Sec. 87.  He was the more confirm’d in this Opinion, because it appeared to him before, that this TRUE Powerful and Glorious Being, was not by any means capable of Multiplicity, and that his Knowledge of his Essence, was his very Essence, from whence he argued thus: 

     He that has the Knowledge of this Essence has the Essence itself;
     hut I have the knowledge of this Essence. Ergo, I have the
     Essence itself.

Now this Essence can be present no where but with itself, and its very Presence is Essence; and therefore he concluded that he was that very Essence.  And to all other Essences which were separate from Matter, which had the Knowledge of that true Essence, though before he had looked upon them as many, by this way of thinking, appear’d to him to be only one thing.  And this misgrounded Conceit of his, had like to have firmly rooted itself in his Mind, unless God had pursu’d him with his Mercy, and directed him by his gracious Guidance; and then he perceiv’d that it arose from the Relicks of that Obscurity which is natural to Body, and the Dregs of sensible Objects.  Because that Much and Little, Unity and Multiplicity, Collection and Separation, are all of them Properties of Body.  But we cannot say of these separate Essences, which know this TRUE Being (whose Name be prais’d) that they are many or one, because they are immaterial.  Now, Multiplicity is because of the Difference of one Being from another, and there can be no Unity but by Conjunction, and none of these can be understood without Compound Notions which are mix’d with Matter.  Besides, that the Explication of Things in this place is very straight and difficult; because if you go about to express what belongs to these separate Essences, by way of Multitude, or in the Plural, according to our way of speaking, this insinuates a Notion of Multiplicity, whereas they are far from being many; and if you speak of them by way of Separation, or in the Singular, this insinuates a Notion of Unity, whereas they are far from being one.

Sec. 88.  And here methinks I fee one of those Batts, whose Eyes the Sun dazzles, moving himself in the Chain of his Folly, and saying, This Subtilty of yours exceeds all Bounds, for you have withdrawn your self from the State and Condition of understanding Men, and indeed thrown away the Nature of Intelligible Things, for this is a certain Axiom, that a thing must be either one, or more than one.  Soft and fair; let that Gentleman be pleas’d to consider with himself, and contemplate this vile, sensible World, after the same manner which Hai Ebn Yokdhan did, who, when he consider’d it one way, sound such a Multiplicity in it, as was incomprehensible; and then again considering it another way, perceiv’d that it was only one thing; and thus he continu’d