"
Lastly, Locke turns upon his opponent the power of the _odium theologicum_.
"Let it be as hard a matter as it will to give an account what it is that
should keep the parts of a material soul together after it is separated
from the body, yet it will be always as easy to give an account of it as to
give an account what it is that shall keep together a material and
immaterial substance. And yet the difficulty that there is to give an
account of that, I hope, does not, with your lordship, weaken the
credibility of the inseparable union of soul and body to eternity; and I
persuade myself that the men of sense, to whom your lordship appeals in
this case, do not find their belief of this fundamental point much weakened
by that difficulty.... But you will say, you speak only of the soul; and
your words are, that it is no easy matter to give an account how the soul
should be capable of immortality unless it be a material substance. I grant
it, but crave leave to say, that there is not any one of these difficulties
that are or can be raised about the manner how a material soul can be
immortal, which do not as well reach the immortality of the body....
"But your lordship, as I guess from your following words, would argue that
a material substance cannot be a free agent; whereby I suppose you only
mean that you cannot see or conceive how a solid substance should begin,
stop, or change its own motion.
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