full of Obscurity and Darkness are founded on the Ignorance we are in of the Properties of our Soul 'T is from our having as I have elsewhere proved no clear Idea of our Being and that what is in us which gives way to be conquer'd by a Determination not invincible is absolutely unknown to us Furthermore if I cannot clearly answer these Objections I can answer by others which to me seem more incapable of Solution I can from Principles oppos'd to mine deduce more harsh and unlucky Consequences than those which are presum'd to follow from Liberty such as I have suppos'd in us But I engage not on the Particulars of all this as taking no delight to walk in the dark and to lead others upon Precipices THE ILLUSTRATION OR CONTINUATION OF THE TREATISE CONCERNING Nature and Grace What is meant by acting by General and Particular Wills I. I Say that God acts by General Wills when he acts in consequence of the General Laws which he has establish'd For Example I say that God acts in me by General Wills when he gives me the Sense of Pain when I am prick'd since in pursuance of the General and Efficacious Laws of Union of my Soul and Body which he has constituted he makes me suffer Pain when my Body's ill dispos'd So when a Bowl strikes another I say God moves the stricken by a General Will because he moves it in pursuance of the General and Efficacious Laws of the Communications of Motions God having generally Ordain'd that at the Instant of Collision of two Bodies the Motion should be distributed between them according to certain Proportions and 't is by the Efficacy of that General Will that Bodies have the force of moving one another II. I say on the contrary that God acts by Particular Wills when the Efficacy of his Will is not determin'd by some General Law to the producing any Effect Thus supposing God should make me feel the Pain of pricking whilst there happen'd no Change in my Body or in any Creature whatsover which determines him to act in me by some General Law I say that then God acts by Particular Wills So again supposing a Body begins to move without being stricken by another or without any Alteration happening in the Will of Spirits or in any other Creature which determines the Efficacy of some General Laws I say that God would move that Body by a Particular Will III. According to these Definitions it plainly appears that so far from denying Providence I suppose on the contrary that God works all in all things that the Nature of the Heathen Philosophers is a Chimera and that to speak properly Nature is nothing but the General Laws which God has establish'd for the Construction or Preservation of his Work by the simplest ways by an Action always uniform constant perfectly worthy of an infinite Wisdom and an universal Cause But that which I here suppose though certain for the Reasons I have given in The Search after Truth is not absolutely necessary to what I design to prove For if it be suppos'd that God had communicated his Power to the Creatures in such a manner as that surrounding Bodies had a real and true Force by which they might act on our Soul and make her happy and miserable by Pleasure and Pain and that Bodies in Motion had in themselves a certain Entity which they call Impress'd Quality that they can communicate it to those about them and with that Celerity and Uniformity we observe it would be still equally easie to prove what I intend For then the Efficacy of the concurrent Action of the General Cause would be necessarily determin'd by the Action of the Particular Cause God for Instance would be oblig'd by these Principles to afford his Concourse to a Body at the Instant of Collision that it might communicate its Motion to others which is still to act by virtue of a General Law Yet I do not argue upon that Supposition as believing it utterly false as I have shewn in the Third Chapter and Second Part of the Sixth Book of The Search after Truth in the Illustration of the same Chapter and elsewhere Which Truths suppos'd here follow the Notes by which we may discover whether an Effect be produc'd by a General or Particular Will MARKS by which we may judge whether an Effect be produc'd by a General or Particular Will IV. When we see an Effect immediately produc'd after the Action of an Occasionl Cause we ought to judge it produc'd by the Efficacy of a General Will. A Body moves immediately after the Collision the Collision of Bodies is the Action of an Occasional Cause Therefore this Body moves by a General Will. A Stone falls on the Head of a Man and kills him and this Stone falls like all others that is continues its Motion almost in Arithmetical Proportion 1 3 5 7 9 c. Which suppos'd I say it moves by the Efficacy of a General Will or by the Laws of the Communications of Motions as is easie to demonstrate V. When we see an Effect produc'd without the Mediation of the known Occasional Cause we have reason to think it produc'd by a Particular Will supposing this Effect be not manifestly unworthy of its Cause as I shall say hereafter For Example When a Body 's mov'd without being smitten by another there 's great Probability it was mov'd by a Particular Will but yet we cannot be confident of it For on Supposition of a General Law that Bodies should move according to the several Volitions of Angels or the like 't is visible this Body might be put in Motion without Impulsion the particular Will of some Angel being in this case able to determine the Will of the general Cause to move it Thus we may be often positive that God acts by general Wills but we cannot have the like Assurance that he acts by particular Wills even in the most averr'd Miracles VI. Since we have not a competent Knowledge of the various Combinations of Occasional Causes to discover whether such and such Effects arrive in consequence of their Action and are not sufficiently Intelligent to discover for Instance whether such a Rain be Natural or Miraculous produc'd by a necessary Consequence of the Communication of Motions or by a particular Will we must judge an Effect is produc'd by a General Will when 't is visible the Cause did not propose it self a particular End For the Wills of Intelligences have necessarily an End general Wills a general End and particular Wills a particular Design Nothing can be more plain and evident For Example Though I cannot discover whether a Shower of Rain which falls on a Meadow falls in consequence of general Laws or by a particular Will of God I have reason to think it falls by a general Will if I see it fall as well on the neighbouring Grounds or on the River which bounds the Meadow no less than on the Meadow it self For
six hours a day they sometimes study six different things 'T is visible that this fault proceeds from the same Cause as the others I have been speaking of For there is great probability that if those who studied in this manner knew evidently how disproportion'd it was to the Capacity of their Mind and that it was more apt to fill it with Error and Confusion than with true Science they would not let themselves be transported with the disorderly motives of their Passion and Vanity For indeed this is not the way to be satisfy'd in our pursuits but the most ready means to know nothing at all CHAP. IV. I. The Mind cannot dwell long upon Objects that have no Relation to it or that include not something of Infinity in them II. The Inconstancy of the Will is the Cause of that want of Application and consequently of Error III. Our Sensations take us up more than the Pure Idea's of the Mind IV. Which is the Source of the Corruption of our Morals V. And of the Ignorance of the Vulgar sort of Men. THE Mind of Man is not only subject to Error for want of being Infinite or for being of less Extent than the Objects of its Consideration as has been explain'd in the two last Chapters But because it is Inconstant and nothing Resolute in its Action and unable to keep the View fixt and steady on the Object long enough to examine all the parts of it The better to conceive the Cause of this Inconstancy and Levity of the Mind we must know that the Will is the Directress of its Action that the Will applies it to the Objects which it loves and that the same Will is it self in perpetual fluctuation and disquietude whereof I assign this to be the Cause 'T is not to be doubted but GOD is the Author of all things and has made them only for Himself and that he draws the Heart of Man towards him by a Natural and Invincible Impression which he perpetually influences him withal 'T is impossible for GOD to have will'd that there should be any Will that did not love Him or that lov'd Him less than any other Good if there could be any other besides Himself it being impossible for Him to ordain that a Will should not love that which was supreamly Amiable or should love that more which was less lovely And thus Natural Love must needs carry us to GOD as proceeding from GOD and nothing being able to stop the motions thereof unless GOD Himself that impresses them There is then no Will whatever but necessarily follows the motions of this Love The Righteous and the Wicked the Blessed and the Damned love GOD with this Love and 't is this Love in one sense that is the Cause of the Misery of the latter For this Natural Love we have for GOD being the same thing with the Natural Impression which carries us towards Good in general towards Infinite Soveraign Good 't is manifest that all Minds love GOD with this Love since there is no other that is the Universal the Infinite the Soveraign Good For lastly All Spirits and even the Divels passionately desire to be Happy and to possess the Soveraign Good and they desire it without Choice Deliberation and Liberty by the bent and necessity of their Nature Being therefore made for GOD for an Infinite Good for a Good that comprehends in Himself all Goods the Natural Motion of our Heart can never stop till we arrive to the possession of this Good The Will then labouring thus with a perpetual thirst being toss'd and agitated with Desires Eagerness and Restless longings for that Good it is not in Possession of cannot but with much Uneasiness suffer the Mind to dwell any time upon Abstract Truths which don't affect it and which it judges incapable of making it Happy It therefore pushes the Mind forward continually to the Research of other Objects and when in this hurry and agitation communicated to it by the Will it meets with any Object that carries the Mark of Good I mean that by approaching the Soul makes it sensible of some internal Delight or Satisfaction then this Thirst of the Heart rises anew these Desires Eagernesses and Fervencies are re-kindled and the Mind oblig'd to wait on them fixes it self only on the Object that either is or seems to be the cause of them to approximate it to the Soul that regales and feeds upon it for some time But the Emptiness of the Creatures being unable to fill the Infinite Capacity of the Heart of Man these little Pleasures instead of extinguishing its Thirst only provoke and inflame it and give the Soul a foolish and vain Hope of being satisfy'd in the multiplicity of Earthly Pleasures which produces a far greater Inconstancy and an inconceivable Levity in the Mind which ought to make the Discovery to the Soul of all these Goods It 's true when the Mind falls by chance upon an Object of an Infinite Nature or which includes something great and mighty in it its unsettledness and casting about ceases for some time For finding that this Object bears the badge and character of that which the Soul desires it dwells upon it and closes in with it for a considerable time But this closing and adhesion or rather obstinacy of the Mind to examine Subjects infinite or too vast and unweildy is as useless to it as that Levity wherewith it considers those that are proportion'd to its Capacity since 't is too weak to accomplish so difficult an Enterprise and in vain it endeavours to effect it That which must render the Soul happy is not as I may speak the Comprehension of an Infinite Object this she is not capable of but the Love and Fruition of an Infinite Good whereof the Will is capable through the Motion of Love continually impress'd on it by GOD Himself Which being thus we need not wonder at the Ignorance and Blindness of Mankind because their Mind being subjected to the Inconstancy and Levity of their Heart which incapacitate it from considering any thing with a serious Application is unable to penetrate into a subject any whit perplex'd and difficult For in short the Attention of the Mind is to intelligible Objects what a steady View of the Eyes is to those of Sight And as a Man that can't fix his Eyes on the Bodies that are about him can never see them well enough to distinguish the differences of their least parts and to discover all the Relations those little parts have to one another So a Man who cannot fix the Eye of his Mind upon the things desir'd to be known can never have a sufficient Knowledge to distinguish all the parts and to observe all the Relations that may possibly be between themselves or themselves and other subjects Yet it is certain that all our Knowledge consists in a clear View of the Relations things stand in to one another So that when it happens as
the Fire which causes it that Light is in the Air and Colours are upon colour'd Objects They have no Thought of any Motions of Imperceptible Bodies which are the Cause of these Sensations It is true they do not judge that Pain is in the Needle which pricks them in like manner as they judge that Heat is in the Fire But the reason of it is That the Needle and its Action are visible but the little parts of the Wood that proceed from the Fire and their Motion against our Hands are altogether invisible Thus seeing nothing that strikes upon our Hands when we warm our selves and yet feeling Heat in them we Naturally judge this Heat to be in the Fire for want of discovering any thing in it besides So that it is generally true that we attribute our Sensations to the Objects themselves when we are Ignorant of the Causes of these Sensations And because Pain and Titillation are produc'd by Sensible Bodies as by a Needle or a Feather which we both see and touch we for this Reason do not conclude that there is any thing in these Objects like the Sensations which they cause in us And yet I confess that we do not fail to judge Combustion is not in the Fire but only in the Hand though it proceed from the same cause i. e. the Action of the little parts of the Wood as well as Heat which yet we attribute to the Fire But the Reason of this is That Combustion is a Species of Pain For having often judg'd that Pain is not in the external Body which produces it we are induc'd to form the same Judgement of Combustion That which is another Reason of our Judging in this manner is that Pain or Combustion most strenuously applys our Soul to the consideration of the parts of her Body and this Intension of the Soul turns off her thoughts from any other thing Thus the Mind attributes the Sensation of Combustion to the Object that is most present and nigh her self And because we find presently after that the Combustion has left some visible marks in the part in which we felt the Pain this is a Confirmation of the Judgement we have made that Combustion is in the Hand But this is no Impediment why we should not embrace this general Rule That we are accustom'd to attribute our Sensations to Objects when-ever they act upon us by the Motion of some Invisible Parts And upon this ground it is that we usually believe Colours Light Smells Tasts Sounds and some other Sensations to be in the Air or in the External Objects which produce them for as much as all these Sensations are produc'd in us by the Motions of some Imperceptible Bodies CHAP. XII I. Of our Errors concerning the Motions of the Fibres of our Senses II. That we have no Perception of these Motions or that we confound them with our Sensations III. An Experiment that proves it IV. Three kinds of Sensations V. The Errors that accompanie them THE second thing that occurs in every Sensation is the Vibration of the Fibres of our Nerves which is communicated to the Brain And we err in confounding always this Vibration with the Sensation of the Soul and in judging there is no such Vibration at all when we have no Perception of it through the Senses We confound for instance the Vibration excited by the Fire in the Fibres of our Hand with the Sensation of Heat And we say the Heat is in the Hand But because we are insensible of any Vibration caus'd by Visible Objects in the Optick Nerve which is in the Fund of the Eye we think this Nerve is not vibrated at all nor cover'd with the Colours that we see On the contrary we judge these Colours are spread only on the surface of the External Objects Yet it is manifest by the following Experiment that the Colours are as strongly and lively express'd on the Fund of the Optick Nerve as in visible Objects For take but the Eye of an Ox just kill'd and strip off the Coats that are opposite to the Pupill and situate near the Optick Nerve putting a piece of very transparent Paper in their room This done place the Eye in the hole of a Window so as the Pupill may be towards the Air and the hind-part of the Eye in the Chamber which should be close shut up and darken'd all over And upon this the Colours of Objects that are out of the Chamber will appear to be spread upon the Fund of the Eye but painted topsy-turvy If it fortunes that the Colours are not lively enough on the account of the too little distance of the Objects represented in the Fund of the Eye the Eye must be lengthened by constringing the sides of it or shortned if the Objects are too remote We see by this Experiment that we ought to judge or perceive that Colours are in the Fund of the Eye in like manner as we judge that Heat is in our Hands if our Senses were given us for the Discovery of Truth and if Reason conducted us in the Judgments we make upon the Objects of our Senses But in accounting for this inconsistent Variety of our Judgements about Sensible Qualities it it must be consider'd That the Soul is so intimately united to her Body and moreover has contracted so much Carnality since the Fall that she attributes a great many things to the Body which are only peculiar to her Self and can hardly any longer distinguish her self from it Insomuch that she does not only attribute to it all the Sensations we are at present speaking of but also the Force of Imagination and even sometimes the Power of Reasoning For there have been a multitude of Philosophers stupid and senseless enough to believe the Soul was nothing else but the more refin'd and subtle part of the Body A Man that shall read Tertullian considerately will be but too sensibly convinc'd of what I say since he subscribes to this Opinion after a great number of Authors whose Authority he alledges This is so true that he endeavours to prove in his Book Concerning the Soul that we are oblig'd by Faith Scripture and particular Revelations to believe the Soul a Corporeal Being I design not a Refutation of his Notions because I have suppos'd a Man to have read some of St. Austin's or Mr. Des-Cartes's Works which will sufficiently discover the Extravagance of these Thoughts and confirm and corroborate the Mind in the Distinction of Extension and Thought of the Soul and Body The Soul then is so blind as not to know her self nor discern that her own Sensations do belong to her But to explain this it is necessary to distinguish in the Soul three kinds of Sensations some Vigorous and Lively others Faint and Languishing and lastly a Middle sort between these two The Vigorous and Lively Sensations are such as surprize and quicken the Mind with a sort of Violence as being
and likewise those that use them have Bodies diversly dispos'd Two Persons after Dinner though rising from the same Table must sensibly perceive in their Faculty of Imagining so great a Variety of Alterations as is impossible to be describ'd I confess those who are in a perfect state of Health perform Digestion so easily that the Chyle flowing into the Heart neither augments nor diminishes the Heat of it and is scarce any Obstruction to the Blood 's fermenting in the very same manner as if it enter'd all alone So that their Animal Spirits and consequently their Imaginative Faculty admit hardly any Change thereby But as for Old and Infirm People they find in themselves very sensible Alterations after a Repast They generally grow dull and sleepy at least their Imagination flags and languishes and has no longer any Briskness or Alacrity They can conceive nothing distinctly and are unable to apply themselves to any thing In a word they are quite different and other sort of People from what they were before But that those of a more sound and robust Complection may likewise have sensible proofs of what I have said they need only make reflection on what happens to them in Drinking Wine somewhat more freely than ordinary or on what would fall out upon their drinking Wine at one Meal and Water at another For it is certain that unless they be extreamly stupid or that their Body be of a make very extraordinary they will suddainly feel in themselves some Briskness or little Drousiness or some such other accidental thing Wine is so spirituous that it is Animal Spirits almost ready made But Spirits a little too libertine and unruly that not easily submit to the orders of the Will by reason of their Solidity and excessive Agitation Thus it produces even in Men that are of a most strong and vigorous Constitution greater Changes in the Imagination and in all the parts of the Body than Meats and other Liquors It gives a Man a Foil in Plautus's Expression and produces many Effects in the Mind less advantagious than those describ'd by Horace in these Lines Quid non Ebrietas designat operta recludit Spes jubet esse ratas in praelia trudit inermem Sollicitis animis onus eximit addocet artes Foecundi calices quem non fecere disertum Contractâ quem non in paupertate solutum It would be no hard matter to give a Reason for all the Principal Effects produc'd in the Animal Spirits and thereupon in the Brain and in the Soul it self by this Commixture of the Chyle and Blood as to explain how Wine exhilarates and gives a Man a certain Sprightliness of Mind when taken with Moderation why it Brutifies a Man in process of time by being drunk to excess why a Man is drousie after a good Meal and a great many others of like Nature for which very ridiculous Accounts are usually given But besides that I am not writing a Tract of Physicks I must have been necessitated to have given some Idea of the Anatomy of the Brain or have made some Supposition as Monsieur Des-Cartes has done before me in his Treatise concerning Man without which it were impossible to explain ones self But finally if a Man shall read with Attention that Discourse of Monsieur Des-Cartes he will possibly be satisfy'd as to all these particular Inquiries because that Author explains all these things at least he furnishes us with sufficient Knowledge of them to be able of our selves to discover them by Meditation provided we are any whit acquainted with his Principles CHAP. III. That the Air imploy'd in Respiration causes some Change in the Animal Spirits THE second general Cause of the Changes which happen in the Animal Spirits is the Air we breath For though it does not forthwith make such sensible Impressions as the Chyle yet it causes at long run what the Juices of Meats do in a much shorter time This Air passes out of the Branches of the Trachea into those of the Arteria Venosa Hence it mingles and ferments with the rest of the Blood in the Heart and according to its own particular Disposition and that of the Blood it produces very great Changes in the Animal Spirits and consequently in the Imaginative Faculty I know there are some Persons who will not be persuaded that the Air mixes with the Blood in the Lungs and Heart because they cannot discover with their Eyes the Passages in the Branches of the Trachea and in those of the Arteria Venosa through which the Air is communicated But the Action of the Intellect ought not to stop when that of the Senses can go no farther It can penetrate that which to them is impenetrable and lay hold on things which have no handle for the Senses 'T is not to be question'd but some parts of the Blood continually pass through the Branches of the Vena Arteriosa into those of the Trachea The Smell and Moisture of the Breath sufficiently prove it and yet the Passages of that Communication are imperceptible Why then may not the subtil parts of Air be allow'd to pass through the Branches of the Trachea into the Arteria Venosa though the Passages of this Communication be undiscernible In fine a much greater quantity of Humours transpire through the imperceptible Pores of the Arteries and the Skin than escape through the other Avenues of the Body and even the Pores of the most solid Metals are not so close but there are found Bodies in Nature little enough to find a free passage through them since otherwise these Pores would quickly be entirely stopt It is true that the course and ragged parts of the Air cannot penetrate through the ordinary Pores of Bodies and that Water it self though extreamly gross can glide through those crannies which will not give admittance to them But we speak not here of the course or branch'd and ragged Parts of Air they seem to be of little use to Fermentation We only speak of the little stiff and pungent Parts and such as have none or very few Branches to impede their passage because these are the fittest for the Fermentation of the Blood I might notwithstanding affirm upon the Testimony of Silvius that even the coursest Air passes from the Trachea to the Heart who testifies he has seen it pass thither by the Art and Ingenuity of Mr. de Swammerdam For 't is more reasonable to believe a Man who says he has seen it than a thousand others who talk at random It is certain then that the most refin'd and subtil Parts of Air which we breath enter into the Heart and there together with the Blood and Chyle keep up the Fire which gives Life and Motion to our Body and that according to their different Qualities they introduce great Changes in the Fermentation of the Blood and in the Animal Spirits We daily discover the Truth of this by the various Humours and the different Characters of
the Minds of Men of different Countries The Gascons for instance have a more brisk and lively Imagination than the Normans Those of Rhoan and Dieppe and Picardie differ all from one another And yet farther from the Low-Normans though at no great distance from each other But if we consider Men that live in Countries more remote we shall find much stranger Differences between them For instance an Italian a Flemming and a Dutch-Man To conclude there are places celebrated in all Ages for the Wisdom of their Inhabitants as Theman and Athens and others as notorious for their Stupidity as Thebes and Abdera and some others Athenis tenue coelum ex quo acutiores etiam putantur Attici crassum Thebis Cic. de Fato Abderitanae pectora plebis habes Mart. Boeotum in crasso jurares aëre natum Hor. CHAP. IV. I. Of the Change of the Spirits caus'd by the Nerves which go to the Heart and Lungs II. Of that which is caus'd by the Nerves which go to the Liver to the Spleen and Viscera III. That all that is perform'd without the concurrence of our Will but yet it cannot be done without a Providence THE third cause of the Changes which happen to the Animal Spirits is the most ordinary and most active of them all because it is this which produces maintains and corroborates all the Passions For our better understanding this we must know that the Nerves of the fifth sixth and eighth Conjugation shoot out the greatest part of their Branches into the Breast and Belly where they are most advantagiously imploy'd for the Preservation of the Body but most dangerously in regard to the Soul Because these Nerves in their Action depend not on the Will of Men as do these us'd in moving the Legs and Arms and other External Parts of the Body And they have a greater influence upon the Soul than the Soul has upon them We must know then that many of the Branches of the Nerves of the eighth Conjugation fall in among the Fibres of the Principal of all the Muscles the Heart that they encircle its Orifices its Auricles and its Arteries That they expatiate also into the Substance of the Lungs and thus by their different Motions produce very considerable Changes in the Blood For the Nerves which are dispers'd among the Fibres of the Heart causing it to Dilate and Contract it self in too hasty and violent a manner throw with an unusual force abundance of Blood towards the Head and all other External Parts of the Body Though sometimes these same Nerves have a quite contrary Effect As for the Nerves which surround the Orifices of the Heart it s Auricles and Arteries their use is much the same with that of the Registers wherewith the Chymists moderate the Heat of their Furnaces or of Cocks which are instrumental in Fountains to regulate the Course of their Waters For the use of these Nerves is to contract and dilate diversly the Orifices of the Heart and by that manner to hasten and retard the Entrance and the Exit of the Blood and so to augment and diminish the Heat of it Lastly The Nerves which are dispers'd over the Lungs have the same employment For the Lungs being made up only of the Branches of the Trachea of the Vena Arteriosa and the Arteria Venosa interwoven one among another it is plain that the Nerves which are dispers'd through their Substance by their Contraction must obstruct the Air from passing so freely out of the Branches of the Trachea and the Blood out of those of the Vena Arteriosa into the Arteria Venosa to discharge it self into the Heart Thus these Nerves according to their different agitation augment and diminish still the Heat and Motion of the Blood All the Passions furnish us with very sensible Experiments of these different Degrees of Heat of our Heart we manifestly feel its Diminution and Augmentation sometimes on a sudden And as we falsly judge our Sensations to be in the Parts of our Body and by occasion of them to be Excited in our Soul as has been explain'd in the foregoing Book So the generality of Philosophers imagine the Heart to be the Principal Seat of the Passions of the Soul and 't is even at this day the most common and receiv'd Opinion Now because the Imaginative Faculty receives considerable Changes by the Changes which happen in the Animal Spirits and because the Animal Spirits are very different according to the different Fermentation of the Blood perform'd in the Heart it is easie to discover the Reason of Passionate People's imagining things quite otherwise than those who consider'd the same sedately and in cold Blood The other Cause which exceedingly contributes to the Diminution and Augmentation of these Extraordinary Fermentations of the Blood in the Heart consists in the Action of many other Branches of the Nerves whereof we have been speaking These Branches are dispers'd throughout the Liver which contains the more subtil part of the Blood or that which is commonly call'd the Bile through the Spleen which contains the grosser part or the Melancholy through the Pancreas which contains an acid Juice most proper for Fermentation through the Stomach the Guts and the other parts which contain the Chyle Finally They are dispers'd and spread about all the parts that can any ways contribute to the varying the Fermentation of the Blood in the Heart There is moreover nothing even to the Arteries and Veins which has not a Connection with these Nerves as Dr. Willis has discover'd of the Inferiour Trunck of the Great Artery which is connected to them near the Heart of the Axillary Artery on the right side of the Emulgent Vein and several others Thus the use of the Nerves being to agitate the parts to which they are fastened diverse ways it is easie to conceive how for instance the Nerve which surrounds the Liver may by constringing it drive a great quantity of Bile into the Veins and the Canalis Cysticus which mingling with the Blood in the Veins and with the Chyle through the Canalis Cysticus enters the Heart and produces a Heat therein much more fervent than ordinary Thus when a Man is mov'd with some kind of Passions the Blood boyls in the Arteries and in the Veins and the Heat is diffus'd throughout the Body the Fire flies up into the Head which is presently fill'd with such a prodigious quantity of over-brisk and rapid Animal Spirits as by their impetuous Current hinder the Imagination from representing other things than those whose Images they form in the Brain that is from thinking on other Objects than those of the Predominant Passion 'T is so again with the little Nerves which run into the Spleen or into other parts which contain a Matter more gross and course and less capable of Heat and Motion they render the Imagination wholly Languid Drousy and Unactive by pouring into the Chanels of the Blood a Matter that is
that might still be brought that the fore-knowledge of these inconveniences ought not to have prevented GOD from executing his Design It may be affirm'd in one Sense that GOD had never a Design of making Monsters for it seems evident to me that supposing he should make but one Animal he would never make it Monstrous But his Design being to produce an admirably contriv'd Work by the most simple means and to unite all his Creatures to one another he fore-saw certain Effects that would necessarily follow from that Order and Nature of Things and that was not sufficient to make him change his Purpose and Design For though in conclusion a Monster consider'd disjunctively be an imperfect Work yet when conjoyn'd with the rest of the Creation it renders not the World imperfect We have sufficiently explain'd what the Imagination of a Mother is capable of working upon the Body of her Child Let us now examine the influence she has upon his Mind and let us try to discover the first and topmost irregularities of the Vnderstanding and Will of Men in their Original For this is our main and principal Design 'T is certain that the Traces of the Brain are accompany'd with Sensations and Idea's of the Soul and that the Motions of the Animal Spirits are never excited in the Body but there are Motions in the Soul correspondent to them In a word it is certain that all the Corporeal Passions and Sensations are attended with real Sensations and Passions of the Soul Now according to our first Supposition Mothers communicate to their Children the Traces of their Brain and consequently the Motions of their Animal Spirits Therefore they breed in the Mind of their Infants the same Sensations and Passions themselves are affected with and consequently corrupt their Moral and Intellectual Capacity several ways If it be so common for Children to bear imprinted in their Faces the Marks or Traces of the Idea that made an impression on their Mother though the Cutaneous Fibres make a stronger resistance to the current of the Spirits than the soft and tender parts of the Brain and the Spirits are in a greater Agitation in the Brain than towards the Surface of the Body it can't be reasonably doubted but the Animal Spirits of the Mother produce in the Brain of their Children many Tracks and Footsteps of their disorderly Motions Now the great Traces of the Brain and the Emotions of the Spirits answering to them being a long time preserv'd and sometimes for the whole course of a Man's Life it is plain that as there are few Women but have their Weaknesses and Failings and are disturb'd with some Passion or other during the Season of their Breeding there must needs be but few Children but what bring into the World with them a Mind some way or other preposterously fram'd and are born Slaves to some domineering Passion We have but too frequent Experience of these things and all Men know well enough that there are whole Families subject to great Weaknesses of Imagination which have been hereditarily transmitted from their Ancestors But it would be unnecessary here to give particular instances On the contrary it is more expedient for the Consolation of some Persons to affirm that these Infirmities of their Fore-fathers being not Natural or essential to the Nature of Man the Traces and Impresses of the Brain which were the cause of them may by degrees wear out and in time be quite effac'd Yet it will not be amiss to relate here an Instance of James I. King of England which is mention'd by Sir Kenelm Digby in his Book that he publish'd concerning Sympathetick Powder He asserts in that Book that Mary Stuart being big with King James some Scotch Lords rush'd into her Chamber and kill'd her Secretary who was an Italian before her Face though she interpos'd her self between them to prevent the Assassination that this Princess receiv'd some slight hurts and that the Fright she was put into made such deep impressions in her Imagination as were communicated to the Infant she bore in her Womb insomuch that King James her Son was unable all his Life to behold a naked Sword He says he experimentally knew it at the time he was Knighted For the King when he should have laid the Sword upon his Shoulder run it directly against his Face and had wounded him with it if some one had not guided it to the proper place There are so many Examples of this kind that it would be needless to turn over Authors for them And I believe there is no body will dispute the truth of these things For in short we see very many Persons that can't endure the sight of a Rat a Mouse a Cat or a Frog and especially creeping Creatures as Snakes and Serpents and who know no other Reason of these their extraordinary Aversions than the Fears their Mothers were put in by these several Creatures at the time of their going with Child But that which I would above all have observ'd upon this subject is That there are all appearances imaginable of Men's preserving to this day in their Brain the Traces and Impressions of their first Parents For as Animals produce others that are like them and with the like impresses in their Brain which are the Cause that Animals of the same Species have the same Sympathies and Antipathies and perform the same Actions at the same junctures and the like occasions So our First Parents after their Sin receiv'd such great Prints and deep Traces in their Brain through the impression of sensible Objects as might easily have been communicated to their Children Insomuch that the great Adheâ—ion which is found in us from our Mother's Womb to sensible Objects and the great distance betwixt us and GOD in this our imperfect state may in some measure be accounted for by what we have been saying For since there is a necessity from the establish'd Order of Nature that the Thoughts of the Soul should be conformable to the Traces of the Brain we may affirm that from the time of our Formation in our Mother's Belly we are under Sin and stain'd with the Corruption of our Parents since we Date from thence our vehement Application to sensible Pleasures Having in our Brain the like Characters and Impresses with those Persons who gave us Being we must necessarily have the same Thoughts and the same Inclinations with respect to Sensible Objects And thus we must come into the World with Concupiscence about us and infected with Original Sin We must be born with Concupiscence if Concupiscence be nothing but a Natural Effort made by the Traces of the Brain upon the Mind to unite it to things sensible And we must be born with Original Sin if Original Sin be nothing but the Reign of Concupiscence and that Effort grown as it were victorious and Master of the Infant 's Heart and Mind Now there is great probability that this Reign or Victory of
to their Passions which proceed from the Commotion of the Animal Spirits I shall not explain these things more at large because it is easie to judge of this Age by the others before treated of and to conclude that Old Men have more difficulty than others at conceiving what is said to them that they are more zealously devoted to their Prejudices and Ancient Opinions and consequently are more confirmed and strengthened in their Errors in their corrupt Habits and other things of like Nature 'T is only to be advertis'd That the state of Old Age is not precisely determined to Sixty or Seventy Years that all Old Men are not Dotards and that those who have pass'd the Sixtieth Year are not always delivered from the Passions of Youth and that we ought not to draw too general Consequences from the Principles establish'd CHAP. II. That the Animal Spirits generally run in the Tracks of Idea's that are most familiar to us which is the Reason of our preposterous Judgments I Have I think explain'd in the fore-going Chapters the various Changes happening in the Animal Spirits and in the Constitution of the Fibres of the Brain according to different Ages Wherefore supposing a Man to have meditated a little upon what has been said upon that Subject he must necessarily have a distinct Knowledge enough of the Imagination and of the most common Natural Causes of the differences observable between the Minds of Men since all the Changes happening in the Imagination and the Mind are only the Consequences of those which are to be found in the Animal Spirits and the Fibres that compose the Brain But there are many particular and such as we may call Moral Causes of the Changes which happen in the Imagination of Men namely Their different Conditions their various Employments and in a word their several ways of Living which deserve to be attentively consider'd because these sorts of Changes are the Causes of a numberless multitude of Errors every Man judging of things with reference to his own Condition We think it not so much our Business to stand to explain the Effects of some less customary Causes such as great Diseases surprizing Misfortunes and other unexpected Accidents which make very violent Impressions in the Brain and which sometimes totally subvert it because these things are of very rare occurrence and besides the Error such sort of Persons fall into are too gross to be contagious since they are palpable and discernible to all Mankind But that we may perfectly comprehend all the Changes the different conditions and states of Life produce in the Imagination 't is absolutely necessary to be call'd to mind that our Imagining Objects is only the framing Images thereof to our Selves and that these Images are nothing but the Traces delineated by the Animal Spirits in the Brain that we Imagine things so much stronglier as these Traces are more deep and better cut and as the Animal Spirits more frequently and violently pass through them that these Spirits by their frequent course so plain and open the Passage as to enter the same Tracks with greater readiness than any other neighbouring parts through which they either have not pass'd or not so frequently This is the most ordinary Cause of the Confusion and Falsity of our Idea's For the Animal Spirits which were directed by the Action of External Objects or even by the orders of the Soul to the production of certain Traces frequently produce others which indeed have some resemblance with them but are not altogether the Traces of these same Objects nor those the Soul desir'd to represent because the Animal Spirits finding some Resistance in the parts of the Brain through which they ought to pass are easily diverted to throng into the deep Traces of Idea's which are most familiar to us Here are some very gross and sensible Instances of these things When those who are not extraordinary short-sighted behold the Moon they see in her two Eyes a Nose and a Mouth in a word it looks to them as if they saw a Face tho there be nothing in her of what they fancy they perceive Many Persons see in her quite another thing And those who believe the Moon to be such as she appears would quickly be undeceived did they but behold her with Telescopes though of a moderate size or did they only consult the Descriptions Hevelius Riccioli and others have made Publick Now the Reason why a Man usually sees a Face in the Moon and not those irregular Blotches that are in her is because the Traces of a Face which are imprinted in the Brain are very deep for that we frequently look on Faces and with great Attention So that the Animal Spirits meeting with opposition in the other parts of the Brain easily swerve from the Direction the Light of the Moon impresses on them when a Man beholds her to accomodate themselves to the Traces whereunto Nature has affix'd the Idea's of a Face Besides that the apparent Magnitude of the Moon differing not much from a common head at a certain Distance She by her Impression forms such Traces as have Connection with those which represent a Nose a Mouth and Eyes and so she determines the Spirits to take their course in the Traces of a Face There are some who discern in the Moon a Man on Horse-back or something else than a Face because their Imagination having been briskly smitten with some particular Objects the Traces of these Objects open at any thing that bears the least Analogy to them 'T is upon the same grounds we Imagine we see Chariots Men Lions and other Animals in the Clouds when there is any little resemblance between their Figures and these Animals and all Men especially those who are used to Designing see sometimes Heads of Men on Walls whereon there are many irregular stains 'T is for the same Reason still that the Spirits of Wine entering without any Direction of the Will into the most familiar Traces make Men betray their Secrets of the greatest concernment and that when a Man sleeps he usually dreams of Objects he has seen in the Day-time which have form'd very great Traces in the Brain because the Soul is ever representing those things whereof she has the greatest and deepest Traces But see other Examples of a more complex kind A Distemper is new and it makes such havock and destruction as amazes all Men. This imprints Traces so deep in the Brain that this Disease is never absent from the Mind If this Disease be call'd for instance the Scurvy all Diseases must presently be call'd Scurvy the Scurvy is new therefore all new Distempers is the Scurvy The Scurvy is accompany'd with a dozen Symptoms whereof many are common to other Distempers that matters not If a sick Person fortunes to have any one of the Symptoms he must needs be sick of the Scurvy and other Distempers are never suspected or thought of that have the same Symptoms 'T is
great Precipice which a Man sees under him and from which there is danger of falling or the Traces of some bulky Body imminent over his Head and ready to fall and crush him is naturally Connected with that which represents Death and with a Commotion of the Spirits which disposes him to flight or the desire of flying it This Connection admits no alteration because 't is necessary it should always be the same and it consists in a disposition of the Fibres of the Brain which we bring with us into the World All the Connections which are not Natural may and ought to break because the different Circumstances of times and places ought to change to the end they may be useful to the Preservation of Life 'T is convenient the Partridge for instance should fly the Sports-man with his Gun at the season and the places of his pursuing the Game But there 's no necessity it should fly him in other places or at other times Thus 't is necessary all Animals for their Preservation should have certain Connections of Traces easily made and easily broken and that they should have others very difficult to be sever'd and lastly others incapable of Dissolution 'T is of very great use to make diligent enquiry into the different Effects these different Connections are able to produce For there are Effects which as they are very numerous so they are no less important to the Knowledge of Man and all things relating to him We shall see hereafter that these things are the principal Causes of our Errors But 't is time to return to the Subject we have promis'd to Discourse on and to explain the different Changes which happen to the Imagination of Men by reason of their different ways and purposes of Life CHAP. IV. I. That Men of Learning are the most subject to Error II. The Causes why Men had rather be guided by Authority than make use of their own Reason THE Differences observable in Men as to their Ways and Purposes of Life are almost infinite Their different Conditions different Employments different Posts and Offices and different Communities are innumerable These Differences are the Reason of Men's acting upon quite different Designs and Reasoning upon different Principles Even in the same Community wherein there should be but one Character of Mind and all the same Designs you shall rarely meet with several Persons whose Aims and Views are not different Their various Employments and their many Adhesions necessarily diversifie the Method and Manner they would take to accomplish those various things wherein they agree Whereby 't is manifest that it would be an impossible Undertaking to go about to explain in particular the Moral Causes of Error nor would it turn to any great Account should we do it in this place I design therefore only to speak of those Ways of Living that lead us into great multitudes of Errors and Errors of most dangerous Importance When these shall be explain'd we shall have open'd the way for the Mind to proceed farther and every one may discover at a single View and with the greatest ease imaginable the most hidden Causes of many particular Errors the Explication whereof would cost a world of Pains and Trouble When once the Mind sees clearly it delights to run to Truth and it runs to it with an inexpressible swiftness The Imployment that seems most necessary to be treated of at present by Reason of its producing most considerable Changes in the Imagination of Men and its conducting them into Errors most is that of Men of Books and Learning who make greater use of their Memory than Thought For Experience has ever manifested that those who have applied themselves the most fervently to the Reading of Books and to the Search of Truth are the Men that have led us into a very great part of our Errors 'T is much the same with those that Study as with those that Travel When a Traveller has unfortunately mistaken his way the farther he goes at the greater distance he is from his Journey 's end and he stâ—ll deviates so much more as he is industrious and in haste to arrive at the place design'd So the vehement pursuits Men make after Truth cause them to betake themselves to the Reading of Books wherein they think to find it or put them upon framing some Phantastical System of the things they desire to know wherewith when their Heads are full and heated they try by some fruitless Sallies and Attempts of Thought to recommend them to the taste of others with hopes to receive the Honours that are usually pay'd to the first Founders of Systems These two Imperfections are now to be consider'd 'T is not easie to be understood how it comes to pass that Men of Wit and Parts choose rather to trust to the Conduct of other Men's Understanding in the Search of Truth than to their own which GOD has given them There is doubtless infinitely more Pleasure as well as Honour to be conducted by a Man 's own Eyes than those of others And a Man who has good Eyes in his Head will never think of shutting them or plucking them out under the hopes of having a Guide And yet the use of the Understanding is to the use of the Eyes as the Understanding is to the Eyes and as the Understanding is infinitely superiour to the Eyes so the use of the Understanding is accompany'd with more solid Satisfactions and gives another sort of Content than Light and Colours give the Sight Notwithstanding Men employ their Eyes in Guiding and Conducting themselves but rarely make use of their Reason in Discovery of Truth But there are many Causes which contribute to this overthrow of Reason First Men's Natural Carelessness and Oscitation that will not let them be at the Pains of Thinking Secondly Their Incapacity to Meditate which they have contracted for want of applying themselves to it from their Youth as has been explain'd in the Ninth Chapter Thirdly The inconcernedness and little Love they have for Abstract Truths which are the Foundation of all that can be known in this World The Fourth Reason is the Satisfaction which accrues from the knowledge of Probabilities which are very agreeable and extreamly moving as being founded upon sensible Notions The Fifth Cause is that ridiculous Vanity which makes us affect the seeming Learned For those go by the Name of Learned who have read most Books The Knowledge of Opinions is of greater use in Conversation and serves better to catch the Admiration of the Vulgar than the Knowledge of True Philosophy which is learned by Meditation In the sixth place we may reckon that unreasonable Fancy which supposes the Ancients were more enlightned than we can be and that there is nothing left for us but what they have succeeded in The Seventh is a Disingenuous Respect mix'd with an absurd Curiosity which makes Men admire things that are most Remote and Ancient such as are far fetch'd or
Religion against Hereticks give frequent occasion to the same Hereticks of adhering obstinately to their Errors and treating the mysteries of Faith as Humane Opinions The Working and Agitation of the Mind and the Subtilties of the School are no fit means to make Men sensible of their own Weakness and to inspire them with that Spirit of Submission requisite to make them humbly resign to the Decisions of the Church On the contrary these Subtil and Humane Reasonings may kindle a secret Pride in their Heart and dispose them to imploy their Mind to evil purpose by framing a Religion suitable to its Capacity And so far are we from seeing Hereticks convinc'd by Philosophic Arguments and the Reading of Books purely Scholastical so as to acknowledge and condemn their Errors that on the contrary we find them daily taking constant occasion from the Weakness of some School-men's Arguings to turn the most Sacred mysteries of our Religion into Jest and Raillery which indeed are not establish'd on any Reason and Explications of Humane Derivation but only on Authority of the Word of GOD written or unwritten that is transmitted down to us by way of Tradition And indeed 't is impossible for Humane Reason to make us comprehend how one GOD is in Three Persons How the Body of our LORD can be really present in the Eucharist and how 't is consistent for Man to be free whilst GOD knows from all Eternity all that Man shall do The Reasons that are brought to prove and explain these things are such for the generality as convince none but those who are willing to admit them without Examination but look ridiculous and extravagant to Men minded to oppugn them and that are not settled in the Belief of the Foundation of these mysteries Nay it may be said that the Objections that are form'd against the Principal Articles of our Faith and especially against the mysteries of the TRINITY are so strong as cannot possiby admit of any clear evident and satisfactory Solution such I mean as one way or other does not shock our weak and staggering Reason These mysteries being in truth incomprehensible The best way of converting Hereticks is not then to accustom them to the Exercise of Reason by urging to them only uncertain Arguments deduc'd from Philosophy because the Truths we would instruct them in come not under the Scrutinity of Reason Nor is it always convenient to use Argument in Truths that can be made out by Reason as well as Tradition as the Immortality of the Soul Original Sin the necessity of Grace the corruption of Nature and some others for fear least the Mind having once tasted the Evidence of Argument upon these Questions will not acquiesce in those which are only prov'd by Tradition On the other hand they should be taught to quit their own Reason by making them sensible of its Weakness its Limitation and its Disproportion to our mysteries and when the Pride of their mind shall be humbled and brought down it will be easie to introduce them into the Sentiments of the Church by representing to them her Authority or explaining to them the Tradition of all Ages if they are capable of understanding it But whilst men are continually calling of their Sight from the Weakness and Limitation of their Mind their Courage will be puffed up with an indiscreet Presumption they will be dazled by an abusive Light and blinded with the love of Glory and so Hereticks will be continually Hereticks Philosophers obstinate and opinionated And Men will never leave disputing on all things they can dispute on as long as Disputation pleases them CHAP. III. I. The Philosophers dissipate or dissolve the force of their Mind by applying it to Subjects including too many Relations and depending on too many things and by observing no Method in their Studies II. An Instance taken from Aristotle III. That Geometricians on the contrary take a good Method in the Search of Truth Especially those who make use of Algebra and Analyticks IV. That their Method increases the strength of the Mind and that Aristotle's Logick lessens it V. Another Fault of Learned Men. MEN not only involve themselves in a multitude of Errors by being busied with Questions partaking of Infinity whilst their Mind is Finite but by over-matching their Mind which is but of a narrow Reach with those of a vast Comprehension It has been already said That as a piece of Wax was incapable of receiving many perfect and very distinct Figures so the Mind was incapable of receiving many distinct Idea's that is of perceiving many things distinctly at the same time Whence 't is easie to conclude that we should not apply our selves at first to the finding out occult Truths the Knowledge whereof depends on too many things some of which are unknown to us or not so familiar as they should be For we ought to study with order and make what we know distinctly serviceable to the Learning we know not or what we know but confusedly And yet the most part of those who take to any Study trouble not themselves so much They never make trial of their forces nor enter into themselves to try how far the reach of their Mind will go 'T is a secret Vanity and a disorderly Desire of Knowledge and not Reason which regulates their Studies For without consulting their Reason they undertake the fathoming the most hidden and inscrutable Truths and the resolving Questions which depend on such a multitude Relations that the most quick and piercing Mind would to the discovering their Truth with an absolute Certainty require several Ages and infinite Experiments to build upon In Medicine and Morality there are a vast many Questions of this nature all the Sciences of Bodies and their Qualities as of Animals Plants Mettals and their Properties are such Sciences as can never be made sufficiently evident or certain especially unless they are cultivated in in another manner than has been done and the most simple and least compos'd are began with on which those other depend But Men of study care not to be at the pains of a methodical Philosophy They are not agreed about the certainty of the Principles of Physics They frankly confess they know not the Nature of Bodies in general nor their Qualities And yet they fancy themselves able for instance to account for Old Men's Hairs growing White and their Teeth becoming Black and such like Questions which depend on so many Causes as 't is impossible to give any infallible Reason of them For to this 't is necessary to know wherein truly consists the Whiteness of Hairs in particular the Humours they are fed with the Strainers which are in the Body to let these Humours through the Conformation of the Root of the Hairs or of the Skin they pass through and the difference of all these things in a Young Man and an Old which is absolutely impossible or at least extreamly difficult to be known Aristotle for instance
to have any other Principal End of his Actions than Himself This is a common Notion with all Men capable of any Reflection and Holy Scripture will not suffer us to doubt that GOD has created all things for Himself It is necessary then not only that our Natural Love I mean the Motion he produces in our Mind should tend towards him but also that the Knowledge and the Light he gives it should discover something to us which is in Him For all that comes from GOD can have no other End but GOD. If GOD has made a Mind and given it the Sun for its Idea or for the immediate Object of its Knowledge GOD we should think had made that Mind and the Idea of that Mind for the Sun and not for Himself GOD cannot therefore make a Mind for the Knowledge of his Works were it not that this Mind should in some sort see GOD in contemplating his Works So that it may be said that unless we saw GOD in some manner we should see nothing at all just as we should love nothing at all except we lov'd GOD that is except GOD continually impress'd on us the love of Good in general For that Love being our Will we are unable to love any thing or will any thing without Him since we cannot love particular Goods but by determining towards these Goods the motion of Love that GOD gives us for Himself Thus as we love not any thing but by means of that necessary Love we have for GOD so we know nothing but through that necessary Knowledge we have of Him all the particular Idea's which we have of the Creatures being only the Restrictions of the Idea of the Creator as all the Motions of the Will towards the Creatures are only Determinations of the Motion towards the Creator I suppose there is no Theologist but will agree with me in this that the Impious love GOD with this Natural Love I speak of And St. Augustin and some other of the Fathers maintain'd it as a thing undoubted that the Wicked see in GOD the Rules of Morals and eternal Truths So that the Opinion I am explaining ought not to trouble any body Ab illa incommutabili luce Veritatis etiam impius dum ab ea avertitur quodammodo tangitur Hinc est quod etiam impii cogitant aeternitatem multa rectè reprehendunt rectéque laudant in hominum moribus Quibus ea tandem regulis judicant nisi in quibus vident quemadmodum quisque vivere debeat etiamsi nec ipsi eodem modo vivant Vbi autem eas vident Neque enim in sua natura Nam cum proculdubio mente ista videantur eorumque mentes constet esse mutabiles has verò regulas immutabiles videat quisquis in eis hoc videre potuerit ..... Vbinam ergo sunt istae regulae scriptae nisi in libro lucis illius quae veritas dicitur unde lex omnis justa describitur ...... in qua videt quid operandum sit etiam qui operatur injustitiam ipse est qui ab ea luce avertitur à qua tamen tangitur There are in St. Augustin infinite passages of the like Nature whereby he proves that we see GOD even in this Life through the Knowledge we have of eternal Truths Truth is uncreated immutable immense eternal and above all things It is true independently and by it self and is beholden to nothing else for its Perfection It renders the Creatures more perfect and all Spirits are naturally solicitous to know it nothing can have all these Perfections except GOD therefore Truth is GOD. We see immutable and eternal Truths therefore we see GOD. These are the Reasons of St. Augustin My own are somewhat different and I would not unjustly usurp the Authority of so Great a Man to countenance my Opinion 'T is my thoughts then that Truths even those which are eternal as That twice two are four are not so much as absolute Beings so far am I from believing them to be GOD. For 't is manifest that this Truth consists only in the Relation of Equality which is between twice two and four We do not say then with St. Augustin That we see GOD in seeing eternal Truths but in seeing the Idea's of these Truths for Idea's are real but the Equality between Idea's which is the Truth has nothing real in it When for instance we say the Cloth we measure is three Ells long The Cloth and the Ells are real but the Equality between the three Ells and the Cloth is no real Being but only a Relation intervening between them In saying Twice two are four the Idea's of the Numbers are real but the Equality between them is only a Relation And thus according to our own Opinion we see GOD in seeing eternal Truths not that these Truths are GOD but because the Idea's on which these Truths depend exist in GOD and perhaps too St. Augustin understood it so We are perswaded also that we know changeable and corruptible Truths in GOD though St. Augustin speaks only of the immutable and incorruptible since there is no need of subjecting GOD to any imperfection on this account nothing being more requir'd than that GOD gives us a Manifestation of what He has in Himself which relates to these things But when I say that we see in GOD material and sensible Things special Notice should be taken that I don't say We have the Sensations of them in GOD but only that they proceed from GOD who acts upon us For GOD perfectly knows sensible things but not by any Sensation In perceiving any thing of a sensible Nature two things occur in our Perception Sensation and Pure Idea The Sensation is a Modification of our Soul and 't is GOD who causes it in us which he is able to cause though He has it not Himself because he sees in the Idea he has of our Soul that it is capable of it As to the Idea which is found joyn'd to the Sensation that is in GOD and we see it because he is pleas'd to discover it to us And GOD joyns the Sensation to the Idea when the Objects are present to the intent we may believe them so and may enter into the Sentiments and Passions that we ought to have with relation to them We believe lastly that all Spirits see the eternal Laws no less than other things in GOD but with some difference They know the Divine Order and the Eternal Truths and even the Beings GOD has made according to this Order and these Truths through the Union they necessarily have with the WORD or the WISDOM of GOD who enlightens them as we have before explain'd But 't is through the impression they without intermission receive from the Will of GOD which carries them towards Him and strives as I may so say to conform their Will entirely like His own that they know this Order to be a Law I mean that they know the Eternal Laws
which methinks could not happen were it not for the facility they have at considering the Idea of Being in general which is always present to their Mind through the intimate presence of Him who includes all Beings If the vulgar Philosophers would be content to let their Physicks go for simple Logicks which furnish'd out Terms for the Discoursing of Natural things and if they would give those Men leave to be quiet who affix to these Terms distinct and particular Idea's to make themselves intelligible we should have nothing to reprehend in their Conduct But they set up themselves for the explaining Nature by general and abstract Idea's as if Nature were her self abstract and will absolutely have the Physicks of their Master Aristotle to be real Physicks which searches to the bottom of things and not a simple Logick only though it has nothing sufferable in it except it be some Definitions so loose and indefinite and some so general Terms as may be employ'd in all sorts of Philosophy In fine their Heads are so full of these imaginary Entities and these loose and indeterminate Idea's which spring up naturally in their Minds that they are too incapable of fixing their Thoughts for any time upon the real Idea's of things to discover their solidity and evidence And this is the Cause of that their extream ignorance of the true Principles of Natural Philosophy 'T is necessary to give a proof of it The Philosophers are sufficiently agreed That that ought to be look'd upon as the Essence of a thing which is acknowledg'd the First in that thing which is inseparable from it and on which all the Properties which belong to it depend So that to discover wherein consists the Essence of Matter we must consider all the Properties that comport with it or are included in the Idea we have of it as Hardness Softness Fluidness Motion Rest Figure Divisibility Impenetrability and Extension and enquire immediately which of these Attributes is inseparable from it Thus Fluidity Hardness Softness Motion and Rest being to be separated from Matter since there are many Bodies without Hardness Fluidity or Softness which are not in Motion or lastly which are not at rest it clearly follows that none of these Attributes are essential to it And now there remain only four which we conceive inseparable from Matter namely Figure Divisibility Impenetrability and Extension wherefore in order to understand which Attribute is to be taken for its Essence we must no longer think of separating them but only examine which is the Primary and that supposes none before it Now we easily discover that Figure Divisibility and Impenetrability suppose Extension and that Extension presupposes nothing But this being given Divisibility Impenetrability and Figure necessarily follow Extension then ought to be concluded the Essence of Matter on Supposition it has no other Attributes than those beforemention'd and such as are like them and I am perswaded no Man in the World can doubt of it when he has seriously consider'd it But all the difficulty is to know Whether Matter has not some other Attributes different from Extension and its Dependants so that Extension it self may not be essential to it but may suppose some other thing both as its Subject and its Priâ—ciple Many Men after having most attentively consider'd the Idea which they have of Matter by all the Attributes that are known of it after having meditated likewise on the Effects of Nature as much as their Strength and Capacity of Mind would permit them have been strongly convinc'd that Extension supposes not any thing in Matter whether because they have had no distinct and particular Idea of that thing pretended precedaneous to Extension or because they have found no visible Effect to prove it For even as to our being perswaded that a Watch hath no Entity different from the Matter it is compos'd of it suffices to know how the different Disposition of the Wheels is able to effect all the Movements of a Watch without having any other distinct Idea of what might possibly be the Cause of these Motions though there be many Logical to had So because these Persons have no distinct Idea of what could be in Matter were Extension taken away and see no Attribute that can explicate its Nature and because Extension being granted all the Attributes conceiv'd to belong to Matter are at the same time granted and because Matter is the Cause of no Effect which may not be conceiv'd producible by Extension diversly configur'd and diversly mov'd therefore they are perswaded that Extension is the Essence of Matter But as no Man can infallibly demonstrate there is not some Intelligence or New-created Entity in the Wheels of a Watch so no Man can without a particular Revelation be assur'd as of a Geometrical Demonstration that there is nothing but Extension diversly configur'd in a Stone For 't is absolutely possible for Extention to be joyn'd with something which we don't conceive because we have no Idea of it though it seems very unreasonable to believe and assert it it being contrary to Reason to assert what we neither know nor have any conception of Yet though we should suppose That there were something besides Extension in Matter yet that would be no Impediment if we well observe it why Extension should not be its Essence according to the Definition we have given of the Word For in short 't is absolutely necessary that every thing in the World should be either a Being or a Mode of being and no Thinking and Attentive Man can deny it But Extension is not the Mode of a Being therefore it is a Being But because Matter is not constituted of several Beings as Man who is compos'd of a Body and Mind Matter being one simple Being it is manifest that Matter is nothing but Extension Now to prove that Extension is not a Mode of Being but a real Being it must be observ'd That a Mode of Being cannot be conceiv'd but the Being must at the same time be conceiv'd whereof it is the Mode We cannot conceive Rotundity for Instance but we must conceive Extension because the Mode of Being or Existence being only the Being it self in such a sort of state the Roundness of tbe Wax for Instance being but the Wax it self in such a sort or fashion it is plain that we cannot conceive the Mode without the Being If then Extension were a Mode of Being we could not conceive Extension without the Being whereof Extension was the Mode whereas we easily conceive Extension all alone Wherefore it is not a Mode of Being but consequently a Being of it self And so it is the Essence of Matter since Matter is but a simple Being and not compos'd of many Beings as I have already said But many Philosophers have so accustom'd themselves to general Idea's and Logical Entities as to have their Mind more possess'd with them than those that are distinct particular and Physical Which is evident
pursuant to his first Will to give us the Sensation of Pleasure when we don't deserve it either because the Action we do is unprofitable or criminal or that being full of Sin we have no Right to demand a Recompence The Enjoyment of Sensible Pleasures was justly due to Man in his Regular Actions whilst he remain'd Innocent But â—ince the Fall there are no Sensible Pleasures entirely innocent or incapable of harming us when we taste them For it is commonly sufficient only to taste them to become their Slave Thirdly GOD being Just cannot chuse but punish one day the Violence that was done him by obliging him to reward with Pleasure criminal Actions committed against him When our Soul shall be dis-united from our Body GOD will be dispens'd from the Obligation he has impos'd upon himself of giving Sensations answerable to the Motions of the Animal Spirits but he will still be oblig'd to satisfie his Justice and so that will be the season of his Wrath and Vengeance Then though he change not the Order of Nature but remain ever fix'd and immutable in his first Will he will punish the unmerited Pleasures of the Voluptuous with Pains that will never have an end Fourthly Because the Certainty we have in this Life of the future Execution of that Justice exagiâ—ates the Mind with dreadful Anxieties and throws it into a sort of Despair which renders the Voluptuous miserable even amidst the greatest Pleasures Fifthly Because of those disquieting Remorses which almost ever attend the most Innocent Pleasures by reason we are inwardly convinc'd we don 't deserve them which Remorses rob us of a certain internal Joy that is found even in the Severities of Repentance And therefore though Pleasure be a Good yet it must be acknowledg'd that the Enjoyment of it is not always to our Advantage for the foregoing Reasons And for others of like nature most requisite to be known and easily deducible from them it must be granted that it is most commonly highly advantageous to suffer Pain though really an Evil. Nevertheless every Pleasure is a Good and actually makes happy the Enjoyer at the time of Enjoyment and so long as he enjoys it and every Pain is an Evil and makes the Sufferer actually unhappy at the instant of suffering and so much as he suffers it The Righteous and Holy may be said to be the most miserable of all Men in this Life and most worthy of Compassion Si in vita tantum in Christo speramus miserabiliores sumus omnibus hominibus says St. Paul For those that weep and suffer Persecution for Righteousness sake are not blessed for suffering Persecution for the sake of Righteousness but because the Kingdom of Heaven is Theirs and a great Reward is laid up for them in Heaven that is because they shall be happy Such as are persecuted for Righteousness are thereby Righteous Vertuous and Perfect as being in the Divine Order and because Perfection consists in the observing it But they are not happy because they suffer There shall be a time when they shall suffer no more and then they shall be happy as well as righteous and perfect However I deny not but the Righteous even in this Life may be in some measure happy by the Strength of their Hope and Faith which bring those future Goods as it were present to their Minds For it is certain that the vigorous and lively Hope of any Good brings it closer to the Mind and anticipates the Enjoyment and thus makes a Man happy in part since 't is the Taste and the Possession of Good 't is Pleasure that makes us happy Therefore we should not tell Men that Sensible Pleasures are not good and that they render the Possessors never the Happier since this is false and at the time of Temptation they find it so to their Misfortune They ought to be told That these Pleasures are in their own nature good and after a sort capable to make them happy yet for all that to be avoided for such like Reasons as the foremention'd but that they have not strength enough to withstand them of themselves because they desire to be happy by an invincible Inclination which these transitory Pleasures to be avoided by them in some measure satisfie and therefore are under a fatal necessity of being lost unless rescued and assisted These things are to be inculcated to them to give them a distinct Knowledge of their own Imbecillities and their need of a Redeemer We ought to speak to Men as our Lord and not as the Stoicks do who understand neither the Nature nor Distemper of an humane Mind We must continually tell them they are to hate and despise themselves and not look for a Settlement and Happiness here below that they must continually bear their Cross or the Instrument of their Suffering and lose their Life at present to save it everlastingly Lastly we must shew them their Obligation to act quite contrary to their Desires to make them sensible of their Impotence to Good For their Will is invincibly bent on Happiness which 't is impossible actually to obtain without doing what they have a Mind to Perhaps being sensible of their present Evils and knowing their future they will humble themselves on Earth possibly they will cry to Heaven will seek out a Mediator stand in fear of sensible Objects and conceive a salutary Abhorrence for whatever flatters Concupiscence and their Senses Probably they may enter into that Spirit of Prayer and Repentance so necessary to the obtaining Grace without which no Strength no Health no Salvation can be expected We are inwardly convinc'd that Pleasure is good which inward Conviction is not false for Pleasure is really so We are naturally convinc'd that Pleasure is the Character of Good and that natural Conviction is certainly true for whatever causes Pleasure is unquestionably very good and amiable But we are not assur'd that sensible Objects or even our Soul it self are capable of producing Pleasure in us For there is no reason why we should believe it but a thousand why we should not Thus sensible Objects are neither good nor amiable they are to be employ'd as serviceable to the Preservation of Life but we must not love them as being incapable of acting upon us The Soul ought only to love what is good to her and able to make her happier and more perfect and therefore nothing but what 's above her can be the Object of her Love since 't is evident her Perfection can derive from nothing that is not so But because we judge that a Thing is the Cause of some Effect when it constantly attends it we imagine that sensible Objects act on us because at their approach we have fresh Sensations and because we see not him who causes them really in us In tasting a Fruit we have a Sensation of Sweetness and we attribute that Sweetness to the Fruit which we judge both to cause it and contain it We
the Christians is quite different from that they deny not but Pain is an Evil and that it is hard to be separated from those things to which Nature has united us or to rid our selves from the Slavery Sin has reduc'd us to They agree that it is a Disorder that the Soul shall depend upon her Body but they own withall that she depends upon it and even so much that she cannot free her self from that Subjection but by the Grace of our Lord. I see saith St. Paul another Law in my Members warring against the Law of my Mind and bringing me into Captivity to the Law of Sin which is in my Members O wretched Man that I am who shall deliver me from the Body of this Death the Grace of God through Jesus Christ our Lord shall do it The Son of God his Apostles and all his true Disciples command us above all to be Patient because they know that Misâ—ry must be the Expectâ—tion and Portion of the Righteous In short true Christians or true Philosophers say nothing but what is agreeable to sound Reason and Experience whereas all Nature continually impugns the proud Opinion and presumption of the Stoicks The Christians know that to free themselves in some manner from the Subjection they are under they must endeavour to deprive themselves of all those things that they cannot enjoy without Pleasure nor want without Pain it being the only means to preserve that Peace and Liberty of Mind which they owe to their Deliverer's Beneficence On the contrary the Stoicks following the false Notions of their Chimerical Philophy imagine that they are wise and happy and that they need but think upon Vertue and Independency to become Vertuous and Independent Sound Reason and Experience assure us that the best way not to feel the smart of stinging is to shun the Nettle but the Stoicks say Sting me never so much I shall by the strength of my Mind and the help of my Philosophy raise my self so high above my Body that all your pricking shall not reach me I can demonstrate that my Happiness depends not upon it and that Pain is not an Evil and you shall see by the Colour of my Face and by the whole deportment of my Body that my Philosophy has made me invulnerable Their Pride bears up their Courage however it hinders not but that they should suffer Pain with Vexation and be really miserable so that their Union with their Body is not destroyed nor their Pain vanished but all this proceeds from their Union with other Men strengthened by the desire of their Esteem which in some manner withstands the Union of their Soul with their Body The sensible view of the Spectators to whom they are united stops the Course of the Animal Spirits that should follow upon the pain and blots out the Impression they would make upon their Face for was there no body to look on them that Phantasm of Constancy and Liberty of Mind would presently vanish So that the Stoicks do only in some degree withstand the Union of their Soul to their Body by making themselves greater Slaves to other Men to whom they are united by a drift of Glory And 't is therefore an undoubted truth that all Men are united to all sensible things both by Nature and their Concupiscence which may sufficiently be known by Experience and of which all the Actions of Mankind are sensible demonstrations though Reason seems to oppose it Though this Union be common to all Men 't is not however of an equal Extent and Strength in all for as it proceeds from the Knowledge of the Mind so it may be said that we are not actually united to unknown Objects A Clown in his Cottage does not concern himself with the Glory of his Prince and Country but only with the honour of his own and the Neighbouring Villages because his Knowledge does not extend farther The Union with such Objects as we have seen is stronger than the Union to those we have only imagin'd or heard relation of because by Sensation we are more strictly united to sensible things as leaving deeper Impressions in our Brain and moving the animal Spirits in a more violent manner than when they are only imagin'd Neither is that Union so strong in those that continually oppose it that they may adhere to the Goods of the Mind as it is in those who suffer themselves to be carried away and inslav'd by their Passions since Concupiscence increases and strengthens that Union Last of all the several Employments and States of this Life together with the various dispositions of divers Persons cause a considerable difference in that sensible Union which Men have with Earthly Goods Great Lords have greater Dependencies than other Men and their Chains as I may call them are longer The General of an Army depends on all his Souldiers because all his Souldiers reverence him This Slavery is often the Cause of his Valour and the desire of being esteem'd by those that are Witnesses of his Actions often drives him to Sacrifice to it more sensible and rational desires The same may be said of all Superiours and those that make a great Figure in the World Vanity being many times the Spur of their Vertue because the love of Glory is ordinarily stronger than the love of Truth I speak here of the love of Glory not as a simple Inclination but a Passion since that love may become sensible and is often attended with very lively and violent Commotions of the Animal Spirits Again the different Ages and Sexes are primary Causes of the difference of Passions Children love not the same things as adult and old Men or at least love them not with that Force and Constancy Women depend only on their Family and Neighbourhood but the dependencies of Men extend to their whole Country because 't is their part to defend it and that they are mightily taken up with those great Offices Honours and Commands that the State may bestow upon them There is such a variety in the Employments and Engagements of Men that it is impossible to explain them all The disposition of Mind in a Married Man is altogether different from that of a single Person for the former is in a manner wholly taken up with the care of his Family A Fryar has a Soul of another make and depends upon fewer things than the Men of the World and even than Secular Ecclesiasticks but he is stronger fastned to those few things One may argue in the same manner concerning the different States of Men in general but the little sensible engagements cannot be explain'd because they differ almost in every private Person it often hapning that men have particular Engagements altogether opposite to those that they ought to have in reference to their condition But though the different Genius and Inclinations of Men Women Old Men Young Men Rich Poor Learned and Ignorant in short of all the different Sexes Ages and
on a sudden design'd the destroying of the whole Nation that his Revenge might be the more splendid Two Men sue each other about a Piece of Land they ought only to produce in Court their Titles to it and to say nothing but what relates to the Case or to set it off fair However they seldom fail to slander one another to contradict each other in every thing to raise trifling Contestations and Accusations and to intricate the Suit with an infinity of Accessary Circumstances which confound the Principal In short the Passions reach as far as the sight of the Mind does in those that are affected by them I would say there is nothing to which we may suppose their Object to be related but their Motion will extend to it which is done after the following manner The Tracks of the Objects are so connected to each other in the Brain that it is impossible the Course of the Spirits should violently move any one of them without raising several others at the same time The principal Idea of the Thing perceiv'd is therefore necessarily accompanied with a vast number of accessary Ideas which increase more and more as the Impression of the Animal Spirits is more violent Now that Impression cannot but be very violent in the Passions because they continually hurry into the Brain abundance of such Spirits as are fit to preserve the Traces of the Ideas which represent their Object So that the Motion of Love or Hatred extends not only to the Chief Object of either Passion but also to all the Things that are found any ways relating to it because the Motion of the Soul in the Passion follows the Perception of the Mind as the Motion of the Animal Spirits in the Brain follows the Traces of the Brain as well those that excite the principal Idea of the Passion 's Object as those that are related to it And therefore we must not be surprized if Men carry their Hatred or Love to such a heighth and commit such strange and capricious Actions Every one of those Effects has its proper Cause though unknown to us because their accessary Ideas being not always like to ours we cannot rightly judge of them So that Men act always by some particular Reason even in those Actions that appear most extravagant to us CHAP. VII Of the Passions in particular And first Of Admiration and its ill Effects WHatever I have said hitherto of the Passions is general yet 't is no hard matter to draw particular Inferences from it If one do but reflect upon what occurs in his own Breast and upon the Actions of others he will discover at one View a greater number of those Truths than can be explain'd in a considerable time However there are so few who think of retiring into themselves and make any Attempt to that purpose that to quicken them and raise their Attention it will not be amiss somewhat to descend into Particulars It seems when we handle or strike our selves that we are almost insensible whereas if we be but never so little touched by others we receive such lively Sensations as awaken our Attention In a word as it never comes into our Mind to tickle our selves and if it did perhaps the Attempt would be unsuccessful So almost for the same Reason the Soul cares not to feel and sound her self is presently disgusted at that sort of Exercise and commonly is incapable of feeling or knowing all the Parts that belong to her till touch'd and made sensible to her by others So that it will be necessary for the facilitating some People in acquiring the Knowledge of themselves to mention some of the particular Effects of the Passions to â—each them by touching them of what Make and Constitution their Soul is of In the mean while those that shall read the following Thoughts must be forewarn'd that they will not always be touched to the Quick nor be aware that they are subject to the Passions and Errours of which I shall speak because particular Passions are not always the same in all Men. All Men indeed have the same natural Inclinations which referr not to the Body and likewise all those that relate to it when 't is in a very good Constitution But its various Tempers and frequent Alterations produce an infinite Variety in particular Passions To which diversity of Constitutions if that variety of Objects be added which cause very different Impressions upon those who follow not the same Employments and manner of Life it will plainly appear that such a Person who is lively touched by some Things in one Place of his Soul may be absolutely insensible as to many others so that we should commonly mistake should we always judge of the Commotions of others by what we feel in our selves I am not afraid of being deceiv'd when I assert That all Men would be happy for I fully and certainly know that Chinese and Tartars Angels and Devils in a word all Spirits whatsoever have an Inclination for Felicity Nay I know that God shall never produce any Spirit without that Desire I never saw either Chinese or Tartar so that I never learn'd it from Experience nor yet from my inward Consciousness which only teaches me that I would my self be happy God alone can inwardly convince me that all other Men Angels and Devils desire Happiness and he only can assure me that he will never create a Spirit that shall not care for Felicity For who else can positively assure me of what he does and even thinks And as he cannot deceive me so I may safely relie on what I learn from him And therefore I am certain that all Men would be happy because that Inclination is natural and independent on the Body It goes quite otherwise with particular Passions For because I love Musick Dancing Hunting Sweet-meats high-season'd Dishes c. I cannot certainly conclude that other Men have the same Passions Pleasure is doubtless sweet and grateful to Men but all find it not in the same Things The Love of Pleasure is a Natural Inclination not depending upon the Body and therefore general to all Men But the Love of Musick Hunting or Dancing is not general because the Disposition of the Body from which it proceeds being different in several Persons the Passions they produce are not always the same General Passions as Desire Joy and Sorrow are the Mean betwixt natural Inclinations and particular Passions They are general as well as Inclinations but they are not always of the same strength because the Cause which produces and feeds them is not always equally active There is an infinite Variety in the Degrees of Agitation of the Animal Spirits in their Plenty and Scarcity in their Solidity and Fineness and in the Relation betwixt the Fibres of the Brain and those Spirits And therefore it often happens that we touch not Men in any part of their Soul when we treat of particular Passions but if they chance to
for instance to be humble and timorous and even outwardly to testifie that Disposition of the Mind by a modest Look and respectful or timorous Deportment when we are in the Presence of a Person of Quality or one that is proud and powerful It being almost ever profitable for the Good of the Body that the Imagination should stoop before sensible Grandeur and give it outward Marks of its inward Submission and Veneration But this is done naturally and machinally without the Consent of the Will and sometimes notwithstanding its Opposition Even such Beasts as Dogs which stand in need of prevailing upon those with whom they live have ordinarily their Bodies so disposed that it machinally takes the Posture that is most suitable in reference to those that are about them For that is absolutely necessary to their Preservation And if Birds and some other Creatures want such a Disposition 't is because they need not asswage the Fury of those whom they can escape by Flight or whose Help is not necessary for the Preservation of their Life It can never be too much observ'd that all the Passions which are raised in us at the sight of something external machinally spread on the Face those Looks that are fit and suited to our present State that is those that are apt by their Impression machinally to dispose the Spectators to such Passions and Motions as are useful for the Good of Civil Society Admiration it self when produced in us by the Perception of something external which others can consider as well as we puts the Face in such a Shape as is fit to strike others with a machinal Impression of Admiration and which acts so regularly on the Brain that the Spirits contain'd in it are driven to the Muscles of the Face to fashion it into a Look altogether like our own This Communication of the Passions of the Soul and the Animal Spirits to unite Men together in reference to Good and Evil and to make them altogether like not only by the Disposition of their Mind but also by the Posture of their Body is so much the greater and more observable as the Passions are more violent by reason that the Animal Spirits are then agitated with more strength And this must needs be so because the Good and Evil being then greater or more present requires a greater Application and a stricter Association of Men to seek or avoid them But when the Passions are moderate as Admiration usually is their Communication is insensible and they do not alter the Countenance by which the Communication uses to be wrought For there being no urgent Occasion it would be needless to put a Force on the Imagination of others or to take them off from their Business to which their Application is perhaps more requisite than to the looking on the Causes of those Passions There is nothing more wonderful than that Oeconomy of the Passions and Dispositions of the Body in reference to the surrounding Objects All our machinal Actions are most becoming the Wisdom of our Maker God has made us susceptible of all those Passions chiefly to unite us with all sensible Things for the Preservation of Society and of our corporeal Being and his Design is so exactly perform'd by the Construction of his Work that we cannot but admire his Wisdom in the Contrivance of the Springs and Texture of it However our Passions and all those imperceptible Bands which tie us to the surrounding Objects often prove by our own Fault fruitful Causes of Errours and Disorders For we make not of our Passions the Use we ought to do we allow them every thing and know not so much as the Bounds we ought to prescribe to their Power so that the weakest and least moving Passions as Admiration for instance have strength enough to draw us into Errour Some Examples whereof are these When Men and especially those that are endu'd with a lively Imagination contemplate the best side of themselves they find for the most part a great deal of Self-complacency and Satisfaction and their internal Satisfaction is increased by the Comparison they make betwixt themselves and others that are not so airy and spirituous Besides that they have many Admirers and that few of their Opposers gain Success and Applause for Reason is seldom or never applauded in opposition to a strong and lively Imagination In short the Face of their Hearers takes on such submissive and dutiful Looks and expresses at every new Word they say such lively Strokes of Admiration that they admire themselves too and that their Imagination pufft up with their pretended Advantages fills them with an extraordinary Satisfaction of themselves And since we cannot see Men in the heighth of a Passion without receiving some impression from it and adopting as I may say their Sentiments how should it be possible that those who are surrounded with a Throng of Admirers should give no access to a Passion that is so flattering and so grateful to Self-love Now that high Esteem which Persons of a strong and lively Imagination have of themselves and their good Qualities puffs them up with Pride and gives them a Magisterial and Decisive Comportment they listen to others but with Contempt they answer but with Jeering they think but with reference to themselves and as they look on the Attention of the Mind that is so requisite for the discovery of Truth as a Slavery so they are altogether indocible Pride Ignorance and Blindness go hand in hand The bold or rather vain-glorious Wits will not be the Disciples of Truth and never retire into themselves unless it be to contemplate and admire their supposed Perfections so that he who resists the Proud shines in the middle of their Darkness without dissipating it There is on the contrary a certain Disposition of the Blood and Animal Spirits that occasions too mean Thoughts of our selves The Scarcity the Dulness and Fineness of the Animal Spirits join'd to the Coursness of the Fibres of the Brain cause the Imagination to be weak and languishing And the Contemplation or rather the confused Sense of that Faintness of Imagination is what breeds in us a vicious Humility which we may call Meanness of Spirit All Men are susceptible of the Truth but all apply not themselves to him who alone is able to teach it The Proud make their Address and listen but to themselves and the Dis-spirited make their Application to the Proud and submit themselves to their Determinations Both the one and the other give ear to bare Men. Proud Minds follow the Fermentation of their own Blood that is their own Imagination and the Low-spirited are over-sway'd by the over-ruling Countenance of the Proud and so are both subjected to Vanity and Lies The Proud is like a rich and powerful Man who has a great Retinue who measures his own Greatness by the number of his Attendants and his Strength by that of the Horses of his Coach whereas the Low-spirited is like
engages us to apply our selves to Subjects that are very disgusting First because that Passion is very dangerous to the Conscience Secondly because it insensibly draws us into ill Studies that have more Lustre than Use or Truth in them and Lastly because it is very difficult to moderate it and that we often become its Fool and Property and instead of enlightning the Mind we only strengthen the Concupiscence of Pride which both corrupts our Moral Powers and darkens our Understanding with an undissolvable Obscurity For it must be consider'd how That Passion insensibly increases settles and fortifies it self in the Heart of Man and when it is too violent instead of helping the Mind in the Search of Truth it strangely blinds it and even persuades it that Things are just as it desires they should be Sure it is there would not be so many false Inventions nor imaginary Discoveries were not Men's Heads giddy'd by the ardent Desire of appearing Inventors For the firm and obstinate Persuasion wherein several Persons have been to have found for Instance the Perpetual Motion the Quadrature of the Circle the Duplication of the Cube by ordinary Geometry in all likelihood proceeded from an extraordinary Desire of seeming to have perform'd what others have vainly attempted And therefore 't is fitter to excite in us such Passions as are so much more useful to our searching out of Truth as they are more strong and wherein the Excess is not to be fear'd Such are the Desires of making a good Use of our Mind of freeing our selves from Prejudices and Errours of getting a sufficient Light to behave our selves in our Condition and such others as neither engage us into fruitless Studies nor carry us on to rash and inconsiderate Judgments When we have begun to taste the pleasure of making use of our Mind to be sensible of the Profit that arises from it have freed our selves of violent Passions and have disrelish'd sensible Pleasures which always prove the Masters of or rather the Tyrants over Reason in those that indiscreetly give up themselves to them we need not other Passions but such as we have spoken of to become attentive upon the Subjects on which we desire to meditate But most Men are not in that Condition they have neither Taste nor Understanding nor Curiosity for any thing but what affects the Senses their Imagination is corrupted by an almost infinite Number of deep Traces which raise none but false Ideas and as they depend upon all the Objects that resort to the Senses and Imagination so they always judge by the Impression they receive from them that is with reference to themselves Pride Debauchery the various Engagements the restless Desires of Advancement which are so common amongst the Men of the World darken the Sight of Truth and stifle in them the Sense of Piety because they separate them from God who alone is able to enlighten as he alone is able to govern us For we cannot increase our Union with sensible Things without diminishing that which we have with intellectual Truth since we cannot be at the same time strictly united with Things so different and opposite Those whose Imagination is pure and chaste that is whose Brain is not fill'd up with deep Traces that fasten them to visible Things may easily unite themselves to God listen attentively to the Truth that speaks to them and even forbear the Use of the most just and rational Passions But as to those that live amongst the Great who depend upon too many things and whose Imagination is soil'd by the false and obscure Ideas of sensible Objects they cannot apply themselves to the Truth unless they be born up by some Passion strong enough to countervail the Weight of the Body that carries them down and to imprint Traces on their Brain that may make a Revulsion upon the Animal Spirits However as every Passion can only by it self perplex our Ideas they ought to use that Help but so far as Necessity requires and all Men ought to study themselves that they may proportionate their Passions to their Weakness It is no hard matter to find a Method of raising in us such Passions as we desire since the Knowledge we have given in the foregoing Books of the Union betwixt Soul and Body has sufficiently open'd the way to it In a word no more is requir'd than to think attentively upon those Objects that by the Institution of Nature are able to raise the Passions Thus we may almost at any time excite in our Hearts whatever Passion we have occasion for but because we can easier excite them at any time than suppress them or remedy the Disorders they cause in the Imagination we must be very sober and cautious in employing them Above all we must take care not to judge of Things by Passion but only by the clear Sight of the Truth which is almost impossible when the Passions are somewhat lively they ought only to raise our Attention but they never fail of stirring up their proper Ideas and violently driving the Will to judge of Things by those Ideas that affect it rather than by the pure and abstracted Ideas of Truth that make no Impression upon it So that we often make Judgments which last no longer than the Passion because they are not produced by the clear Sight of the immutable Truth but by the Circulation of the Blood True it is that Men are wonderfully obstinate in some Errours which they maintain as long as they live but then those Errours have other Causes than the Passions or at least depend on such as are permanent and lasting proceeding from the Constitution of the Body from Interest or from some other durable Cause For Instance Interest being a Motive of a continual standing produces a Passion that never dies and the Judgments that arise from it are very long liv'd But all the other Sentiments of Men which depend upon particular Passions are as inconstant as the Fermentation of their Humours They say one while this another while that and yet what they say is commonly conformable to what they think And as they run from one counterfeit Good to another by the Motion of their Passion and are disgusted at it when that Motion ceases so they run from one false System into another and ardently assert a false Opinion when Passion makes it probable which the Passion ebbing they afterwards forsake By their Passions they taste of every Good without finding any really so and by the same Passions see all Truths without discovering any thing absolutely true though in the time of their Passion what they taste seems to them the Sovereign God and what they see an undeniable Truth The Senses are the second Spring whence we can draw Succours to make the Mind attentive Sensations are the very Modifications of the Soul and differ from the pure Ideas of the Mind the former raising a much stronger Attention than the latter So that 't is plain that
Men pay their Worship to the Sun and is still the universal Cause of the Disorders of their Mind and the Corruption of their Heart Why say they by their Actions and sometimes by their Words should we not love Bodies since they are able to afford us Pleasure And why are the Israelites blam'd for lamenting the Loss of the Garlick and Onions of Egypt since the Privation of those things which enjoyed afforded them some Happiness made them in some sort unhappy But the Philosophy that is mis-call'd New and represented as a Bugbear to frighten weak Minds that is despised and condemned without hearing that New Philsosophy I say since it must have that name destroys all the Pretences of the Libertines by the establishing its very first Principle that perfectly agrees with the first Principle of the Christian Religion namely That we must love and fear none but God since none but He alone can make us happy As Religion declares that there is but one true God so this Philosophy shews that there is but one true Cause As Religion teaches that all the Heathen Divinities are but dead Metals and immovable Stone so this Philosophy discovers that all the second Causes or Divinities of the Philosophers are but unactive Matter and ineffective Wills As Religion commands not to bow to those Gods that are not Gods so this Philosophy teaches not to prostrate our Minds and Imagination before the phantastick Grandeur and Power of pretended Causes which are not Causes which we ought neither to love nor to fear nor be taken up with but think upon God alone see and adore love and fear him in all things But that 's not the Inclination of some Philosophers they will neither see God nor think upon him for ever since the Fall there is a secret Opposition betwixt God and Man They delight in Gods of their own Invention in loving and fearing the Contrivances of their Heart as the Heathens did the Works of their Hands They are like those Children who tremble at the sight of their Play-Fellows after they have dawb'd and blacken'd them Or if they desire a more noble Comparison though perhaps not so just they resemble those famous Romans who reverenced the Fictions of their Mind and foolishly adored their Emperours after they themselves had let loose the Eagle at their Canonization CHAP. IV. An Explication of the Second Part of the General Rule That the Philosophers observe it not but that Des Cartes has exactly followed it WE have been shewing to what Errours Men are liable when they reason upon the false and confused Ideas of the Senses and their rambling and undetermin'd Notions of Logick whence it appears that to keep to Evidence in our Perceptions 't is absolutely necessary exactly to observe that Rule we have prescrib'd and to examine which are the clear and distinct Ideas of things that we may only argue by deduction from them In that same general Rule concerning the Subject of our Studies there is yet a remarkable Circumstance namely That we must still begin with the most simple and easie things and insist long upon them before we undertake the Enquiry after the more composed and difficult For if to preserve Evidence in all our Perceptions we must only reason upon distinct Ideas 't is plain that we must never meddle with the Enquiry of compound things before the simple on which they depend have been carefully examin'd and made familiar to us by a nice Scrutiny since the Ideas of compound things neither are nor can be clear as long as the most simple of which they are composed are but confusedly and imperfectly known We know things imperfectly when we are not sure to have considered all their Parts and we know them confusedly when they are not familiar enough to the Mind though we may be certain of having consider'd all their Parts When we know them but imperfectly our Argumentations are only probable when we perceive them confusedly there is neither Order not Light in our Inferences and often we know not where we are or whither we are going But when we know them both imperfectly and confusedly which is the commonest of all we know not so much as what we would look for much less by what Means we are to find it So that it is altogether necessary to keep strictly to that Order in our Studies Of still beginning by the most simple Things examining all their Parts and being well acquainted with them before we meddle with the more composed that depend on the former But that Rule agrees not with the Inclination of Man who naturally despises whatever appears easie his Mind being made for an unlimited Object and almost incomprehensible cannto make a long Stay on the Consideration of those simple Ideas which want the Character of Infinite for which he is created On the contrary and for the same Reason he has much Veneration and an eager Passion for great obscure and mysterious Things and such as participate of Infinity Not that he loves Darkness but that he hopes to find in those deep Recesses a Good and Truth capable of satisfying his Desires Vanity likewise gives a great Commotion to the Spirits stirring them to what is great and extraordinary and encouraging them with a foolish Hope of hitting right Experience teaches that the most accurate Knowledge of ordinary Things gives no great Name in the World whereas to be acquainted with uncommon Things though never so confusedly and imperfectly always procures the Esteem and Reverence of those who willingly conceive a great Idea of whatever is out of their depth of Understanding And that Experience determines all those who are more sensible to Vanity than to Truth which certainly make up the greatest Number to a blind-fold Search of a specious though chimerical Knowledge of what is great rare and unintelligible How many are there that reject the Cartesian Philosophy for that ridiculous Reason That its Principles are too simple and easie There are in this Philosophy no obscure and mysterious Terms Women and Persons unskill'd in Greek and Latin are capable of learning it It must then be say they something very inconsiderable and unworthy the Application of great Genius's They imagine that Principles so clear and simple are not fruitful enough to explain the Effects of Nature which they supposed to be dark intricate and confused They see not presently the Use of those Principles that are too simple and easie to stop their Attention long enough to make them understand their Use and Extent They rather chuse to explain Effects whose Causes are unknown to them by unconceivable Principles than by such as are both simple and intelligible For the Principles these Philosophers are wont to explain obscure Things by are not only obscure themselves but utterly incomprehensible Those that pretend to explain Things extremely intricate by Principles clear and generally receiv'd may easily be refuted if they succeed not since to know whether what they say
intend not to treaâ— of The Curious may consult des Cartes's Principles of Philosophy I only observe as an Answer to an Objection which will presently be made against this Hypothesis that is Why those small Particles cannot re-enter through the Pores from whence they came That besides that the Pores of the Load-stones may be suppos'd to be wrought like the Channelling of a Screw which may pruduce the propos'd Effect it may be said likewise that the small Branches of which those Pores are made bend one way to obey and yield to the Motion of the entring Particles whereas they stand on end and shut them out another way So that we must not be surpriz'd at this Difference betwixt the Pores of the Load-stone for it may be explain'd in several manners and the only Difficulty consists in chusing the best If we had endeavour'd to resolve the fore-mention'd Question beginning with the Corpuscles that are suppos'd to stream out of the Magnet C we should have found the same and likewise discover'd that Air is compos'd of an infinite Number of Parts that are in a perpetual Motion without which it would be impossible that the Load-stone c could approach the Magnet C. I insist not on the Explication of this because there is no Difficulty in it Here follows a Question more compound and complicate than the fore-going for the Solution of which 't is necessary to make use of many Rules 'T is ask'd Which may be the Natural and Mechanical Cause of the Motion of our Members The Idea of Natural Cause is clear and distinct when understood as I have explain'd it in the former Question But the Words Motion of our Members are equivocal and confus'd because there are several such Motions some being Voluntary others Natural and others Convulsive There are also different Members in the Humane Body and therefore according to the first Rule I must ask Of which of these Motions the Cause is requir'd from me But if the Question be left undetermin'd and to my Discretion I examine it after this manner I attentively consider the Properties of those Motions and discovering at first that Voluntary Motions are sooner perform'd than Convulsive I infer that their Cause is different and therefore that I may and must examine the Question by Parts for it seems to require a long Discussion I restrain then my self to consider only Voluntary Motions and because several of our Members are employ'd about them I content my self for the present with the Consideration of the Arm. I observe that it is compos'd of several Muscles which are most or all in Action when we raise soâ—ething from the Ground or remove it from one place to the other But I only insist upon one being willing to suppose that the others are very near fashion'd after the same manner I inform my self of its Texture and Shape by some Book of Anatomy or rather by the sensible Sight of its Fibres and Tendons which I cause to be dissected in my presence by some skilful Anatomist to whom I put all the Queries which in the sequel may exhibit to my Mind a Medium to find out what I seek for After such a serious Consideration I cannot doubt but the Principle of the Motion of my Arm depends on the Contraction of its Muscles which compose it I am likewise content lest I should puzzle my self with too many Difficulties to suppose according to the common Opinion that this Contraction is perform'd by the Animal Spirits which filling up the Ventricle of those Muscles may cause their Extremities to come nearer Now the whole Question concerning Voluntary Motion is reduc'd to this Point How the small Quantity of Animal Spirits which are contain'd in our Arm may at the Command of the Will so suddenly swell the Muscles as to afford a sufficient Strength to list up an Hundred Weight or more Upon an attentive Reflexion thereupon the first Means that offers it self to the Imagination is commonly that of a quick and violent Fermentation like to that of Gun-powder or of some Liquors fill'd with Volatile Salt when they are mix'd with others that are Acid or full of a fixed Salt A small quantity of Gun-powder is able when kindled to raise not only an Hundred Weight but even a Tower and a Mountain Earthquakes that overthrow Cities and shake whole Countries proceed from Spirits kindling under the Ground almost as Gun-powder So that supposing in the Arm such a Cause of the Fermentation and Dilatation of the Spirits it may be look'd upon as the Principle of that Force by which Men perform so sudden and violent Motions But as we ought to mistrust those Means that are offer'd to the Mind by the Senses and of which we have no clear and evident Knowledge so we must not easily admit this for it is not sufficient to give an Account of the Strength and Quickness of our Motions by a Comparison For this is both a confus'd and imperfect Account because we are here to explain a voluntary Motion and Fermentation is not so The Blood is exceedingly fermented in Fevers and we cannot hinder it The Spirits are inflam'd and agitated in the Brain but we cannot rule their Agitation nor lessen it by our Desire When a Man moves the Arm several Ways a Thousand Fermentations great and small swift and â—low ought to begin and what is harder to explain to end likewise in a Moment as often and as soon as it is desir'd if this Hypothesis were true Besides Those Fermentations ought not to dissipate all their Matter but need always be ready to take Fire When a Man has walk'd Twenty Miles how many Thousand times must the Muscles employ'd in walking have been fill'd and empty'd and what a vast quantity of Spirits would be requir'd if Fermentation should dissipate and deaden them so often And therefore this Supposition is insufficient to explain such Motions of our Body as entirely depend upon our Will 'T is plain that the present Question may be reduc'd to this Problem of Mechanicks To find â—ut by Pneumatick Engines a Means to overcome such a Force as an Hundred Weight by another Force though never so small as that of an Ounce Weight And that the Application of that small Force may produce the desir'd Effect at the Discretion of the Will The Solution of that Problem is easie and the Demonstration of it clear It may be solv'd by a Vessel which hath two Orifices one of which is a little more than 1600 times larger than the other in which the Pipes of two equal Bellows are inserted and let a Force precisely 1600 times stronger than the other be apply'd to the Bellows of the larger Mouth for then the Force 1600 times weaker shall overcome the stronger The Demonstration of which is clear in Mechanicks since the Forces are not exactly in a reciprocal Proportion with their Mouths and that the Relation of the weaker Force to the smaller Mouth is greater than
desire to know whether a Thing has such or such Properties or if we know it has we desire only to discover what is the Cause of them To solve the Questions of the first sort we must consider Things in their Birth and Original and conceive that they are always produc'd by the most simple and natural Ways But the Solution of the others requires a very different Method for they must be resolv'd by Suppositions and then we must examine whether those Suppositions induce into any Absurdity or whether they lead to any Truth plainly and clearly known For instance We desire to discover the Properties of the Roulet or some one of the Conick Sections We must consider those Lines in their Generation and form them by the most simple and least perplexing Ways for that is the best and shortest Means to discover their Nature and Properties We easily see that the Subâ—endent of the Roulet is equal to the Circle whence it is form'd And if we discover not many of its Properties that way 't is because the Circular Line that produces it is not sufficiently known But as to Lines merely Mathematical the Relations of which may be more clearly known such as are Conick Sections 't is sufficient for the discovering a vast Number of their Properties to consider them in their Generation Only we must observe that as they may be produc'd by a Regular Motion several Ways so all sorts of Generation are not equally proper to enlighten the Mind that the most simple are the best and that it often happens notwithstanding that some particular Methods are fitter than others to demonstrate some particular Properties But when it is not requir'd to discover in general the Properties of a Thing but to know whether such a Thing has such a Property then we must suppose that it actually enjoys it and carefully examine the Consequences of that Supposition whether it induces into a manifest Absurdity or leads to an undeniable Truth that may serve as a Means to find out what is sought for That is the Method which Geometricians use to solve their Problems They suppose what they seek and examine what will follow of it they attentively consider the Relations that result from the Supposition they represent all those Relations that contain the Conditions of the Problem by Equations and then reduce those Equations according to the usual Rules so that what is unknown is found equal to one or several Things perfectly known I say therefore that when 't is requir'd to discover in general the Nature of Fire and of the different Fermentations which are the most universal Causes of natural Effects the shortest and surest Way is to examine them in their Principle We must consider the Formation of the most agitated Bodies the Motion of which is diffus'd into those that ferment We must by clear Ideas and by the most simple Ways examine what Motion may produce in Matter And because Fire and the various Fermentations are very general Things and consequently depending upon few Causes there will be no need of considering very long what Matter is able to perform when animated by Motion to find out the Nature of Fermentation in its very Principle and we shall learn withall several other Things altogether requisite to the Knowledge of Physicks Whereas he that would in such a Question argue from Suppositions so as to ascend to the first Causes even to the Laws of Nature by which all things are form'd would make a great many of them that should prove false and unprofitable He might perhaps discover that the Cause of the Fermentation is the Motion of an invisible Matter communicated to the agitated Parts of Matter For 't is sufficiently known that Fire and the various Fermentations of Bodies consist in their Agitation and that by the Laws of Nature Bodies receive their immediate Motion only from their meeting with others that are more agitated So that he might discover that there is an invisible Matter the Motion of which is communicated to visible Bodies by Fermentation But 't is morally impossible that he should ever by his Suppositions find out how all that is perform'd which however is not so hard to do when we examine the Formation of Elements or of Bodies of which there is a greater Number of the same Nature as is to be seen in Monsieur des Cartes's System The Third Part of the Question concerning Convulsive Motions will not be very difficult to solve if we suppose that there are in our Bodies Animal Spirits susceptible of Fermentation and withall Humours so piercing as to insinuate themselves into the Pores of the Nerves through which the Spirits are diâ—â—us'd into the Muscles provided always that we pretend not to determine the true Texture and Disposition of those invisible Parts that contribute to these Convulsions When we have separated a Muscle from the rest of the Body and hold it by the two Ends we sensibly perceive that it endeavours to contract it self when prick'd in the Middle 'T is likely that this depends on the Construction of the imperceptible Parts of which it is made which are as so many Springs determin'd to some certain Motions by that of Compunction But who can be sure he has found out the true Disposition of the Parts employ'd in the Production of that Motion and who can give an uncontroverted Demonstration of it Certainly that appears altogether impossible though perhaps by long thinking we might imagine such a Construction of Muscles as would be fit to perform all the Motions we know them to be capable of we must not therefore pretend to determine the true Construction of the Muscles However because it cannot be reasonably doubted but that there are Spirits susceptible of some Fermentation by the Mixture of a very subtile heterogeneous Matter and that acriminious and pungent Humours may creep into the Nerves that Hypothesis may be suppos'd Now to proceed to the Solution of the Question propos'd We must first examine how many sorts of Convulsive Motions there are and because their Number is indefinite we must insist on the Principal the Causes of which seem to be different We must consider in what Parts they are made what Diseases precede and follow them whether they are attended with Pain or free from it and above all what are the Degrees of their Swiftness and Violence for some are very swift and violent others are very swift but not violent a third sort are violent and not swift and others again are free from both these Symptoms Some finish and begin afresh perpetually others keep the Parts rigid and unmoveable for some time and others deprive us of their Use and altogether deform them All this being well weigh'd it will be no hard matter to explain in general after what has been said concerning Natural and Voluntary Motions how the Convulsive are perform'd For if we conceive that some Matter capable of fermenting the Spirits mixes with those contain'd in
of Nature which puts it and preserves it in Motion by preserving it successively in different places by his bare Will in as much as an Almighty Being acts not with Instruments and his Will is necessarily follow'd by Effects I acknowledge then it 's possible that God may will that every thing remain in its present state whether it be Motion or Rest and that his Will may be the natural Power which Bodies have of remaining in the state they once have obtain'd And if so we must like M. des Cartes measure that Power conclude what ought to be the Effects of it and give Rules for the Force and Communication of Motions upon the Collision of different Bodies in proportion to their Magnitude since we have no other way of coming to the knowledge of that general and immutable Will of God who makes the different Power these Bodies have of acting upon and resisting one another consist in their different Magnitude and Swiftness But however I have no infallible proof that God wills by a positive Will that Bodies remain in Rest and one would think it sufficient for God to will the Existence of Matter not only to cause it to exist but to exist in Rest. The case is not the same with Motion since the Idea of a Matter mov'd certainly includes two Powers to which it is related viz. that which created and also that which mov'd it But the Idea of a Matter in Rest includes only the Idea of a Power which has created it whilst there is no necessity of any other Power to put it in Rest since if we barely conceive Matter without thinking on any Power we shall necessarily conceive it in Rest. Thus it is I conceive things for I am to judge by my Ideas and my Ideas tell me Rest is but the privation of Motion For God need but cease to will the Motion of a Body to make its Motion cease and to cause it to Rest. But I remember I have heard from many very ingenious Persons that Motion seem'd to them as much the privation of Rest as Rest the privation of Motion And some will not doubt to affirm for Reasons I can't comprehend that Motion seems rather a privation than rest I do not distinctly call to Mind the Reasons they alledge however this ought to make me suspicious lest my Ideas should be false For though most Men say what they please upon Subjects that seem of little moment yet I have Reason to believe the Persons I speak of were pleas'd to speak what they thought wherefore I must still examine my Ideas more carefully To me it seems a thing of undoubted Certainty and the Gentlemen before mention'd won't deny it that 't is the Will of God which moves Bodies The Force then which that Bowl I see in Motion has is the Will of God that moves it what now is God requir'd to do to stop it Must he Will by a positive Will that it should Rest or is it sufficient to cease to will its Motion 'T is plain that if God but cease to will the Motion of this Bowl the cessation of its Motion and consequently Rest will succeed the cessation of the Will of God For the Will of God which was the Force that moved the Bowl desisting that Force desists and the Bowl will be no longer mov'd Therefore the cessation of the moving Force produces Rest Rest then has no Force to cause it but is a bare privation that supposes no positive Will in God Thus we should admit in God a positive Will without any Reason or Necessity if we ascribed to Bodies any Force to remain in Rest. But to overthrow this Argument if possible Let us now suppose a Bowl at Rest as before we suppos'd it in Motion what must God do in order to agitate it Is it enough that he ceases to will its repose if so I have hitherto made no advance for that Motion will be equally the privation of Rest as Rest of Motion I suppose then that God desists to will the Rest of this Bowl but supposing it I see it not put in Motion and if any others do I desire them to inform me with what degree of Motion it is carried Certainly 't is impossible it should be mov'd or have any degree of Motion and 't is impossible to conceive any degree of Motion in it barely from our conceiving that God ceases to will it should be at Rest because it goes not with Motion as it does with Rest. Motions are infinitely various and are susceptible of more and less but Rest being nothing one cannot differ from another One and the same Bowl which moves twice as fast at one time as at another has twice as much Force or Motion at one time as at another But it cannot be said that the same Bowl has Rest double at one time to its Rest at another There must therefore be a positive Will in God to put a Bowl in Motion or to give it such a Force as it may move it self with But he need only cease to will it should be mov'd to cause its Motion to desist that is to make it Rest. Just as to the creating a World it is not enough that God cease to will its non-existence unless he likewise positively will the manner it shall exist in But in order to annihilate it there is no need of God's willing it should not exist since God cannot will Nothingness by a positive Will but barely that he cease to will its Being I consider not here Motion and Rest according to their relative Capacity for 't is manifest that resting Bodies have as real Relations to those about them as Bodies in Motion I only conceive that Bodies mov'd have a moving Force and that others at Rest have no Force at all to persevere in it because the Relations of mov'd to the circumambient Bodies perpetually changing they need a continual Force to produce these Changes it being indeed nothing but these Changes that cause all that Novelty we observe in Nature but there is no need of Force to do nothing When the Relation of a Body to those surrounding it is constantly the same there is nothing done and the Continuance of that Relation I mean the Action of the Will of God which preserves it is not different from that which preserves the Body it self If it be true as I conceive That Rest is but the Privation of Motion the least Motion or that of the least Body mov'd will include a greater Force or power than the Rest of the greatest Body and so the least Force and the least Body suppos'd to be mov'd in a Vacuum against another never so great and bulky will be capable of moving it since the largest Body at Rest will have no power of resisting the least Body that shall strike against it Therefore the Resistance which is made by the Parts of hard Bodies to hinder their Separation necessarily proceeds from
to furnisâ— an Animal with parts quite useless and to congeal the Fruits after they are perfectly formed Is not this rather because God does what he pleases and that his power supersedes all Order and Rule For to mention things of greater Importance than the Fruits of the Earth wherewith he may do as he sees good the Clay whereof God makes Vessels of wrath is the same with that which he fashions Vessels of Mercy ANSWER These are the difficulties which serve only to obscure the Truth as proceeding from the darkness of the Mind We know that God is just we see that the wicked are Happy ought we to deny what wee see ought we to doubt of what we know because we may possibly be so stupid as not to know and so Libertine as not to believe what Religion teaches us of future Torments So we know that God is Wise and all that he does is Good mean while we see Monsters or defective Works What are we to believe that God is out of his aim or that these Monsters are not his handiwork Certainly if we have sence and constancy of Mind we shall believe neither the one nor the other For 't is manifest that God does all and that whatever he does is as perfect as possible with relation to the simplicity and fewness of the means he imploys in the Formation of his Work We must hold fast to what we see and not quit our ground for any difficulties impossible to be resolv'd when our Ignorance is the cause of that Impossibility If Ignorance must raise Difficulties and such like Difficulties overthrow the best establisht Opinions what will remain certain among Men who know not all things What Shall not the brightest Lights be able to disperse the least Darkness and shall any little shadow Eclipse the clearest and the liveliest Light But though the answering such sort of Difficulties might be dispenc'd with without Prejudice to the fore-establisâ—t Principle yet it is not amiss to show they are not unanswerable For the Mind of Man is so unjust in its Judgments that it may possibly prefer the Opinions which seem to result from these imaginary Difficulties before certain Truths which no Man can doubt of but because he will and with that design ceases to examine them I say then that God wills order though there are Monsters and 't is moreover because God wills order that there are Monsters and this is my reason Order requires that the Laws of nature whereby God produces that infinite Variety so conspicuous in the World should be very simple and very few in number Now 't is the simplicity of these general Laws which in some particular Junctures and because of the Disposition of the subject produces irregular Motions or rather Monstrous Combinations and consequently God's willing order is the cause of these Monsters Thus God does not positively or directly will the Existence of Monsters but he positively wills certain Laws of the Communication of Motions whereof Monsters are the necessary consequences because these Laws though of a most simple kind are nevertheless capable of producing that variety of forms which can't be sufficiently admired For Example In consequence of the general Laws of the Communication of Motions there are some Bodies which are driven near the Centre of the Earth The Body of a Man or an Animal is one of these that which upholds him in the Air breaks under his Feet is it just or according to Order that God should change his general Will for that particular Case Surely it seems not probable That Animal therefore must necessarily break or maim its Body And thus we ought to argue about the generation of Monsters ORDER requires that all Beings should have what 's necessary to their Preservation and the Propagation of the Species provided this may be done by most simple Means and worthy the Wisdom of God And so we see that Animals as also Plants have general Means to preserve themselves and to continue their Species and if some Animals fail thereof in some particular Occasions 't is because these general Laws whereby they were form'd reach not these private Emergencies because they respect not Animals separately but generally extend to all Beings and that the Good of the Publick must be preferr'd before Particular Advantages 'T is evident That if God made but one Animal it would not be Monstrous But Order would require That he should not make that Animal by the same Laws that he at present forms all others for the Action of God must be proportion'd to his Design By the Laws of Nature he designs not the making one Animal but a whole World and he must make it by the simpliest Means as Order requires 'T is enough then that the World be not monstrous or that the general Effects be suitable to the general Laws to vindicate the Work of God from Censure and Reproach If for all particular Changes God had instituted so many particular Laws or if He had constituted in every Being a particular Nature or Principle of all the Motions that arrive in it I confess it would be hard to juâ—tifie his Wisdom against so visible Disorders We should perhaps be forc'd to confess either that God wills not Order or that he knows not how or is not able to rectifie Disorder For in short it seems to me impossible to ascribe an almost infinite Number of second Causes of natural Forces Vertues Qualities and Faculties to what we call the Sports and Disorders of Nature with a Salvo to the infinite Power and Wisdom of the Author of all things OBJECTION against the Second Article GOD can never act for Himself A wise Being will do nothing useless but whatever God should do for himself would be useless because he wants nothing God wills nothing for himself if by the Necessity of his Essence he has all the Perfection he can desire And if God desires nothing for himself he works nothing for himself since he works only by the Efficacy of his Will The Nature of Good is to be communicative and diffusive 't is to be useful to others and not to it self 't is to seek out 't is if it be possible to create Persons whom it may make happy Therefore it is a Contradiction for God who is essentially and supremely good to act for himself ANSWER GOD may be said to act for himself two ways either with intent to derive some Advantage from what he does or to the end his Creature may find its Happiness and Perfection in him I enquire not at present whether God acts for himself in the first sense and whether to receive an Honour worthy of himself he has made and restor'd all things by his SON in whom according to the Scripture all things subsist I only assert that God cannot create and preserve Spirits in order to know and love created Beings 'T is an Immutable Eternal and necessary Law That they should know and love God as I
her Infant the Mother is the cause of the Sin and the Father has no part in it Yet St. Paul teaches us that by Man came sin into the World He does not so much as speak of the Woman Therefore c. ANSWER David assures us that his Mother conceiv'd him in iniquity and the Son of Syrach says Of the Woman came the beginning of Sin and by her we all dy Neither of them speak of Man St. Paul on the contrary says that by Man Sin entred into the World and speaks not of the Woman How will these Testimonies accord and which of the two is to be justify'd if it be necessary to vindicate either In discourse we never attribute to the Woman any thing peculiar to the Man wherein she has no part But that is often ascrib'd to the Man which is proper to the VVoman because her Husband is her Master and Head We see that the Evangelists and also the Holy Virgin call Joseph the Father of Jesus when she says to her Son Behold thy Father and I have sought thee sorrowing Therefore seeing we are assur'd by Holy Writ that Woman has subjected us to Sin and Death it is absolutely necessary to believe it nor can it be thrown upon the Man But though it testifies in several places that 't is by Man that Sin enters into the World yet there is not an equal necessity to believe it since what is of the Woman is commonly attributed to the Man And if we were oblig'd by Faith to excuse either the Man or the Woman it would be more reasonable to excuse the former than the latter However I believe these forecited passages are to be litterally explain'd and that we are to say both the Man and Woman are the true causes of Sin each in their own way The Woman in that by her Sin is communicated it being by her that the Man begets the Children and the Man in that his Sin is the cause of Concupiscence as his action is the cause of the fecundity of the Woman or of the communication that is between her and her Infant It is certain that 't is the Man that impregnates the Woman and consequently is the cause of that communication between her Body and the Child's since that communication is the Principle of its Life Now that Communication not only gives the Child's Body the dispositions of its Mother's but also gives its Mind the dispositions of her Mind Therefore we may say with St. Paul that by one Man sin entred into the world and nevertheless by reason of that communication we may say that Sin came from a Woman and by her we all dye and that our Mother has conceiv'd us in Iniquity as is said in other places of Scripture It may be said perhaps that though Man had not sinn'd yet Woman had produc'd sinful Children for having her self sinn'd she had lost the Power God gave her over her Body and thus though Man had remain'd Innocent she had corrupted the Brain and consequently the Mind of her Child by reason of that communication between them But this surely looks not very probable For Man whilst righteous knowing what he does cannot give the Woman that wretched fecundity of conceiving sinful Children If he remains Righteous he wills not any Children but for God to whom Infant Sinners cannot be well pleasing for I suppose not here a Mediator I grant however that in that case the Marriage had not been dissolv'd and that the Man had known his Wife But it is certain that the Body of the Woman belong'd to her Husband since it was taken out of his and was the same Flesh. Duo in carne una It is moreover certain that Children are as much the Fathers as the Mothers Which being so we can't be persuaded that the Woman would have lost the Power over her Body if her Husband had not sinn'd as well as she For if the Woman had been depriv'd of that Power whilst the Man remain'd Innocent there had been this Disorder in the Universe that an upright Man should have a corrupt Body and sinful Children Whereas it is against Order or rather a contradiction that a just God should punish a perfectly Innocent Man And for this reason Eve feels no involuntary and rebellious Motions immediately after her sin as yet she is not asham'd of her Nakedness nor goes to hide her self On the contrary she comes to her Husband though naked as her self her Eyes are not yet open'd but she is still as before the absolute Comptroller of her own Body Order requir'd that immediately after her Sin her Soul should be disturb'd by the rebellion of her Body and by the shame of her own and her Husband's nakedness for there was no reason that God should any longer suspend on her behalf the Laws of the Communication of Motions as I have said in the seventh Article But because her Body is her Husband 's who is as yet Innocent she is not punish'd in this Body but this punishment is deferr'd till the time that he should eat himself of the Fruit which she presented him Then it was they both began to feel the rebellion of their Body that they saw they were naked and that shame oblig'd them to cover themselves with Fig-leaves Thus we must say that Adam was truly the cause of Original Sin and Concupiscence since it was his Sin that depriv'd both himself and his Wife of their power over their Body by which defectiveness of power the Woman produces in the Brain of her Child such tracks as corrupt its Soul at the very instant of its Creation OBJECTION against the Twelfth Article 'T is but random divining to say the communication between the Mother's and the Infant 's Brain is necessary or useful to the conformation of the foetus For there is no such Communication between the Brain of an Hen and that of her Chickens which notwithstanding are perfectly and compleatly form'd ANSWER I answer that in the seventh Chapter of the Second Book I have sufficiently demonstrated that Communication by the use I make of it in explaining the Generation of Monsters as also certain natural Marks and Fears deriv'd from the Mother For 't is evident that a Man who swoons away at the sight of a Snake because his Mother was frighted with one when she bore him in her Womb could not be subject to that Infirmity but because formerly such Traces had been imprinted on his Brain as these which open upon seeing a Snake and that they were accompany'd with a like Accident And herein I am no Diviner for I do not venture to determine wherein that Communication precisely consists I might say it was perform'd by those Fibres which the Foetus shoots into the Matrix of the Mother and by the Nerves wherewith that part is very probably fill'd and in saying so I should no more divine than would a Man who had never seen the Engines call'd La Samaritaine in affirming
because he knows not what it was that depriv'd him of this necessary thing or because being unworthy of his Hatred it could not excite it 'T is true this Man Hates the Privation of the Good which he Loves But it is manifest that this kind of Hatred is really Love For he Hates the Privation of Good meerly because he Loves Good and since to fly the Privation of Good is to tend towards Good Is is evident that the Motion of his Hatred is not different from that of his Love Therefore his Hatred if he have any being not contrary to his Love and Sorrow being always contrary to Joy it is evident that his Sorrow is not his Hatred and consequently Joy is different from Love Lastly It is evident that Sorrow proceeds from the Presence of something which we hate or rather from the Absence of something which we Love Therefore Sorrow supposes Hatred or rather Love but 't is very different from them both I know St. Austin defines Pain to be an Aversion the Soul conceives from the Bodies being disposed otherwise than she would have it and that he often confounds Delectation with Charity Pleasure with Joy Pain with Sorrow Pleasure and Joy with Love Pain and Sorrow with Aversion or Hatred But there 's great Probability this Holy Father in all this follow'd the common way of speaking of the Vulgar who confound most of those things which occur in them at one and the same time Or it may be did not examine these things in so Nice and Philosophical a manner as he might have done Yet I think I both may and ought to say that to me it seems necessary exactly to distinguish these things if we would explain our selves clearly and without Equivocation upon most of the Questions handled by him For even Men of a quite opposite Opinion use to build upon the Authority of this great Man because of the various Senses and Constructions his Speech will afford which is not always Nice and accurate enough to reconcile Persons who are perhaps more eager to dispute than desirous to agree THE ILLUSTRATION UPON THE Third CHAPTER of the Second PART of the Sixth BOOK Concerning the Efficacy ascribed to Second Causes EVER since the Transgression of our first Parent the Mind rambling constantly abroad forgets both it self and Him who pierces and enlightens it and is so absurdly pliant to the Seducements of its Body and those about it as to imagine its own Happiness and Perfection is to be found in them He that alone is able to act in us is at present hidden from our Eyes His Operations are of an insensible kind and though he produces and preserves all Beings yet the Mind whilst the earnest Enquirer of the Cause of all things cannot easily know him though it meets him every moment Some Philosophers chuse rather to imagine a Nature and particular Faculties as the Causes of those which we term Natural Effects than to render to God all the Honour that is due to his Power And though they have no Proof nor even clear Idea of this pretended Nature and Faculties as I hope to make appear they had rather talk without knowing what they say and reverence a purely imaginary Power than by any Essay of Thought to discover that Invisible Hand which works all in all things 'T is unavoidable for me to believe that one of the most deplorable Consequences of Original Sin is our having no Taste nor Sense for God or our Incapacity of Tasting or Meeting him without a sort of Dread and Abhorrence We ought to see God in all things to be sensible of his Power and Force in all Natural Effects to admire his Wisdom in the wonderful Order of his Creatures In a word to Worship to Fear to Love Him only in all his Works But in our present State there is a Secret Opposition between Man and GOD Man conscious of his being a Sinner hides himself flies the Light and is afraid to meet his Maker and therefore had rather imagine in surrounding Bodies a blind Power or Nature with which he can be familiar than find in them the terrible Power of an Holy and Just GOD who knows and Operates all in all I confess there are very many Persons who from another Principle than that of the Heathen Philosophers follow their Opinion about Nature and Second Causes But I hope to convince them in the Process of this Discourse that they fall into this Sentiment out of a Prejudice which 't is impossible to shake off without those Succours which are furnish'd by the Principles of a Philosophy that has not always been sufficiently known For in all likelihood this is what has kept them from declaring for an Opinion which I think my self oblig'd to espouse I have a great many Reasons which will not let me attribute to Second or Natural Causes a Force Power or Efficacy to produce any thing whatever The chief whereof is That this Opinion is to me utterly inconceivable Though I use all possible Endeavours to comprehend it I cannot find in my self the Idea to represent to me what can be that Force or Power ascrib'd to the Creatures And I need not fear passing a rash Judgment in affirming that those who hold that the Creatures are endued with a Force and Power advance what they do not clearly conceive For in short if the Philosophers clearly conceive that Second Causes have a true Force to act and produce their Like I being a Man as well as they and participating of the same Sovereign Reason might in all probability discover the Idea which represent to them that Force But all the efforts that my Mind can make can discover no other Force Efficacy or Power than in the Will of the Infinitely perfect Being Besides when I think upon the different Opinions of Philosophers upon this subject I can no longer doubt of my assertion For if they saw clearly what this Power of Creatures was or what was in them truly powerful they would agree in their Opinion about it When Men cannot accord though they have no private Interest to hinder them 't is a certain Sign they have no clear Idea of what they say and that they understand not one another especially if they dispute on subjects that are not of a Complex Nature and of difficult discussion like this before us For there would be no difficulty to resolve it if Men had a clear Idea of a created Force or Power Here then follow some of their Opinions that we may see how little agreement there is among them There are Philosophers who maintain that second Causes act by their Matter Figure and Motion and these in one sense are right enough Others by their substantial form Many by Accidents or Qualities some by Matter and Form others by Form and Accidents and others still by certain vertues or faculties distinct from all this There are of them who affirm that the substantial Form produces Forms
and the Accidental Form Accidents Others say that the Forms produce both other Forms and Accidents Others still that bare Accidents are not only capable of producing Accidents but even Forms But it must not be imagin'd that those for instance who say that Accidents can produce Forms by vertue of the Form they are join'd to understand it the same way For one part of them will have Accidents to be the very Force or Virtue of the Substantial Form Another that they imbibe into them the Influence of the Form and only act so by vertue of it A Third lastly will have them to be but Instrumental Causes But neither are these latter sort altogether agreed about what is meant by Instrumental Cause and the vertue they receive from the Principal Nor can the Philosophers compromise about the Action whereby second Causes produce their Effects For some of them pretend that Causality ought not to be produc'd since it is this which produces Others will that they truly act by their own Action But they are involv'd in so many Labyrinths in explaining precisely wherein this Action consists and there are so many different Opinions about it that I cannot find in my Heart to recite them Such is the strange variety of Opinions though I have not produc'd those of the Ancient Philosophers or that were born in very remote Countries But we have sufficient Reason to conclude that they are no more agreed upon the subject of second Causes than those before alledg'd Avicenna for instance is of Opinion that Corporeal Substances cannot produce any thing but Accidents This according to Ruvio is his Hypothesis He supposes that God produces immediately a most perfect Spiritual Substance That this produces another less perfect and this a third and so on to the last which produces all Corporeal Substances and Corporeal Substances Accidents But Avicembrom not able to comprehend how Corporeal Substances which cannot penetrate each other should cause alterations in them supposes that there are Spirits which are capable of acting on Bodies because they alone can penetrate them For these Gentlemen not admitting the Vacuum nor the Atoms of Democritus nor having sufficient knowledge of the subtil matter of M. des Cartes could not with the Gassendists and Cartesians think of Bodies which were little enough to insinuate into the pores of those that are hardest and most solid Methinks this diversity of Opinions justifies this thought of ours that Men often talk of things which they understand not and that the Power of Creatures being a Fiction of Mind of which we have naturally no Idea every Man makes it and imagines it what he pleases 'T is true this Power has been acknowledg'd for a Real and True by most Men in all Ages but it has never yet been prov'd I say not demonstratively but in any wise so as to make an impression upon an Attentive thinking Man For the confus'd Proofs which are built only upon the fallacious Testimony of the Senses and Passions are to be rejected by those who know how to exercise their Reason Aristotle speaking of what they call Nature says it is Ridiculous to go about to prove that Natural Bodies have an inward Principle of Motion and Rest because says he it is a thing that 's Self-Evident He likewise does not doubt but a Bowl which strikes another has the force of putting it in Motion This is witnessed by his Eyes and that 's enough for him who seldom follows any other Testimony than of the Senses very rarely that of his Reason and is very indifferent whether it be intelligible or not Those who impugn the Opinion of some Divines who have written against Second Causes say like Aristotle that the Senses convince us of their Efficacy And this is their first and principal Proof 'T is evident say they that the Fire burns that the Sun shines that Water cools and he must be out of his Senses who can doubt of it The Authors of the other Opinion says the great Averroes are out of their Wits We must say almost all the Peripateticks use sensible Proofs for their Conviction who deny this Efficacy and so oblige them to confess we are capable of acting on them and wounding them 'T is a judgment which Aristotle has already pronounc'd against them and it ought to be put in Execution But this pretended Demonstration cannot but create Pity For it gives us to know the Weakness of an Humane Mind And that the Philosophers themselves are infinitely more sensible than Reasonable It evinces that those who glory in being the Inquirers of Truth know not even whom they are to consult to hear any News of it Whether Soveraign Reason which never deceives but always speaks things as they are in themselves or the Body which speaks only out of Interest and with reference to the preservation and convenience of Life For in fine what prejudices will not be justified if we set up our Senses for Judges to which most of them owe their Birth As I have shown in The Search after Truth When I see a Bowl shock another my Eyes tell me or seem to tell me that it is the True Cause of the motion it impresses for the true cause that moves Bodies is not visible to my Eyes But if I interrogate my Reason I evidently see that Bodies having no Power to move themselves and their moving force being nothing but the Will of God which preserves them successively in different places they cannot communicate a Power which they have not nor could communicate if they had it For 't is plain that there must be Wisdom and that Infinite to regulate the communication of motions with that exactness Proportion and Uniformity which we see A Body cannot know that infinite multitude of impuls'd Bodies round about it and though we should suppose it to have knowledge yet it would not have enough so proportionably to regulate and distribute at the instant of protrusion the moving force it self is carried with When I open my Eyes the Sun appears to me splendidly glorious in Light And it seems not only to be visible it self but to make all the World so too Methinks 't is he that arrays the Earth with flowers and enriches it with Fruits That gives Life to Animals and striking by His Heat into the very Womb of the Earth impregnates Her with Stones Marbles and Metalls But in consulting my Reason I see nothing of all this And if I faithfully consult it I plainly discover the seducement of my Senses and find that God Works all in all For knowing that all the changes which accrue to Bodies have no other principle than the different Communications of Motions which occur in visible and invisible Bodies I see that God does all since 't is his Will that causes and his Wisdom that regulates all these Communications I suppose that Local Motion is the principle of Generations Corruptions Alterations and Universally of all the changes
incident to the Corporeal World which is an Opinion sufficiently now receiv'd among Men of Letters But let their Opinion about it be what it will that matters not much since it seems much easier to conceive that a Body drives another when it strikes it than to comprehend how Fire can produce Heat and Light and educe from the power of matter a substance that was not in it before And if it be necessary to acknowledge that God is the True Cause of the different Communications of Motion by a much stronger reason we should conclude that none but He can Create and Annihilate real Qualities and substantial Forms I say Create and Annihilate For it seems to me at least as difficult to educe from matter a substance that was not in it or to reduce it into it again whilst yet there nothing remains of it as to create it or Annihilate it But I stick not to the Terms And I make use of those because there are no other that I know of which express without Obscurity and Ambiguity the changes suppos'd by the Philosophers to arrive every moment by the force of second Causes I had some scruple to set down here the other Arguments which are commonly urg'd for the Force and Efficacy of natural Causes For they appear so weak and trifling to those who withstand Prejudices and prefer their Reason before their Senses that I can scarce believe methinks that Reasonable Men could be perswaded by them However I produce and answer them since there are many Philosophers who urge them ARGUMENT I. If second Causes did not Operate say Suarez Fonseca and some others Animate things could not be distinguish'd from Inanimate since neither one nor the other would have an inward principle of their Actions ANSWER I answer that Men would have the same sensible proofs that have convinc'd them of the distinction they make between things Animate and Inanimate They would still see Animals do the same Actions as eat grow cry run bound c. and would discern nothing like this in Stones And this one thing makes the vulgar Philosophers believe that Beasts live and that Stones do not For we are not to fancy that they know by a clear and distinct view of Mind what is the Life of a Dog 'T is their Senses which regulate their Decisions upon this Question If it were necessary I could prove here that the principle of the Life of a Dog differs not from the principle of the Motion of a Watch. For the Life of Bodies whatever they be can consist but in the Motion of their Parts And we may easily judge that the same subtil matter which causes the Fermentation of the Blood and Animal Spirits in a Dog and which is the principle of his Life is no perfecter than that which gives Motion to the Spring of a Watch or which causes the Gravitation in the Weights of a Clock which is the principle of their Life or to speak as others do of their Motion It behoves the Peripateticks to give those whom they stile Cartesians a clear Idea of what they call the Life of Beasts Corporeal Soul Body which Perceives and Desires Sees Feels Wills and then we shall clearly resolve their Difficulties if after that they shall persist in raising them ARGUMENT II. It were impossible to discover the Differences or Powers of the Elements So that Fire might refrigerate as Water and nothing would be of a settled and fix'd Nature ANSWER I answer That whilst Nature remains as it is that is to say whilst the Laws of the Communication of Motions remain constantly the same it is a Contradiction that Fire should not burn or separate the Parts of certain Bodies Fire cannot refrigerate like Water unless it becomes Water for Fire being only Fewel whose Parts have been violently agitated by an invisible surrounding Matter as is easie to demonstrate it is impossible its Parts should not Communicate some of their Motion to approaching Bodies Now as these Laws are constant the Nature of Fire its Virtues and Qualities are unchangeable But this Nature and these Vertues are only Consequences of the General and Efficacious Will of GOD who does all in all things Therefore the Study of Nature is in all respects false and vain when we look for other true Causes than the Wills of the ALMIGHTY I confess that we are not to have recourse to God or the Universal Cause when we require the Reason of particular Effects For we should be ridiculous to assert for Instance That GOD dries the Ways or Freezes the Water in the River We must say The Air dries the Earth because it moves and bears off the Water with it that dilutes it Or that the Air or the subtil Matter Freezes the River in Winter because at that time it communicates not sufficient Motion to the Parts that constitute the Water In a Word we must if we can assign the Natural and particular Cause of the Effects propos'd to Examination But because the Action of these Causes consists in the moving Force which actuates them which moving Force is the Will of GOD which create them we ought not to say they have in themselves a Force or Power to produce any Effects And when in Reasoning we are at last arriv'd to a general Effect of which we seek the Cause 't is no good Philosophy to imagine any other than the general And to feign a certain Nature a first Moveable and universal Soul or some such Chimera whereof we have no clear and distinct Idea would be to argue like an Heathen Philosopher For Example when we are ask'd whence it comes that some Bodies are in motion or that the agitated Air communicates its Motion to the Water or rather whence proceeds the mutual Protrusion of Bodies Motion and its Communication being a general Effect on which all others depend we cannot answer I do'nt say like Christians but Philosophers without ascending to God who is the Universal Cause Since 't is His Will that is the moving Force of Bodies and that regulates the Communication of their Motions Had he will'd there should be no new Production in the World he would not have put its Parts in motion And if hereafter He shall will the Incorruptibility of some of the Beings he had made he shall cease to will the Communication of Motions in point of those Beings ARGUMENT III. 'T is needless to Plow to Water and give several preparatory Dispositions to Bodies to fit them for what we desire from them For GOD has no need of preparing the Subjects on which he Works ANSWER I answer That GOD may do absolutely all he pleases without finding any Dispositions in the Subjects he works upon But he cannot do it without a Miracle or by Natural ways that is by the General Laws of the Communication of Motions which he has constituted and which he almost always follows in his Actings GOD never multiplies his Wills without Reason
but acts always by the simplest Ways and for that Reason he makes use of the Collision of Bodies in giving them Motion Not that this Collision is absolutely necessary to it as our Senses tell us but that being the Occasion of the Communication of Motions there need be but very few Natural Laws to produce all the admirable Effects we see For by this means we may reduce all the Laws of the Communication of Motions to one Viz. That percutient Bodies being considered as but one at the Moment of their Contact or Collision the moving Force is divided between them at their Separation according to the Proportion of their Magnitude But whereas concurrent Bodies are surrounded with infinite others which act upon them by Virtue and Efficacy of this Law however constant and uniform this Law be it produces a World of quite different Communications because it acts upon infinite Bodies which are all related to one another It is necessary to Water a Plant to make it grow because by the Laws of the Communication of Motions hardly any other than Watry Particles can by their Motion and by reason of their Figure insinuate and Wind up themselves into the Fibres of Plants and by variously fastning and combining together take the Figure that 's necessary to their Nourishment The subtil Matter which is constantly flowing from the Sun may by its agitating the Water lift it into the Plants but it has not a competent Motion to raise gross Earthy Particles Yet Earth and Air too are necessary to the Growth of Plants Earth to preserve the Water at their Root and Air to give this Water a Moderate Fermentation But the Action of the Sun the Air and Water consisting but in the Motion of their Parts in proper speaking GOD is the only Agent For as I have said there is none but He that can by the efficacy of his Will and by the Infinite Extent of his Knowledge cause and regulate those infinitely infinite Communications of Motions which are made every moment and in a Proportion infinitely exact and regular ARGUMENT IV. Can God resist and Fight against Himself Bodies justle strike and resist one another therefore Gods Acts not in them unless it be by his concourse For if it were he only that produc'd and preserv'd Motion in Bodies he would take care to divert them before the Collision as knowing well that they are impenetrable To what purpose are Bodies driven to be beaten back again why must they proceed to recoil Or what signifies it to produce and Preserve useless Motions Is it not an Absurdity to say that God impugns himself and that He destroys his Works when a Bull fights with a Lyon when a Wolf devours a Sheep and a Sheep eats the Grass which God makes to grow Therefore there are Second Causes ANSWER Therefore Second Causes do all and God does nothing at all For God cannot act against himself but Concourse is Action The concurring to contrary Actions is giving contrary Concourse and consequently doing contrary Actions To concur with the Action of Creatures that resist each other is to Act against himself To concur to useless Motions is to Act in vain But God does nothing needless or in vain he does no contrary Actions and therefore concurs not to the Action of Creatures that often destroy one another and makes useless Actions and Motions See where this proof of Second Causes leads us But let us see what Reason says to it God Works all in every thing and nothing resists him He Works all in all things in as much as his Will both makes and regulates all Motions And nothing resists him because he does what ever he Wills But let us see how this is to be conceiv'd Having resolv'd to produce by the simplest ways as most conformable to Order that infinite Variety of Creatures which we admire he will'd that Bodies should move in a right line because that is the most simple But Bodies being impenetrable and their Motions tending in Lines that oppose or intersect one another they must necessarily fall foul together and consequently cease moving in the same manner God foresaw this yet notwithstanding positively will'd the Collision or shock of Bodies not that he 's delighted in impugning himself but because he design'd to make use of this Collision as an Occasion for his establishing the General Law of the Communication of Motions by which he foresaw he must produce an infinite Variety of admirable Effects For I am perswaded that these two Natural Laws which are the simplest of all others Namely that All Motion tends to make it self in a right line and that in the Collision Motions are Communicated proportionably to the magnitude of the Colliding Bodies are sufficient to produce such a World as we see That is the Heaven and Stars and Planets and Comets Earth Water Air and Fire In a Word the Elements and all Unorganiz'd and inanimate Bodies For Organiz'd Bodies depend on many other Natural Laws which are perfectly unknown It may be living Bodies are not form'd like others by a determinate number of Natural Laws For there is great probability they were all form'd at the Creation of the World and that Time only gives them a necessary Growth to make them Visible to our Eyes Nevertheless it is certain they receive that Growth by the General Laws of Nature whereby all other Bodies are form'd which is the Reason that their Increase is not always Regular I say then that God by the first of Natural Laws positively Wills and consequently Causes the Collision of Bodies and afterwards imploys this Collision as an Occasion of establishing the Second Natural Law which regulates the Communication of Motions and that thus the actual Collision is the Natural or Occasional Cause of the Actual Communication of Motions If this be well consider'd it will be evidently acknowledg'd that nothing can be better Order'd But supposing that God had not so Ordain'd it and that he had diverted Bodies when ready to encounter as if there were a Vacuum to receive them First they would not be subject to that perpetual Vicissitude which makes the Beauty of the Universe For the Generation of some Bodies is perform'd by the Corruption of Others and 't is the contrariety of their Motion which produces their Variety Secondly God would not act in the most simple manner For if Bodies ready to meet should continue on their Motion without touching they must needs describe Lines curv'd in a thousand different Fashions and consequently different Wills must be admitted in God to determine their Motions Lastly if there were no Uniformity in the Action of Natural Bodies and that their Motion were not made in a right Line we should have no certain Principle for our Reasonings in natural Philosophy nor for our conduct in many Actions of our Life 'T is not a disorder that Lyons eat Wolves and that Wolves eat Sheep and Sheep grass of which God has had so
that God should continue to them their Vertue he endow'd them with in their Creation And since this Opinion is exactly agreeable with Prejudice because of the insensible Operation of God in Second Causes it is commonly embrac'd by the vulgar sort of Men and such as have more studied Ancient Naturalists and Physicians than Theology and Truth Most are of Opinion that God created all things at first and gave them all the Qualities and Faculties that were necessary to their preservation that he has for example given the first Motion of Matter and left it afterwards to it self to produce by the Communication of its Motions that admirable variety of Forms we see 'T is Ordinarily suppos'd that Bodies can move one another and this is said to be Mr. des Cartes's Opinion though he speaks expresly against it in the Thirty Sixth and Seventh Articles of the Second Part of his Philosophical Principles Since Men must unavoidably acknowledge that the Creatures depend on God they lessen and abridge as much as possible that dependance whether out of a secret Aversion to God or a strange and wretched stupidity and insensibility to his Operation But whereas this Opinion is receiv'd but by those who have not much studied Religion and have preferr'd their Senses to their Reason and Aristotle's Authority to that of Holy Writ we have no reason to fear its making way into the Mind of those who have any Love for Truth and Religion for provided a Man seriously examin'd it he must needs discover its falsity But the Opinion of God's Immediate Concourse to every Action of Second Causes seems to accord with those Passages of Scripture which often attribute the same Effect both to GOD and the Creature We must consider then that there are places in Scripture where 't is said that God is the only Agent I am the Lord that maketh all things that stretcheth forth the Heavens alone that spreadeth abroad the Earth by my self Ego sum Dominus says Isaiah faciens OMNIA Extendens coelos SOLVS stabiliens Terram NVLLVS Mecum A Mother Animated with the Spirit of God tells her Children it was not her that form'd them I cannot tell how you came into my Womb For I neither gave you Breath nor Life neither was it I that form'd the Members of every one of you But doubtless the Creator of the World c. Nescio qualiter in utero meo apparuistis singulorum membra NON EGO IPSA COMPEGI sed mundi Creator She does not say with Aristotle and the School of the Peripateticks that to her and the Sun they ow'd their Birth but to the Creator of the Universe Which Opinion that God only Works and forms Children in their Mothers Womb not being conformable to Prejudice and Common Opinion These Sentences according to the pre-establish'd Principle must be explain'd in the Literal Sense But on the contrary the Notion of Second Causes falling in with the vulgar Opinion and being Suited to the sensible impression the Passages which expresly make for the separate Efficacy of Second Causes must be reckon'd invalid when compar'd with the former Concourse therefore is insufficient to reconcile the different Texts of Scripture and all Force Power and Efficacy must be ascrib'd to God But though the immediate concurrence of God with Second Causes were fit to accommodate the disagreeing passages of Holy Writ yet after all it is a question whether it ought to be admitted For the Sacred Books were not compos'd for the Theologists of these times but for the People of the Jews So that if this People had not understanding or Subtilty enough to imagine a Concourse such as is admitted in School-Divinity and to agree to a thing which the greatest Divines are hard put to to explain it follows if I mistake not that the Holy Scripture which Attributes to God and even to God alone the production and preservation of all things would have betray'd them into Error And the Holy Pen-Men had stood chargeable with writing not only in an unintelligible but deceitful Language For in saying that God Work'd all they would have design'd no more than that God assisted to all things with his concourse which was not probably so much as thought on by the Jews Those amongst them who were not very great Philosophers believing that God Work'd all and not that he concurr'd to all But that we may pass a more certain judgement about this Concourse it would be requisite to explain with care the different Hypotheses of the School-Men upon it For besides those impenetrable Clouds and Obscurities which involve all the Opinions that cannot be explain'd and defended without loose and indefinite Terms there are upon this Matter so great a variety of Opinions that it would be no hard Matter to discover the cause of them But I design not to engage in a discussion that would be so wearisom to my self as well as the greatest part of Readers On the contrary I had rather try to show that my Opinions may in some thing accord with those of the greater number of Scholastick Divines though I cannot but say their Language looks very Ambiguous and confus'd To explain my self I am of Opinion as I have said elsewhere that Bodies for example have no Force to move themselves and that therefore their moving force is nothing but the Action of God or not to make use of a Term which has no distinct import their moving force is nothing but the Will of God always necessarily Efficacious which successively preserves them in different Places For I believe not that God Creates any particular Beings to make the moving force of Bodies not only because I have no Idea of such a kind of Being nor see how they could move Bodies But also because these Beings themselves would have need of others to move them and so in infinitum For none but God is truely Immoveable and Mover altogether Which being so when a Body strikes and moves another I may say that it Acts by the Concurrence of God and that this Concurrence is not distinct from its own Action For a Body meeting another moves it by its Action or its moving force which at bottom is nothing but the Will of God preserving the Body successively in different Places the translation of a Body being not it's Action or moving force but the Effect of it Almost all Divines say too that the Action of Second Causes is not different from that of God's Concurrence with them For though they have a various Meaning yet they suppose that God Acts in the Creatures by the same Action as the Creatures And they are oblig'd if I mistake not thus to speak For if the Creatures Acted by an Action which God Work'd not in them their Action consider'd as such would no doubt be independent But they acknowledge as it becomes them that the Creatures depend immediately on God not only as to their Being but likewise as to
their Operation So likewise in point of free Causes I believe that God incessantly gives the Mind an Impression towards Good in General and that he moreover determines this Impression towards particular Goods by the Idea's or Sensations that he gives us as I have explain'd in the first Illustration which is the same with what the Divines intend by affirming That God moves and prevents our Wills Thus the Force which puts our Minds in Motion is the Will of God which Animates us and inclines us towards Good For God Creates not Beings to constitute the moving force of Minds for the same Reason that he Creates none to be the moving force of Bodies The Wills of God being of themselves Efficacious He need but Will to do And we ought not to multiply Beings without necessity Besides whatever is real in the determinations of our Motions proceeds likewise from the Action of God in us as appears from the first Illustration But all we Act or produce is by our Wills that is by the Impression of the Will of God which is our moving force For our Wills are Efficacious no farther than they are of God as mov'd Bodies impel not others but in as much as they have a moving force that translates them which is no other than the Will of God which Creates or preserves them successively in different places Therefore we Act no otherwise than by the Concourse of God and our Action consider'd as Efficacious and capable of producing any Effect differs not from his but is as say most Divines the self same Action eadem numero actio Now all the Changes which arrive in the World have no other Natural Cause than the Motions of Bodies and Volitions of Minds For First by the General Laws of the Communications of Motions the invisible Bodies which surround the visible produce by their various Motions all these divers Changes whose Cause is not apparent And Secondly by the Laws of Union of our Soul and Body when circumambient Bodies Act upon our own they produce in our Soul a multiplicity of Sensations Idea's and Passions Thirdly Our Mind by its Volitions produces in it self infinite different Idea's for they are our Volitions which as Natural Causes intend and Modifie our Mind Their Efficacy nevertheless proceeds from the Laws which God has establish'd And Lastly when our Soul acts upon our Body she produces several Changes in it by vertue of the Laws of her Union with it and by means of our Body she effects in those about it abundance of Changes by vertue of the Laws of Communication of Motions So that the Motions of Bodies and the Volitions of Minds are the only Natural or Occasional Causes of Natural Effects which no Man will deny who uses any Attention supposing only he be not prepossest by those who understand not what they say who fancy perpetually to themselves such Beings as they have no clear Idea's of and who offer to explain things which they do not understand by others absolutely incomprehensible Thus having shown that God by his Concourse or rather by his Efficacious Will performs whatever is done by the Motions of Bodies and the Wills of Minds as Natural or Occasional Causes it appears that God does every thing by the same Action of the Creature Not that the Creatures have of themselves any Efficacious Action but that the Power of God is in a manner Communicated to them by the Natural Laws which God has establish'd on their account This then is all that I can do to reconcile my Thoughts to the Opinion of those Divines who defend the necessity of immediate Concourse and hold that God does All in all things by an Action no ways differing from the Creatures For as to the rest of the Divines I think their Opinions utterly indefensible and especially that of Durandus together with the Sentiments of some of the Ancients refuted by St. Austin who absolutely deniâ—d the necessity of God's Concurrence pretending that Second Causes did all things by the Power which God in their Creation gave them For though this Opinion be less intricate and perplex'd than that of other Divines yet to me it seems so repugnant to Scripture and so suitable to Prejudices to say no worse of it that I think it altogether unwarrantable I confess that the School-Men who make God's immediate concourse to be the same Action with that of the Creatures do not perfectly agree with my Explication and all those that I have read except Biel and Cardinal d' Ailly are of Opinion That the Efficacy which produces Effects proceeds from the Second Cause as well as the First But as I make it indispensable for me to speak nothing but what I clearly conceive and always to take the side that best comports with Religion I think I am not liable to blame for deserting an Opinion which to many Men seems still more inconceiveable as they strive more to comprehend it and for establishing another which agrees perfectly not only with Reason but also with the Sacredness of our Religion and Christian Morality which is a Truth already prov'd in the Chapter that 's the Subject of these Reflexions However 't is not inconvenient to say something to it that I may fully verifie what I have said upon the present Question Both Reason and Religion evince That God will be Lov'd and rever'd by his Creatures Lov'd as Good and Rever'd as Power Which is such a Truth as it would be Impiety and Madness to doubt of To love God as he requires and deserves we must according to the First Commandment both of the Law and Gospel and by Reason it self as I have somewhere shown Love Him with all our Strength or with the whole extent of our Loving Capacity 'T is not sufficient to prefer Him before all things unless we moreover Love Him in all things For otherwise our Love is not so perfect as it ought to be and we return not to God all the Love that he gives us and gives us only for Himself in whom every one of His Actions Center So to render to God all the Reverence that is due to Him 't is not enough to adore Him as the Supreme Power and fear Him more than His Creatures we must likewise fear and adore Him in all His Creatures all our respects must perpetually tend towards Him to whom alone Honour and Glory are to be ascrib'd Which is what God Commands us in these Words Thou shalt Love the Lord thy God with all thy Heart and with all thy Soul and with all thy Strength And in these Thou shalt fear the Lord thy God and Him only shalt thou serve Thus the Philosophy that convinces us that the Efficacy of Second Causes is a Fiction of the Mind that the Nature of Aristotle and some other Philosophers is a Chimera that none but God is Strong and Powerful enough not only to Act on our Soul but even to give the
least Motion to Matter This Philosophy I say perfectly Accommodates with Religion whose end is to Unite us to God in the strictest Bonds 'T is Customary with us to Love only those things which are capable of doing us some Good This Philosophy therefore Authorises only the Love of God and Condemns the Love of every thing else We ought to fear nothing but what is able to do us some Evil. Therefore this Philosophy approves the fear of God and absolutely Condemns all other Thus it justifies all the just and Reasonable Motions of our Soul and Condemns all those that are contrary to Reason and Religion For we can never justifie the Love of Riches the desire of Greatness the Extravagance of Debauchery by this Philosophy by the Principles whereof the Love for Bodies is absurd and ridiculous 'T is an indisputable Truth 't is a Natural Opinion 't is even a Common Notion that we ought to Love the cause of our Pleasure and to Love it proportionably to the Felicity it either Actually does or is able to possess us with 'T is not only just but as it were necessary that the cause of our happiness should be the Object of our Love Therefore this Philosophy will teach us to Love God only as being the only Cause of our Felicity That surrounding Bodies cannot Act upon that we Animate and consequently much less upon our Mind That 't is not the Sun which enlightens us and gives us Life and Motion Nor that fills the Earth with Fruits and Beautifies it with Flowers and supplies us with Food and Nourishment This Philosophy seconding the Scripture teaches that 't is God alone who gives us Rain and Regulates the Seasons that fills our Bodies with Food and our hearts with Joy that he alone is able to do us good and thereby has given a perpetual Testimony of what he is though in the ages passed he suffer'd all Nations to walk in their own ways According to the Language of this Philosophy we must not say that 't is Nature that fills us with good nor that it is God and Nature together But that it is God alone speaking thus without Ambiguity for fear of deceiving the Ignorant For we must distinctly acknowledge one cause of our happiness if we we make it the only Object of our Love 'T is likewise an undeniable Truth That we ought to fear things that are able to harm us and to fear them in Proportion to the Evil they can do us But this Philosophy teaches us that God only can do us evil that 't is he as says Isaiah who forms the Light and creates Darkness who makes Peace and creates Evil and there is no Evil but what he does as says the Prophet Amos. Therefore it is he only that is to be fear'd We must not fear either Plague or War or Famine or our Enemies or even Devils themselves But God alone We ought to shun the Sword when we see a Blow a coming we are to fly the Fire and avoid a ruinous House that 's ready to crush us but we must not fear these things We may fly from those Bodies which are the Occasional or Natural Causes of Evil but we must fear God as the true Cause of all the misfortunes of Sinners and hate only Sin which necessarily provokes the cause of our Happiness to become the Cause of our Misery In a Word all the Motions of our Mind must center upon God since he alone 's above it and the Motions of our Body may relate to the Bodies round it This is what we learn from that Philosophy that admits not the Efficacy of Second Causes But this Efficacy being suppos'd I cannot see but we have reason to fear and Love Bodies and that to regulate our Love by Reason we need but prefer God before all things the First and Vniversal to every Second and Particular Cause We can see no need of Loving him with all our Strength Ex totâ mente ex toto corde ex totâ animâ ex totis viribus as says the Scripture Yet when a Man contents himself in preferring God to all things and adoring him with a Worship and a Love of Preference without making a continual Effort to Love and Honour him in all things It often fortunes that he deceives himself that his Charity vanishes and is lost And that he is more taken up with sensible than the supream Good For should it be demanded of the greatest Sinners and even Idolaters whether they preferr'd the universal to particular Causes they would make no scruple to answer amidst their Debauches Errours and Extravagance that they are not wanting to their essential Duty and that they are very sensible of what they owe to God 'T is acknowledg'd that they are deceiv'd But take away the Efficacy of Second Causes and they have no probable Pretext left to justifie their Conduct and Behaviour whilst if it be granted them they will think and Discourse with themselves in the following manner when blinded by their Passions and attentive to the Testimony of their Senses I am made for Happiness Neitheir can I nor indeed ought I to supersede my Love and Respect for whatever can be the Cause of my Felicity Why then must not I Love and respect sensible Objects if they be the true Causes of the Happiness I find in their Enjoyment I acknowledge the Sovereign Being as only worthy of Sovereign Worship and I prefer Him before all the World But since I see not that He requires any thing from me I enjoy the Goods he affords by Means of Second Causes to which he has subjected me And I pay not my Gratitude to him which perhaps would be to his Dishonour As he gives me no Blessing immediately and by himself or at least without the Assistance of his Creatures 't is a Sign he requires not the immediate Application of my Mind and Heart at least that he desires the Creatures should partake with him in the Acknowledgments and Resentments of my Heart and Mind Seeing he has communicated Part of his Power and Glory to the Sun has environ'd him with Splendour and Majesty and has given him the Supremacy in all his Works and seeing from the Influence of this great Luminary we receive all the necessary Blessings of Life Why should we not employ a part of this indebted Life in rejoicing in his Light and testifying the Sense we have of his Greatness and his Benefits Wou'd it not be the most shameful Ingratitude to receive from that excellent Creature abundance of all things and yet to shew no Sense of Gratitude to him for them And should we not be unspeakably blind and stupid to be unmov'd with Fear and Veneration in Respect of him whose Absence freezes us to Death and whose too near Approach can burn and destroy us I say it again that God is preferable to all things and infinitely more estimable than his Creatures But we are to fear and Love
us good but as capable to enjoy together with us the true Good These Truths seem evident to me but Men strangely obscure them by supposing that the surrounding Bodies can Act on us as True Causes Indeed most Christian Philosophers acknowledge That the Creatures can do nothing unless God concur to their Action and that so sensible Objects being unable to Act on us without the Efficacy of the First Cause must not be lov'd or fear'd by us but God only on whom they depend Which Explication makes it manifest That they condemn the consequences which I have now deduc'd from the Principle they receive But if in imitation of Monsieur de la Ville's Conduct I should say 't was a slight and subterfuge of the Philosophers to Cloak their Impiety if I should urge them with the Crime of supporting Aristotle's Opinions and the prejudices of Sense at the expence of their Religion if piercing too into the inmost recesses of their Heart I should impute to them the secret desire of debauching Men's Morals by the defence of a Principle which serves to justifie all sorts of disorders and which by the consequences I have drawn from it overthrows the first Principle of Christian Morality Should I be thought in my Senses whilst I went to condemn most Men as impious upon the strength of the inferences I had deduc'd from their Premises Monsieur de la Ville will no doubt pretend that my Consequences are not rightly inferr'd but I pretend the same of his and to ruine them all I need but explicate some Equivocal Terms which I shall sometime do if I find it necessary But how will Monsieur de la Ville justifie the common Opinion of the Efficacy of Second Causes and by what sort of concourse will he ascribe to God all that is due to Him Will he make it clearly appear that one individual Action is all of God and all of the Creature Will he demonstrate that the Power of the Creature is not useless though without its Efficacy the sole Action of God would produce the same effect Will he prove that Minds neither ought to Love nor Fear Bodies though the latter have a true Power of Acting on the former and will he make multitudes of Converts hereupon among those whose Mind and Heart are taken up with sensible Objects from a confus'd Judgment they make that these Objects are capable of making them Happy or Miserable Let him confess then That if we might treat as Hereticks and profane Persons all that hold Principles from which Heretical and Impious Consequences may be drawn no Man what ever could secure his Faith from being suspected ARGUMENT III. The Consequence of the Principle propos'd by Monsieur de la Ville as a Point of Faith viz. That the Essence of Body consists not in Extension This negative Principle overthrows the only demonstrative and direct Proof we have of the Soul 's being a distinct Substance from the Body and consequently of her Immortality When this truth is receiv'd which I presume with many other Persons to have demonstrated which Monsieur de la Ville impugns as contrary to the decisions of the Church viz. That the Essence of matter consists in Extension in Length Breadth and Thickness It is easie to comprehend that the Soul or that which is capable of Thought is a distinct substance from the Body For it 's manifest that Extension whatever Division and Motion be conceiv'd in it can never arrive to Reason Will or Sense Wherefore that thinking thing which is in us is necessarily a substance distinct from our Body Intellectual Notices Volitions and Actual Sensations are Actually Modes of some substances Existence But all the Divisions incidental to Extension can produce nothing but Figures Nor all its various Motions any thing but Relations of Distance Therefore Extension is not capable of other Modifications Therefore our Thought Desire Sensations of Pleasure and Pain are Modes of a Substances Existence which is not a Body Therefore the Soul is distinct from the Body which being conceded we thus demonstrate her Immortality No substance can be Annihilated by the Ordinary strength of Nature For as nature cannot produce something out of nothing So she cannot reduce something into nothing Modifications of Beings may be Annihilated Rotundity of a Body may be destroy'd for that which is round may become square But this roundness is not a Being a Thing a Substance but only a Relation of Equality of distance between the terminating parts of the Body and that which is in the Center Which relation changing the Roundness is destroy'd but the substance cannot be reduc'd to nothing Now for the foremention'd Reasons the Soul is not a Mode of a Body's Existing Therefore she is immortal and though the Body be dissolv'd into a Thousand parts of a different Nature and the structure of its Organs broke to pieces since the Soul consists not in that structure nor in any other Modification of matter 't is evident that the dissolution and even the Annihilation of the substance of an humane Body were that Annihilation true could not Annihilate the substance of our Soul Let us add to this another proof of the immortality of the Soul grounded upon the same Principle Though the Body cannot be reduc'd to nothing because it is a substance it may notwithstanding die and all its parts may be dissolv'd Because Extension is divisible But the Soul being a substance distinct from Extension cannot be divided For we cannot divide a Thought a Desire a Sensation of Pain or Pleasure as we may divide a square into two or four Triangles Therefore the substance of the Soul is indissoluble incorruptible and consequently immortal because unextended But if Monsieur de la Ville supposes that the Essence of Body consists in something besides Extension how will he convince the Libertines that she is neither material nor mortal They will maintain that something wherein the Essence of Body consists is capable of thinking and that the substance which thinks is the same with that which is extended If Monsieur de la Ville denies it they 'll show that he does it without Reason since according to his Principle Body being something else than Extension he has no distinct Idea of what that can be and consequently cannot tell but that unknown thing may be capable of Thought Does he think to convince them by saying as he does in his Book that the Essence of Body is to have Parts without Extension Certainly they will not take his Word for it for finding it as hard to conceive parts without Extension as indivisible Atoms or Circles without two Semi-circles they must have more deference for him than he has for God himself For Monsieur de la Ville in the last part of his Book pretends that God himself cannot oblige us to belive contradictory things such as are the Parts of a Body without any Actual extension But the Libertines on their part would
were true that God acted by particular Wills since Miracles are such only from their not happening by General Laws Therefore Miracles suppose these Laws and prove the Opinion I have establish'd But as to ordinary Effects they clearly and directly demonstrate General Laws or Wills If for Instance a Stone be dropp'd upon the Head of Passengers it will continually fall with equal speed not distinguishing the Piety or Quality or Good or Ill Disposition of those that pass If we examine any other Effect we shall see the same Constancy in the Action of the Cause of it But no Effect proves that God acts by particular Wills though Men commonly fancy God is constantly working Miracles in their Favour That way they would have God to act in being consonant to their own and indulgent to Self-love which centers all things on themselves and very proportionate to their Ignorance of the Complication of Occasional Causes which produce extraordinary Effects naturally falls into Mens Thoughts when but greenly studied in Nature and consult not with sufficient Attention the abstract Idea of an Infinite Wisdom of an Universal Cause of a Being Infinitely Perfect CONCERNING Nature and Grace DISCOURSE II. Of the Laws of GRACE in particular and of the Occasional Causes which regulate and determine their Efficacy PART I. Of the Grace of JESVS CHRIST I. SINCE none but GOD can act immediately and by himself on Minds and produce in them all the various Motions they are capable of 'T is he alone who sheds his Light within us and inspires us with certain Sensations which determine our diverse Volitions And therefore none but he can as a True Cause produce Grace in our Souls For Grace or that which is the Principle or Motive of all the Regular Motions of our Love is necessarily either a Light which instructs us or a confus'd Sensation that convinces us that God is our Good since we never begin to love an Object unless we see clearly by the Light of Reason or feel confusedly by the tast of Pleasure that this Object is good I mean capable of making us happier than we are II. But since all Men are involv'd in Original Sin and even by their Nature infinitely beneath the Majesty of God 'T is Jesus Christ alone that can by the Dignity of his Person and the Holiness of his Sacrifice have access to his Father reconcile him to us and merit his Favours for us and consequently be the meritorious Cause of Grace These Truths are certain But we are not seeking the Cause which produces Grace by its own Efficacy nor that which merits it by its Sacrifice and Good Works We enquire for that which regulates and determines the Efficacy of the General Cause and which we may term the Second Particular and Occasional III. For to the end the General Cause may act by General Laws or Wills and that his Action may be regular constant and uniform 't is absolutely necessary there should be some Occasional Cause to determine the Efficacy of these Laws and to help to fix them If the Collision of Bodies or something of like Nature did not determine the Efficacy of the General Laws of the Communication of Motions it would be necessary for God to move Bodies by particular Wills The Laws of Union of the Soul and Body become efficacious only from the Changes befalling one or other of these two Substances For if God made the Soul feel the Pain of pricking tho' the Body were not prick'd or though the same thing did not happen in the Brain as if it were he would not act by the General Laws of Union of the Soul and Body but by a particular Will If Rain fell on the Earth otherwise than by a necessary Consequence of the General Laws of Communication of Motions the Rain and the Fall of every Drop that composes it would be the Effect of a particular Will So that unless Order requir'd it should rain that Will would be absolutely unworthy of God 'T is necessary therefore that in the Order of Grace there should be some Occasional Cause which serves to fix these Laws and to determine their Efficacy And this is the Cause we must endeavour to discover IV. Provided we consult the Idea of intelligible Order or consider the sensible Order which appears in the Works of God we shall easily discover that Occasional Causes which determine the Efficacy of General Laws and are of use in fixing them must necessarily be related to the Design for which God has establish'd them For Example Experience evidences that God has not made and Reason certifies that he ought not to make the Courses of the Planets the Occasional Causes of the Union of our Soul and Body He ought not to will that our Arm should be mov'd in such or such a manner or that our Soul should feel the Tooth-ake when the Moon shall be in conjunction with the Sun if so be this Conjunction acts not on the Body God's Design being to unite our Soul to our Body he cannot in prosecuting that Design give the Soul Sensations of Pain save when there happen some Changes in the Body repugnant to it Wherefore we are not to seek out of our Soul or Body the Occasional Causes of their Union V. Hence it follows that God designing to form his Church by Jesus Christ could not according to that Design seek the Occasional Causes which serve to settle the General Laws of Grace by which the Spirit of Jesus diffus'd through his Members communicates Life and Holiness to them except in Jesus Christ and in the Creatures united to him by Reason Thus the Rain of Grace is not deriv'd to our Hearts by the diverse situations of the Stars nor by the Collision of certain Bodies nor even according to the different Courses of the animal Spirits which give us Motion and Life All that Bodies can do is to excite in us Motions and Sensations purely Natural For whatever arrives to the Soul through the Body is only for the Body VI. Yet as Grace is not given to all that desire it nor as soon as they desire it and is granted to those who do not ask it it thence follows that even our Desires are not the Occasional Causes of Grace For this sort of Causes have constantly and most readily their Effect and without them the Effect is not produc'd For Instance the Collision of Bodies being the Occasional Cause of the Change which happens in their Motion if two Bodies did not meet their Motions would not alter and if they alter'd we may be assur'd they met The general Laws which shed Grace upon our Hearts find nothing therefore in our Wills to determine their Efficacy as the general Laws which regulate the Rains are not founded on the Dispositions of the Places rain'd upon For it indifferently rains upon all Places on hollow and manur'd Grounds even on the Sands and the Sea it self VII We are therefore reduc'd to confess that
Principle In a word Jesus Christ needing Minds of particular Dispositions for the causing particular Effects may in general apply to them and by that Application infuse into them sanctifying Grace As the Mind of a Projector thinks in general of square Stones when these Stones are actually necessary to his Building XVIII But the Soul of Jesus being not a general Cause we have reason to think it has often particular Desires in regard to particular Persons When we intend to speak of God we must not consult our selves and make him act like us but consider the Idea of a Being infinitely perfect and make God act according to that Idea But in speaking of the Action of the Soul of Jesus we may look into our selves and make him act like particular Causes For Example We have reason to believe that the Conversion of St. Paul was owing to the Efficacy of a particular Desire of Jesus Christ. And we are to look upon the Desires of the Soul of Jesus which have a general respect to Minds of a certain Character as particular Desires though they comprehend many Persons because these Desires change daily like those of particular Causes But the general Laws by which God acts are always the same because the Wills of God ought to be firm and constant by reason that his Wisdom is infinite XIX The diverse Desires of the Soul of Jesus distributing Grace we clearly conceive why it is not equally dispers'd to all Men and why bestow'd on some more abundantly at one time than another For his Soul not thinking on all Men at once cannot at the same time have all the Desires whereof it is capable So that he acts not on his Members in a particular manner except by successive Influences as the Soul moves not at once all the Muscles of our Body For the Animal Spirits are unequally and successively distributed into our Members according to the various Impressions of Objects the diverse Motions of our Passions and the several Desires we freely excite within us XX. True it is that all the Righteous constantly receive the Influence of their Head which gives them Life and that when they act by the Spirit of Jesus Christ they merit and receive new Graces though it be not necessary that the Soul of Jesus should have any particular Desires as the occasional Causes of them For Order which requires that every Desert should be rewarded is not an arbitrary but a necessary Law and independent from any occasional Cause But though he who performs a meritorious Action may be rewarded for it whilst the Soul of Jesus has no actual Desires relating to him yet 't is certain that he merited not this Grace but by the Dignity and Sanctity of the Spirit which Christ has communicated to him For Men are not well-pleasing to God nor able to do good but in as much as they are united to his Son by Charity XXI It must be farther acknowledg'd that those who observe the Counsels of Jesus Christ out of an Esteem they have for them and through the Fear of future Punishment sollicite as I may say by their Obedience the Charity of Christ to think on them though they act from a Principle of Self-love But their Actions are not the Occasional Causes either of Grace since it does not infallibly follow them or even of the Motions of the Soul of Jesus in their Favour since these Motions never fail to communicate it Thus only the Desires of Jesus Christ as Occasional Causes have infallibly their Effect because God having constituted him Head of the Church ought by him only to communicate his sanctifying Grace to his Elect. XXII Now we may consider in the Soul of Jesus Christ Desires of two sorts viz. Actual Transitory and Particular that have but a short-liv'd Efficacy and Stable and Permanent which consist in a setled and constant Disposition of the Soul of Jesus Christ with relation to certain Effects which tend to the Execution of his Design in general If our Soul by its various Motions communicated to our Body all that was necessary to its Formation and Growth we might distinguish in her two kinds of Desire For it would be by the actual and transitory Desires that she would drive into the Muscles of the Body the Spirits which gave it a certain Disposition with reference to present Objects or to the actual Thoughts of the Mind But it would be by stable and permanent Desires that she would give to the Heart and Lungs the natural Motions by which Respiration and the Circulation of the Blood were perform'd By these Desires she would digest the Aliments and distribute them to all the Parts that needed them in as much as that sort of Action is at all times necessary to the Preservation of the Body XXIII By the actual transitory and particular Desires of the Soul of Jesus Grace is deriv'd to unprepar'd Persons in a manner somewhat singular and extraordinary But 't is by his permanent Desires that it is given regularly to those who receive the Sacraments with the necessary Dispositions For the Grace we receive by the Sacraments is not given us precisely because of the Merit of our Action though we receive them in Grace but because of the Merits of Jesus Christ which are freely applied to us in consequence of his permanent Desires We receive in the Sacraments much more Grace than our Preparation deserves and it suffices to our receiving some Influence from them that we do not oppose and resist it But 't is abusing what is most Sacred in Religion to receive them unworthily XXIV Amongst the actual and transitory Desires of the Soul of Jesus there are certainly some more durable and frequent than others and the Knowledge of these Desires is of greatest Consequence in Point of Morality Doubtless he thinks oftner on those who observe his Counsels than on other Men. His Motions of Charity for Believers are more frequent and lasting than those for Libertines and Atheists And as all Believers are not equally prepar'd to enter into the Church of the Predestinate the Desires of the Soul of Jesus are not equally lively frequent and durable on the account of them all Man more earnestly desires the Fruits that are fittest for the Nourishment of his Body he 〈◊〉 oftner on Bread and Wine than on Meats of difficult Digestion So Jesus Christ designing the Formation of his Church ought to be more taken up with those who can most easily enter than on others which are extremely remote The Scripture likewise teaches us that the Humble the Poor the Penitent receive greater Graces than other Men because the Despisers of Honours Riches and Pleasures are the fittest for the Kingdom of Heaven Those for Example who have learn'd of Jesus Christ to be meek and humble in Heart shall find Rest to their Souls The Yoke of Christ which is insupportable to the Proud will become easie and light by the Assistances of Grace For God
Difficulties that can be started about the Circumstances of our Mysteries like as to vindicate the Orders of Nature and Grace in themselves we need but know That God being infinitely wiâ—e frames no Design but upon the admirable Proportion of Wisdom and Fecundity discover'd in the ways capable to bring it to pass as I have explain'd in the First Discourse L. Most Men judging of God by measure of themselves imagines that he first forms a Design and afterwards consults his Wisdom about Ways to execute it For our Volitions generally prevent our Reason and our Designs are hardly ever perfectly Rational But God's Ways are not like those of Men who acts in the following manner if I have well consulted the Idea of a Being infinitely perfect God by the infinite Light of his Wisdom knows all possible Works and at once all the respective Ways of producing them He sees all the Proportions between Means and their End He compares all things by one Eternal Immutable and Necessary View and by the Comparison he makes of the Proportions of Wisdom and Fecundity which he discovers between the Designs and Ways of executing them he freely forms a Design But the Design being form'd he necessarily chooses the general Ways most worthy of his Wisdom Greatness and Goodness For since he forms no Design but through the Knowledge of the Means of executing it the Choice of the Design includes the Choice of Means LI. When I say That God forms his Design freely I would not be thought to mean that he may make choice of another less worthy and reject that which is more worthy of his Wisdom For supposing that God wills the Production of an external Work worthy of him he is not indifferent in the Choice but must produce the perfectest possible with reference to the Simplicity of the Ways he acts by This God owes to himself from following the Rules of his Wisdom and he must always act in the wisest and perfectest manner But I say that God forms his Design freely because he does not invincibly and necessarily love any thing besides his own Substance Neither the Incarnation of the Word nor for a much stronger Reason the Creation of the World are necessary Emanations of his Nature God is fully Self-sufficient For the Being infinitely perfect may be conceiv'd alone and without necessary Relation to any of his Creatures LII As God necessarily loves himself he necessarily follows the Rules of his Wisdom But whereas his Creatures constitute no part of his Being he is so full and sufficient in himself that nothing obliges him to produce them and he is absolutely indifferent or free on their Account And therefore it is that he has made the World in Time For that Circumstance sufficiently shews that the Creatures are not necessary Emanations of the Divinity but essentially depending on the Free Will of the Creator LIII Lo however an Objection that offers it self immediately to the Mind If it were true that God necessarily follow'd the Rules of his Wisdom the World would not have been created in Time For either the World is worthy or unworthy of God If it were better that the World should not be produc'd from Nothing it ought to be Eternal if on the contrary that it should remain in Nothingness it ought not to be created Therefore God is not oblig'd to stick to Rules which his Wisdom prescribes since the World was created in Time But this Objection is easily answer'd 'T is better for the World to be than not to be but it had better not be at all than be Eternal The Creature ought to carry the Essential Character of Dependency If Spirits were Eternal they might have some reason to consider themselves as Gods or necessary Beings or at least as capable of contributing to the Greatness or Felicity of God whilst imagining he could not forego producing them They might in a manner compare themselves with the Persons in the Deity while believing themselves produc'd like them by a necessary Emanation Thus God ought by the Rules of his Wisdom to leave Creatures the Mark of their Dependence and yet give them Assurance that he made them not to annihilate them and that being constant in his Purposes by reason of his unlimited Wisdom they shall eternally subsist LIV. This Difficulty may still be driven farther in this manner God necessarily follows the Rules of his Wisdom and necessarily does what is best But it was at least better for the World to be created in Time than not to be at all And certainly it was fit by the Rules of the Wisdom of God that the World should be produc'd in the Circumstances in which he produc'd it Therefore the Creation of the World in Time is absolutely necessary God was not at Liberty on its account nor capable of hindring its temporary Production For the Resolution of this Difficulty it must be observ'd That though God follows the Rules prescrib'd by his Wisdom yet he does not necessarily what is best because being Master of his Action he may choose to do any thing To act and not to follow the Rules of his Wisdom is a Fault Therefore on supposition that God acts he necessarily acts in the wisest manner conceivable But his Liberty in the Production of the World is a Sign of his Abundance Fulness and Self-sufficiency 'T is better for the World to be than not to be the Incarnation of Jesus Christ renders the Work of God worthy of its Author I acknowledge But whereas God is essentially happy and perfect and as nothing is good on his Consideration but himself or the Cause of his Perfection and his Happiness he loves nothing invincibly besides his own Substance and whatever is exteriour to him ought to be produc'd by an Action really eternal and immutable but that derives its Necessity from Supposition of the Divine Decrees LV. I offer another Principle which I have already mention'd which may afford some Light to the Difficulties that may arise about the Incarnation of Jesus Christ and the Creation of the World Reason and Authority of Holy Writ teach us that the First and Principal of the Designs of God is the Constitution of his Church in Jesus Christ. The present World is not created to remain as it is The Falshood and Errour the Injustice and Disorder that are seen in it give us sufficiently to understand it ought to have an end The future World which Truth and Justice shall inhabit is the Earth which God has settled on inviolable Foundations and which being the Object of Divine Love shall eternally subsist God has not created this Visible World with other Design than to raise by degrees that invisible City whereof St. John speaks so many Wonders and as Jesus Christ shall be the principal Beauty of it he was always had in View by God in the Production of his Work He has made all for Man and with reference to him as the Scripture teaches But he for
unequally supplied there 's all Reason to believe the Diversity of their Graces must proceed from him who is the Chief of Angels as well as Men and who under that Character has merited by his Sacrifice all the Graces which God has given his Creatures but has variously applied them by his different Desires It being undeniable that Jesus Christ long before his Birth or Meriting might be the Meritorious Cause of the Graces given to the Angels and Saints of the Old Testament it ought methinks be granted that by his Prayers he might be the Occasional Cause of the same Graces long before they were demanded For indeed there is no necessary Relation between Occasional Causes and the Time of Production of their Effects and though commonly these sort of Causes are follow'd by their Effects at the Time of their Action yet their Action being not of it self efficacious since its Efficacy depends on the Will of the universal Cause there 's no necessity of their actual Existence for the producing their Effect For Instance Suppose Jesus Christ at this present time should desire of his Father that such a Person might receive such a Supply of Grace at certain Moments of his Life that Prayer of Jesus Christ would infallibly determine the Efficacy of the General Will God has of saving all Men in his Son This Person will receive these Assistances though the Prayer of Jesus Christ be pass'd and his Soul actually think on another thing and never think again on that which he requir'd for him But the past Prayer of Jesus Christ is no more present to his Father than a future For all that must happen in all Times is equally present to God Thus God loving his Son and knowing he shall have such Desires with respect to his Ancestors and those of his own Nation and likewise to the Angels which must enter into the Spiritual Edifice of his Church and constitute the Body whereof he is the Head ought to accomplish the Desires of his Son before they were made that the Elect which preceded his Nativity and which he purchas'd by the Merit of his Sacrifice might as peculiarly belong to him as others and that he might be their Head as really as he is ours I acknowledge it is fit that Meritorious and Occasional Causes should rather precede their Effects than follow them and that Order would have Causes and their Effects exist together For 't is plain that all Merit ought to be instantly recompenc'd and every Occasional Cause actually to produce its Effect provided nothing hinders bâ—t it may or ought be done But Grace being absolutely necessary to Angels and Patriarchs could not be deferr'd But as for the Glory and Reward of the Saints of the Old Testament since that might be deferr'd 't was fit that God should suspend its Accomplishment till Jesus Christ should ascend into Heaven be constituted High Priest over the House of God and begin to exercise the Sovereign Power of Occasional Cause of all Graces merited by his Labours upon Earth Therefore we are to believe that the Patriarchs entred not Heaven till after Jesus Christ their Head Mediator and Fore-runner But though it should be granted that God had not appointed an Occasional Cause for all the Graces afforded the Angels and Patriarchs I see not how it can be thence concluded that Jesus Christ does not at present endue the Church with the Spirit which gives it Increase and Life that he does not pray for it or that his Prayers or Desires are not effectually heard in a word that he is not the Occasional Cause which applies to Men the Graces he has merited I grant if you 'll have it so that God before Jesus Christ gave Grace by particular Wills the Necessity of Order requiring it Whilst by Order the Occasional Cause could not be so soon establish'd and the Elect were very few in Number But now when the Rain of Grace falls not as heretofore on a small Number of Men but is shower'd on all the Earth and Jesus Christ may or ought be constituted the Occasional Cause of the Goods which he has merited for his Church what reason is there to believe God works so many Miracles as he gives us good Thoughts For in short all that is done by particular Wills is certainly a Miracle as not being a Result of the General Laws he has ordain'd whose Efficacy are determin'd by Occasional Causes But how can we imagine that in order to save Men he works so many Miracles useless to their Salvation I would say affords them all these Graces which they resist because not proportion'd to the actual Force of their Concupiscence St. John teaches us That Christians receive from the Fulness of Jesus Christ Graces in abundance For says he the Law was given by Moses but Grace and Truth came by Jesus Christ. For indeed the Graces which preceded him were not comparable to those he distributed after his Triumph If they were Miraculous we are to suppose they were extremely rare Even the Grace of the Apostles before the Holy Spirit was given them could not come in comparison with those they receiv'd when the High Priest of future Goods having entred by his Blood into the Holy of Holies had obtain'd by the Force of his Prayers and sent through the Dignity of his Person the Holy Spirit to animate and sanctifie his Church The unaccountable Blindness of the Jews their gross and carnal Notions their frequent Relapses into Idolatry after so many Miracles sufficiently manifest their disregard for true Goods and the dispiritedness of the Apostles before they had received the Holy Ghost is a sensible Proof of their Weakness So that Grace in those Days was extremely rare because our Nature in Jesus Christ was not yet establish'd the Occasional Cause of Graces Jesus Christ was not yet fully consecrated Priest after the Order of Melchisedech nor had his Father given him that Immortal and Glorious Life which is the particular Character of his Priesthood For 't was necessary that Jesus Christ should enter the Heavens and receive the Glory and Power of Occasional Cause of true Goods before he sent the Holy Spirit according to the Words of St. John The Holy Ghost was not yet given because that Jesus was not yet glorified And according to others of Jesus Christ himself It is expedient for you that I go away for if I go not away the Comforter will not come unto you but if I go I will send him unto you Now it cannot be imagin'd that Jesus Christ consider'd as God is the Head of the Church as Man he has obtain'd that Quality The Head and Members of a Body must be of the same nature Jesus Christ as Man intercedes for Men as Man he receiv'd from God a Sovereign Power over his Church For as he is God he intercedes not as God he has not receiv'd a Name which is above every Name but he is equal to the Father
The Soul of a Beast is a Substance distinct from its Body This Soul is Annihilated and therefore Substances may naturally be Annihilated Therefore though the Soul of Man be a Substance distinct from his Body it may be Annihilated when the Body is destroyed And thus the Immortality of the Humane Soul cannot be Demonstrated by Reason But if it be own'd to be most certain That no Substance can be naturally reduc'd to nothing the Soul of Beasts will subsist after Death and since they have no reward to hope for and are made for Bodies they must at least pass out of one to another that they may not remain useless in Nature Which seems to be the most reasonable Inference Now 't is Matter of Faith That God is just and Wise That he Loves not Disorder That Nature is corrupted That the Soul of Man is Immortal and that That of Beasts is Mortal Because indeed it is not a distinct Substance from their Body nor consequently capable of Knowledge and Love or of any Passions and Sensations like ours Therefore in the Stile of Monsieur de la Ville who condemns Men upon Consequences that he draws from their Principles the Cartesians may justly charge him with a Crime and all Mindkind besides for believing Beasts have Souls What would Monsieur de la Ville say if in his way of proceeding we should tax him of Impiety for entertaining Opinions from whence it might be concluded That God is not Just Wise or Powerful Opinions that overthrow Religion that are opposite to Original Sin that take away the only Demonstration Reason can give of the Immortality of the Soul What would he say if we should charge him with Injustice and Cruelty for making innocent Souls to suffer and even for Annihilating them to feed upon the Bodies which they Animate He is a Sinner but they are Innocent and yet for the Nourishment of his Body he kills Animals and Annihilates their Souls which are of greater Worth than his Body Yet if his Body could not subsist without the Flesh of Animals or if the Annihilation of a Soul should render his Body for ever Immortal this Cruelty as unjust as it is might perhaps be excusable But with what Pretence can he Annihilate Substances altogether innocent to sustain but a few days a Body justly condemn'd to Death because of Sin Would he be so little a Philosopher as to excuse himself upon the Custom of the Place he lives in But what if his Zeal should carry him into the Indies where the Inhabitants found Hospitals for Beasts and the Philosophers and the better and more gentile Part of them are so charitable to to the smallest Flies that for fear of killing them by Breathing and Walking they wear a fine Cloath before their Mouths and fan the Ways through which they pass Would he then fear to make innocent Souls to suffer or to Annihilate them for the Preservation of a Sinner's Body Would he not rather chuse to subscribe to their Opinion who give not Beasts a Soul more Noble than their Body or distinct from it and by publishing this Opinion acquit himself of the Crimes of Cruelty and Injustice which these People would charge upon him if having the same Principles he follow'd not their Custom This Example may suffice to shew that we are not permitted to treat Men as Hereticks and dangerous Persons because of Irreligious Consequences that may be deduc'd from their Principles when these Consequences are disown'd by them For though I think it would be an infinitely harder Task to answer the aforesaid Difficulties than those of M. de la Ville's yet the Cartesians would be very Ridiculous if they should accuse Monsieur de la Ville and others that were not of their Opinion of Impiety and Heresie 'T is only the Authority of the Church that may decide about Matters of Faith and the Church has not oblig'd us and probably whatever Consequence may be drawn from common Principles never will oblige us to believe that Dogs have not a Soul more Noble than their Body that they know not their Masters that they neither fear nor desire nor suffer any thing because it is not necessary that Christians should be instructed in these Truths ARGUMENT II. Almost all Men are perswaded That sensible Objects are the true Causes of Pleasure and Pain which we feel upon their Presence They believe that the Fire sends forth that agreeable Heat which rejoyces us and that our Aliments Act in us and give us the Welcome Sensations of Tasts They doubt not but 't is the Sun which makes the Fruits necessary for Life to thrive and that all sensible Objects have a peculiar Vertue by which they can do us a great deal of Good and Evil. Let us see if from these Principles we cannot draw Consequences contrary to Religion and Points of Faith A Consequence opposite to the first Principle of Morality which obliges us to love God with all our Strength and to fear none but Him 'T is a common Notion by which all Men Order their Behaviour That we ought to love and fear what has Power to do us Good and Harm to make us feel Pleasure and Pain to render us happy or miserable and that this Cause is to be lov'd or fear'd proportionably to its Power of Acting on us But the Fire the Sun the Objects of our Senses can truly Act on us and make us in some manner happy or miserable This is the Principle suppos'd we may therefore Love and Fear them This is the Conclusion which every one naturally makes and is the general Principle of the corruption of Manners 'T is evident by Reason and by the First of God's Commandments That all the motions of our Soul of Love or Fear Desire or Joy ought to tend to God and that all the Motions of our Body may be Regulated and Determin'd by encompassing Objects By the Motion of our Body we may approach a Fruit avoid a Blow fly a Beast that 's ready to devour us But we ought to Love and Fear none but God all the Motions of our Soul ought to tend to Him only we are to Love Him with all our strength this is an indispensible Law We can neither Love or Fear what is below us without disorder and corruption Freely to fear a Beast ready to devour us or to fear the Devil is to give them some honour to Love a Fruit to desire Riches to rejoyce in the light of the Sun as if he were the true cause of it to Love even our Father our Protector our Friend as if they were capable of doing us good is to pay them an Honour which is due to none but God in which sense it is lawful to Love none But we may and ought to Love our Neighbour by wisâ—ing and procuring him as Natural or Occasional Cause all that may make him happy and no otherwise For we to Love our Brothers not as if able to do