own it. No one yet, that ever I heard of, how much soever
immersed in matter, allowed that excellency to any figure of the gross
sensible outward consequence of it; or that any mass of matter
should, after its dissolution here, be again restored hereafter to an
everlasting state of sense, perception, and knowledge, only because it
was moulded into this or that figure, and had such a particular frame
of its visible parts. Such an opinion as this, placing immortality in a
certain superficial figure, turns out of doors all consideration of soul
or spirit; upon whose account alone some corporeal beings have hitherto
been concluded immortal, and others not. This is to attribute more to
the outside than inside of things; and to place the excellency of a man
more in the external shape of his body, than internal perfections of his
soul: which is but little better than to annex the great and inestimable
advantage of immortality and life everlasting, which he has above other
material beings, to annex it, I say, to the cut of his beard, or the
fashion of his coat. For this or that outward mark of our bodies no more
carries with it the hope of an eternal duration, than the fashion of a
man's suit gives him reasonable grounds to imagine it will never wear
out, or that it will make him immortal. It will perhaps be said, that
nobody thinks that the shape makes anything immortal, but it is the
shape that is the sign of a rational soul within, which is immortal. I
wonder who made it the sign of any such thing: for barely saying it,
will not make it so. It would require some proofs to persuade one of it.
No figure that I know speaks any such language. For it may as rationally
be concluded, that the dead body of a man, wherein there is to be found
no more appearance or action of life than there is in a statue, has yet
nevertheless a living soul in it, because of its shape; as that there
is a rational soul in a changeling, because he has the outside of a
rational creature, when his actions carry far less marks of reason with
them, in the whole course of his life than what are to be found in many
a beast.

16. Monsters

But it is the issue of rational parents, and must therefore be concluded
to have a rational soul. I know not by what logic you must so conclude.
I am sure this is a conclusion that men nowhere allow of. For if they
did, they would not make bold, as everywhere they do to destroy
ill-formed and mis-shaped productions. Ay, b