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The
Human Soul
by Uriel Acosta
Since we have to deal with the mortality or
immortality of the human soul, it is appropriate to
ask what that soul is. Many ignorant fools speak of
it as though it were a virgin personified; others
describe it as something emergent from purgatory.
We say that the human soul is man's vital spirit,
by means of which he lives. This spirit is in the
blood, and with it man acts and moves in the world.
Man lives as long as the vital spirit works in his
body. He dies when the spirit is either naturally
or accidentally extinguished. The only difference
between the animal soul and the human soul is that
the human soul is endowed with reason, while the
animal soul lacks reason.
We know that we have something called the soul,
and we must ask what it is that creates this soul
in the human body. Man creates, by a natural
process, the soul of another man, just as an animal
creates the soul of another animal similar to
itself. That can be the only indubitable answer.
... Those who assert that the soul is different
from the body; that it was created by a God who
deposed it, are not worth being heeded. ... Man
would not die if his vital spirit, his soul, could
not die.
Excerpted from The Writings
of Uriel Da Costa
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