Selected quad for the lemma: act_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
act_n	king_n	law_n	prerogative_n	3,673	5	10.4433	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A29780	Miracles, work's above and contrary to nature, or, An answer to a late translation out of Spinoza's Tractatus theologico-politicus, Mr. Hobbs's Leviathan, &c. published to undermine the truth and authority of miracles, Scripture, and religion, in a treatise entituled, Miracles no violation of the laws of nature.	Browne, Thomas, 1654?-1741.	1683 (1683)	Wing B5062; ESTC R1298	42,132	76

tacit Act of his Will c. 2. Where Mention is made of Means used but those such as cannot be conceived to be in their own Nature proper or sufficient to produce the Effect As the Clay wherewith our Saviour cured the Eyes of the Person born Blind the Spittle wherewith he loosed the tongue of the other that was Dumb c. These effects may be justly affirmed to be related in Scripture as Miracles not upon this account that the Scripture refers them immediately to God without mention of any train of Natural Causes subservient to him in their Production it appears we have some surer Grounds whereupon to proceed in examining what Effects in Scripture are related as Miracles though that which he would possess his Readers with the Opinion that it is the only 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we have be as has been shewed not only false but ridiculous and absurd From what has been said I may rationally draw these two consequences 1. That for the Scripture to refer any Effect immediately to God is not for it to relate the Effect as Miraculous and therefore from its referring the Effects of Nature immediately to God we cannot infer as he does that the Scripture relates many memorable things as Miracles which yet notwithstanding proceeded from the fixt and immutable Order of Nature 2. That there are yet many Effects plainly related in Scripture for Miracles by it 's express Declaration and it 's relating of them in such Terms from whence we may by undeniable Consequence gather as much And so supposing that the Scripture is a true History for which we have infinitely more evidence than for any other History in the World it follows evidently against his main Assertion from the relations of these miraculous Effects in Scripture that there really have been Miracles in the sense wherein he denies them i. e. Works beside above and contrary to Nature But this Corollary though very pertinent to our purpose is ex abundanti All that we were obliged to was to shew that the Conclusion which he draws from the Principles he takes out of Mr. Burnett is false and illogical Since therefore Mr. Burnett asserts positively that there are Miracles as is shewed above and nothing here produced out of him can infer or insinuate the contrary we may justly demand both in his Name and in behalf both of Religion Reason and good Logique that this part of the Premonition be returned into the Place from whence it came where it may stand with more Truth and Coherence and the Conclusion of the Translator left to stand apart by it self as a bold and I may say Impious Assertion without any Proof But not to wrong him he has some Succedaneous Arguments in the close of the Premonition but these ' as I before hinted are only some brief Touches of what we have after more at large out of Spinoza viz. That for God to work by a power immediate or supernatural is inconsistent with and Point-blank repugnant the Fundamental Laws and Constistutions of Nature It sounds somewhat like to the King's Prerogative being inconsistent with the Fundamental Laws of Property and Priviledge That these Laws are the Acts of the Divine Wisdom extend themselves to whatever events he hath Willed and Decreed that the power of Nature is infinite as being one and the same with the Power of God He has one thing which he asserts besides that among all the Miracles related to be done in favour of the Israelites there is not one that can be apodictically Demonstrated to be repugnant to the established Order of Nature Now here I am not bound to Demonstrate it for his sake for two Reasons 1. Because it were to prove a Negative 2. Because his main Ground or Spinoza's rather why he denies all supernatural Effects is not upon account of his own great reach in Natural Philosophy whereby he could undertake to solve Mechanically all the effects related in Scripture for Miraculous but from Arguments purely Metaphysical proving in his Opinion the impossibility of any such thing as a Work above Nature For to this he holds and not the other as appears from p. 21. of the Treatise where he concludes absolutely from his Arguments against the possibility of Miracles That all the Events that are truly related in Scripture to have come to pass proceeded necessarily according to the immutable Laws of Nature And that if any thing be found which can be apodictically Demonstrated to be repugnant to those Laws or not to have followed from them we may safely and piously believe the same not to have been dictated by Divine inspiration but impiously added to the Sacred Volumes by sacrilegious Men. So that unless the Scripture Miracles will submit to his Touch-stone unless they will come and lay open their Occult Qualities and the whole plot and confederacy of those natural Causes that combined to Effect them he has an Index Expurgatorius to blot their Names out of the holy Scripture and a Court of Inquisition for those that relate them to arraign them for Sacriledge and Impiety But I pass on to consider each part of the Treatise in order The Treatise is divided between Mr. Hobbs and Spinoza Mr. Hobbs speaks as far as to the middle of the third page out of the Chapter about Miracles in the third Part of his Leviathan He first explains the signification of the Word from its Etymology and other words in sacred and profane Writers of like import with it From its Etymology he deduces that it signifies A Work of God which men admire or wonder at Then proposes to enquire what works are such and reduces them to two kinds 1. Such as are rare and the like thereof seldom or never seen 2. Such as we cannot conceive to be produced by natural Causes but only by Gods immediate hand He gives some Instances of both An Oxe or an Horse speaking preter-natural Births the Conversion of a man into Stone and the first Rainbow that appeared That such Effects as these seem Miraculous because rare or no natural cause of them conceivable On the contrary the Works of Art however wonderful not reputed to be Miracles because their Causes known Upon the same ground he observes That the same thing may seem to be a Miracle to one Man and not to another in proportion to their different degrees of Knowledge and Experience So Eclipses Miracles to the vulgar not to Philosophers Simple Men made to believe that others can know their most secret Actions by Inspiration when the more wary and prudent perceive the juggle So far Mr. Hobbs here in his Leviathan he proceeds to assign another property of a Miracle viz. That it be wrought to confirm the Divine Mission of some Prophet or other and then to give a definition of it but there his Translator leaves him and passes on to Spinoza Before we follow him thither we may reflect a little 1. Upon