and reason, as I know not, nor am not able to reconcile them: However, though I am doubtful of them, yet I can assure your self that I continue, Madam, _Your Faithful Friend_ _and Servant._ [1] _Of the Immortality of the Soul, l._ 2. _c._ 10. XXVI. _MADAM,_ By reason the _Soul_ is a _Spirit_, and therefore _Contractible_ and _Dilatable_, your _Authors_ opinion is,[1] That _it begins within less compass at first in organising the fitly prepared matter, and so bears it self on in the same tenour of work, till the body hath attained its full growth; and that the Soul dilates it self in the dilating of the Body, and so possesses it through all the members thereof._ Truly, _Madam_, as for the contraction and dilation of an immaterial Spirit, if I heard never so many arguments, I should hardly be able to conceive the possibility of it; For in my opinion, dilating and contracting are motions and actions of Nature, which belong to natural material Creatures, and to none else; for dilation and contraction cannot be without extension, but extension belongs to parts which an immaterial Spirit hath not: But suppose it be so, then the Soul must contract and dilate, extend and shrink together, and so grow less and bigger, according to the extension of the body; and when the body dies, the soul, in my opinion, must contract to a very point; and if one part of the body die before the other, the soul must by degrees withdraw out of those parts: also when a part of the body is cut off, the soul must needs contract, and grow less; the like when a man is let blood. Which contracting of the soul, by your _Authors_ leave, doth seem, to my imagination, just like the contracting of Hodmandod into her shell. Besides, if the soul be individable, and equally spread all over the body, then, to my opinion, she must necessarily be of a human shape; and if the body be deformed, the soul must be deformed also; and if the body be casually extended, as by taking Poyson into the body, the soul must be so too, as being individable and filling every part; and if a man be born with six fingers or toes, the soul must be so too; or if a dwarf, the soul must be a dwarf also; and if he be born deaf and dumb, the soul must be so too. But if two Twins, as it may fall out, should be born united in one body, I would fain know then, whether they would have two souls, or but one? As for example, if they should have but one body, and one stomack, liver, heart, spleen, lungs, bowels, and yet have four legs, four hands, and two heads: It seems, to my opinion, that then two Immaterial Souls must be joyned as into one; neither do I know yet how this could well be, the monster having but one body, nor how that Immaterial Soul can be divided, being inseparably double, when the body dies. But, _Madam_, all this I speak of the Natural Soul of Man, not of the Divine Soul, which is not subject to natural imperfections, and corporeal errors, being not made by Nature, but a