Sect. 7.--Now, the first of mine was that of the
Arabians;<9> that the souls of men perished with their


* A revolution of certain thousand years, when all things
should return unto their former estate, and he be teaching
again in his school, as when he delivered this opinion.
bodies, but should yet be raised again at the last day:
not that I did absolutely conceive a mortality of the
soul, but, if that were (which faith, not philosophy,
hath yet thoroughly disproved), and that both entered
the grave together, yet I held the same conceit thereof
that we all do of the body, that it rise again. Surely it
is but the merits of our unworthy natures, if we sleep
in darkness until the last alarm. A serious reflex upon
my own unworthiness did make me backward from
challenging this prerogative of my soul: so that I
might enjoy my Saviour at the last, I could with
patience be nothing almost unto eternity. The second
was that of Origen; that God would not persist in his
vengeance for ever, but, after a definite time of his
wrath, would release the damned souls from torture;
which error I fell into upon a serious contemplation of
the great attribute of God, his mercy; and did a little
cherish it in myself, because I found therein no malice,
and a ready weight to sway me from the other extreme
of despair, whereunto melancholy and contemplative
natures are too easily disposed. A third there is, which
I did never positively maintain or practise, but have
often wished it had been consonant to truth, and not