof my Right Hand, because I have a Left!
"And in fine, to make a just comparison which will overthrow all thatyou have said; I shall only alledge to you a Painter, who cannot workwithout his pencil: And I'll tell you, that it is just so with theSoul, when she wants the use of the Senses. Yet they have the Soul,which can only act imperfectly, because of the loss of one of herTools, in the course of Life, to be able then to work to Perfection,when after our death she hath lost them all. If they tell me, overand over again, that she needeth not these Instruments for performingher Functions, I'll tell them e'en so, That then all the Blind aboutthe Streets ought to be Whipt at a Carts-Arse, for playing theCounterfeits in pretending not to See a bit."
He would have gone on in such impertinent Arguments, had not I stopthis Mouth, by desiring him to forbear, as he did for fear of a quarrel;for he perceived I began to be in a heat: So that he departed, and leftme admiring the People of that World, amongst whom even the meanesthave Naturally so much Wit; whereas those of ours have so little, andyet so dearly bought.