16. Consciousness alone unites actions into the same person.
But though the same immaterial substance or soul
does not alone, wherever it be, and in whatsoever state, make the same man; yet it is plain, consciousness, as far
as ever it can be extended--should it be to ages past--unites existences and actions very remote in time into the
same person, as well as it does the existences and actions of the immediately preceding moment: so that whatever
has the consciousness of present and past actions, is the same person to whom they both belong. Had I the same
consciousness that I saw the ark and Noah's flood, as that I saw an overflowing of the Thames last winter, or as
that I write now, I could no more doubt that I who write this now, that saw' the Thames overflowed last winter,
and that viewed the flood at the general deluge, was the same self,--place that self in what substance you
please--than that I who write this am the same myself now whilst I write (whether I consist of all the same
substance, material or immaterial, or no) that I was yesterday. For as to this point of being the same self, it matters
not whether this present self be made up of the same or other substances--I being as much concerned, and as
justly accountable for any action that was done a thousand years since, appropriated to me now by this
self-consciousness, as I am for what I did the last moment.
