The Improvement of Human Reason | Page 6

him, nor did I ever see any of their Works. Those who are now alive, are, either such as are still advancing forwards, or else such as have left off, without attaining to perfection; if there are any other, I know nothing of them.
As to those Works of Alpharabius which are extant, they are most of them Logick. There are a great many things very dubious in his Philosophical Works; for in his _Méllatolphadélah_, i.e. The most excellent Sect, he asserts expressly, _that the Souls of Wicked Men shall suffer everlasting Punishment_; and yet says as positively in his Politicks that they shall be dissolv'd and annihilated, and that the Souls of the Perfect shall remain for ever. And then in his Ethicks, speaking concerning the Happiness of Man, he says, that it is only in this Life, and then adds, _that whatsoever People talk of besides, is meer Whimsy and old Wives Fables_. A principle, which if believ'd would make all Men despair of the Mercy of God, and puts the Good and Evil both upon the same Level, in that it makes annihilation the common end to them both. This is an Error not to be pardon'd by any means, or made amends for. Besides all this, he had a mean Opinion of the Gift of Prophecy, and said that in his Judgment it did belong to the faculty of Imagination, and that he prefer'd Philosophy before it; with a great many other things of the like nature, not necessary to be mention'd here.
As for the Books of _Aristotle, Avicenna_'s Exposition of them in his Alshepha [i.e. _Health_] supplies their Room, for he trod in the same steps and was of the same Sect. In the beginning of that Book, says, that the Truth was in his opinion different from what he had there deliver'd, that he had written that Book according to the Philosophy of the _Peripateticks_; but those that would know the Truth clearly, and without Obscurity, he refers to his Book, Of the Eastern Philosophy. Now he that takes the pains to compare his Alshepha with what Aristotle has written, will find they agree in most things, tho' in the Alshepha there are a great many things which are not extant in any of those pieces which we have of Aristotle. But if the Reader, take the literal Sense only, either of the Alshepha or Aristotle, with, out penetrating into the hidden Sense, he will never attain to perfection, as Avicenna himself observes in the Alshepha.
As for _Algazali_[14], he often contradicts himself, denying in one place what he affirm'd in another. He taxes the Philosophers with _Heresy_[15] in his Book which he calls Altehaphol, i.e. Destruction, because they deny the Resurrection of the Body, and hold that Rewards and Punishments in a Future State belong to the Soul only. Then in the beginning of his _Almizan_, i.e. The Balance, he affirms positively, that this is the Doctrine of the _Suphians_[16], and that he was convinc'd of the truth of it, after a great deal of Study and Search. There are a great many such Contradictions as these interspers'd in his Works; which he himself begs Pardon for in the end of his _Mizan Alamal [The Ballance of Mens Actions]_; where he says, that there are Three sorts of Opinions; 1. Such as are common to the Vulgar, and agreeable to their Notions of things. 2. Such as we commonly make use of in answering Questions propos'd to us. 3. Such private as a Man has to himself, which none understand but those who think just as he does. And then he adds, that tho' there were no more in what he had written than only this, viz. That it made a Man doubt of those things which he had imbib'd at first, and help'd him to remove the prejudices of Education, that even that were sufficient; because, he that never doubts will never weigh things aright, and he that does not do that will never see, hut remain in Blindness and Confusion.
_Believe your Eyes, but still suspect your Ears,_ _You'll need no Star-light[17], when the day appears_.
This is the account of his way of Philosophizing, the greatest part of which is enigmatical and full of obscurity, and for that reason of no use to any but such as thoroughly perceive and understand the matter before, and then afterwards hear it from him again, or at least such as are of an excellent Capacity, and can apprehend a thing from the least intimation. The same Author says in his _Aljawahir_ [i.e. _The Jewels_] that he had Books not fit to be communicated, but to such only as were qualified to read them, and that in them he had laid down the _Naked Truth_; but none of