resteth from the work of creation; but continueth working to the end of the world; what time that work also shall be accomplished, and an eternal Sabbath shall ensue."1 Again, in the Advancement, he expresses the opinion that the soul of man" was immediately inspired from God; . . . . . and therefore the true knowledge of the nature and state of the soul must come by the same inspiration that gave the substance." This passage in a work intended for the general reader, and dedicated to an orthodox king, as well as some others, in popular works, might admit of an interpretation in accordance with some views of inspired theology; but whether his idea of the mode and manner of this inspiration of a soul into the body was that of Gratiano, when he was almost made to waver in his faith, and

or whatever precise signification may be attributed to the very common words, inspired, breathed into, or infused, it is plainly the substance of the soul that he considers as coming from that source, and in this way; and any true knowledge of its nature and state, its origin and constitution as a speciality of thinking essence, must be sought in that same source, "the greater providence" itself; that is, we may suppose, in ontology or the science of all being. Having thus got a soul, we must look into it in order to see what it is; and a sound psychology will begin with the actual fact, and proceed with an exact analysis of its operations as a thinking power. In his interpretation of the Fable of Pan, he gives us some further light, with some more definite expression, on this subject, and proceeds thus:—

"The Nymphs, that is, souls, please Pan; for the souls of the living are the delight of the world. But he is deservedly the commander of them, since they follow, each her own nature as leader, and, with infinite variety, each as

1 Confession of Faith, Works (Boston), XIV. 147.

if in her own native manner, leap and dance about him, with never ceasing motion. And so, some acute one of the moderns has reduced all the faculties of the soul to Motion, and noted the conceit and precipitation of some of the ancients, who, considering of the memory, the imagination, and the reason, and, with careless eye, hastily viewing the subject, overlooked the Thinking Power, which holds the first place. For whoever remembers, or even recollects, thinks; and whoever imagines, likewise thinks; and whoever reasons, also thinks: indeed the soul, whether prompted by sense, or acting by its own permission, whether in the functions of the intellect, or in those of the affections and will, leaps to the modulation of thoughts; and this is what was meant by the leaping of the Nymphs." 1

And in the following passage from the "Othello," we may discover a similar course of reasoning upon the will, and the thinking power acting by its own permission, thus:

"Iago. Our bodies are gardens, to the which our wills are gardeners; so that if we will plant nettles, or sow lettuce: set hyssop, and weed up thyme; supply it with one gender of herbs, or distract it with many; either to have it sterile with idleness, or manured with industry; why the power and corrigible authority of this lies in our wills. If the balance of our lives had not one scale of reason to poise another of sensuality, the blood and baseness of our natures would conduct us to most preposterous conclusions: but we have reason to cool our raging motions, our carnal stings, our unbitted lusts, whereof I take this, that you call love, to be a sect or scion. Rod. It cannot be.

Iago. It is merely a lust of the blood and a permission of the will." — Act I. Sc. 3.

A learned interpreter of the Sonnets, bringing the light of the "Hermetic Philosophy" to bear upon them, with an excellent appreciation of their quality, scope, and purpose in general, very justly remarks upon the 135th and 136th, in particular, that "far from being a play upon the poet's name, as many suppose," they "contain the poet's metaphysical view of God as Power" 2 or Will; an interpretation which may find additional warrant in the Baconian distinction between the human and the divine soul, fatally separated from each other (as our Hermetic philosopher profoundly conceives) by the mystic Wall of the flesh or material nature, as illustrated in the "Midsummer Night's Dream"; for, between this poet and the philosopher, there 1 De Aug. Scient., L. II. c. 13.

2 Remarks on the Sonnets of Shakes., (New York, 1865,) p. 50.

is everywhere a remarkable concurrence of idea, and his doctrine of the will is made the burden of these singular sonnets, running thus:—

"Whoever hath her wish, thou hast thy Will,

And Will to boot, and Will in overplus;
More than enough am I that vex thee still,
To thy sweet will making addition thus.
Wilt thou whose will is large and spacious,
Not once vouchsafe to hide my will in thine?
Shall will in others seem right gracious,
And in my will no fair acceptance shine?
The sea, all water, yet receives rain still,
And in abundance addeth to his store;
So thou, being rich in Will, add to thy Will
One will of mine to make thy large Will more.
Let no unkind, no fair beseechers kill;
Think all but one, and me in that one Will.

If thy soul check thee that I come so near,
Swear to thy blind soul that I was thy Will,
And will thy soul knows is admitted there,
Thus far for love, my love-suit sweet fulfil.
Will will fulfil the treasure of thy love,
I fill it full with wills, and my will one,
In things of great receipt with ease we prove,
Among a number one is reckon'd none.
Then in the number let me pass untold,
Though in thy store's account I one must be,
For nothing hold me, so it please thee hold
That nothing me a something sweet to thee:

Make but my name thy love, and love that still,
And then thou lov'st me for my name is Will." 1

When Pyramus and Thisbe both die on the stage, in the "Midsummer Night's Dream," the play proceeds thus: —

"Thes. Moonshine and Lion are left to bury the dead.

Dem. Ay, and Wall too.

Bot. No, I assure you; the wall is down that parted their fathers." Mid. Night's Dr., Act V. Sc. 1.

There is here most certainly an influx, inspiration, or infusion of a power to think; a power to perceive, conceive,

1 See also Shakes. Sonnets, (Facsimile of ed. of 1609,) London, 1862; which uses italics and capital letters as here printed.

remember, and act; a reason and a power of will that, by its own permission, leaps to the modulation of thought. That power contains under it the whole content of the term soul, a self-acting, self-directing thinking power; and the analysis of that content gives the faculties of the soul, or those modes of operation, which are called the mental powers. This influx of the substance of the soul, as such thinking power, is all that comes from that source; and the conceit of a genius, dæmon, angel, or any other kind of soul or spirit, accompanying it, lying in behind it, and guiding and directing its operations, other than perhaps "the secret will and grace" of "the greater providence" itself, he would seem to have considered as a visionary invention of the imaginations of men. "Divination by influxion" was a notion of like nature, "grounded upon this other conceit, that the mind, as a mirrour or glass, receives a kind of secondary illumination from: the foreknowledge of God and spirits." And surely, any supposition of revelations of the thoughts, ideas, will, and purposes of God being poured, inspired, or breathed, into this soul from this same direction, and in addition to the soul itself, like a "flowing river," of which the receptive soul is only a sort of “pensioner" and a "surprised spectator," "2 as some think, or as any kind of secondary illumination out of the foreknowl edge of God and spirits, can be no less superstitious and absurd than the fantastical vagaries of divination. Soul, indeed, streams into man from a source which is hidden, but his thoughts and visions are his own work. No knowledge of the supernatural world, nor of the ideas, thoughts, purposes, foreknowledge, and providence of God in the universe ever did come, nor ever can come, to man directly in that way, nor by that road; though behind this soul there may continue to be "the law of his secret will and grace," as in the play:

1

1 Trans. of the De Aug., Works (Boston), IX. 53.

2 Emerson's Essays, First Series (Boston, 1854), p. 244.

"K. Rich. All unavoided is the doom of destiny.
Q. Eliz. True, when avoided grace makes destiny."
Richard III. Act IV. Sc. 4.

And the witch says of Macbeth,

"He shall spurn fate, scorn death, and bear

His hopes 'bove wisdom, grace, and fear.".

Act III. Sc. 5.

And again, the operation of this same grace may be distinctly seen in the following lines:

"Mal.

Comes the King forth, I pray you?

Doc. Ay, sir: there are a crew of wretched souls,
That stay his cure: their malady convinces

The great assay of art; but at his touch,

Such sanctity hath Heaven given his hand,
They presently amend.

[Exit DOCTOR.

A most miraculous work in this good king,
Which often, since my here remain in England,
I have seen him do. How he solicits Heaven,
Himself but knows; but strangely-visited people,
All swoln and ulcerous, pitiful to the eye,
The mere despair of surgery, he cures;
Hanging a golden stamp about their necks,
Put on with holy prayers: and 't is spoken,

To th' succeeding royalty he leaves

The healing benediction. With this strange virtue,

He hath a heavenly gift of prophecy,

And sunery blessings hang about his throne,

That speak him full of grace.” — Macb., Act IV. Sc. 3.

And in the end, when he has been proclaimed King of Scotland, he concludes his speech thus :

We will perform in measure, time, and place." — Act V. Sc. 7. "For we see," says Bacon, "that in matters of faith and religion our imagination raises itself above our reason; not that divine illumination resides in the imagination; its seat being rather in the very citadel of the mind and understanding; but that the divine grace uses the motions of the imagination as an instrument of illumination, just as it