Objection

For what, say they, doth not the Soule waxe old?How comes it then that agèd men doe dote;And that their braines grow sottish, dull and cold,Which were in youth the onely spirits of note?

What? are not Soules within themselues corrupted?How can there idiots then by nature bee?How is it that some wits are interrupted,That now they dazeled are, now clearely see?

Yet say these men, If all her organs die,Then hath the soule no power her powers to vse;So, in a sort, her powers extinct doe lie,When vnto act shee cannot them reduce.

And if her powers be dead, then what is shee?For sith from euery thing some powers do spring,And from those powers, some acts proceeding bee,Then kill both power and act, and kill the thing.

But how, till then, shall she herselfe imploy?Her spies are dead which brought home newes before;What she hath got and keepes, she may enioy,But she hath meanes to vnderstand no more.

Then what do those poore soules, which nothing get?Or what doe those which get, and cannot keepe?Like buckets bottomlesse, which all out-letThose Soules, for want of exercise, must sleepe.

But still this crue with questions me pursues:If soules deceas'd (say they) still liuing bee;Why do they not return, to bring vs newesOf that strange world, where they such wonders see?

'Tell us, ye dead, will none of you in pity,To those you left behind, disclose the secret?

Oh! that some courteous ghost would blab it out;What 'tis you are, and we must shortly be.'

Well, well, say these vaine spirits, though vaine it isTo thinke our Soules to Heauen or Hell to goe,Politike men haue thought it not amisse,To spread this lye, to make men vertuous so.