Date: 1674

"To this inquiry therefore I diligently applied myself, both by reading and meditation; by Reading, that I might recall into my memory what I had long before transcribed out of the books of such Authors who had written judiciously and laudably of the Passions: by Meditation, that I might examin t...

— Charleton, Walter (1620-1707)

Date: 1674

"And therefore for the more probable explication of the Phenomena of the Passions which are not raised in the Rational Soul, I found myself obliged to admit her to have a Sensitive one conjoyned with her, to receive her immediate suggestions, and to actuate the body according to her soveraign wil...

— Charleton, Walter (1620-1707)

Date: 1674

"Secondly it seem'd to me no less unconceivable, whence that dismal ψυχομαχια or intestin war which every Man too frequently feels within himself, and whereof even St. Paul himself so sadly complained, when (in Epist. ad Roman. cap. 3.) he cries out, video aliam legem in membris meis repugnantem ...

— Charleton, Walter (1620-1707)

Date: 1674

"What then can remain to cause this dire war daily observed within us, betwixt the allurements of our Sense, on one side, and the grave dictates of our Mind, on the other; but two distinct Agents, the Rational Soul and the Sensitive, coexistent within us, and hotly contending about the conduct of...

— Charleton, Walter (1620-1707)

Date: 1674

"To this Objection therefore I answer (1.) that had this excellent Man, Monsieur des Cartes been but half as conversant in Anatomy, as he seems to have been in Geometry, doubtles he would never have lodged so noble a guest as the Rational Soul, in so incommodious a closet of the brain, as the Gla...

— Charleton, Walter (1620-1707)

Date: 1674

"This Glandule which he supposeth to be so easily flexible and yielding to contrary impulses, is not loosely suspended, but fixed: so that whoever hath once beheld the solid basis, strong consistence, and firm connexion thereof, will hardly ever be brought to allow it capable of any impulse to ei...

— Charleton, Walter (1620-1707)

Date: 1674

"Though we should grant this Gland to be both the Throne of the Soul, and most easily flexible every way: yet hath Des Cartes left it still unconceivable, how an Immaterial Agent, not infinite, comes to move by impuls a solid body, without the mediation of a third thing that is less disparil or d...

— Charleton, Walter (1620-1707)

Date: 1674

"And as for the Bipartition of this Sensitive Soul into two principle members as it were, or active sourses; vix. the Fiery part, upon which Life depends; and the Lucid, from whence all the faculties Animal are, like so many distinct rayes of light, derived."

— Charleton, Walter (1620-1707)

Date: 1674

"In Man indeed, it seems not difficult to conceive, that the Rational Soul, as president of all th'inferiour faculties, and constantly speculating the impressions, or images represented to her by the Sensitive, as by a mirrour; doth first form to herself conceptions and notions correspondent to t...

— Charleton, Walter (1620-1707)