We bear an immortal spirit within our material bodies

Now, said Aristotle to the scribe, write out my proof, which is pure reason that man bears an immortal spirit within his material body.

When you look at a man you see nothing before you but a man composed of skin, or, epidermis; and if you trusted to nothing but your eyes, without reason, you could not say that man was composed of anything but skin. Now there is the perfect form of a man composed of skin. Underneath the epidermis is the true skin, which is to the sight invisible. So there is another perfect form of man, composed of true skin. Underneath the true skin is another perfect form, composed of veins. Take away all else, and there stands the man of veins.

Next, there is the perfect arterial man. Next, there stands the perfect form of man, composed of nerves. Now, we have the perfect form of man, composed of muscles. Then there stands the perfect form of man, composed of bone – per se – a skeleton.

Now all this is matter, or material substance, which would be inert, or dead, if it were not for an animating principle that permeated every particle of this complex structure; and that animating principle is the perfect spiritual man; and this spiritual man is composed of magnetism and electricity.

Now there is a perfect form composed of magnetism and another one composed of electricity; and these two are the immortal, imperishable form of man; they are united, and go hand in hand. One cannot exist without the other. Now there is a third principle, which we will call the soul of man; and the magnetic form, and the electric form, bear the soul within them. The soul is the guiding principle of the spiritual body; and it clothes itself with magnetism and electricity; that is, it holds it together in the perfect form of man. Now, when the soul leaves the material body of man, it takes the magnetic and electric body with it; for these three bodies are inseparable. Magnetism, as all know, is invisible, except under certain conditions; and electricity is also an invisible substance, except under certain conditions and the soul is an invisible substance, except under certain conditions; and if man did not have a magnetic and an electric body, there would be no heat within him; for it is the uniting of magnetism and electricity that causes all light and heat. When the soul leaves the material body of a man, and has taken with it all the magnetism and electricity, the material body falls apart or decays; for its animating principle has left it – all that could think, hear, feel, or see, has left it.

Now this that has left the material body, we call the spiritual body; and it is triune in its nature – the intelligent body, the magnetic body, and the electric body – and this body has lost nothing but a gross covering of matter, which it no longer needs. All that thinks, hears, sees or feels, it retains; for these are of the soul and not of the material body; for if they were, the material body would still continue to think, hear, feel and see, just the same when the soul had fled. Now the soul has an electric and magnetic body; and the magnetic and the electric body are perfectly and evenly balanced; they are in exact equilibrium; they are the clothing and the vehicles of the soul; and these three bodies in one, are all invisible to the material sight of man, because composed of invisible substance, for all know that electricity is invisible, and magnetism is invisible, and the soul is invisible, but this body may be visible under certain conditions. Now the soul is the intelligent, or animating principle of the magnetic and electric body; and it can move its electric body with the swiftness of electricity, or it can gently float, or remain quiescent; and the magnetic body attracts and holds together the electric body; for the magnetic body permeates the electric body, and the intelligent soul permeates and guides the whole; and the God that man talks so much about, sits enthroned within his own body for God and the soul of man are one and the same person; and the soul of man first exists as an invisible germ within a little invisible magnetic and electric globe; male and female in one. Therefore, God is both male and female, equally balanced, and co-existent.

Aristotle (Archangel)