Things themselves cannot touch the soul. They cannot reach it or affect it in any way. The soul can only affect and move itself. Whatever beliefs and opinions the soul accepts for itself — that's what determines how external things seem to matter.
As for the things themselves, they touch not the soul, neither can they have any access unto it: neither can they of themselves any ways either affect it, or move it. For she herself alone can affect and move herself, and according as the dogmata and opinions are, which she doth vouchsafe herself; so are those things which, as accessories, have any co-existence with her.