 safe when I return.« »No, I will not be left,
answered Pekuah; I will go down between you and the prince.«
    They then all descended, and roved with wonder through the labyrinth of
subterraneous passages, where the bodies were laid in rows on either side.
 

                                 Chapter XLVIII

                   Imlac discourses on the nature of the soul

»What reason, said the prince, can be given, why the Egyptians should thus
expensively preserve those carcasses which some nations consume with fire,
others lay to mingle with the earth, and all agree to remove from their sight,
as soon as decent rites can be performed?«
    »The original of ancient customs, said Imlac, is commonly unknown; for the
practice often continues when the cause has ceased; and concerning superstitious
ceremonies it is vain to conjecture; for what reason did not dictate reason
cannot explain. I have long believed that the practice of embalming arose only
from tenderness to the remains of relations or friends, and to this opinion I am
more inclined, because it seems impossible that this care should have been
general: had all the dead been embalmed, their repositories must in time have
been more spacious than the dwellings of the living. I suppose only the rich or
honourable were secured from corruption, and the rest left to the course of
nature.
    But it is commonly supposed that the Egyptians believed the soul to live as
long as the body continued undissolved, and therefore tried this method of
eluding death.«
    »Could the wise Egyptians, said Nekayah, think so grossly of the soul? If
the soul could once survive its separation, what could it afterwards receive or
suffer from the body?«
    »The Egyptians would doubtless think erroneously, said the astronomer, in
the darkness of heathenism, and the first dawn of philosophy. The nature of the
soul is still disputed amidst all our opportunities of clearer knowledge: some
yet say, that it may be material, who, nevertheless, believe it to be immortal.«
»Some, answered Imlac, have indeed said that the soul is material, but I can
scarcely believe that any man has thought it, who knew how to think; for all the
conclusions of reason enforce the immateriality of mind, and all the notices of
sense and investigations of science concur to prove the unconsciousness of
matter.
    It was never supposed that cogitation is inherent in matter, or that every
particle is a thinking being. Yet, if any part of matter be devoid of thought,
what part can we suppose to think? Matter can differ from matter only in form,
density, bulk, motion
