bare proposal and prosecution of this design immediately brings every Man into a sense of all the main duties of Morality For upon the serious consideration of the nature of Things he cannot but discern in the result of all that Justice and Benevolence has a more effectual tendency to procure his Happiness than Fraud and Oppression And then if upon the force of that perswasion he set himself upon resolutions of Vertue and Honesty he will by a little care and experience gain such a skill in their practice as Men usually do prudence and dexterity in the management of those Affairs that they choose for the serious employment of their Lives For they according to the sagacity of their minds quickly grow subtil and curious in their own proper business so as to be able to perceive the less discernible degrees of advantage and disadvantage and to follow them with greater readiness and to improve them with greater art And so is it if they make it any part of the design of the business of their Lives to look after and obtain their own Contentment and so betake themselves to those courses and manners of life as are most apparently serviceable to that end they cannot but arrive at a competent knowledge and sufficiency not onely in the great and fundamental rules of Morality but in all the subordinate measures and less observable circumstances of good and evil So that it is made almost unavoidable even from the very first instinct of Nature but that all Men must have some sense and notion of their Duty because it is impossible but they must sometimes have some thoughts and some designs of being happy and then if they act in order to it according to the dictates of their own minds and the directions suggested to them by the nature of things they must determin themselves to pursue it in such ways as are agreeable to both i. e. by living according to the Laws of Nature and the Principles of Integrity Or by being sincere in their pretences of Kindness and Benevolence to all Men and faithfull to this Principle in their Entercourses and Transactions with them which alone will easily leade them into the knowledge and bring them under the obligation of all the Duties of Morality because they so naturally arise out of this Principle or are rather so apparently contain'd in it that whoever embraces it as the best Rule of his Actions and the most usefull Instrument of his Happiness cannot as occasion is offer'd but acknowledge himself bound to act according to the rules and prescriptions of all the particular Vertues that are but so many ways and means of pursuing this one general End And in whatsoever capacity we consider Mankind if we are resolved to seek our own happiness in conjunction with the common good and yet nothing is more manifest than that it is not to be compast upon any other terms this will secure a worthy and honest behaviour in all regards and towards all Relations Thus take them in their greater or their lesser Societies this still enforces them to pursue what is usefull or necessary to the good of all some things there are necessary to the welfare of Mankind in general and these take in the fundamental Rules of Morality and the Laws of Nations which are nothing else than the Law of Nature as exercised between Nation and Nation and some things there are that are usefull to one City or a certain Body of Men united under one civil Government and these are provided for by national and municipal Laws and some things there are that have a peculiar Influence upon the good of particular Families and these direct to us the performance of all oeconomical Duties as we stand engaged in our several domestick Relations and lastly some things there are that relate onely to the concernments of single Persons and by these is every Man obliged to deal justly and candidly in all his affairs and transactions So that if Men have any sense of or design for their own Happiness and if they will be upright in the use of those means that they cannot but understand to be most effectual to procure it this alone will irresistibly drive them into a sense and acknowledgment of all their respective obligations And in the same manner might I proceed to draw forth the whole System of all moral Vertues from this natural appetite of Happiness but that is too large an undertaking and more than is necessary to our present purpose it is enough that if Men will follow their own natural Instinct of self-love and take those courses as cannot but appear to themselves most agreeable to it that this alone will guide them into a sufficient knowledge of all the rules of Good and Evil. § IX Thirdly The observation of this Law is farther recommended and in some measure secured by its agreeableness with all the Appetites and Inclinations of humane Nature all our natural desires are not onely just and reasonable in themselves but they incline us to such designs and actions as naturally tend to the good and welfare of Mankind And if there be any practices that have a more remarkable consonancy to our Reasons and are of a greater necessity to our Happiness they are peculiarly gratefull and acceptable to our strongest Instincts and Appetites So that before a Man can cast off his Obedience to the Laws of Nature he must doe violence to all its Inclinations and pervert the bent of its first Impressions as well as affront the dictates of his Understanding i. e. Injustice and Cruelty are Unnatural as well as Unreasonable and all Men are guarded and prejudiced against such attempts by the temper and constitution of their Natures that recoils at an unjust or an unkind action and has some affections so tender that they cannot naturally endure to entertain injurious or wicked designs and withall so strong and vehement that they force him to a prosecution of the most commendable acts of love and kindness So that though they were not establish't into Laws nor received any Sanction from the meer inclinations of Nature though that they must if we suppose an Authour of Nature yet are they thereby endear'd to our care and observation and that is a very considerable advantage to secure their credit and reputation in the world in that it is impossible for any humour to keep up its esteem for any time that is not acceptable to Nature and therefore how much soever Men may labour to debauch their Minds by wicked Customs and affected Impieties yet in spite of all their sturdy Resolutions natural Affection will at last overcome and there are very few if any that can so far harden themselves as to shake off or vanquish all natural Endearments But for a more satisfactory account of this Principle it is necessary to specifie some particular Passions that incline Mankind to a love of Society and Good-nature or in other words to Justice and
and malignity derives from a much worse Principle viz. it s unworthy conceptions of the mean and narrow capacities of humane Nature to which it is necessary to reduce the proportion of humane Happiness And therefore the Epicureans allowing no other Principle of Being to Men than the Engine of their Bodies and by consequence no other sensation than what results from the contrivance of the parts of matter from hence it plainly appears that they resolve our sovereign delight purely into sensual enjoyments because upon their Principles we are from the condition of our Natures utterly uncapable of any other gratifications And therefore we dispute not with Epicurus whether Pleasure be the end of Vertue but what Pleasure If he had taken in the full capacity of humane Nature as it consists of Soul and Body he had said nothing less than the best and wisest Philosophers do or ought to say But when he intends the Pleasure of the Body alone he destroys the very Being of Vertue and humane Happiness and resolves all our enjoyment into meer brutishness and sensuality And that he intends nothing more is past all dispute to any Man that is not resolved to abuse himself in that he never taught any thing more constantly concern'dly and expresly than this That Man is nothing else beside the fabrick of his Body In this one desperate Principle lies all the poison of his Philosophy of old and so does that of another of late that makes Self-interest which is but another word for Pleasure the onely end and reason of all humane actions For if he had meant the Self-interest of the whole Man as it comprehends the interest of the Soul and Body that is his present and his future state it had been an honest and a pious assertion But when he intends nothing more than the narrow interest of our present advantage and takes off all regard to the future this defeats all the obligations of Vertue Religion and Honesty and leaves all Men at liberty to doe all things indifferently as they shall apprehend most convenient to their own private ends and interests ease and pleasure § XVIII Great numbers of Apologies have indeed been made by learned Men to abate or rather altogether excuse the meanness of Epicurus his Opinion but all in vain For what though as they plead he distinguish't between the Pleasures of the Body and the Mind and gave the latter the Preheminence yet 't is notorious not onely that by the Mind he never intended any Being distinct from the Body but onely the power of Imagination which in his Philosophy is supposed the highest instrument of sensual perceptions but what is more palpable as I shall shew more at large anon that he placed our supreme Felicity onely in the pleasures of the Body Though here their Opinion is so very foul that they are forced upon all turns to talk ambiguously and for the most part inconsistently with themselves sometimes they will have their sovereign Pleasure to signifie the actual enjoyments and gratifications of Sensuality sometimes nothing more than indolency or meer freedom from pain sometimes both together with the reflexion of the Mind upon them Thus Epicurus speaks out plainly that he understands not what Happiness is nor where it is to be found if it be not in the delights of the Palate and some other that modesty forbids to name So the wise Metrodorus for that title Epicurus was pleased to bestow upon his Friend as well as himself expresly teaches that the Belly is the onely proper seat of Happiness and that no Arts or Sciences are any way usefull or valuable than as they are subservient to its delights But because this account of the utmost emprovement of humane Happiness and Wisedom too seem'd too mean and brutish for those lofty expressions wherewith they had set off their own Happiness making it equal with that of the Gods themselves they sometime tell us that by Pleasure we are not to understand the meer actual delights and gratifications of the Body but partly a freedom from the pain and trouble that is removed thereby and chiefly those delightfull reflexions that we naturally enjoy upon it so that they intend not the pleasures of Sensuality but that innocent satisfaction of Mind that naturally ensues upon their enjoyment in that when the desires of the Appetite are quieted and its wants supplied the pure consideration of this affects the Mind of every wise Man with great joy and tranquility of thought And this poor slender Subtilty they fancy to be of mighty use to palliate the foulness of their Doctrine and to enhance their grave and philosophical account of the Divine Felicity of humane Nature and herein do all the Epicurean Apologists with a singular confidence triumph as if their great Master had undoubtedly placed our sovereign Happiness purely in the Operations of the Mind But beside what I have already observed that Epicurus spoke out too bluntly to find any subterfuge in this Apology it does not at all mend the matter that they would excuse For if to resolve all our Happiness into the actual delights of Sensuality be thought somewhat too shamefull to own it is very little more honourable to place it in entertaining the Fancy with reflections upon them And if it be below the dignity of humane Nature to doe nothing better than to Eat and Drink it is altogether as unworthy of it to think of nothing greater this is onely to remove its Happiness from the Table to the Couch All their boastings concerning the pleasures of the Mind amount to no more than this and therefore Plutarch when the Apology is made takes them up quick for it Yes yes says he this Plea were to some purpose if they would acknowledge any Pleasures wherewith the Mind might entertain it self distinct from those of the Body but when they openly declare and protest that it is not capable of any other satisfaction than what it enjoys in providing for or reflecting upon its sensual delights do they not avowedly resolve all the Happiness of the Mind into pure Sensuality when they onely make use of it as an Instrument to repeat or emprove that sort of Pleasures as it were by preserving the fumes of them in the Fancy and when the sensual delight it self is gone feeding upon its meer imagination So that all that this pretence amounts to is that the Mind continually pleases it self with the memory of past Pleasures and the hope of Pleasures to come And is not this a brave account of all the Wisedom and Happiness of the Mind of Man that it is onely a Cook to cater for the Body that it is ingenious to provide for the pleasures of the Flesh that it has a quick and a strong Fancy that makes it as happy as God himself by being perpetually fixed upon them At least this great satisfaction that they will have to be the onely privilege of a wise Man is the very height of
And there indeed lay all the Wisedom and all the Folly too of the Stoicks that they would needs change the Natures by the change of the Names of things And if there be any thing peculiar to their Philosophy it consists in the invention of new Words and pedantick Distinctions And therefore Tully very unhappily brings in Zeno thus rating all the Philosophers that went before him and that were content to suit their Principles to the Nature of Things and the Experience of Sense what can be more absurd more foolish and more insufferable than to reckon Health Plenty and all the other Comforts and Advantages of Life into the accounts of Good things I tell you Plato and you Aristotle you are dangerously and wofully mistaken to call those things Bona that are onely proeposita A desperate Errour that unavoidably destroys all the Rules and Obligations of Vertue and confounds all the differences of Good and Evil. This change of words as small a matter as it may appear has so much influence upon the practice and emprovement of Morality that sufficiently reâ—ompences all the pains and disputations of the Porch O magnam vim ingenii as he concludes causamque justam cur nova existeret disciplina O brave Zeno it is gallantly done to reform the Manners and the Wisedom of the World Thou upright as thou art wilt not be born away by carnal complyance with the Corruptions of the Age or by the Authority of self-seeking Philosophers that yield so much to the degenerate and low conceptions of the Vulgar as to acknowledge that it is some kind of blessing to enjoy the Comforts of Health and Plenty O brutish and Epicurean Sottishness to adopt such sordid such common and such uncertain things into any part of our Happiness This is to expose a wise Man as well as one of the common Heard to the insolence of Fortune and she may if she please in spite of Vertue riflle him of some share of his Happiness This is not to be endured that any thing should have any influence or power over a Sage beside his own sovereign and imperial Will And therefore however any Disease may rack or torment you keep your Courage and never confess it to be Evil 't is nothing worse than a meer Refusable Event And then no doubt the poor Man's Mind is at perfect ease and bravely fortified against all manner of Pain and Impatience And that is the great power of their Philosophy to asswage Pains and cure Diseases by exotick words and by giving it a greek name they can make Sickness Poverty or any other Calamity of Life harmless things And let a Vertuoso determine a fit of the Stone to be no more than 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a refusable thing and not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an Evil and he makes it as pleasant and agreeable to himself as the Joys of Paradise And think not to convince Zeno or Antisthenes of their mistake with racks and tortures alas they laugh at all your vain attempts and what have they to doe with the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 no they too are as much at ease in the Bull of Phalaris as upon a Bed of Roses The Fire has not so much power or confidence as to dare to singe one hair of a Philosophers Beard and if it should be so bold as to attempt them they will damp and basfle all its fury with a querk of Logick In short these Men talk more like Magicians than Philosophers and can doe any thing or be any thing by virtue of a strange word Ex iisdem verborum proestigiis as Tully to Cato regna nata vobis sunt imperia divitiae tantae quidem ut omnia quae ubique sint sapientis esse dicatis From these jugling tricks and legerdemains of Words you raise and as it were conjure up to your selves Kingdoms and Empires and Wealth so much that nothing less will satisfy you unless every wise Man among you may be master of the whole World But to leave them to their own conjuring Arts I shall briefly discourse with them according to the true and real account of things If then there be no such thing to be reasonably expected as a future State let us onely see what ground of Happiness is to be enjoyed from Vertue and what obligations of Vertue can be passed upon the Stoical Principles As for Happiness they lay the foundations of it as I have already observed upon that self-love that every Creature bears to it self and its own preservation Either then humane Nature is nothing but Body or compounded of Body and Soul if it be nothing but Body then upon the Stoical Principles it is capable of no Happiness at all seeing they pass nothing in their Account of Good and Evil but onely the Vertues of the Mind and therefore if they are nothing but Body all the qualities of their Mind are nothing But if beside that we have a Soul either it perishes with the Body or it survives it if it perishes then it is no more than the sense of the Body it self and it plainly casts us back upon the Epicurean Principle that there is no Happiness but present Pleasure and Interest if it survive then that entitles it to an Happiness beside that of this Life and so we are advanced to our own Hypothesis As for Vertue the whole Sect place it in one Catholick Principle of living according to Nature But then the difficulty is to discover what they mean by Nature and there every Man is a Sect to himself and we have as many different Accounts of it as there are ruling Schoolmasters of the Porch But what Interpretation soever we follow unless founded upon our Supposition we are still forced back to the School of Epicurus for his Principle too was to live according to Nature which was to enjoy the utmost Pleasure of this present Life and if there be no other State it is certain there can be no other way of living according to Nature Thus Zeno's 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. a constancy to a Man's self and some settled course of Life would amount to no more than this that every wise Man ought to consult how to live here with as much ease and pleasure as he can for if there be no other State he cannot be wisely constant in the pursuit of any better Design And then as for Cleanthes his Notion that living according to Nature is to comply with universal Nature that is to submit to the Providence of God This properly concerns the single Vertue of Patience and yet affords us no more Comfort than that forementioned Principle of the necessity of the thing for if I am any way fatally involved in misery whether by Providence or by Chance I am equally miserable But then this Rule if applied to the Duty of Man in general signifies nothing at all For what is it to follow the Providence of God unless it be
agrees exactly with all those other innumerable Records that I think I have proved unquestionable But if I am mistaken either in any of these or any other historical or chronological Nicities they are no more than the fringes of my Argument which is demonstrative either with or without them And now this being premised that the Reader take all matters of Fact as I have intended and represented them and lay the same stress upon them that I have done I will upon the perusal of the whole leave it to his own choice to make his own conclusion I am not ignorant that it is commonly lookt upon as an invidious thing for an Authour to seem to speak with any assurance of his own performance but for that I am not concern'd for I onely make use of my own liberty to judge of the nature and capacity of my Argument and leave others to theirs And as I would not be so vain as to overvalue so neither would I be so formal as to undervalue a Discourse onely because it is my own lest by this seeming and counterfeit modesty in my self I reflect but a scurvy and uncivil complement upon my Cause For Writers when all is done do not create their Topicks of Reasoning no more than Workers in the Mines do their Oar but onely dig up such Materials as the Vein will afford So that if I should pretend to less Evidence than my Cause has given me I should onely wrong that for I do not make but find it And therefore though I would not forestall my Reader 's Judgment much less upbraid his Ingenuity by pretending too confidently to demonstration but leave every Man to the result of his own impartial thoughts yet this I cannot but declare for my own part That the Evidence that the good Providence of God has given me of my Christian Faith is much greater than I could in reason have expected and I am sure much more than I should in modesty have desired And the satisfaction that upon a thorough Enquiry I have received is so very great that as much as I think my self obliged to the Goodness of the Divine Providence for the strange work of my Redemption I think my self not less obliged for the wonderfull and amasing Evidence that he has given me of it The security of the Gift is as valuable as the Gift it self For it is the certainty of our Title to good things that gives our Minds satisfaction in them And certainly it is the highest contentment that humane Nature is capable of to live not with a meer fluctuating Hope and unexamin'd Belief but a just and reasonable Assurance of immortal Happiness But if in this this following Discourse fall short of demonstration yet however I am ensured of its acceptance with all good Men from the goodness of its design which is to doe some honour to our dear Saviour and his Divine Religion And if by this Undertaking I have done any thing towards that it is enough and I may from this time forward as cheerfully as the good old Man did when he had his Saviour in his Arms sing my Nunc Dimittis THE CONTENTS PART I. A Demonstration of the Law of Nature from the Nature of Things and of the future State of Mankind from the Law of Nature § I. THE Enquiry after a Law of Nature supposes and depends upon the antecedent proof of an Authour of Nature pag. 1. § II. The Law of Nature not to be proved by Instincts and Notions within us but by the outward Appearances of Things p. 5. § III. The greater and the lesser Rules of Morality the greater evident to all the World the consent of Mankind as to their Obligation unknown to none without the most wilfull ignorance or most brutish stupidity The lesser are onely Rules of Decency one Direction about them all viz. To avoid unnatural imitations p. 9. § IV. All the Laws of Nature reduced to one Principle viz. Mutual Love and Kindness among all Mankind this demonstrated to be the will and intention of their Maker The absurdity of Mr. Hobbs's supposed state of War shewn though there were no Deity But if there be a Deity the Obligation of the Law of Nature unavoidable p. 17. § V. The end and design of Society its Divine Institution demonstrated The state of War shewn to be contradictory to humane Nature p. 25. § VI. The Divine Institution of Propriety and Dominion proved first from the limitedness of every Man's Nature secondly from its subserviency to the publick Good p. 35. § VII The Law of Nature made known and recommended to us from the constitution of all things within us First From the natural activity of the mind of Man p. 42. § VIII Secondly From that natural sense and desire that every Man has of his own Happiness p. 47. § IX Thirdly From some natural instincts and inclinations of humane Nature As First Conjunction of Sexes for propagation of the Kind Secondly The strength of natural Affection between Parents and Children Thirdly Natural Pity and Compassion Lastly From the Passion of Laughing p. 50. § X. All the particulars of the Argument recapitulated p. 57. § XI The Sanction of the Laws of Nature by natural Rewards and Penalties proved p. 60. § XII The first reward of Vertue is its own intrinsick pleasure and natural tendency to tranquility of Mind and health of Body p. 64. § XIII The second is the Conscience that a good Man has of his approving himself to the wisedom of the Divine Understanding and the acceptance of the Divine Will p. 69. § XIV The third is the endearment and recommendation of himself to the love and good-will of Mankind p. 74. § XV. The first natural Punishment of Injustice is the forfeiture of all other Mens Kindness The second is Insecurity The third is provoking the whole Society to endeavour his destruction in order to the publick Safety p. 79. § XVI As the Law of Nature follows upon the supposition of a Divine Providence so does the certainty of a future State upon the supposition of a Law of Nature in that without it it can never attain the end of its Institution and first because without it Mankind is utterly uncapable of Happiness this proved against all the Philosophers p. 84. § XVII And first against the Epicureans The Controversie with them stated not whether Pleasure be our sovereign Happiness but what Pleasure p. 88. § XVIII The meanness and foulness of Epicurus his Doctrine that all Happiness consists in sensual Pleasure proved against those several Apologies that are made to excuse it p. 91. § XIX There can be no Happiness in this Life if taken alone because of the fickleness and uncertainty of all its Enjoyments p. 96 § XX. The several prescriptions of Epicurus and Seneca against the miseries of Life shewn to be vain and trifling p. 99. § XXI The fear of Death proved an inevitable and insuperable misery of Life without the
Friendship and Honesty 1. Conjunction of Sexes for propagation of the kind and this becomes necessary from the same Causes that are necessary to the preservation of every single Person and this not onely inclines but compels them to delight in each others Society with the highest Affections of mutual Love and Kindness So that they cannot take care of their own support without being obliged to extend their Affections beyond themselves and this inclination is of greater force and has a stronger tendency to Society in Mankind than in any sort of Creatures in that it is constant and perpetual and not confined to certain times and seasons and that makes them more capable of these tender impressions and thus are the generality of Men carried on by the instigation of Nature as well as some other motives to seek Marriages and take upon them the care of Families and the education of Children and that obliges them to Justice and Civility as well for the sake of their domestick Relatives as for their own For the preservation of Propriety is as necessary to the preservation of Families as of Persons and therefore as I would not provoke my Neighbour to invade my own Enclosures I must avoid to lay waste or plunder his and as I would secure my own Plantation it concerns me to oblige the affections and assistence of all others that lie within the compass of my Affairs i. e. of all that are able to succour me with their Friendship or annoy me with their Injuries And thus are we all enforced to neighbourly kindnesses from the same principle that endears us to our nearest and natural Relations and this concern extends it self from House to House through whole Kingdoms and Countries for every Man has the same tenderness for his own Family as for himself and therefore are they all equally concern'd to have their Rights kept safe and inviolable And thus are great Empires and Common wealths but so many Combinations of so many Families for their own mutual defence and protection and now if Men are strongly inclined by Nature to enter into Families and if a regard to their own Families oblige them to be just and honest to their Neighbours and if both these combine them together into greater Societies both for their private and their common Safety the Institution of Government is so far from being any far fetch 't contrivance that it is natural for Men to fall into this Order its necessity is so great and so apparent that no Man can refuse or dislike it without being very unwise or very unnatural 2. The strength of natural Affection between Parents and Children and this proceeds from the same mechanical Necessity with the passion of self-love Eurip. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in that they are made up of the same material Principles that necessarily beget a sympathy between their native Contextures and Dispositions so that setting aside the workings of their Minds and the emprovements of their Understandings that alone must quickly oblige natural Relations to mutual Endearments The propriety of their Constitutions and the peculiar mold of their Bodies disposes them to agreeable passions and inclinations Children are as the Ancients phrase it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 pieces of their Parents and the matter of which they are formed is stampt with the same Characters and Propensions And this is very visible in the outward signatures and features of their Bodies but it is much more certain in the inward complexion and modification of their humours and it is impossible but that must breed an agreeableness of temper and affection At least from whencesoever this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may arise it is evident from the most universal Experience that there is no passion more natural or more acceptable to Mankind insomuch that no people were ever able to resist or to overcome the vehemence of its bent and inclination neither were there ever any able so much as to attempt it unless here and there such a Monster as affected both to put an affront upon the strongest principles of his own Nature and the most avowed practices of Mankind And their singularity is so unnatural that how boldly soever these wretches may seem to pretend to it they can never be confident or serious in such an enormous baseness It is impossible for any thing that has the shape or the bowels of a Man to be cruel to his own off-spring without a sad regret and recoil of his own Nature And now when this Instinct is imprinted upon us with such deep and lasting Characters when the force of its inclinations is so strong and vehement and when it is very nigh as natural and inseparable as the love of our selves it is a mighty inducement to seek peace and exercise good will as well for their sakes as our own Beside that this endears us to something out of our selves and obliges us to some concernment beyond our own meer self-interest and is the first beginning of a Society and lays the first foundations of a publick Good that spreads it self into a wider extent with the increase of Families and Kindreds which being related to each other as well as single Persons make up Kingdoms and Common-wealths beside all this it cannot but be a mighty inducement to all persons to settle Peace or Obligations of mutual Love as well for the sake of posterity as for their own in that it is equally necessary to the happiness of all Mankind in all times and all places and therefore as they desire the happiness of their off-spring which yet it is natural for them to desire as vehemently as their own they cannot but be concern'd for the continuance of Peace and Amity among them And this obliges them not onely to keep the World in good order for their own time but to take care of the settlement and tranquility of future Ages From whence proceed the establishments of Government and the standing Laws and prescriptions of Justice this then is plainly no inconsiderable enforcement to the practice of Vertue and Honesty when it is so absolutely necessary to the gratifying of so strong and so natural an Inclination 3. Natural Pity and Compassion The Divine Providence has implanted in the Nature and Constitution of humane Bodies a principle of Love and Tenderness and the bowels of Men are soft and apt to receive impressions from the complaints and calamities of their Brethren and they cannot without doing violence to themselves and their own natural sense of Humanity be altogether senseless of the miseries and infelicities of other Men. It is possible indeed that some few may so long accustom themselves to savageness and cruelty as to have no more sense of any kind and humane passions than Wolves and Tygers but then these are Monsters and such as have apparently debauch't or affronted all the principles and inclinations of their own Natures But as for the generality of Men their hearts are so tender and their natural
of the Society and the Safety of every Man's Life and the Quiet of every Man's Mind So that these things being thus apparently tied together by such an inevitable train of Causes and Effects and their connextion being so obvious and so palpable to every Man's notice what can we imagine the Divine Providence could have done more to recommend their Practice and enforce their Obligation and for a farther proof of this I might resume all the Heads of Discourse that I have already represented to discover the Sufficiency of the Publication of the Law of Nature and shew what particular Rewards are entail'd upon the performance of particular Duties and what Punishments are in the course of Nature inflicted upon their Neglect But what I have performed in the former part of this Discourse supersedes the necessity of any distinct account of it here because I have all along as I have proceeded demonstrated together with their subserviency to the publick Weal their serviceableness to every Man 's private Interest and that includes as well the Sanction as the Declaration of the Law And therefore without descending to all Particulars I shall onely in general treat of those Enforcements that Nature or the Authour of it has added to all his Laws and they alone will give us a sufficient account of their Obligation in that they are so many and so obvious to the most vulgar Experience and most easy Observation that there is nothing else that concerns the Life of Man the knowledge whereof is more familiar and more unavoidable § XII The first Reward of Vertue is its own natural and intrinsick Pleasure Acts of Love and Kindness are in themselves gratefull and agreeable to the temper of humane Nature and all Men feel a natural Deliciousness consequent upon every Exercise of their good-natur'd Passions And nothing affects the Mind with greater Complacency than to reflect upon its own inward Joy and Contentment So that the Delight of every vertuous Resolution doubles upon it self in that first it strikes our Minds with a direct Pleasure by its suitableness to our Natures and then our Minds entertain themselves with pleasant Reflections upon their own Worth and Tranquility And this is made so apparent from the plainest and most easy Experience that it cannot possibly escape any Man's Animadversion There is no Man that does not perceive more satisfaction in the Affections of Love and Joy and Good-will than in the black and unquiet Passions of Malice Envy and Hatred that do but torment the Mind with Anguish Restlesness and Confusion A base and ill-natur'd Disposition frets and vexes it self with perpetual male-contentedness and the Man that gives himself up to any spite and rancour of Mind is not so much as within the capacity of Happiness at least in the same proportion that good or bad Passions prevail in the Minds of Men in the same are they affected with Joy or Misery Now this being made so plain and visible in the whole Entercourse of humane Life it must needs lay a mighty Enforcement and manifest Obligation to a suitable Behaviour for what Motive can we conceive of nearer concernment than when the Action it self is its own Reward or Punishment And as the kind Passions are most agreeable to the temper of our Minds so are they most healthfull to the Constitution of our Bodies and have a natural Influence upon the Cheerfulness and Preservation of our Lives The Affections of Love and Hope and Delight cherish our natural Heat sweeten our radical Moisture beget gentle and vigorous Spirits promote the Circulation of the Bloud and make the Heart and all the vital Parts more brisk and lively Whereas on the contrary Hatred and Envy and Discontent stifle the motion of the Bloud oppress the Heart damp the Spirits and hinder the functions of the Brains and Nerves and breed Diseases and Obstructions of the Spleen For when the briskness of the vital Heat is checkt and the contraction of the Heart weakned the Bloud grows thick and cold in the Extremities of the Vessels and is not able to thrust it self forward through the remoter Branches of the Arteries into the Fibres of the Veins but stagnates in all the more narrow Passages of the Body especially in the more curious and delicate Vessels that are every where spread up and down through the substance of the Brain from whence proceed tremblings in the Heart paleness in the Face and if they are strong and inveterate scorbutick Distempers through the whole habit of the Body So that as a Man desires length of Life and preservation of Health he is obliged to shun all bitter and unkind Passions in that they are in the constitution of Nature necessary causes of Discrasies and Diseases and though their Symtoms unless they are very vehement are not so obvious and palpable yet are they certain from all the Experiments and Observations in natural Philosophy and in what proportion soever they prevail over Mens Minds in the same do they disorder and disturb their Bodies So that the Law of Nature is recommended to the nature of Man in all its Capacities and is suited to the satisfaction of all its respective Faculties of Body and Mind and by consequence is design'd to make up the completest and most entire Enjoyment of Pleasure and Happiness But besides this as it extends its Delight to all our Appetites so does it make the sense of their Felicity more intence and affecting and entertain the Mind with the most vehement and transporting Joys For there are but two things requisite to raise Pleasure up to the height of Beatitude and they are the spriteliness of the Act and the excellency of the Object Now the Good of all Mankind which is the general notion and scope of all Vertue being of the largest and most diffusive extent and the biggest Design that we can either desire or propose to our selves it calls forth all the vigour and earnestness of our Minds and employs the utmost force and vehemence of our Passions and transports us with perpetual Delight and Satisfaction Every Man enjoys a sensible Complacency in every act of Kindness his Good-will reflects back upon himself and when he is concern'd to procure anothers Happiness he thereby increases his own but when the Object of his Affections is so vast and unbounded a Good it excites a force and quickness of Mind proportionable to its own greatness it equalls the utmost capacity of all our Powers and we can never outdoe its worth it is sufficient to entertain all our Thoughts and to employ all our Actions and the Man that propounds this to himself as the delight of his Soul and the design of his Life never wants for objects or opportunities of Content but enjoys a complete and continual Felicity from the exercise of his own good-will and the reflections of his own Mind And though no Man can be capable of so pure and unmixed a Satisfaction in this Life there being
casheird the Epicurean Principles I shall be so much the more brief with the Stoicks partly because of the great agreement between their Paradoxes and the Decrees of Epicurus Both being onely so many stubborn Opinions taken up against the Nature of Things and the Experience of Mankind And notwithstanding that the Stoicks may seem so contradictory in many of their Propositions to the Epicureans yet after all they relie upon the same Principles and therefore when reduced to practice will resolve themselves into the same Actions But chiefly because they onely amuse us with the noise of wrangle and disputation so that almost all their Disquisitions upon this noble Argument spend themselves in vain and impertinent Contentions about technical Terms and Phrases that serve neither to promote the attainment nor to unfold the nature of true Happiness but rather to obstruct all serious and effectual endeavours after it by entertaining and diverting the Minds of Men with innumerable curious and useless Niceties And though the Writings of Cicero and Seneca may supply us with many excellent Rules and Helps for the tranquillity of our Lives yet their value is strangely abated and their use sadly defeated by their too much mixture of dry and barren Speculation insomuch that a Man may sooner arrive at the end of true Happiness than of their Disputes and Distinctions about it And for that Reason I shall wave enquiring into any of their logical and metaphysical Subtilties and onely represent in general the vanity of their attempts after Vertue and Happiness in their way of philosophising They therefore gravely considering with themselves that these outward things could never afford but very little and very uncertain satisfaction to the Minds of Men in that they were liable to so many Chances and foreign Contingencies and therefore being unwilling to be endebted to Fortune for their Content confined its disposal entirely within themselves so that every Man's Happiness was to be spun out of his own Bowels And thence discarding all the outward Advantages of Life Riches Honour Power Health and Friends as things altogether indifferent they summ'd up all the numbers of their Happiness singly in the Joys and Pleasures of a Life conducted by the Rules of Vertue This indeed were a great and glorious Account of things were it supported by any wise and sober Principles but alas it is so far from having any real Foundation that it is inconsistent with the first and fundamental Principle of humane Nature as it is own'd by the Stoicks themselves For they begin from the Catholick Doctrine of all the Philosophers the natural passion of Self-love that Mankind as well as every other Creature has to its own welfare and preservation to pursue what it supposes will advance its Content and Happiness and shun whatever may impair or destroy it Now what is humane Nature according to them but a Being compounded of Body and Soul and if so then it is obliged as it loves it self to seek the welfare of both How then comes it to pass that it should so far forsake it self as utterly to forget one moiety of it self in its pursuit of Happiness So that they must either renounce their first Principle of our Love to our whole selves or their first Maxim that our whole Happiness relates to the Mind alone But that is the peculiar vanity of these Men that they would be philosophising after the rate of Angels and discourse without considering that their Bodies are one half of their Natures and that their Souls are not disengaged from Matter and by consequence have sensual Appetites too gross to be satiated by bare Thoughts and Reflections and sensitive Pains too sharp to be allayed by Words and Subtilties This I say is the peculiar Pedantry of this Sect of Men to be disposed of by the power of Phrases without attending to the nature and reality of things and they would cheat our Senses and delude our Appetites with tricks and arts of Sophistry That which all the World dread and fly from they forbid us to acknowledge to be evil though we are convinced it is so by sad and sensible Experience And when Dionysius a reverend Sage of the Sect was so rackt and torn apeices with the torments of the Stone that the continuance and unintermission of his Pain had tired out his Patience and vanquish't his Apathy and at last forced him to cry out in the extremity of his Anguish O'Pain I yield I must and do acknowledge thee to be an Evil this Confession put Cleanthes that Bigot of Stoicism into such a fit of zeal and outrage that he could not refrain to chide and upbraid his Apostacy with the most satyrical sharpness of Expression and the poor Man was in great danger of being expell'd the Sect for not being able to outface his Misery But if you demand why Pain is not to be reckoned among things evil their answer is ready because it is not vicious and criminal This is a doubty Solution and worth the wagging of a Sages Beard for all the World knows Pain or Sickness to be no immorality 't is in vain to prove it but when I feel my self restless and miserable let them If they can convince me whether it be indifferent or equally eligible to be at ease in perfect Health or to endure the torments of a Feavour O yes say they for though it have no relation to or influence upon our Happiness yet ought it to be rejected because 't is unpleasant unnatural uneasy grievous and troublesome Here is plenty of Phrase and synonymous Expression for what other People in one word call Evil and by what title soever we may pretend to despise it that is no aswaging the Pain and if it be grevious I am not less miserable than if it were Evil. So that after all their Rants and Braveries they are forced to submit to the common Fate and Calamity of Mankind and to acknowledge from the conviction of their own Senses that a Sage however he may swagger is obnoxious to sadness and misery as well as other ordinary Mortals And so Seneca objects to himself without ever attempting to answer it You boast of mighty things things too great not onely to be wish't for but to be understood and when you have vented these glorious Braveries viz. that it is impossible for a wise Man to suffer poverty you deny not but that he may as often as others want Food and Raiment When you say that he cannot be obnoxious to madness you deny not but that he may be beside himself rave talk wildly and doe all the other Pranks of frantick People When you affirm that he cannot be any Man's Servant you deny not but that he may be sold for a Slave and doe all the offices of a Black And so when you have talk't after this proud and supercilious rate after all you submit to the real Condition of other Mortals onely abusing your selves with big and lofty Words
to approve of and comply with every thing that comes to pass If so then seeing Villany does as often prosper as Vertue by that alone the Providence of God would recommend it to our choice And that no doubt would be an admirable Rule of Justice and Honesty as we have found by late Experience that destroys all difference between Good and Evil but what is made by the event of things and changes their Natures with the change of Times and Fashions The third and last Opinion is that of Chrysippus that to follow Nature is to follow our own proper Nature or the guidance of our own Reason But then if there be no other Estate of things beside this every Man 's own natural Understanding will easily inform him that he is concern'd in nothing else then to consult his own present Pleasure and Advantage But this Conclusion is so evident that I shall pursue it no farther so that though after I had considered their general Principles I intended to have enter'd upon the particular Treatises of Seneca Antoninus and Epictetus I now find it absolutely needless of which any Man that will reade them over may satisfie himself for if he reade them with our Supposition he will find them for the main wise and rational Discourses but if without it they all vanish into meer Poetry and Elysian Dreams § XXVI In the third place the Platonists and from them the Peripateticks were pleased to enlarge the Bounds of humane Felicity and make our Happiness of equal extent with our Capacities making every thing an Ingredient thereof that is any way gratefull or suitable to our Natures And therefore to a vertuous Life they superadded all the Goods of Body and Fortune and to render a Man truely and completely happy they required beside the Endowments of the Mind all the other Comforts and Enjoyments of humane Life And this they assert reasonably enough from the first Principle of Nature in which alone all Sects of Philosophers agree that every sensible Being bears an innate love and kindness to it self and from that is possest with a natural desire not onely of its own preservation but of the most perfect state and condition that its Nature is capable of So that the parts and degrees of our Happiness are to be measur'd onely from the capacity and variety of our Faculties And therefore humane Nature being compounded of two Principles Body and Mind they must both be gratified in their respective Sensations to make up the adequate Notion of humane Happiness And as for the gratification of the Mind that they say consists principaly in the constant exercise of Vertue and subordinately in Knowledge Wisedom Contemplation or any other exercise of Wit and Ingenuity And then as for the Happiness and Well-being of the Body that consists chiefly in an healthfull sound and vigorous Constitution and subordinately in all the other accidental advantages of this present Life that are so many instruments of Pleasure and Delight These Men discourse more consistently than the other Sects to the constitution of humane Nature and give a fuller account of the condition of humane Happiness in that they take in all our Capacities and do not with the Epicureans consine it to the Body alone nor with the Stoicks to the Mind alone but take our Nature as they find it and suit its Happiness not to the workings of their own Imaginations but to our real state of Being But though these approach nearer than either of the former to the true notion of Happiness yet are they as distant as either of them from its acquisition Insomuch that when they come to reduce their Principle to practice they are at last forced to delude themselves with the very same Maximes and Paradoxes And therefore though Tully has in his Books de Finibus fully confuted the Hypotheses both of the Epicureans and Stoicks yet when he comes in his Tusculine Questions to discourse practically concerning the same things he at last produces no better grounds of comfort and contentment than those that he had at first rejected and is in the result of every Discourse either an Epicurean or a Stoick or both And this I shall prove distinctly in both the forementioned heads of dispute First that he is able to give no better account of Happiness than the Epicureans Nor secondly to lay any better grounds for the stability or assign any more effectual motives for the practice of Vertue From both which it will evidently appear that there is some further account to be given of these things than what he has given upon supposition of the Soul's Mortality if there be a Providence that has made Happiness our End and Vertue the means to attain it And first he begins with the greatest difficulty of all the fear of Death where all the philosophick Consolation he is able to give us is built upon little tricks and subtilties and chiefly upon that pitifull sophism of Epicurus that Death can never doe us any harm because when that is we are not But first let him say what he will it is inconsistent with his own first and fundamental Principle viz. That the most vehement passion of humane Nature is a love of it self and its own preservation and therefore to endeavour to reconcile a Man to utter death and dissolution is to perswade him to contradict himself and his own Nature This Principle then of self-preservation being once supposed as natural and necessary it prevents the very consideration of all manner of Discourses opposite to it And to what purpose is it for Tully with all his Wit and Eloquence to perswade me not to dread Death when he has beforehand told me it as the most undoubted truth in all Philosophy and so it is that I cannot avoid to love and desire Life He must first renounce his Principle and I my Nature before we can begin to philosophise upon this Argument And therefore secondly be it so that when Death is we are not yet what relief is this against the melancholy thoughts of the living who as much as they love their own existence by virtue of their former Principle cannot but as much dread by virtue of the same the apprehensions of its utter dissolution So that as long as this invincible instinct of Nature remains that can neither be destroyed nor commanded the anguish of this single Meditation is too close and affecting to be allayed or over-ruled by any other Or as himself has framed the Objection without so much as attempting to answer it Quid qui vivimus cum moriendum sit nonne miseri sumus Quae enim potest in vitâ esse jucunditas cum dies noctes cogitandum sit jam jamque esse moriendum What though after Death we shall never be sensible of the loss of Life yet whilst we live what comfort can we enjoy if we lie under such an invincible necessity of dying What freedom and satisfaction can we reap from all our
that wild Beast Man out of Caves and Dens into Societies thou wert the first Authour of all Domestick and Civil Friendships thou art the onely Foundress of all Laws and good Manners to thee alone doe we owe all the Comfort and Happiness of humane Life and to thy Divine Discipline do we entirely submit our selves one day spent according to thy Precepts is infinitely to be preferr'd to an Eternity of Vice or Luxury With many more such flights and transports are we entertain'd in this eloquent Discourse and it seems to have been written with a more than usual warmth and spirit out of that vehement delight he ever had to oblige and gratifie his justly admired Brutus But as for Arguments he is forced to satisfie himself with such as himself has already confuted For it is very observable that he here wholly quits his own Sects of the Peripateticks and Academicks and turns perfect Stoick and cashiers all the Goods both of Body and Fortune out of the accounts of Happiness and confines all the nature and exercise of it onely to a Life conducted by the Rules and Laws of Vertue First then let us see for what reasons he forsakes his own Discipline and secondly by what Arguments he establishes that of the Stoicks As for the reason of the first it is very obvious forasmuch as no Man can be Happy that is in Misery and therefore if that may be created by the Evils of Body or Fortune then no Man how good or wise soever is capable of being Happy For if there be three kinds of Good and three kinds of Evil as they say there is then he that is tortured with all the Evils of two of them that is he that is racked with all manner of pains in his Body and is oppressed with all the spites of Fortune in his Estate is notwithstanding all the Happiness that he can reap from the third sort of Good sufficiently miserable Secondly no Man can be happy that is not secure of his Happiness in that his very insecurity is so much Misery and therefore he that places two shares out of his own power can have no security of their Enjoyment and so no Happiness So that if health of Body and prosperity of Fortune be two necessary ingredients of humane Happiness the case is plain that it is impossible to secure that because it is impossible to ensure their continuance But of the uncertainty of these things I have already discoursed against the Epicureans and now I shall in a few words represent their Vanity Suppose then a Mamblessed with all the advantages that the whole World is able to afford him what is it all but a shadow and a phantasm And to make short work of it how vain and imaginary are the Prerogatives of the most envied and desired conditions of Life For Princes cannot enjoy beyond the capacities of private Men and though they may possess the whole World yet they can use and taste no more of it than inferiour Persons Their Appetites are as finite as other Mens and when they have all the delicacies that a wanton or a witty Luxury can devise they can but enjoy and seast to Satiety and so can the meanest and most despicable Cottager In short they enjoy nothing beyond others but tumults of Pomp and Ceremony unless great Cares and Anxieties make up any part of humane Happiness And of this Cardan propounds a very apt instance in Charles the Fifth King of Spain and Emperour of Rome the most fortunate Prince not onely of his own time but of many foregoing Ages who enjoyed a very large Empire not onely in Europe but in the Indies who was successfull in all his Enterprises beyond his hopes and desires who was not onely absolute Sovereign in his own Dominions but Umpire between all Christian Princes and disposed of Seigniories and Kingdoms at his imperial will and pleasure And yet this mighty Man lived always in danger of the Incursions of Solyman the Great was continually fretted with the endless Divisions of the German and Italian Princes perplexed with the loss of this Fleet and that Army Now says he shall we esteem this Man happy that was so perpetually disquieted with such cares such dangers such losses May I perish if I would not rather choose the condition of a poor Carthusian though it is in reality no better than that of a Slave And as if this had been a real prophesie that great Prince ratified it not many years after by his own choice taking Sanctuary from all his Greatness and Prosperity by entring into a monastick Life And should we ransack the Histories of all the most fortunate Princes in the World we should quickly find all their Felicity embitter'd with so many Griefs and Crosses as to conclude with Pliny after all his search that there never was any such thing as an happy Prince in the World And now when we have cut off the vanities of State and Grandieur that so much dazle and amuse those that know them not and so little satisfie those that do the delights of Nature that remain and that all Mankind doe or may equally enjoy though they are not altogether as useless and impertinent yet are they altogether as unable to minister any competent satisfaction to the Minds of Men. For as for the pleasures of the Body their enjoyment consists rather in allaying Miseries than in any true and real Delight for they are Pleasures upon no other account than their supplying some present wants and when the indigence of any Appetite is appeased its Pleasure then ceases and when Apicius has glutted himself with the choicest delicates that wit or wealth can compass he does then loathe and nauseate them more than he ever desired or relisht them Beside this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Plutarch styles it this little lump of Flesh is of all things the unfittest to be made the seat of Happiness not onely because all the Pleasures it is capable of are so vain short and transient but because it is liable to so many so sharp so lasting and so stubborn pains any one whereof is heavy enough to weigh down our biggest Happiness though it were much more solid and substantial than it is And yet there is no Man that does not labour under some distemper or other and though possibly at present he may be free from its actual pain yet he cannot avoid its perpetual fear and foresight and certainly no Man can be happy that lives either in actual misery or under the constant expectation of it and yet into these two seasons is humane Life as naturally divided as into Night and Day And then as for the Goods of Fortune no Man was scarce ever yet so compleatly lucky as to have her always to comply with his desires Aristotle here reckons up Riches Friends Authority good Birth vertuous Off-spring Strength Beauty a sufficiency not onely for a Man 's own personal Wants but all the
illic reperietis primum Neronem in hanc sectam cum maximè Romae orientem Caesariano gladio ferocisse Sed tali dedicatore damnationis nostrae etiam gloriamur Qai enim scit illum intelligere potest non nisi grande aliquod bonum à Nerone damnatum Tentaverat Domitianus portio Neronis de crudelitate sed qua homo facile coeptum repressit restitatis etiam quos relegaverat If you search your own Records you will find that Nero was the first Emperour that imbrued his hands in Christian Blood but we glory in the hatred of such an Enemy as Nero for whoever knows the Man cannot but know that it must be some very great good thing that Nero hates And Domitian too a piece of the same cruelty made the same attempt but having in him either some little humanity or the inconstancy of Mankind for which of these Tertullian means by his qua homo is altogether ambiguous he desisted from his design and revoked his own proscriptions § XXXIX The Third Persecution hapned under the Reign of Trajan and was set on foot upon variety of designs all which were very remote from any fair Inquiry into the cause of Christianity it self The first was the old jealousie of our Saviour's Kindred and the Line of David and this as Hegesippus informs us was started by the Jews and the Gnosticks against Symeon the Son of Cleophas the Brother of Joseph then Bishop of Jerusalem and that at a time when all the Royal Family of Judah wer sought after and dispatched out of the way as pretended Rivals of the Empire And for this reason was this good Old man put to death in the Hundred and one and twentieth year of his Age. The Second motive of this Persecution was the Emperour's great jealousie of those Societies call'd Heteriae that had often created great mischief and trouble to the Empire and therefore for the prevention of such disturbances he strictly forbad all manner of associations and publick meetings and in this point of Government he was so peremptory that when Pliny moved him to erect a Corporation of Smiths at Nicomedia as a great convenience to the City he would by no means be induced to allow it Now the Assemblies of Christians being grown numerous they fell under the edge of this Law and it was accordingly executed against them by the Governours and Pro consuls in their several Provinces It is commonly supposed that this Edict against these Illegal Societies was published on purpose to ensnare the Christian Meetings and it is possible it might be so yet there is no ground for it in History but on the contrary it is manifest that this Emperour was possest with a particular jealousie against all kinds of Assemblies as appears in the foremention'd case of the Smiths of Nicomedia And that he had no particular design against the Christians is evident from his answer to Pliny's Letter by which he inform'd the Emperour how he had executed this Edict in his Province against them and what numbers he had punished for their obstinacy against the Law but having made enquiry into the design of their meetings he was sufficiently satisfied of the innocence of the men and therefore desires directions from him after what manner he should proceed against them or whether at all The Emperour upon this account that he received of the peaceableness of the Christians takes off the severity of his Edict against them and gives instructions that they should not be sought for as being really innocent yet if they were accused and Convicted they should be punished according to Law that is for the good example of Government This seems to have been all that Emperour's design in his Laws and Proceedings against the Christians otherwise certainly he would never have remitted the Execution of a Law of which he was so tender onely for their sakes But because this was the first Prosecution in which we meet with any thing like legal Proceedings against the Christians I shall give an account of all the unjust and unreasonable methods of procedure against them both in this and the following Persecutions and so without troubling the Reader with a distinct Narrative of every one give him a true State of the grounds and reasons of all and from thence it will evidently appear that they proceeded not upon any sober enquiry but were meerly driven on by brutish folly and madness The heads of their accusation then were either real or feigned the feigned were apparently the contrivances of malice and the real were as apparently the charges of folly as I shall shew in each particular The first and great charge of all was the Christians contempt of their Gods and Religion But here the cause of Paganism was so foul and brutish that it was the most dishonourable abuse that ever was put upon humane nature and were not the matter of fact undeniably evident it would have been incredible that Mankind should ever sink into such a senseless stupidity The Barbarous People whom the Greeks and Romans so much despised Worshipped onely the Heavenly Bodies but these Polite these Civilised these Philosophical Nations deified the worst of things and the worst of men and replenisht Heaven with such a rout of Deities as made it look more like a Jail full of Rogues and Villains than an Habitation of Gods and they relate such foul things of them that one would scarce believe such ill reports of the vilest of Men and if their Enemies would have set themselves to have contrived Stories that might render them odious and contemptible the blackest calumnies they could have fastned upon them must have fall'n short of the extravagance of their own Reports And as were their Gods such was their Worship too all lewdness and Debauchery and such things were acted in their Temples as were not allowed in the publick Stews The foulest uncleannesses were their highest Devotions How lascivious and obscene were the Ceremonies of Cibele Priapus Flora and Venus who were Worshipt with nothing but the vilest Lust and Wantonness So foul and beastly were the celebrated Mysteries of Bacchus that the Senate of Rome it self was at last forced to banish them out of Italy as the foulest example of Lust and Debauchery In short the prodigious Stories that they told of their greatest Deities Saturn Jupiter Ceres or the Mother of the Gods as much exceeded the wickedness of Mankind as Heaven is higher than the Earth Though the truth is they represented them much worse than they were whilst they made them work Miracles to compass their brutish ends for when all is done they were neither better nor worse than Mortal Men. Saturn and Jupiter were known Tyrants in Crete Apollo a common Fidler the Muses Servant Maids AEsculapius a Tooth drawer in Arcadia Venus a known Strumpet to Cinyras King of Cyprus not long before the Trojan War These and like these were the Gods they Worshipt and how this folly first