likewise that it is not Voluntary But as long as there is any Obscurity in the Subject we consider and we are not perfectly assur'd we have discover'd all that 's necessary to the Resolution of the Question as it most commonly happens in those which are abstruse and difficult and include many Relations we are free to deny our Consent and the Will may still command the Vnderstanding to apply it self to something new Which makes us not so averse to believe that the Judgments we form on such kind of Subjects are Voluntary Howbeit the generality of Philosophers suppose that even the Judgments we form upon things obscure are no ways Voluntary and will have the Consent to Truth in general to be an Action of the Vnderstanding which they call Assensus to distinguish it from the Consent to Good which they attribute to the Will and term Consensus but see the cause of their Distinction and Mistake Which is That in this state of Life we often evidently perceive some Truths without any reason to Doubt of them and so the Will remains not indifferent in the Consent it gives to Truths so manifest as has been just explain'd But 't is not so in point of Good there being no Particular Good we know but we have reason to doubt whether we ought to Love it Our Passions and Inclinations which we naturally have for Sensible Pleasures are though confus'd yet through the Corruption of our Nature very strong Reasons which render us cold and indifferent even in the Love of God himself And so we are manifestly sensible of our Indifference and are inwardly convinc'd we make use of our Liberty in our Loving GOD. But we do not in like manner apprehend that we imploy our Liberty in Consenting to Truth especially when accompanied with full Evidence and Conviction which induces us to believe our Consent to Truth is not Voluntary As if it was necessary our Actions should be indifferent to become Voluntary and that the Blessed did not love God most Willingly without being diverted from it by something or other in like manner as we Consent to that evident Proposition that twice 2 are 4 without being diverted from the Belief of it by any shew of a contrary Reason But to the end we may distinctly discover what the difference is between the Consent of the Will to Truth and its Consent to Goodnesâ— it is requisite to know the difference which is found between Truth and Goodness taken in the ordinary acceptation and with reference to us That difference consists in this That we have an Interest and Concern in Goodness but Truth does not at all affect us For Truth consists only in the Relation which two things or more haâ—â— between them but Goodness consists in the Relation of agreement which things have with our selves which is the reason that the Will has but One Action in respect of Truth which is its Acquiescence in or Consent to the Representation of the Relation which is betwixt things and that it has two in respect of Goodness namely its Acquiescence in or Consent to the Relation of agreement the thing has with our selves and its Love or Tendency towards that thing which actions are extreamly different though they are usually confounded For there is a great deal of difference betwixt simply Acquiescing and being carried to love the thing which the Mind represents since we often Acquiesce in things we could gladly wish were not and which we have an aversion to Now upon a due consideration of things it will visibly appear That 't is ever the Will which Acquiesces not only in things if they be agreeable to it but the Representation of things and that the reason of the Will 's Acquiescing always in the Representation of things of the clearest Evidence is as we have already said because there is no farther Relation in them necessary to be consider'd which the Vnderstanding has not already throughly discuss'd Insomuch that 't is as it were necessary for the Will to leave off disquieting and tireing it self in vain and to rest satisfy'd in a full assurance that it is not deceived since there is nothing left to put the Vnderstanding upon a fresh Inquiry This is especially to be observ'd that in the Circumstances we are under we have but a very imperfect Knowledge of things and consequently there is an absolute necessity we should have this Liberty of Indifference whereby we are impower'd to withold our selves from giving our Consent For the better discovering this Necessity it must be consider'd that we are carry'd by our Natural Inclinations to the imbracing Truth and Goodness so that the Will never reaching after things but what the Mind has some notice and apprehension of must needs pursue that which has the Face and Appearance of Truth and Goodness But because all that has the look of Truth and Good is not always what it appears to be it is plain that if the Will had not this Liberty but must infallibly and necessarily have embrac'd every thing that came cloath'd with an Appearance of Truth and Goodness it would have almost ever been Deceived Whence probably it might be concluded That the Author of its Being was the Author of its Errors and Seducements We have therefore a Liberty given us by God that we might avoid falling into Error and all the Evils consequent upon Errors by not resting with a full Assurance upon Probabilities but only upon Truth that is by commanding the Mind with an indefatigable Application to examine every thing till it has fully enlightned and unravell'd all that comes under its Examinations For Truth generally comes attended with Evidence and Evidence consists in a clear and distinct View of all the Parts and Relations of the Object which are necessary to give a certain and well-grounded Judgment The use then we should make of our Liberty is to IMPLOY IT AS FAR AS IT WILL GO That is never to consent to any thing whatever until we are as it were forc'd to 't by the secret Reproaches of our Reason To submit our selves to the false Appearance of Truth is to inslave our selves contrary to the Will of God but honestly to yield to the inward Reproaches of our Reason which accompany the Denial of our Submission unto Evidence is to obey the Voice of Eternal Truth which speaks within us Here then are Two Rules founded upon what I have been saying which are the most necessary of all others both for Speculative Sciences and Morality and which may be look'd on as the Foundation of all Humane Sciences The First which respects the Sciences is this A Man should never give an entire Consent but only to Propositions which appear so evidently true that he cannot deny it them without feeling an internal Pain and the secret Vpbraidings of his Reason that is without being plainly convinc'd he would make an ill use of his Liberty in case he should refuse to give his Consent
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
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
is because his Wisdom which in this respect is an Abyss to our apprehensions Wills it so Lastly 't is because this Conduct is more worthy of God than could be any other more favourable for the Reprobate For even they are condemn'd hy an Order as worthy our Adorations as that whereby the Elect are sanctified and sav'd And nothing but our Ignorance of Order and our Self-love make us blame a Conduct which the Angels and Saints eternally admire But let us return to the proofs of the efficacy of second Causes ARGUMENT V. If Bodies had not a certain Nature or Force to act with and if God did all things there would be nothing but what was Supernatural in the most ordinary effects The distinction of Natural and Supernatural which has been so well receiv'd in the World and establisht by the universal approbation of the Learn'd would be Chimerical and Extravagant ANSWER I answer that distinction is absurd in the Mouth of Aristotle since the Nature he has establisht is a meer Chimera I say that distinction is not clear in the mouth of the Vulgar part of Men who judge of things by the Impression they make upon their Senses For they know not precisely what they mean when they say the Fire burns by it's Nature I say that this distinction may pass in the mouth of a Divine if he means by natural Effects the consequences of the General Laws which God has settled for the production and preservation of all things And by supernatural Effects those which are independent on these Laws In this sense the Distinction is true But the Philosophy of Aristotle together with the Impression of the senses makes it as I think dangerous because it may divert from God the too respectful admirers of the Opinions of that wretched Philosopher or such as consult their senses instead of retiring into themselves to consult the Truth And therefore that distinction is not to be made use of without an Explication St. Austin having us'd the word fortune retracted it though there are few that could be deceiv'd by it St. Paul speaking of meats offer'd to Idols advertises that an Idol is nothing If the Nature of the Heathen Philosophy be a fiction if that nature be nothing it should be precaution'd for that there are many who are abus'd by it And more than we suppose who inconsiderately attribute to it the Works of God who are taken up with this Idol or fiction of the Humane mind and pay it those Honours which are only due to the Divinity They are willing to let God be Author of Miracles and some Extraordinary effects which in one sense are little worthy of his Greatness and Wisdom and they refer to the Power of their Imaginary nature those constant and regular Effects which none but the Wise know how to admire They suppose too that this so wonderful disposition which all living Bodies have to preserve themselves and beget their like is a production of their Nature For according to these Philosophers the Sun and Man beget a Man We may still distinguish between supernatural and natural Order several ways For we may say that the supernatural relates to future Goods that it is establish't upon consideration of the merits of CHRIST that it is the first and principal in the designs of God and other things enough to preserve a distinction which they are vainly apprehensive should fall to the ground ARGUMENT VI. The main proof which is brought by the Philosophers for the Efficacy of second Causes is drawn from the will and liberty of Man Man wills and determines of himself But to Will and Determine is to Act. 'T is certainly Man who commits Sin God not being the Author of it any more than of Concupiscence and Error Therefore Man acts ANSWER I have sufficiently explain'd in several Places of the Treatise about the Search of Truth what is the Will and Liberty of Man and especially in the first Chapter of the first Book and in the first Illustration upon it so that it is needless to repeat it again I acknowledge Man Wills and Determines himself in as much as God causes him to Will incessantly carries him towards good and gives him all the Idea's and Sensations by which he determines his Impression I know likewise that Man alone commits Sin But I deny that therein he does any thing For Sin Errour and even Concupiscence are nothing I have explain'd my self upon this Point in the first Illustration Man wills but his Volitions are impotent in themselves they produce nothing and God works all notwithstanding them For 't is even God that makes our Will by the Impression he gives us towards Good All that Man has from himself are Errour and Sin which are nothing There is a great difference between our Minds and Bodies that are about us I grant Our Mind in one sense Wills Acts and Determines it self Our own inward Consciousness is an evident Conviction If we were destitute of Liberty there could be no future Recompence and Punishment for 't is our Liberty that makes our Actions good or bad and without it Religion would be but a Phantasm and a Dream But that which we cannot see clearly is That Bodies have a force of Acting This it is we cannot comprehend and this we deny when we deny the Efficacy of Second Causes Even the Mind acts not in that measure which is imagin'd I know that I will and that I Will freely I have no Reason to doubt of it which is stronger than that inward feeling I have of my self Nor do I deny it but I deny that my Will is the true Cause of the Motion of my Arm of the Idea's of my Mind and of other things which accompany my Volitions For I see no Relation between so different things Nay I most clearly see there can be no Analogy between my Will to move my Arm and the Agitation of some little Bodies whose Motion and Figure I do not know which make choice of certain Nervous Canals amongst a Million of others unknown to me in Order to cause in me the Motion I desire by a World of Motions which I desire not I deny that my Will produces in me my Idea's I cannot see how 't is possible it should for since it cannot Act or Will without Knowledge it supposes my Idea's but does not make them Nay I do not so much as know precisely what an Idea is I cannot tell whether we produce them out of nothing and send them back to the same nothing when we cease to perceive them I speak after the Notion of some Persons I produce you 'll say my Idea's by the Faculty which God gives me of Thinking I move my Arm because of the Union which God has establish'd between my Mind and Body Faculty Vnion are Logical Terms of loose and indeterminate Signification There is no particular Being nor Mode of Being which is either Faculty or Vnion Therefore
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
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
us The second is a New Determination of the Motion of the Will towards that Object provided it be or seem to be a Good Before that View the Natural Motion of the Soul was either undetermin'd that is to say she was carried towards Good in general or it otherwise determined by the knowledge of some particular Object But in the very instant of the mind 's perceiving that Relation of the new Object to it self that general Motion of the Will is forthwith determin'd conformably to the perception of the Mind The Soul advances near that Object by her Love that she may relish it and discover her good in it through a sensible delectation which the Author of Nature affords her as a Natural Reward of her Inclination to Good She judged that that Object was a Good by an abstracted and unpathetick Reason but she persists in the persuasion of it through the Efficacy of Sensation and the livelyer that Sensation is the stronger is her adhesion to the Good that seems to be the Cause of it But if that particular Object be considered as Evil or able to deprive us of some Good there happens no New Determination in the Motion of the Will but only the Motion towards the Good oppos'd to that seemingly evil Object is augmented which augmentation is greater or lesâ—er as the Evil seems to be more or less formidable to us For indeed we hate only because we love and the Evil that is without us is judg'd no farther Evil than with reference to the Good of which it deprives us So that Evil being consider'd as a privation of Good to fly from Evil is to fly the privation of Good which is the same thing as to tend towards Good and therefore there happens no new determination of the Natural Motion of the Will at the presence of an unwelcome Object but only a Sensation painful distasteful or imbitter'd which the Author of Nature inflicts on the Soul as a pain naturally consequent to her being depriv'd of Good Reason alone had not been sufficient to carry her to it wherefore this painful and vexing Sensation is superadded to quicken her Thence I conclude that in any Passion whatsoever all the Motions of the Soul towards Good are the Motions of Love But as we are affected with divers Sensations according to the various Circumstances that attend the View of Good and the Motion of the Soul towards it so we come to confound our Sensations with the Commotions of the Soul and to imagine as many different Motions in the Passions as there are different Sensations Upon this head it must be observed that Pain is a true and real Evil and no more the Privation of Pleasure than Pleasure the Privation of Pain for there is a great difference betwixt not feeling or being depriv'd of such a Sensation of Pleasure and the actual enduring of Pain So that every Evil is not precisely so because it deprives us of Good but only that Evil as I have explain'd that is without us or is not a Modification of our Soul Nevertheless as by Goods and Evils we commonly understand things good or evil and not the Sensations of Pleasure and Pain which are rather the natural Tokens by which the Soul distinguishes Good from Evil it may be said methinks without Equivocation that Evil is nothing but the privation of Good and that the natural motion of the Soul that removes us from Evil is the same with that which carries us to good for in brief all natural Motion being an Impression of the Author of Nature whose acting centers in himself and who can incline us only towards himself The true Motion of the Soul is always essentially the Love of Good and but accidentally an Aversion from Evil. I grant that Pain may be consider'd as an Evil and in that sense the Motion of the Passions which is stir'd up by it is not real since we never will Pain and though we positively will the absence of Pain yet 't is only because we positively will the Preservation or Perfection of our Being The third thing to be observ'd in every Passion is the Sensation that attends them the Sensation of Love Hatred Desire Joy Sorrow which are all different in the different Passions The fourth thing is a new Determination of the course of the Animal Spirits and Blood to the outward and inward parts of the Body Before the View of the Object of the Passion the vital Spirits were dispers'd throughout the whole Body for the preservation of all its parts in general but at the appearance of that new Object all this Order and Oeconomy is disturb'd and most part of the Spirits are thrown into the Muscles of the Arms Legs Face and other exteriour parts of the Body to put them in a disposition suitable to the ruling Passion and to give it such a gesture and motion as are necessary for the obtaining or avoiding the imminent Good or Evil But if its own Forces are insufficient for its occasions these same Spirits are distributed in such a manner as make it machinally utter certain words and cries and which diffuse over the Face and the rest of the Body such an air and comportment as is capable of actuating others with the same Passion it self is possess'd with For Men and Beasts having a mutual cohesion by the Eyes and Ears when any one of them is in a violent Commotion it necessarily affects the Spectators and Hearers and naturally makes upon their Imagination such an Impression as troubles them and moves them to preserve it As to the rest of the Animal Spirits they violently descend into the Heart Lungs Liver Spleen and other Viscera thence to draw contributions and to hasten those parts to send forth a sufficient and timely supply of Spirits necessary to preserve the Body in that extraordinary Contention The fifth thing is a sensible Commotion of the Soul who feels her self agitated by an unexpected overflow of Spirits This sensible Commotion of the Soul always attends that Motion of the Spirits that the Soul may participate of all that affects the Body even as the Motion of Spirits is raised in the Body when the Soul is carried toward any Object For the Body and Soul being mutually united their Motions are reciprocal The sixth thing are several Sensations of Love Hatred Joy Desire Sorrow that are produced not by the Intellectual view of Good or Evil as those that have been already mention'd but by the various concussions that are caused in the Brain by the Animal Spirits The seventh thing is a certain Sensation of Joy or rather internal Satisfaction which detains the Soul in her Passion and assures her that she is in the fittest State she can be in reference to the Object she considers This internal satisfaction attends all the Passions whatsoever whether they proceed from the sight of an Evil or from the sight of a Good Sorrow as well as Joy This satisfaction makes
all the Passions pleasant and induces us to yield our consent and give up our selves to them and 't is that satisfaction which must be overcome by the Delights of Grace and the Comforts of Faith and Reason For as the Joy of the Mind is the result of a certain or evident Knowledge that we are in the best state that can be in relation to the Objects perceiv'd by the Understanding so the pleasantness of the Passions is a natural consequence of that confused Sensation we have of being in the best state we can be in reference to those things we perceive by our Senses Now 't is by the Joy of the Mind and the Comforts of Grace that the false delight of the Passions which makes us Slaves to sensible Goods must be vanquished All the forementioned things are to be found in all the Passions unless they be raised by confused Sensations and that the Mind perceive not the Good or Evil from whence they proceed for then 't is plain that they have not the three first qualifications It likewise appears that all these things are not free since they are in us without our Consent and even against it since the Sin but that the Consent of our Will is the only thing which is really in our power However it will be fit to explain all these things more at large and to make them more sensible by some Instances Let us suppose a Man to whom an Affront has been actually offer'd or one whose Imagination is either naturally strong and lively or over-heated by some Accident as a Disease or a Surfeit of Sorrow and Melancholy This Man in his Closet fancies that such a one who perhaps does not think upon him is willing and ready to wrong him The sensible View or the Imagination of the Opposition betwixt the Actions of his Enemy and his own designs will be the first Cause of his Passion That the Motion of this Man's Will may acquire some new determination it is not absolutely necessary that he should receive or imagine he receives any Affront for 't is sufficient that his Mind only should think on it without his Body's being concern'd in it However as this new determination would not be the determination of a Passion but only a most weak and languishing Inclination 'T is better to suppose that some great opposition is actually made to this Man's Designs or that he strongly fancies that it will be so than to make another Supposition wherein the Senses and Imagination are little or not at all concern'd The second thing to be consider'd in this Man's Passion is an increase of the Motion of his Will towards that Good of which his real or pretended Enemy endeavours to deprive him the stronger the opposition is or appears the more considerable will be the increase He at first hates his Adversary only because he loves that Good and his Hatred against him grows in proportion to his Love for it because the Motion of the Will in the Passion of Hatred is at bottom nothing else but a Motion of Love that Motion of the Soul towards Good not differing from that by which she avoids its Privation as has been already observ'd The third thing is a Sensation suitable to that Passion in our Instance 't is a Sensation of Hatred But though the Motion of Hatred be the same with that of Love yet the Sensation of Hatred is altogether different from that of Love as any one may experience in himself Motions are Actions of the Will but Sensations are Modifications of the Mind The Motions of the Will are natural Causes of the Sensations of the Mind and these Sensations of the Mind reciprocally encourage and keep up the Motions of the Will in their Determination The Sensation of Hatred is in the Man before us the natural result of the Motion of his Will excited upon the view of Evil and this Motion is afterwards maintained by the Sensation it hath produced What we have just now said of this Man might happen to him though he had not a Body But because he 's made up of two Substances naturally united the Motions of his Soul are communicated to his Body and those of his Body to his Soul so that the new Determination or the increase of the Motion of his Will naturally causes a new Determination in the Motion of the Animal Spirits which is always different in all the Passions though the Motion of the Soul be still almost the same The Spirits therefore are violently driven into the Arms Legs and Face to dispose the Body in a manner adapted to the Passion and to shed over the Face the Look of an injured Person with reference to all the Circumstances of the Injury receiv'd and to the Quality and Capacity both of the Agent and Patient That Expansion of the Spirits is so much the more strong abundant and quick as the Good is greater the Opposition more vehement and the Brain livelyer affected And therefore if the Person whereof we speak only imagine himself injur'd or if he receive a real but slight injury that makes no considerable concussion in the Brain the Expansion of the Animal Spirits will prove weak and languishing and perhaps insufficient to alter the natural and ordinary Disposition of the Body But if the Outrage be exceeding great or the Imagination enflam'd the Brain will be extraordinarily shaken and the Spirits so violently dispers'd that in a moment they will imprint on the Face and Body the Symptoms of the ruling Passion If he be strong enough to obtain the Victory his Countenance will be fierce and threatning If weak and unable to withstand the overwhelming Evil he will appear humble and submissive His Moans and Tears naturally exciting in the Spectators and even in his Enemy Motions of Pity he will draw from thence those succours which he could not expect from his own strength True it is that if the Spirits and Fibres of the Brain in the Spectators and Adversary of that unhappy Wretch be already agitated with a violent Motion contrary to that which breeds Compassion in the Soul the bemoanings of the Distress'd will but increase their Fury and so would his undoing be inevitable should he always keep the same Countenance and Aspect But Nature has provided for it for at the sight of the imminent loss of a great good there are naturally produced on the Face such strange and surprizing Characters of Rage and Despair as to disarm the most Barbarous Enemies and to make them as it were unmovable That frightfull and unexpected sight of the Lineaments of Death drawn by the Hand of Nature upon the Face of an unfortunate Person stops in the very Enemy stricken therewith the Motions of the Spirits and Blood that carried him to Revenge and in that favourable moment of Audience Nature printing again an humble submissive air upon the Face of the poor Wretch that begins to entertain some hopes because of the unmovableness and
false Supposition of the Philosophers which we are here endeavouring to destroy that the surrounding Bodies are the true Causes of our Pain and Pleasure Reason seems to justifie a Religion like the Pagan Idolatry and approve the universal Depravation of Morals Reason I grant teaches not to adore Onions and Leeks for instance as the Sovereign Divinity because they can never make us altogether happy when we have them or unhappy when we want them neither did the Heathens worship them with an equal Homage as their great Jupiter whom they fansied to be the God of Gods or as the Sun whom our Senses represent as the universal Cause that gives Life and Motion to all things and which we can hardly forbear to look on as the Sovereign Divinity if we suppose as the Pagan Philosophers that he Comprehends in his Being the true Causes of what he seems to produce as well upon our Soul and Body as upon all the Beings that surround us But if we must not pay a Sovereign Worship to Leeks and Onions they deserve at least some particular Adoration I mean they may be thought upon and loved in some manner if it be true that they can in some sort make us happy and may be honour'd proportionably to the good they doe us Surely Men that listen to the Reports of Sense think Pulse capable of doing them good otherwise the Israelites would not have bewailed the loss of them in the Wilderness or look'd on themselves as unhappy for being deprived thereof had they not fansied to themselves some great Happiness in the Enjoyment of them See what an Abyss of Corruption Reason plunges us into when it goes hand in hand with the Principles of Pagan Philosophy and follows the footsteps of the Senses But that the Falshood of that wretched Phylosophy and the Certainty of our Principles and Distinctness of our Ideas may not be longer doubted it will be necessary plainly to establish the Truths that contradict the Errours of the Ancient Philosophers or to prove in few words that there is but one true Cause since there is but one true God that the Nature and Force of every thing is nothing but the Will of God that all Natural things are not real but only occasional Causes and some other Truths depending on them It is evident that all Bodies great and little have no force to move themselves a Mountain a House a Stone a Grain of Sand the minutest and bulkiest Bodies imaginable are alike as to that We have but two sorts of Ideas viz. of Spirits and Bodies and as we ought not to speak what we conceive not so we must only argue from those two Ideas Since therefore our Idea of Bodies convinces us that they cannot move themselves we must conclude that they are moved by Spirits But considering our Idea of finite Spirits we see no necessary Connexion betwixt their Will and the Motion of any Body whatsoever on the contrary we perceive that there is not nor can be any Whence we must infer if we will follow Light and Reason That as no Body can move it self so no Created Spirit can be the true and principal Cause of its Motion But when we think on the Idea of God or of a Being infinitely perfect and consequently Almighty we are aware that there is such a Connexion betwixt his Will and the Motion of all Bodies that it is impossible to conceive he should will that a Body be moved and it should not be moved And therefore if we would speak according to our Conceptions and not according to our Sensations we must say that nothing but his Will can move Bodies The moving force of Bodies is not then in themselves this force being nothing but the Will of God Bodies then have no proper Action and when a moving Ball meets with another and moves it the former communicates nothing of its own to the latter as not having in it self the Impression it communicates though the former be the Natural Cause of the latter's Motion and therefore a natural Cause is not a true and real Cause but only an occasional which in such or such a Case determines the Author of Nature to act in such or such a manner 'T is certain that all things are produced by the Motion of visible or invisible Bodies for Experience teaches us that those Bodies whose parts are in greater Motion are always the most active and those that Cause the greatest Alterations in the World so that all the Forces of Nature are but the Will of God who Created the World because he will'd it who spake and it was done who moves all things and produces all the Effects we see because he has established some Laws by which Bodies Communicate their Motion to each other when they meet together and because those Laws are efficacious they and not the Bodies act There is then no Force Power nor true Cause in all the Material and sensible World Nor need we admit any Forms Faculties or real Qualities to produce Effects which the Bodies bring not forth or to divide with God his own Essential Force and Power As Bodies cannot be the true Causes of any thing so likewise the most Noble Spirits are subject to the same impotency on that respect They cannot know any thing unless God enlightens them nor have the Sensation of any thing unless he modifies them nor will unless he moves them towards himself They may indeed determine the Impression God has given them to himself towards other Objects but I doubt whether it can be call'd a Power For if to be able to sin is a Power it is such a one as the Almighty wants saith St. Austin somewhere If Men had of themselves the Power of loving Good it might be said that they have some Power but they cannot so much as love but because God Wills it and that his Will is Efficacious They love because God continually drives them towards Good in general that is towards himself for whom alone they are Created and preserved God moves them and not themselves towards Good in general and they only follow that Impression by a free Choice according to the Law of God or determine it towards false and seeming Goods according to the Law of the Flesh But they cannot determine it but by the sight of Good For being able to doe nothing without an Impression from above they are incapable of loving any thing but Good But though it should be supposed which is true in one sense that Spirits have in themselves the Power of knowing Truths and loving Good should their Thoughts and Will produce nothing outwardly it might still be said that they were impotent and unoperative Now it seems undeniable that the Will of Spirits is not able to move the smallest Body in the World it being evident there is no necessary Connexion betwixt the Will we may have of moving our Arm for instance and the Motion of the same Arm. It moves
have it so and consequently HE whose essential and necessary Will is always conformable to ORDER Which Will remaining immutably the same the Establish'd Order was subverted by the first Man's Disobedience because for the demerits of his Sin it was consonant to Order that he should be Lord of nothing It is not reasonable that the Sinner should suspend the Communication of Motions that the Will of God should conform to his or that any exceptions should be made to the Law of Nature on his Behalf In so much that Man is subject to Concupiscence his Mind depends on his Body he feels in himself indeliberate Pleasures and involuntary and rebellious Motions pursuant to that most just and exact Law which unites the two Parts of which he is compos'd Thus the formal Reason of Concupiscence no less than that of Sin is nothing real and positive being no more in Man than the loss of the Power he had to wave and suspend to the Communication of Motions on some occasions Nor are we to admit any positive Will in God to produce it For this loss which Man has sustain'd was not a consequence of Order or of the immutable Will of God which never swerves from it and is constantly the same but only a consequence of Sin which has rendred Man unworthy of an Advantage due only to his Innocence and Uprightness Wherefore we may say that not God but Sin only has been the Cause of Concupiscence Nevertheless God Works all that is Real and Positive in the Sensations and Motions of Concupiscence for God does every thing but all that has nothing of Evil. 'T is by the general Law of Nature that is by the Will of God that sensible Objects produce in Man's Body certain Motions and that these Motions raise in the Soul certain Sensations useful to the preservation of the Body or the Porpagation of the Species Who then dare presume to say these things are not good in themselves I know it is said that Sin is the Cause of certain Pleasures But do they that say it conceive it Can it be thought that Sin which is nothing should actually produce something Can nothing be suppos'd to be a real Cause However 't is so said but possibly for want of taking due pains of seriously considering what they say or because they are unwilling to enter on an Explication that is contrary to the Discourses they have heard from Men who it may be talk with more Gravity and Assurance than Reflexion and Knowledge Sin is the Cause of Concupiscence but not of Pleasure as Free Will is the Cause of Sin though not of the natural Motion of the Soul The Pleasure of the Soul is good as well as its Motion or Love and there is nothing good but what God does The Rebellion of the Body and the guilt of Pleasure proceed from Sin As the Adherency of the Soul to a particular Good or its Rest proceeds from the Sinner But these are only Privations and Nothings whereof the Creature is capable Every Pleasure is Good and likewise in some measure makes happy the Possessour at least for the time of the Enjoyment But it may be said to be evil because instead of elevating the Mind to Him that is the true Cause of it through the Errour of our Intellectual and corruption of our Moral Part it prostrates it before sensible Objects that only seem to produce it Again it is evil in as much as it is Injustice in us who are Sinners and consequently meriting rather to be punish'd than rewarded to oblige God pursuant to his Primitive Will to recompense us with pleasant Sensations In a word not to repeat here what I have said in other places it is evil because God at present forbids it by Reason of its alienating the Mind from himself for whom he hath made and preserves it For that which was ordain'd by God to preserve Righteous Man in his Innocence now fixes sinful Man in his Sin and the Sensations of Pleasure which he wisely establish'd as the easiest and most obvious Expedients to teach Man without calling off his Reason from his true Good whether he ought to unite himself with the invironing Bodies at present fill the Capacity of his Mind and fasten him on Objects incapable of acting in him and infinitely below him because he looks upon these Objects to be the true Causes of the Happiness he enjoys occasionally from them THE SECOND ILLUSTRATION UPON THE First CHAPTER of the First BOOK Where I say That the Will cannot diversly determine its Propensity to Good but by commanding the Vnderstanding to represent to it some particular Object IT must not be imagin'd that the Will commands the Understanding any other Way than by its Desires and Motions there being no other Action of the Will nor must it be believ'd that the Understanding obeys the Will by producing in it self the Ideas of Things which the Soul desires for the Understanding acts not at all but only receives Light or the Ideas of Things through its necessary Union with Him who comprehends all Beings in an intelligible manner as is explain'd in the Third Book Here then is all the Mystery Man participates of the Sovereign Reason and Truth displays it self to him proportionably to his Application and his praying to it Now the Desire of the Soul is a Natural Prayer that is always heard it being a natural Law that Ideas should be so much readier and more present to the Mind as the Will is more earnest in desiring them Thus provided our Thinking Capacity or Understanding be not clogg'd and fill'd up by the confus'd Sensations we receive occasionally from the Motions occurring in our Body we should no sooner desire to think on any Object but its Idea would be always present to our Mind which Idea Experience witnessing is so much more present and clear as our Desire is more importunate and our confus'd Sensations furnish'd to us by the Body less forcible and applicative as I have said in the foregoing Illustration Therefore in saying that the Will commands the Understanding to represent to it some particular Object I meant no more than that the Soul willing to consider that Object with Attention draws near it by her Desire because this Desire consequently to the efficacious Wills of God which are the inviolable Laws of Nature is the Cause of the Presence and Clearness of the Idea that represents the Object I could not at that time speak otherwise than I did nor explain my self as I do at present as having not yet prov'd God the sole Author of our Ideas and our particular Volitions only the occasional Causes of them I spoke according to the common Opinion as I have been frequently oblig'd to do because all cannot be said at once The Reader ought to be equitable and give Credit for some time if he would have Satisfaction for none but Geometricians pay always down in hand THE ILLUSTRATION UPON THE
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
them which by the Efficacy of the same Law giving the Elasticity to visible Bodies oblige them to rebound and hinder them from observing it But this I ought not to explain more at length XVII Now these two Laws are so Simple so Natural and at the same time so Fruitful that though we had no other Reason to conclude they are observ'd in Nature we should be induc'd to believe them establish'd by Him who works always by the simplest Ways in whose Action there is nothing but what 's so justly uniform and wisely proportion'd to his Work that He does infinite Wonders by a very small Number of Wills XVIII It fares not so with the General Cause as with the Particular with infinite Wisdom as with limited Understandings GOD foreseeing before the Establishment of Natural Laws all that could follow from them ought not to have constituted them if He was to disannul them The Laws of Nature are constant and immutable and general for all Times and Places Two Bodies of such degrees of Magnitude and Swiftness meeting rebound so now as they did heretofore If the Rain falls upon some Grounds and the Sun scorches others if a seasonable Time for Harvest is follow'd by a destructive Hail if an Infant comes into the World with a monstrous and useless Head growing from his Breast that makes him wretched this proceeds not from the particular Wills of GOD but from the Settlement of the Laws of Communication of Motions whereof these Effects are necessary Consequences Laws at once so simple and so fruitful that they serve to produce all we see Noble in the World and even to repair in a little time the most general Barrenness and Mortality XIX He that having built an House throws one Wing of it down that he may rebuild it betrays his Ignorance and he who having planted a Vine plucks it up as soon as it has taken root manifests his Levity because he that wills and unwills wants either Knowledge or Resolution of Mind But it cannot be said that GOD acts either by this Freakishness or Ignorance when a Child comes into the World with superfluous Members that make him leave it again or that an Hail-stone breaks off a Fruit half ripe If he causes this 't is not because he wills and unwills for GOD acts not like particular Causes by particular Wills nor has he establish'd the Laws of the Communications of Motions with design to produce Monsters or to make Fruit fall before Maturity it not being their Sterility but Fecundity for which He will'd these Laws Therefore what He once will'd He still wills and the World in general for which these Laws were constituted will eternally subsist XX. 'T is here to be observ'd That the Essential Rule of the Will of GOD is Order and that if Man for example had not sinn'd a Supposition which had quite chang'd the Designs then Order not suffering him to be punish'd the Natural Laws of the Communications of Motions would never have been capable to incommodate his Felicity For the Law of Order which requires that a righteous Person should suffer nothing against his Will being Essential to GOD the Arbitrary Law of the Communication of Motions must have been necessarily subservient to it XXI There are still some uncommon Instances where these General Laws of Motions ought to cease to produce their Effect not that GOD changes or corrects His Laws but that some Miracles must happen on particular Occasions by the Order of Grace which ought to supersede the Order of Nature Besides 't is fit Men should know that GOD is so Master of Nature that if He submits it to His Laws establish'd 't is rather because He wills it so than by an absolute Necessity XXII If then it be true that the General Cause ought not to produce His Work by particular Wills and that GOD ought to settle certain constant and invariable Laws of the Communication of Motions by the Efficacy whereof He foresaw the World might subsist in the State we find it in one Sense it may be most truly said that GOD desires all his Creatures should be perfect that He wills not the Abortion of Children nor loves monstrous Productions nor has made the Laws of Nature with design of causing them and that if it were possible by ways so simple to make and preserve a perfecter World He would never have establish'd those Laws whereof so great a Number of Monsters are the necessary Results But that it would have been unworthy His Wisdom to multiply His Wills to prevent some particular Disorders which by their Diversity make a kind of Beauty in the Universe XXIII GOD has given to every Seed a Cicatricle which contains in Miniature the Plant and Fruit another Cicatricle adjoining to the former which contains the Root of the Plant which Root contains another Root still whose imperceptible Branches expand themselves into the two Lobes or Meal of the Seed Does not this manifest that in one most real Sense He designs all Seeds should produce their like For why should He have given to those Grains of Corn He design'd should be barren all the Parts requisite to render them Fecund Nevertheless Rain being necessary to make them thrive and this falling on the Earth by General Laws which distribute it not precisely on well manur'd Grounds and in the fittest Seasons all these Grains come not to good or if they do the Hail or some other mischievous Accident which is a Necessary Consequence of these same Natural Laws prevents their earing Now GOD having constituted these Laws might be said to will the Fecundity of some Seeds rather than others if we did not otherwise know that it not becoming a General Cause to work by Particular Wills nor an infinitely wise Being by Complicated Ways GOD ought not to take other Measures than He has done for the Regulating the Rains according to Time and Place or by the Desire of the Husbandman Thus much is suffiâ—ient for the Order of Nature Let us explain that of Grace a little more at large and especially remember that 't is the same Wisdom and the same Will in a word the same GOD who has establish'd them both PART II. Of the Necessity of the General Laws of GRACE XXIV GOD loving Himself by the Necessity of His Being and willing to procure an Infinite Glory and Honour on all Hands worthy of himself consults His Wisdom for the accomplishing His Desires This Divine Wisdom fill'd with Love for Him from whom He receives His Being by an Eternal and Ineffable Generation seeing nothing in all possible Creatures worthy of the Majesty of His Father offers Himself to establish to His Honour an Eternal Worship and to present Him as High Priest a Sacrifice which through the Dignity of His Person should be capable of contenting Him He represents to Him infinite Models for the Temple to be rais'd to His Glory and at the same time all possible Ways to execute His Designs
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
they had committed in murthering our Saviour it was fit that Jesus Christ should come into the World about the Reign of Herod supposing that People by the necessary Consequence of the Order of Nature was to be divided about that time that Civil Wars and perpetual Seditions were to weaken them and that lastly the Romans were to ruine and disperse them with the total Destruction of their City and Temple 'T is true there seems to be something extraordinary in the Desolation of the Jews But as it shews greater Wisdom in God to produce so surprizing Effects by the most simple and general Laws of Nature than by particular Wills which are always Miracles I question whether on that Occasion we are to fly unto a Miracle But for my part I dispute it not here since 't is a Fact that we cannot easily nor need we explain our selves upon And I produce this Instance only to make some Application of my Principles and to make them more easily intelligible to others I have I think said enough of Nature and Grace to satisfie all equitable and moderate Persons about an infinite Number of Difficulties which disturb only their Minds who must needs judge of God by themselves For if Men would consult the Idea of an Infinitely Perfect Being of a General Cause of an Infinite Wisdom and if they would consent to the Principles I have establish'd conformable to that Idea I believe they would neither be surpriz'd nor offended at the Conduct of GOD and that they would change their Murmurs and Censures into Wonder and Adoration CONCERNING Nature and Grace DISCOURSE III. Of the Manner of GRACE's acting in us PART I. Concerning Liberty I. THERE is nothing more rude and unform'd than the Substance of Spirits if we separate it from God For what 's a Mind void of Understanding and Reason destitute of Motion and Love Yet it is the Word and Wisdom of God which is the universal Reason of Minds and 't is the Love whereby God loves himself that gives the Soul the Motion she has towards Good If the Mind knows Truth 't is by its Natural and Necessary Union with Truth it self If it is reasonable 't is so through supreme Reason Lastly If it be a Spirit or Intelligence 't is in one sense because its Substance is enlightned penetrated and perfected by the Light of God himself These Truths I have explain'd in another Place So likewise the Substance of the Soul is not capable of loving Good save by its Natural and Necessary Union with the Eternal and Substantial Love of the Supreme Good it advances not towards Good any farther than convey'd by God it is volent only from the Motion it continually receives from him it lives only through Charity and wills merely through the Love of Good which God makes it participate though it abuses it For in fine God making and preserving Minds only for himself inclines them towards him as long as he preserves their Being and communicates the Love of Good to them whilst they are capable of receiving it Now that natural and continual Motion of the Soul towards Good in general towards Good indefinite towards God is what I here call Will Since 't is that Motion which capacitates the Substance of the Soul to love different Goods II. This Natural Motion of the Soul towards Good in general is invincible for 't is not in our Power not to will to be happy We necessarily love what we clearly know and lively feel to be our Good All Minds love God by the Necessity of their Nature and if they love any thing else by a Free Choice of their Will 't is not because they seek not God or the Cause of their Felicity but because they are deceiv'd 'T is because perceiving by a confus'd Sensation that surrounding Bodies make them happy they consider them as good and by an Ordinary and Natural Consequence love them and unite to them III. But the Love of all these particular Goods is not naturally invincible Man consider'd in his Original State might supersede loving those Goods that fill'd not the whole Capacity of his Affection There being but one Good which includes all others he might sacrifice every other Love to the Love of this For God having made Minds only for himself cannot invincibly carry them to the loving any thing besides him or without relation to him Lastly our own inward Consciousness informs us that we can reject a Fruit though we are inclin'd to take it Now that Power of loving or not loving particular Goods the Non-invincibility which is found in the Motion which carries Minds to the loving what does not seem every way inclusive of all Goods That Power or Non-invincibility is what I call Liberty Thus placing the Definition instead of the thing defin'd that Expression our Will is free signifies that the Natural Motion of the Soul towards Good in general is not invincible in point of Good in particular To the Word Free the Idea of Voluâ—tary is commonly annex'd but in the Sequel of this Discourse I shall take the Word in the Sense I have observ'd as being the most Natural and Ordinary IV. The Word Good is equivocal and may signifie either Pleasure which makes formally happy or the true or seeming Cause of Pleasure In this Discourse I shall constantly take the Word Good in the second Sense because indeed Pleasure is imprinted on the Soul that she may love the Cause that makes her happy that she may advance towards it by the Motion of her Love and may strictly unite to it to be perpetually happy When the Soul loves nothing but her own Pleasure she in effect loves nothing distinct from her self For Pleasure is only a Condition or Modification of the Soul which renders her actually happy and content But whilst the Soul cannot be the Cause of her own Pleasure she 's unjust ungrateful and blind if she loves her Pleasure and forgets to pay the Love and Devotion which is due to the true Cause that produces it in her As none but God can act immediately and by himself on the Soul and make her sensible of Pleasure by the actual Efficacy of his all-potent Will so he alone is truly Good However I term the Creatures Good which are the seeming Causes of the Pleasures we feel occasionally from them For I am unwilling to deviate from the customary way of Speaking any farther than is necessary to explain my self clearly All Creatures though Good in themselves or Perfect with reference to the Designs of God are not Good with reference to us They are not our Good nor the true Cause of our Pleasure or Felicity V. The natural Motion which God constantly imprints on the Soul to carry it to love him or to make use of a Term which is the Abridgement of several Ideas and can be no longer equivocal or confus'd after the Definition I have given of it the Will is determin'd towards particular Goods either
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
different Prospects and make other Discoveries of Truths sometimes they push on certain Enquiries which we out of Laziness have neglected or for want of Strength and Courage have deserted And upon this Prospect of Benefiting my self and some others I run the hazard of being an Author But that my Hopes may not prove abortive I throw in this Precaution That a Man should not be presently discourag'd though he meet with things that run counter to Common Opinions which he has all his Life long believ'd and found generally approved by all Men in all Ages of the World For they are These Universal Errours I more especially strive to extirpate Were Men throughly enlightned Universal Approbation would be an Argument but the case is quite contrary Let him therefore be once for all re-minded that nothing but Reason ought to preside over the Judgments we pass on all Humane Opinions which have no relation to Faith of which GOD alone informs us in a quite different way from that of our discovering Natural things Let him Retire into himself and press near to that Light which perpetually shines Within to the end his Reason may be more and more enlightned Let him industriously avoid all those too lively Sensations and all the Commotions of the Soul which fill the Capacity of the Mind For the least Noise or Glimmering of Light sometimes disturbs the View of the Mind And therefore 't is good to avoid all these things though not absolutely necessary And if after all the struggles he can make he finds himself unable to withstand the continual Impressions that his Body and the Prejudices of Childhood make upon his Imagination recourse to Prayer is needful that GOD may afford those Supplies wherewith his own Strength cannot furnish him Never failing still to resist his Senses For that ought to be the perpetual Employment of those who in imitation of St. Austin have a great love for Truth The CONTENTS of the First Volume CHAP. I. 1. OF the Nature and Properties of the Understanding 2. Of the Nature and Properties of the Will and wherein its Liberty consists Page 1 CHAP. II. 1. Of our Judgments and Reasonings 2. That they depend upon the Will 3. The Use which should be made of its Liberty on their account 4. Two General Rules for the avoiding Error and Sin 5. Some Necessary Reflexions on those Rules 4 CHAP. III. 1. The Answers to some Objections 2. Observations vpon what has been said concerning the Necessity of Evidence 7 CHAP. IV. 1. Of the Occasional Causes of Error whereof there are five Principal 2. The General Design of the whole Work 3. The Particular Design of the First Book 9 CHAP. V. Of the Senses 1. Two ways of Explaining how they were corrupted by Sin 2. That 't is our Liberty and not our Senses which is the true Cause of our Errors 3. A Rule for avoiding Error in the use of our Senses 10 CHAP. VI. 1. Of the Errors of Sight in respect of Extension absolutely consider'd 2. A Continuation of these Errors about Invisible Objects 3. Of the Errors of Sight touching Extension relatively considered 13 CHAP. VII 1. Of the Errors of Sight about Figures 2. We have no Knowledge of the least of them 3. The Knowledge we have of the Greater is not exact 4. An Explication of some Natural Judgments which prevent our Deception 5. That these very Judgments deceive us in some particular Junctures 18 CHAP. VIII 1. That our Eyes are incapable of informing us of the Quantity or Swiftness of Motion considered in it self 2. That Duration which is necessary to our Knowledge of the Quantity of Motion is unknown to us 3. An Instance of the Errors of Sight about Motion and Rest 19 CHAP. IX A Continuation of the same Subject 1. A General Demonstration of the Errors of our Sight concerning Motion 2. That the Distance of Objects is necessary to be known in order to judge of the Quantity of their Motion 3. The Mediums whereby we know the Distances of Objects are examin'd 21 CHAP. X. Of our Errors about Sensible Qualities 1. The Distinction of the Soul and Body 2. An Explication of the Organs of the Senses 3. To what part of the Body the Soul is immediately united 4. An Instance to explain the Effect which Objects have upon our Bodies 5. What it is they produce in the Soul and the Reasons why the Soul perceives not the Motions of the Fibres of the Body 6. Four things which are generally confounded in every Sensation 25 CHAP. XI 1. The Error we fall into concerning the Action of Objects against the external Fibres of our Senses 2. The Cause of this Error 3. An Objection and Answer 28 CHAP. XII 1. Of our Errors concerning the Motions of the Fibres of our Senses 2. That we have no Perception of these Motions or that we confound them with our Sensations 3. An Experiment that proves it 4. Three kinds of Sensations 5. The Errors that accompany them Ibid. CHAP. XIII 1. Of the Nature of Sensations 2. That a Man knows them better than he thinks he does 3. An Objection and Answer 4. Why a Man imagines he has no Knowledge of his own Sensations 5. That it is an Error to think all Men have the same Sensations of the same Objects 6. An Objection and Answer 31 CHAP. XIV 1. Of the false Judgments that accompany our Sensations and which we confound with them 2. The Reasons of these false Judgments 3. That Error is not in our Sensations but only in these Judgments 35 CHAP. XV. An Explication of the particular Errors of the Sight which may serve as an Exemplar of the general Errours of our Senses 37 CHAP. XVI 1. That the Errors of our Senses serve us instead of General and very Fruitful Principles from whence to draw false Conclusions and these Conclusions again become other Principles in their turn 2. The Origine of Essential Differences 3. Concerning Substantial Forms 4. Of some other Errors of the School-Philosophy 38 CHAP. XVII 1. Another Instance taken from Morality which shews that our Senses offer us nothing but false Goods 2. That God alone is our true and proper Good 3. The Origine of the Error of the Epicureans and Stoicks 39 CHAP. XVIII 1. That our Senses make us liable to Error even in things which are not sensible 2. An Example taken from the Conversation of Men. 3. That Sensible Manners are not to be regarded 41 CHAP. XIX Two other Examples 1. The first concerning our Errors about the Nature of Bodies 2. The second concerning those which respect the Qualities of the same Bodies 42 CHAP. XX. The Conclusion of the First Book 1. That our Senses are given us only for the Preservation of our Body 2. That we ought to doubt of the Reports they make 3. That 't is no little thing to doubt as we ought to do 44 Book the Second CHAP. I. 1. A General Idea of the Imagination 2. That it
which in our ordinary way of Conception is a Decree posteriour to this Order of Nature Mysteries then of Faith must be distinguish'd from things of Nature We ought equally to submit to Faith and to Evidence but in the concernments of Faith we must not look for Evidence as in those of Nature we ought not to take up with Faith That is with the Authority of Philosophers In a word to be a Believer 't is requir'd to Assent blindly but to be a Philosopher it is necessary to See plainly 'T is not however to be deny'd but there are some Truths besides those of Faith for which it would be unreasonable to demand indisputable Demonstrations as are those which relate to Matter of Fact in History and other things which have their dependence on the Will of Men. For there are two kinds of Truth the one Necessary the other Contingent I call Necessary Truths those which are immutable by their Nature and those which have been fix'd and determin'd by the Will of God which is not subject to Change All other sorts of Truth are Contingent Mathematicks Physicks Metaphysicks as also a great part of Morality contain Necessary Truths History Grammar Private Right or Customs and such other things as depend on the changeable Will of Man contain only Contingent Truths We demand therefore an exact Observation of the Rule we have been establishing in the Search of Necessary Truths the Knowledge of which may be call'd Science and we must be content with the greatest Probability in History which includes the Knowledge of things Contingent For under the general Name of History may be concluded the Knowledge of Languages Customs as also of the different Opinions of Philosophers when Men have only learnt them by Memory without having either Evidence or Certainty concerning them The Second thing to be Observ'd is that in Morality Politicks and Medicine and in all Practical Sciences we are obliged to be content with Probability Not Universally but upon occasion not because it satisfies the Mind but because the Instance is pressing And if a Man should always delay Acting till he had perfect Assurance of Success the Opportunity would be often lost But though it falls out that a Man must inevitably act yet he should in acting doubt of the Success of what he does And he should indeavour to make such Advances in Sciences as to be able on Emergencies to act with greater Certainty For this should be the constant end of all Mens Study and Employment who make any use of Thought The Third and last thing is this That we should not absolutely despise Probabilities since it often happens that many of them in Conjunction have as convincing a force as most evident Demonstrations Of which Nature there are infinite Examples to be found in Physicks and Morality So that 't is often expedient to amass together a sufficient number of them in subjects not otherwise Demonstrable in order to come to the Knowledge of Truth impossible to be found out any other way And now I must needs confess that the Law I impose is very Rigorous and Severe That there are abundance of Those who had rather renounce Reasoning at all than Reason on such Conditions That 't is impossible to run so fast with such retarding Circumspections However it must be granted me that a Man shall walk with greater Security in observing it and that hitherto those who have march'd so hastily have been oblig'd to return upon the same Ground Besides there are a great number of Men who will agree with me in this That since Monsieur Des-Cartes has discover'd more Truths in Thirty Years than all the Philosophers that preceded him meerly for his Submission to that Law if many others would study Philosophy as he has done we should in time be acquainted with the greatest part of those things which are necessary to make Life as happy as is possible upon an Earth which God has Curs'd CHAP. IV. I. Of the Occasional Causes of Error whereof there are Five Principal II. The general Design of the whole Work III. The particular Design of the First Book WE have seen from what has been said that a Man falls not into Error but for want of making a due use of his Liberty that 't is for want of curbing that eagerness of the Will and moderating its Passion for the bare appearances of Truth that he is deceiv'd And that Error consists only in the Consent of the Will which has a greater Latitude than the Perception of the Understanding since we should never err if we only simply judg'd according as we perceiv'd But though to speak properly there is no other cause of Error than the ill use of our Liberty it may notwithstanding be said we have several Faculties that are the Causes of our Errors not Real Causes but such as may be term'd Occasional All the ways of our Perceiving are so many occasions of Deceiving us For since our false Judgments include two things namely the Consent of the Will and the Perception of the Vnderstanding it is manifest that all the ways of our Perception may afford us some occasion or other of falling into Error forasmuch as they may incline us to rash and precipitate Consents But because it is necessary first to make the Soul sensible of her Weaknesses and Wandrings in order to possess Her with just Desires of a Deliverance from them and that she may with greater ease shake off her Prejudices We will endeavour to make an exact Division of her Manners of Perception which may serve as so many Heads to one or other of which may be referr'd as we proceed the different Errors whereunto we are obnoxious The Soul has three several ways of Perception By Pure Intellect by Imagination and by the Senses By Pure Intellect she perceives things Spiritual Universals Common Notions The Idea of Perfection that of a Being infinitely perfect and in general all her own thoughts when she knows them by a Reflexion made upon her self 'T is likewise by Pure Intellect she perceives Material things Extension with its Properties For 't is the pure Understanding only which is capable of Perceiving a Circle and a perfect Square a Figure of a thousand sides and such like things Such sort of Perceptions bear the name of Pure Intellections or Pure Perceptions since there is no necessity of the Mind 's forming Corporeal Images in the Brain to represent them by By Imagination the Soul only perceives things Material when being Absent she makes them present to her by forming the Images of them in the Brain This is the way whereby a Man Imagines all sorts of Figures a Circle a Triangle a Face an Horse Towns and Fields whether he has already seen them or not This sort of Perceptions we may call Imaginations because the Soul represents to her self these things by framing Images of them in the Brain And for as much as Spiritual things cannot be represented
judging of things with an unwarrantable rashness For we often judge that the Objects whereof we have Idea's exist and likewise that they altogether resemble their Idea's when yet it often falls out that the Objects are neither like their Idea's nor do they exist at all The Existence of a thing does no ways follow from our having an Idea of it much less does it follow that the thing is perfectly like the Idea which we have thereof It cannot be concluded from GOD's giving us such a sensible Idea of Magnitude upon the presentation of a six Foot-rule to our Eyes that this Rule has the same Extension as it is represented to us by that Idea For first All Men have not the same sensible Idea of this same measure since all Men have not their Eyes disposed in the same manner Again The same Person has not the same sensible Idea of a six Foot-rule when he beholds it with his left Eye as when he views it with his right as has been already said Finally It often happens that the self-same Person entertains quite different Idea's of the same Objects at different times according as they are suppos'd nearer or farther off as shall be explain'd in its proper place It is then nothing but prejudice grounded upon no good reason to think we see Bodies according to their real Magnitude for our Eyes being not given us for any other purpose than the security of our Body they discharge their Duty admirable well in giving us such Idea's of Objects as are proportion'd to its magnitude But the better to conceive what ought to be our judgments concerning the Extension of Bodies from the Report of our Eyes let us imagine GOD to have created in Epitomie out of a portion of matter of the bigness of a small Globe an Heaven and Earth and Men upon this Earth with all other things the same proportion being observ'd as in this Grand World These little Men would see each other and the parts of their Bodies as likewise the little Animals which were capable of incommoding them Otherwise their Eyes would be useless to their preservation It is manifest then from this Supposition these little Men would have Idea's of the magnitude of Bodies quite different from ours since they would look upon their little World which would be but a Ball in our account as stretch'd out into infinite spaces just as we do in respect of the World in which we are Or if this is not so easie to be conceiv'd let us suppose GOD had created an Earth infinitely vaster than this which we inhabit so that this new Earth should be to ours what ours would be to that we have spoken of in the fore-going Supposition Let us moreover conceive GOD Almighty to have observ'd in all the parts which went to the Composition of this New World the very same proportion he has done in those which make up Ours It is plain that the Inhabitants of this latter World would be Taller than the space betwixt our Earth and the most distant Stars we can discover And this being so it is manifest that if they had the same Idea's of Extension of Bodies as our selves they would be able to discern some of the parts of their own Bodies and and would see others of a prodigious unweildiness so that 't is ridiculous to think they would see things in the same Bigness as they are seen by us It is apparent in these two Suppositions we have made that the Men whether of the Great or Little World would have Idea's of the Magnitude of Bodies very different from ours supposing their Eyes to furnish them with Idea's of the Objects round about them proportion'd to the Magnitude of their own Bodies Now if these Men should confidently affirm upon the Testimony of their Eyes that Bodies were of the very same bigness whereof they saw them it is not to be doubted but they would be deceiv'd and I suppose no Man will make a question of it And yet it is certain that these Men would have as Good Reason to justifie their Opinion as we have to defend our Own Let us acknowledge then from their Example That we are very uncertain of the Magnitude of Bodies which we see and that all which can be known by us concerning them from the Testimony of Sight is only the mutual Relation there is between Them and Us. In a word that our Eyes were never given us whereby to judge of the Truth of things but only to give us notice of such as might either molest or profit us in something or other But 't is not thought sufficient for Men to credit their Eyes only in order to judge of Visible Objects They think they are to be trusted farther even to judge of those which are Invisible Because there are some things which they cannot see they conclude they do not exist attributing to their Sight a Penetration in a manner Infinite This is an Impediment which prevents their discovering the real Causes of abundance of Natural Effects For that they ascribe them to Imaginary Faculties and Qualities is often meerly for want of discerning the True which consist in the different Configurations of these Bodies They see not for Instance the little parts of Air or Flame much less those of Light or of a matter still more fine and subtil And upon this score they are ready to believe they are not in being at least conclude them void of force and action They betake themselves to Occult Qualities or Imaginary Faculties to explain all the Effects whereof those Imperceptible parts are The True and Natural Cause They had rather have recourse to the horror of a Vacuum to Explain the Elevation of water in the Pump than impute it to the Gravitation of the Air. They chuse to ascribe the Flux and Reflux of the Sea to the Qualities of the Moon rather than to the pressure of the Atmosphere that is to the Air which surrounds the Earth and the Elevation of Vapours to the Attractive Faculties of the Sun than to the simple Motion of Impulse caused by the parts of the Subtil Matter which it continually diffuses abroad They look upon those as Men of trifling and impertinent Thought who have recourse only to the Flesh and Blood in accounting for all the Motions of Animals Likewise for the habits and the Corporeal Memory of Men And this partly proceeds from the Conception they have of the littleness of the Brain and its incapacity thereupon to preserve the Traces of an almost infinite number of things lodg'd in it They had rather admit though they can't conceive how a Soul in Beasts which is neither Body nor Spirit Qualities and Intentional Species for the Habits and Memory of Men or such like things notwithstanding they have no particular Notion of them in their Mind I should be too tedious should I stand to reckon up all the Errors we fall into through this Prejudice There are
of the Vibrations which are excited by Objects in the Fibres of our Flesh It would be of very little use for her to know them nor could she from thence receive sufficient Light to judge whether the things about us were capable of Destroying or Maintaining the oeconomy of our Body But she feels her self touch'd with Sensations essentially different which shewing precisely the Qualities of Objects as they are related to her Body make her most exactly sensible in what capacity these Objects are in to hurt it We may farther consider That in case the Soul had no Perception but of that which happen'd in her Hand when it were burnt if she saw nothing there but the Motion and Separation of some Fibres she would not much concern her self about it Nay she might probably sometimes out of an Humour or a Frolick take some satisfaction in doing it like those Freakish kind of Men who divert themselves in their Passions or Debauches in breaking all things they light upon Or as a Prisoner would not be much concern'd to see the Walls batter'd down about him that confin'd him but rather would be glad of it upon the hopes of a Deliverance So if we had no other Perception than of the Separation of the Parts of our Body when we were burnt or hurt in any manner we should soon be perswaded that our Happiness was not confin'd to a Body which prevented our Injoying those things which ought to make us Happy and so should be glad of seeing it destroy'd Hence it is apparent that the Author of the Union of our Soul and Body hath with greatest Wisdom ordain'd That we should be sensible of Pain whenever any Change happen'd to our Body capable of incommoding it as when a Needle pierced the Flesh or the Fire separated some parts of it and that we should be sensible of a Titillation or an agreeable Heat when these Motions were moderate without perceiving the Truth of that which occur'd in our Body or the Motions of the Fibres we have been speaking of First because in the Sensation of Pleasure and Pain which are things far more different than in Degree we distinguish with greater Ease the Objects which occasion them Secondly because this way of Informing us whether the Uniting our selves with the Bodies that encompass us or the Separating from them be most convenient is the shortest and the speediest and takes up the capacity of the Mind the least which is only made for GOD himself Lastly because Pleasure and Pain are Modifications of our Soul which she feels with Relation to her Body and which more nearly affect her than would the Knowledge of the Motion of some Fibres belonging to it this obliges her to be more sollicitous about them And this is a Reason of the most strict Union betwixt the two Constituent Parts of Man From all which it is manifest that the Senses are given us for the Preservation of our Body only and not for the Discovery of the Truth What hath been said concerning Titillation and Pain ought universally to be understood of all other Sensations as we shall see hereafter I chose to begin with these two Sensations rather than others because they are more Strong and Lively and Proper to make my Meaning more Sensibly conceiv'd It is at present a very easie thing to shew That we fall into infinite Errors concerning Light and Colours and generally concerning all Sensible Qualities as Cold Heat Smells Tasts Sound Pain and Titillation and if I would stand to make a particular Enquiry into all those we fall into about all the Objects of our Senses whole Years would not suffice to make a Deduction of them because they are in a manner Infinite It will be sufficient therefore to speak of them in general In almost all Sensations there are four different things which Men confound with one another because they happen altogether and as it were in the same Instant And this is the Principle of all the Errors of our Senses The first is the Action of the Object that is in Heat for instance the Impulsion or Motion of the little parts of the Wood against the Fibres of the Hand The Second is the Passion of the Organ of Sense that is to say the Agitation of the Fibres of the Hand caused by that of the little Parts of Fire which Agitation is communicated to the Brain because otherwise the Soul would have no Sensation of it The Third is the Passion the Sensation or Perception of the Soul that is What every one Feels in himself when he is near the Fire The Fourth is the Judgment the Soul makes that what she feels is both in her Hand and in the Fire Now this Judgment is Natural or rather is only a Compound Sensation But this Sensation or this Natural Judgement is for the most part attended with another Free or Voluntary Judgement which is so customary for the Soul to make that she is almost incapable of preventing it Here then are four things of a very different Nature as may be seen which Men are not nice enough to distinguish but are apt to confound because of the strict Union of the Soul and Body which hinders them from making an exact distribution of the Properties of Matter and of the Mind 'T is notwithstanding easie to discover That of these four things which occur within us in the Sensation of an Object the two first belong to the Body and the two last appertain to the Soul only provided a Man has any whit meditated on the Nature of the Soul and Body as he ought to have done as I before suppos'd him But these things demand a particular Explication CHAP. XI I. The Error we fall into concerning the Action of Objects against the External Fibres of our Senses II. The Cause of this Error III. An Objection and Answer IN this and the three succeeding Chapters I shall treat of these four things above-mention'd which I said us'd to be confounded and taken for a simple Sensation and I shall only give a general Explication of the Errors we fall into because if I would descend to Particulars there would never be an end of them But I hope however to put the Mind of those who will seriously consider what I am about to say in a condition of discovering with a great deal of Ease all the Errors our Senses can make us Subject to But in order to this it is demanded That they would attentively Meditate as well upon the following Chapters as upon that they have last been Reading The first of the things we confound in each of our Sensations is the Action of Objects upon the External Fibres of our Body It is certain a Man makes hardly any Difference betwixt the Sensation of the Soul and that Action of Objects which is so plain as not to need any farther Proof The generality of Men imagine that the Heat for instance which they Feel is in
is the Identity of time for our having had certain thoughts at the instant of our having certain new Traces in the Brain is oftentimes sufficient for our having a-fresh the same thoughts as often as these Traces are re-produc'd in our Brain If the Idea of GOD has been offer'd to my Mind at the same time my Brain receiv'd an Impression from the sight of these three Letters Jah or from the sound of the same word 't is enough that the Traces produc'd by the sound or sight of these Characters be re-printed to cause me to think on GOD nor can I think of GOD but some confus'd Traces of the Characters or sounds that the thoughts I had of GOD were attended with will be re-produc'd in my Brain For the Brain being never empty of Traces there are constantly such as are somewhat related to what we think of though these Traces are frequently very imperfect and confus'd The second Cause of the Connection between Idea's and Traces and which ever supposes the former is the Will of Men. This Will is necessary to the intent this Connection of Idea's with the Traces may be regulated and accommodated to use For were not Men naturally inclin'd to a mutual Agreement about affixing their Idea's to Sensible Signs this Connection of Idea's would not be only absolutely useless to society but would moreover be very irregular and extreamly imperfect And that first because Idea's have never any strong Connection with the Traces except when the Spirits being agitated and fermented make the Traces deep and permanent So that since the Spirits are only agitated by the Passions had Men no Passion for communicating their own thoughts and participating those of others it is plain that the exact Connection of their Idea's to particular Traces wou'd be very weak since they would never use themselves to those exact and regular Connections were it not to become intelligible one to another Secondly the repeated concurrence of the same Idea's with the same Traces being necessary to make so strong a Connection as may be durable and lasting since a first meeting unless attended with a violent Motion of the Animal Spirits cannot confederate them so strongly as is requisite it is manifest that should not Men contrive to agree it would be the greatest chance in the World for the same Traces and the same Idea's to meet a second time Thus the Will of Men is necessary to regulate the Connection and Alliance of the same Traces with the same Idea's though this Will of Agreeing is not so much the result of their Choice and Reason as an Impression of the Author of Nature who has dispos'd and made us all for the Benefit of each other and given us a strong Inclination to unite in Mind as much as we are united in our Bodies The third Cause of the Connection of Idea's with the Traces is the Nature or the constant and immutable Will of the Creator There is for instance a Natural Connection and independent on our Will between the Traces produc'd by a Tree or a Mountain which we see and the Idea's of a Tree or a Mountain between the Traces produc'd in our Brain by the cry of a Man or an Animal suffering Pains and whose Plaints we hear by the mein of a Man's Countenance that threatens or fears us and the Idea's of Pains Strength Weakness and also the Sensations of Pity Fear and Courage which are occasion'd in our selves These Natural Connections are of all others the strongest they are generally alike in all Mankind and they are absolutely necessary to the Preservation of Life And this is the Reason they have no dependence on our Will For if the Connection of Idea's with Sounds and certain Characters is weak and very different in different Countries 't is because it depends on the weak and changeable Will of Men. And the Reason why it depends thereon is because this Connection is not absolutely necessary to their Living but only to their Living as Men who ought to form themselves into Civil and Rational Societies It is here very observable that the Connection of Idea's which represent things Spiritual distinct from us with the Traces of our Brain is not Natural nor possible to be so And consequently that it is or may be different in all Men since it has no other cause than their own Will and the Identity of time whereof I have spoken before On the Contrary the Connection of Idea's of all things material with certain particular Traces is Natural and consequently there are particular Traces which excite the same Idea in all Mankind It cannot be doubted for instance but all Men have the Idea of a Square upon sight of a Square because that Connection is Natural but it may be very well doubted whether all Men have the Idea of a Square when they hear the word Square pronounc'd because that Connection is altogether arbitrary We ought to think the same thing of all those Traces that are connected with the Idea's of things of a Spiritual kind But because the Traces which have a Natural Connection with Idea's give the Mind concern and application and consequently render it attentive the generality of Men are very ready at comprehending and retaining sensible and palpable Truths that is to say the Relations which Bodies have to one another And on the other hand because the Traces which have no other Connection with Idea's than that which the will has effected between them strike not vigorously on the Mind all Men in general find it very difficult to comprehend and harder yet to retain abstracted Truths that is to say the Relations which are between things which come not within the Verge of Imagination But when these Relations are any whit compounded they seem absolutely incomprehensible especially to those who are not us'd to them because they have not strengthened the Connection between these abstract Idea's and their Traces by a perpetual Meditation And though others have perfectly comprehended them they forget them again in a little time because the Connection is hardly ever so strong as the Natural 'T is so true that all the difficulty Men have to comprehend and retain things Spiritual and Abstract proceeds from the difficulty they find to corroborate the Connection of their Idea's with the Traces of the Brain that when they find the means of Explaining by material Relations those that are between things Spiritual they make them easily understood imprinting them in such manner on the mind as not only to be strongly convinc'd of them but also to retain them without any trouble The general Idea we have given of the Mind in the first Chapter of this Work is perhaps a sufficient Proof of what I say On the contrary when the Relations that are between material things are so exprest that there is no necessary Connection between the Idea's of these things and the Traces of their Expressions they are difficultly comprehended and easily forgotten Those for
of Nothing because to the producing an Angel out of a Stone so far as that is possible to be done the Stone must be first Annihilated and afterwards the Angel Created but simply to Create an Angel there needs no Annihilation at all If then the Mind produces its Idea's from the Material Impressions the Brain receives from Objects it does still the same thing or a thing as difficult or even difficulter than if it Created them Since Idea's being Spiritual cannot be produc'd out of Material Images that are in the Brain to which they have no Proportion or Analogy But some will say That an Idea is not a Substance Be it so but still it is a Being and a Being of a Spiritual kind And as it is impossible to make a Square of a Spirit though a Square be not a Substance so 't is impossible to frame a Spiritual Idea out of a Material Substance tho' an Idea were not a Substance But suppose we should allow the Mind of Man to have an absolute Power of Creating and Annihilating the Idea's of things yet after all he would never imploy it to the producing them For as a Painter though never so excellent at his Art could not represent an Animal he had never seen or had no Idea of so that the Picture he was oblig'd to make of it would not be like that unknown Animal so a Man could not form the Idea of an Object unless he knew it before that is unless he had already the Idea of it which has no dependance on his Will But if he has the Idea of it already he knows the Object and 't is needless to form a new one of it 'T is therefore needless to attribute to the Mind of Man the power of producing its Idea's It may perhaps be said that the Mind has general and confus'd Idea's which it does not produce and that those which it produceth are particular more clever and distinct but it all comes to the same thing For as a Painter could not draw the Picture of a particular Man so as to be certify'd he had hit it right unless he had a distinct Idea of him and even unless the Person himself should sit so the Mind that had only the Idea for instance of Being or of an Animal in general could not represent to it self an Horse nor form any very distinct Idea thereof nor be assur'd this Idea perfectly resembled an Horse unless it had a former Idea thereof wherewith to collate this second Now if it had a former it is in vain to form a second And the Question proceeds upon that former Therefore c It is true that whilst we conceive a Square by pure Intellection we may besides imagine it that is perceive it by drawing the Image of it in the Brain But 't is to be observ'd in the first place that we are not the real and principal Cause of that Image but it would take up too much time to explain it And again that the second Idea which accompanies that Image is so far from being more distinct and accurate than the others that on the contrary it owes all its Exactness to its Resemblance with the first which serves to regulate the second For in brief it is not to be believ'd that the Imagination or even the Senses make us a more distinct Representation of Objects than the Pure Intellect but only that they make the Mind more concern'd and applicative For the Idea's of Sense and Imagination are not distinct any farther than they are conformable with those of Pure Intellection The Image of a Square for instance that the Imagination delineates in the Brain is no otherwise just and regular than as it conforms with the Idea of a Square which we have by Pure Intellection 'T is that Idea which regulates the Image 'T is the Mind that conducts the Imagination and obliges it as I may say to look time after time whether the Image painted by it be a Figure of four right and equal Lines whose Angles are exactly right In a word if that which is imagin'd be like that which is conceiv'd After what has been said I suppose no body can doubt but it is an Error in those that affirm the Mind can form the Idea's of Objects since they attribute to the Mind a Power of Creating and even of Creating with Wisdom and Order though it has no Knowledge of what it does a thing utterly inconceivable But the Cause of this their Error is that customary Judgment Men make of one thing 's being the Cause of another when they are found conjoin'd together supposing that the true Cause of this Effect be unknown to them 'T is for this Reason that every one concludes that a Bowl in motion meeting with another is the true and principal Cause of the motion it communicates to it that the Will of the Soul is the true and principal Cause of the motion of the Arm and such like Prejudices as these because it always happens that a Bowl is mov'd when it lies in the way of another that knocks against it and we move our Arms almost as often as we will it and we do not sensibly perceive what else could be the Cause of these Motions But when an Effect is not so constant an attendant on any thing that 's not the Cause of it there are ever very many who believe this thing to be the Cause of the Effect that happens though all Men fall not into this Error A Comet for instance appears and presently after a Prince goes off c. Stones are expos'd to the Moon and are eaten with Worms The Sun is in Conjunction with Mars at the Nativity of a Child and that Child has some Fortune extraordinary This is Argument sufficient to perswade a great many that the Comet the Moon the Conjunction of the Sun with Mars are the Causes of the Effects I have mention'd and of others that are like them And the Reason why all the World is not of the same Opinion is their Observation that the like Effects do not at all times attend these Causes But all Men having commonly Idea's of Objects present to their Mind when they desire it and this happening many times a day very few of them but conclude that the Will which accompanies the Production or rather Presence of Idea's is the true Cause of them because they see nothing at the same time to which they can attribute them And they imagine that Idea's cease to exist when out of the view of the Mind and that they begin to exist again when re-presented to it 'T is upon the same account too that some judge that External Objects send forth Images that resemble them so as has been said in the preceding Chapter For it being impossible to see Objects by themselves or any otherwise than by their Idea's they judge that the Object produces the Idea because when 't is present they see it
when absent it disappears and the presence of the Object almost always is found in company with the Idea that represents it to us However if Men were not rash and inconsiderate in their judgments they ought only to conclude from the Idea's of things being present to their Mind whenever they will have them that according to the order of Nature their Will is for the most part necessary to their having these Idea's but not that the Will is the True and Principal Cause that exhibits them to the Mind much less that the Will produces them out of nothing or in the manner they explain it Nor is there any more Reason for concluding that Objects emit Species that resemble them because the Soul has seldom any Perception of them but when they are present but only that the Object is for the most part necessary to the Idea's being present to the Mind Lastly They ought not to conclude that the Bowl in motion is the principal and true Cause of the motion of another which it meets in its way since the first has no power of moving it self They can only judge that the Collision of the two Bowls is an occasion to the Author of the motion of Matter to execute the decree of his Will which is the universal Cause of all things by communicating to the other Bowl a part of the motion of the first that is to speak more clearly by willing that the latter should acquire as much motion as the former lost for the impellent force of Bodies can be nothing but the Will of him that preserves them as will be made appear in another place CHAP. IV. That we perceive not Objects by means of Idea's Created with us That GOD does not produce them in us every moment we have need of them THE third Opinion is of those who pretend That all Idea's are Created with us For our better discovering how little likelihood there is in this Opinion we must consider that there are in the World many quite different things whereof we have Idea's But to mention only simple Figures it is certain that the number of them is infinite and even if we fix only on an Ellipsis 't is not to be doubted but the Mind can conceive an infinite number of Ellipses of a different Species inasmuch as it can conceive that one of its Diameters may be lengthened to Infinity the other remaining constantly the same So since the Height of a Triangle may be augmented or diminish'd to Infinity the side which serves for the Base being still the same we conceive there may be infinite Triangles upon the same Base of a different Species And moreover which I desire may be well consider'd here the Mind in some manner perceives that infinite number though it can imagine but a very few and a Man cannot at one and the same time have particular and distinct Idea's of many Triangles of a different Species But that which should be most especially attended to is that this general Idea the Mind has of an infinite number of Triangles of a different Species is a sufficient proof that if we cannot conceive by particular Idea's all these different Triangles in a word if we cannot comprehend Infinity 't is not for want of Idea's or because Infinity is not present to our Mind but meerly for want of the Mind's Capacity and Comprehension If a Man should apply himself to the considering the Properties of all the diverse Species of Triangles and even should eternally pursue this sort of Study he would find new and particular Idea's in an endless succession But his Mind would tire under the unprofitable Disquisition What I have now said of Triangles may be apply'd to Figures of five six an hundred a thousand or ten thousand sides and so up to infinity And if the sides of a Triangle being capable of infinite Relations with each other can make Triangles of infinite Species it is easie to be seen that the Figures of Four Five or of a Million of sides are capable of much greater Differences as being subject to a far greater number of Relations and Combinations of their sides than simple Triangles The Mind then discerns all these things and has Idea's of them all And 't is certain these Idea's will never be exhausted though it should imploy infinite Ages in the consideration of one Figure only and if it perceives not these infinite Figures all at once or if it comprehend not infinity 't is only because its Capacity is too short and limited It has then an infinite number of Idea's What said I an infinite number It has so many infinite numbers of Idea's as there are different Figures Insomuch that there being an infinite number of different Figures the Mind must have an infinity of infinite numbers of Idea's for the Knowledge of Figures only Now I demand of them Whether 't is probable that GOD has created so many things with the Mind of Man For my own part it can never enter into my Head especially since it might be done in another most simple and easie manner as we shall see by and by For whereas GOD acts always by the most simple means it seems unreasonable to explain our manner of knowing Objects by admitting the Creation of an infinity of â—eings when the difficulty may be resolv'd in a way more easie and natural But what if the Mind had a Magazine of all the Idea's necessary to its Perception of things It would be still extreamly difficult to explain how the Soul could make choice of them to represent Objects to her self how for instance she could bring it about to perceive the Sun when it were present to the Eyes of the Body For since the Image the Sun imprints in the Brain is nothing like the Idea we have of it as has been formerly prov'd and since likewise the Soul perceives not the Motion the Sun produces in the Fund of the Eye and in the Brain it is not conceivable how among such an infinite number of Idea's which she had she could exactly divine which it was necessary to represent for the imagining or seeing of the Sun It cannot then be said that the Idea's of things were created with us and that this is sufficient for our perceiving the Objects that are round about us Nor can it be said that GOD produces every moment so many new Idea's as we perceive different things This is sufficiently refuted by what has been said in this Chapter Besides it is necessary we should actually have in our selves the Idea's of all things at all times since at all times we can Will the conceiving all things Which we could never do unless we had already a confus'd Perception of them that is unless we had an infinite number of Idea's present to our Mind For to conclude we cannot Will the Thinking on Objects whereof we have no Idea CHAP. V. That the Mind perceives neither the Essence nor the Existence of
beneath the Grandeur and prostrate it self before the Lustre of Riches But if I consider that the Body is infinitely inferiour to the Mind that it is not its Master nor can instruct it in Truth nor any ways illuminate it and if upon this Scene and Prospect I re-enter into or enquire of my self or rather since I am neither my own Master nor my own Light if I approach unto GOD and in the calm and silence of my Senses and Passions make this Demand Whether Riches or Vertue is preferable I shall hear a clear and distinct Answer concerning what is to be done an Eternal Answer that has been always given and which is and always will be an Answer that 's not necessary to be explain'd since every body know it such as read this and such as do not read it which is neither Greek nor Latin nor French nor German but which all Nations under Heaven understand An Answer lastly that consolates the Just in their Poverty and desolates Sinners in the abundance of their Riches I shall hear this Answer and remain convinc'd and then shall laugh at the Visions of my Imagination and the Delusions of my Senses The Internal Man that is in me shall ridicule the Animal and Terrestrial Man that I carry about me In fine the New Man shall thrive and the Old Man shall be destroy'd provided in the mean time I continually obey the Voice of Him who delivers Himself so clearly in the most secret recess of my Reason and who becoming sensible to accommodate Himself to my Weakness and Disease and to give me Life by that which gave me Death speaks to me anew in a most strong and lively and familiar way by my Senses I mean by the preaching of His Gospel But if I interrogate Him in all Metaphysical Natural and purely Philosophical Questions as well as those which respect the Rule of Manners I shall always have a faithful Master who will never deceive me I shall not only be a Christian but a Philosopher I shall be a sound Thinker and a Lover of what is Good In a word I shall follow the Road that leads me to all Perfection I am capable of either by Nature or by Grace We ought then to conclude from all that has been said that to make the best use possible of the Faculties of our Soul of our Senses Imagination and Vnderstanding we must apply them only to those things for which they were given us We ought carefully to distinguish our Sensations and Imaginations from our Pure Idea's and judge by the former of the Relations our Body has with those about us but never make use of them in discovering Truths which they always confound Whereas Pure Idea's must be us'd in the finding out of Truths but omitted when we judge of the Correspondencies between Exteriour Bodies and our own because their Idea's have never reach and extent enough to give a thorough Representation of them 'T is impossible for Men to have sufficient Knowledge of all the Figures and Motions of the little parts of their Body and Blood and of those of a particular Fruit at a certain Season of their Sickness to know whether there is a Relation of Agreement between that Fruit and their Body and that if they eat of it they shall recover Thus our Senses alone are more useful for the Conversation of our Body than the Rules of Experimental Medicine and Experimental Medicine than Theoretical But Theoretical Medicine that deferrs much to Experience and more to the Senses is the best of all Because all these should be caball'd together Reason then is of universal use and this is the Privilege it obtains over the Senses and Imagination which are limited and conâ—in'd to Sensible things yet this is to be regularly employ'd for though it be the principal part of Our selves it often happens to deceive us by our letting it act too much because it cannot act enough without tiring I mean it cannot know enough to make a right Judgment and yet it will still be judging F. MALEBRANCHE's TREATISE Concerning the SEARCH after TRUTH BOOK IV. Concerning the Inclinations or Natural Motions of the Mind CHAP. I. I. Inclinations are as necessary to Spirits as Motions to Bodies II. GOD gives no Motion to Spirits but what tends towards Himself III. The Tendency Spirits have to particular Goods proceeds but from their Motion towards Good in general IV. The Original of our chiefest Natural Inclinations Which will make up the Division of this Fourth Book THERE had been no occasion of Treating on the Natural Inclinations which are to be the Subject of this Fourth Book nor on the Passions which I am to speak to in the Fifth to discover the Causes of our Errours did not the Understanding depend on the Will in the Perception of Objects But because the Understanding receives its Direction from the Will and is determin'd and fix'd by it rather to some Objects than others in order to penetrate into the Causes of the Errours whereunto we are subject it will be absolutely necessary to be well acquainted with the Nature of our Inclinations Had God in the Creation of the World produc'd a Matter infinitely Extended without imprinting on it any Motion there had been no diversity in Bodies The whole Visible World at this day would have been nothing but an unweildy Mass of Matter or Extension which might perhaps have serv'd to shew the Greatness and Power of its Author but wanting that Succession of Forms and Variety of Bodies wherein the Beauty of the Universe consists would have little to invite Spiritual Beings to admire and adore the Infinite Wisdom of its Governour Now the Inclinations of Spirits seem to be in the Spiritual World what the Motions of Bodies are in the Material and that if Spirits had no Inclinations or Volitions that Variety would be wanting to the Order of Spiritual things which not only excites to the Admiration of the profound Wisdom of God as does the diversity observ'd in Material things but also of his Mercy Justice and Goodness and all his other Attributes in general The difference then of Inclinations has an Effect in Spirits much like that which the diversity of Motions produces in Bodies and the Inclinations of Spirits together with the Motions of Bodies make up all the Beauty of Created Beings So that 't is requisite for the former to have several Inclinations as for the latter to have different Motions But let us try to discover what Inclinations these ought to be Were not our Nature corrupted we should not need to seek by Reason as we are now to do what should be the Natural Inclinations of Created Spirits We need but have descended into our own Breast to have discover'd by an inward Feeling or Self-consciousness of what passes within us all the Inclinations we ought Naturally to have But since we are taught by Faith that Sin has inverted the Order of Nature and even by
Creatures which are either useful to our selves oâ— those we love We have yet many other particular Inclinations which depend on these which probably we may treat of elsewhere In this Fourth Book my only Design is to reduce the Errours of our Inclinations to three Heads to the Inclination we have for Good in general to Love of of Our selves and of our Neighbour CHAP. II. I. The Inclination for Good in general is the Principle of the Restlesness of of the Will II. And consequently of our Inadvertency and Ignorance III. The first Instance shewing that Morals are but little known by the generality of Men. IV. The second Instance shewing that the Immortality of the Soul is controverted by some People V. That we are in extreme Ignorance in point of Abstract things and which have but little reference to us THAT vast Capacity which the Will has for all Goods in general by reason of its being made for a Good that comprehends in it all Goods can't be fill'd by all the things the Mind represents to it and yet the continual Motion which God impresses it withall is never stopt which necessarily gives a perpetual Disturbance and agitation to the Mind The Will which seeks after what it desires obliges the Understanding to represent all sorts of Objects which when represented by the Understanding the Soul cannot taste or if she tastes she remains unsatisfied She cannot taste them because the View of the Mind is seldom accompanied with Pleasure which is the Seasoning whereby the Soul relishes her Good and she is not satisfied because nothing can stop the Motion of the Soul except the Author of the Impression Whatever the Mind represents as the Good of the Soul is finite and whatever is finite may detain her Love for a moment but cannot fix it When new and extraordinary Objects come under the consideration of the Mind or such as have a Character of Infinite the Will gladly bears with an attentive Discussion for some time as hoping to find what she is in Search of because that which appears Infinite bears the Signature of its real Good but after a while is disgusted with this as with the rest and leaves it Hence it is ever restless and fluctuating because it is fated to seek what it never can find though always in hopes of And it loves whatever is Great Extraordinary and Infinite because having miss'd of its true Good in common and familiar things it fancies it may be found in such as are unknown We shall shew in this Chapter that the Restlessness of our Will is one of the Principal Causes of our Ignorance and the Errours we are guilty of upon infinite subjects and in the two following shall explain what it is that breeds that our Inclination for all that 's Great and Extraordinary First It is plain enough from what has been said That the Will is only solicitous to apply the Understanding to those Objects which are related to us and is very negligent as to the rest For that being by a Natural Impression ever longing and Impatient after Happiness it turns the Understanding only upon those things which afford us Pleasure and Advantage Secondly That the Will permits not the Understanding to busie it self long even about things that afford some Pleasure because as has been said all Created things may please us for a season but they quickly grow distastful and then our Mind declines them and takes new ways to other Delights and Satisfactions Thirdly That the Will is prompted to put the Understanding on these desultory advances from Object to Object from that confus'd and as it were distant Representation the Understanding gives of Him who includes in Himself all Beings as has been said in the Third Book For the Will desiring as I may so speak to bring its real good closer so as to be affected by it and to receive its quickning Motion excites the Understanding to represent it by peice-meal But then this is no longer the General the Universal and infinitely Perfect Being which the Mind perceives but something of a limited and imperfect Nature which the Will speedily abandons as finding it unable to stops Its Motion and please It any considerable time and so pursues after another Object Mean while the Advertency and Application of the Mind being absolutely necessary to the discovery of Truths ever so little abstruse it is manifest that the Vulgar of Men must be most grosly Ignorant even in point of such things as have some reference to them but inconceivably Blind as to all Abstract Truths and to which they have no sensible Relation But we must try to make these things manifest by some examples There is no Science that stands in so near a Relation to us as Moral Philosophy which teaches us our Duties to God and our King our Kindred and Friends and in general to all about us Besides it points out the way we must follow to become eternally Happy so that all Men are under an Essential Obligation or rather an dispensible Necessity of resigning themselves to the Study of it Notwithstanding Generations of Men have successively continued six thousand Years and yet this Science is still very imperfect That part of Morals which respects our Duty to God and which questionless is the Principal of all as relating to Eternity has been little known by Men of the greatest Learning and there are still to be found Men of Sense who have no Knowledge of it though the easiest part of all Moral Philosophy For first of all What difficulty is there to find out the Existence of a God Every of his works is a proof of it All the Actions of Men and Beasts prove it Whatever we think whatever we see whatever we feel demonstrates it In a word there is nothing in the World but proves that there is a God or at least may prove it to Men of attentive Minds who seriously betake themselves to Search after the Author of all things Again it is evident that we must pursue the Orders of God if we will be happy For since He is Just and powerful we cannot Disobey him without being punish'd nor obey Him without a recompence But what is it he requires of us That we love Him that our Thoughts be possess'd with Him and our Heart set upon Him For what end had God in Creating Minds and all things else Certainly no other than Himself So that being made for Him we are indispensibly oblig'd from diverting elsewhere the Impression of Love which He perpetually maintains in us in order to our perpetual loving Him These Truths are not very difficult to be discover'd by any attentive and considering Man and yet this sole Moral Principle That to become Vertuous and Happy 't is absolutely necessary to Love God above all things and in all things is the Foundation of all Christian Morality Nor is there need of very great Application to deduce from thence all necessary
as long as we see and feel it 'T is certain that if the Mind could easily keep up to clear and distinct Ideas without being as it were supported by some Sensation and without having its Attention perpetually disturb'd by the Restlesness of the Will we should find no great difficulties in infinite Natural Questions but in a short time should get rid of our Ignorance and Errours about them which we now look upon as inexplicable For instance 't is an indisputable Truth to every Man that makes use of his Reason that Creation and Annihilation exceed the ordinary force of Nature Should we now stick to the consideration of that pure Notion of the Mind and Reason we should not so readily admit the Creation and Annihilation of such innumerable multitudes of New Beings as of Substantial Forms Real Qualities and Faculties and the like We should look for the reason of Natural Effects in the distinct Ideas of Extension Figure and Motion and this is not so difficult as is imagin'd For all Nature hangs in a continued chain and the parts of it mutually prove each other The Effects of Fire as those of Cannons and Mines are very wonderful and their Cause as secret and conceal'd Nevertheless if Men instead of adhering to the Impressions of their Senses and false and delusive Experiments should insist on that sole Notion of Pure Intellect That 't is impossible for a Body gently mov'd to produce a Violent Motion in another since it cannot communicate more moving Force than it has it self it would be easie from that single Notion to conclude there is some subtile and invisible Matter that it is violently agitated and universally diffus'd among all Bodies and several things of like kind which might serve to explain the Nature of Fire and to discover other yet more intricate and hidden Truths For seeing so great Motions produc'd in a Cannon or a Mine and all the visible surrounding Bodies in too little Commotion to effect them we are infallibly assur'd there are other invisible and insensible Bodies which have at least so much Motion as the Cannon Bullet but being extremely fine and subtile may when alone pass freely and without bursting any thing through the Pores of the Cannon before it is fir'd that is as may be seen explain'd at large in Mr. des Cartes before they have surrounded the hard and gross parts of the Saltpeter which the Powder is compos'd of But when the Fire is kindled that is when these most subtile and agitated particles have encompassed the gross and solid parts of the Saltpeter and so have communicated their most forcible and violent Motion to them all must necessarily burst because the the Pores of the Cannon which gave a free passage on all sides to the subtile parts we speak of when alone are not large enough to receive the gross parts of the Saltpeter and others that make the Powder when agitated by the subtile particles that environ them For as the Water of a River shakes not the Bridge it runs under because of the minuteness of its parts So this most fine and subtile Matter continually passes through the pores of all Bodies without causing any sensible alteration But as again that River is able to overturn a Bridge when bearing down its Stream huge massy pieces of Ice or other more solid Bodies it dashes them against it with the same Force that it self is mov'd by so the subtile Matter is capable of those astonishing Effects observable in Cannons and Mines when having communicated to the parts of the Powder swimming in the midst of it an infinitely more violent and rapid Motion than that of Rivers and Torrents these same parts of the Gunpowder cannot freely pass through the Pores of the including Bodies because of their too great bulk and therefore open themselves a way by violently breaking what withstands them But 't is not very easie to imagine these so subtile and refin'd Bodies and they are look'd upon as Chimeras because they cannot be seen Contemplatio fere desinit cum aspectu says My Lord Bacon And indeed the greatest part of Philosophers had rather invent some New Entity than be silent about things they do not understand If it be objected to their false and inconceivable Suppositions that Fire must necessarily be compos'd of parts rapidly mov'd because of those violent Motions it produces whilst nothing can communicate what it has not which surely is a most clear and solid Objection they will be sure to confound all by some childish and imaginary Distinction such as Causes univocal and equivocal that they may seem to say something when indeed they say nothing at all For in fine 't is a receiv'd Maxim with all considering Men That there can be no equivocal Cause in Nature and Ignorance has only invented them Those then who are desirous of knowing Nature should take care to fix more to clear and distinct Notions They should a little check and resist that Levity and Inconstancy of their Will if they would penetrate to the bottom of things for their Minds will ever be feeble superficial and desultory whilst their Wills remain roving fickle and inconstant It must be confess'd that 't is a painful and tiresome thing and full of constraint to become attentive and go to the bottom of the things we have a mind to know But nothing can be had without pains Mean time 't is a reproach to Men of Sense and Philosophers who are oblig'd by all manner of reasons to the Search and Defence of Truth to talk they know not what and to be satisfied with what they do not understand CHAP. III. I. Curiosity is natural and necessary II. Three Rules to moderate it III. An Explication of the first of these Rules AS long as Men shall have an Inclination for a Good that exceeds their Strength and they shall not enjoy it they will ever have a secret Inclination for whatever carries the Character of New and Extraordinary They will constantly be persuing after things which they have not yet consider'd with hopes of finding what they seek for and whereas their Minds can never be fully satisfied without the Intuition of him for whom they are created so they will always be restless and tossing about till He appears to them in His Glory This Disposition of Minds is doubtless very consonant to their Condition it being infinitely better restlesly to search after Truth and Happiness which they do not possess than to fix on a false and ill-grounded security by taking up with Falshood and Seeming Goods the ordinary Desserts they feed on Men ought not to be insensible to Truth and Hapiness and what is New and Extraordinary ought to quicken them For there is a Curiosity which we may permit them or rather which we ought to recommend to them So then common and ordinary things containing not the true Good and the Ancient Opinions of Philosophers being most uncertain it is reasonable we should
constantly impresses on our Will is The Love of our selves and Our own Preservation We have already said That GOD loves all his Works and that it is only his Love which preserves them in their Being and that 't is his Will that all Created Spirits should have the same Inclination with his own 'T is his Will therefore that they all have a natural Inclination for their own Preservation and that they love themselves So that Self-love is reasonable because Man is really amiable in as much as GOD loves us and would have us love our selves but it is not reasonable to love our selves better than GOD since GOD is infinitely more lovely than we are It is injust for us to place our ultimate End in our selves and to centre our Love there without reference to GOD since having no real Goodness or Subsistence of our selves but only by the participation of the Goodness and Being of GOD we are no farther amiable than we stand related to him Nevertheless the Inclination we should have for GOD is lost by the Fall and our Will now has only an infinite Capacity for all Goods or Good in general and a strong Inclination to possess them which can never be destroy'd But the Inclination which we ought to have for our own Preservation or our Self-love is so mightily increas'd that 't is at last become the absolute Master of our Will It has even chang'd and converted the Love of GOD or the Inclination we have for Good in general and that due to other Men into its own nature For it may be said that the Love of our selves at present ingrosses all because we love all things but with relation to our selves whereas we should love GOD only first and all things after as related to him When Faith and Reason certifie us that GOD is the sovereign Good and that he alone can fill us with Pleasures we easily conceive it our Duty to love him and readily afford him our Affections but unassisted by Grace Self-love always is the first Mover All pure and defecate Charity is above the strength of our corrupt Nature and so far are we from loving GOD for himself that Humane Reason cannot comprehend how 't is possible to love him without Reference to our selves and making our ultimate End our own Satisfaction Self-love therefore is the only Master of our Will ever since the Disorders of Sin and the Love of GOD and our Neighbour are only Consequences of it since we love nothing at present but with the hopes of some Advantage or because we actually receive some Pleasure therein This Self-love branches into two sorts viz. Into the Love of Greatness and the Love of Pleasure or into the Love of ones Being and the Perfection of it and into the Love of Well-being or Felicity By the Love of Greatness we affect Power Elevation Independency and a Self-subsisting Being We are after a sort ambitious of having a Necessary Being and in one sense desire to be as Gods for GOD only has properly Being and Necessary Existence for that every Depending Nature exists only by the Will of its Upholder Wherefore Men in desiring the Necessity of their Being desire Power and Independency which may set them beyond the reach of the Power of others But by the Love of Pleasure they desire not barely Being but Well-being Pleasure being the best and most advantageous Mode of the Soul's Existence For it must be noted That Greatness Excellency and Independency of the Creature are not Modes of Existence that render it more happy of themselves for it often happens that a Man grows miserable in proportion to his growing great But as to Pleasure 't is a Mode of Existence which we cannot Actually receive without being Actually more happy Greatness and Independency are commonly External Modes consisting in the relation we have to things about us But Pleasures are in the very Soul are real Modes which modifie her and are naturally adapted to content her And therefore we look upon Excellency Greatness and Independency as things proper for the Preservation of our Being and useful sometimes by the order of Nature to the continuance of our Well-being But Pleasure is always a Mode of the Mind's Existence which of it self renders it Happy and Content So that Pleasure is Well-being and the Love of Pleasure the Love of Well-being Now this Love of Well-being is sometimes more powerful and strong than the Love of Being and Self-love makes us desire Non-existence because we want Well-being This Desire is incident to the Damn'd for whom it were better according to the Saying of our SAVIOUR not to be at all than to be so ill as they are because these Wretches being the declar'd Enemies of him who contains in himself all Goodness and who is the sole Cause of all the Pleasures and Pains we are capable of 't is impossible they should enjoy any Satisfaction They are and will be eternally miserable because their Will shall ever be in the same Disposition and Corruption Self-love therefore includes two Loves that of Greatness Power and Independence and generally of all things thought proper for the preservation of our Being and that of Pleasure and of all things necessary to our Well-being that is to our being Happy and Content These two Loves may be divided several ways whether because we are compounded of two different parts of a Soul and Body by which they may be divided or because they may be distinguish'd or specify'd by the different Objects that are serviceable to our Preservation But I shall insist no longer upon this because designing not a Treatise of Morality there is no need of making an exact Disquisition and Division of all the things relating to us as our Goods Only this Division was necessary to reduce into some order the Causes of our Errours First I shall speak to the Errours that are caus'd by the Inclination we have for Greatness and whatever sets our Being free from Dependence upon others In the next place I shall treat of those which proceed from our Inclination to Pleasure and whatever meliorates our Being as much as possible and contents us most CHAP. VI. I. Of the Inclination we have for whatever elevates us above others II. Of the false Judgments of some Religious Persons III. Of the false Judgments of the Superstitious and Hypocrites IV. Of Voetius Mr. Des Cartes's Enemy WHatever tends to exalt us above others by making us more perfect as Science and Vertue or gives us Authority over them by rendring us more powerful as Honours and Riches seems to put us in a sort of Independence All those that are below us reverence and fear us are always prepar'd to execute what we please for our Preservation and are afraid of offending us or resisting our Desires which makes Men constantly endeavour to be Masters of these Advantages which elevate them above others for they don't consider that their Being and
Well-being depend in truth on GOD alone and not on Men and that real Greatness which shall make them everlastingly happy consists not in the Rank they bear in the imagination of others as impotent and miserable as themselves but in an humble Submission to the Will of GOD who being just will not fail to reward such as persevere in the Order he has prescrib'd them But Men not only desire actually to possess Science and Vertue Dignities and Riches but lay out their whole Endeavours that they may at least be thought really to possess them And if it may be said of them That they are more sollicitous to be Truly Rich than to be thought so we may say too they are less careful to be Truly Vertuous than to appear so for as was handsomly said by the Author of the Moral Reflexions Vertue would not go far unless Vanity bore her Company The Reputation of being Rich Learned Vertuous produces in the Imagination of those about us or that are of nearest Concernment to us very advantageous Dispositions on our behalf it lays them prostrate at our feet actuates them on our account and inspires them with all the Motions that tend to the preservation of our Being and the augmentation of our Greatness which makes Men careful to preserve their Reputation as a Good they have need of to live conveniently in the World All Men then have an Inclination for Vertue Science Honours and Riches and for the Reputation of possessing these Advantages We will now make it appear by some Instances how these Inclinations may engage us in Errour and will begin with the Inclination for Vertue or for the Appearance of it Those who seriously labour to become Vertuous employ most of their Thoughts and Time in the learning Religion and the exercise of Good Works They desire with St. Paul to know only CHRIST Crucify'd the Remedy of the Disease and Corruption of their Nature They wish for no more Light than is requisite to their living as becomes Christians and to discover their Duties And next they study only to grow fervent and punctual in Devotion and so trouble not themselves with those Sciences which seem barren and insignificant to their Salvation Which Conduct is not to be blam'd but highly esteem'd Happy should we think our selves exactly to have serv'd it as we repent the not having sufficiently persu'd it But what is reprovable is That there being undoubtedly Sciences purely Humane of greatest Certainty as well as Use which take off the Mind from sensible things and accustom or prepare it insensibly to relish the Truths of the Gospel Some pious Persons too liberally condemn them without Examination as either unprofitable or uncertain True it is that most of the Sciences are very uncertain and useless 'T is no Mistake to think they contain only very insignificant Truths No body 's oblig'd to study them and 't is better to despise them altogether than to be charm'd and dazl'd with them However we may affirm That the Knowledge of some Metaphysical Truths is most necessary The Knowledge of an Universal Cause or of the Existence of a GOD is of indispensible necessity since even the Certainty of Faith depends on the Knowledge which Reason affords of the Existence of a GOD We ought to know that 't is His Will that constitutes and governs Nature that the Strength and Power of Natural Causes is merely his Will in a word that all things depend on GOD all manner of ways Again 't is necessary to know what is Truth the means to distinguish it from Errour The Distinction betwixt Bodies and Spirits and the Consequences that may be drawn from it as the Immortality of the Soul and many others of like nature which may be infallibly known The Knowledge of Man or of one's Self is a Science that cannot reasonably be despis'd It is stor'd with infinite things absolutely necessary to be known in order to an Accuracy and Penetration of Mind And if it may be said that a gross and stupid Man is infinitely superiour to Matter because he knows that he exists which Matter does not know Those who are acquainted with the Nature of Man are certainly much above the Ignorant and Stupid because they know what they are which the others don't But the Science of Man does not only merit our Esteem because it exalts us above others but much more for abasing us and humbling us before GOD. This Science throughly acquaints us with the Dependence we have on him in all things even in our most customary Actions It manifestly discovers the Corruption of our Nature disposes us to have recourse to him who alone can cure us to fasten upon him to distrust our selves and quit our Self-adherencies and Engagements and furnishes us with several other very requisite Dispositions of Mind to fit us for the Grace of the Gospel Nor can a superficial Tincture and a general Knowledge at least of Mathematicks and Nature be dispens'd with Those Sciences should be learn'd when we are young as disengaging the Mind from things sensible and preventing its growing soft and effeminate they are very useful to the Conduct of Life and even bring us to GOD the Knowledge of Nature doing it directly of it self and that of Mathematicks collaterally by the Disgust it infuses for the false Impressions of the Senses The Vertuous and Religious would do well not to dis-esteem these Sciences nor look on them as uncertain or useless till they are certain they have study'd them so throughly that they can pass a sound Judgment on them There are others enough which they are at liberty to despise as peremptorily as they please They may sentence to the Flames the Heathen Poets and Philosophers the Rabbins with some Historians and a multitude of Authors on whose Stock many set up for Fame and Learning and we shall easily forgive them But let them not condemn the Knowledge of Nature as contrary to Religion since Nature being rul'd by the Will of GOD the True Knowledge of it gives us to understand and admire the Divine Power Greatness and Wisdom For last of all it is probable that GOD has form'd the Universe that Spirits might be employ'd in studying it and by that study be brought to know and reverence its Author So that those who condemn the study of Nature seem to be Opposers of the Will of GOD but that they would have it thought that since the Fall the Humane Mind is incapacitated for that study Nor let it be said that the Knowledge concerning Man puffs up the Mind and renders it vain and arrogant because those who are suppos'd to understand Humane Nature best though frequently they understand it very little are intolerably proud and presumptuous For 't is plain that no Man can be well acquainted with himself but he must be sensible of his Weakness and his Misery So then it is not true and solid Piety that so commonly condemns what it does not
and those which have been fixed and determined by the Will of God which is not subject to change To say that these Truths are immutable by their Nature what is it more than to say they are immutable because immutable unless this signifies they are essentially so without any external assistance But if these Truths were necessary in this manner how were they determin'd by the Will of God since God being free as the Author will not deny he might if he had pleas'd have not determin'd them to be immutable e And if so they are immutable only by Grace because God will'd it so and determin'd them to that state of immutability This being so how come they to be immutable by their Nature since it was possible for them to be liable to change But if it were not possible for them to be subject to change how could they be determin'd by God to be immutable and how could he have fix'd them by the operation of his Will The Author may explain himself upon this Point if he think convenient mean time it is no little concern to know whether God can change the Essences of things and make two Contradictories true at the same time for as a celebrated Divine of our Age has said upon the same words that are now under examination Is God the Author of the Truth of his own Existence Or ought we to affirm that we can form a right-lined Triangle whose three Angles shall be greater than two Rights or that shall have one Side longer than the other two In a word if it be possible for Contradictories to be true and false at the same time what will become of humane Reasoning And what shall we say to those Theological Conclusions which assure us that God is not Corporeal that he is not subject to Change that he has always been f c. g Might we not say in following this Hypothesis that its possible for him to have been eternally and not to have been eternally that he is liable and not liable to change I mean not to pronounce upon so difficult a Question but I may affirm the Author had no right to do it especially in the Circumstances he has done it and without alleadging sufficient Proofs Yet methinks I perceive a shew of Reasoning in these words and by the Will of God which is not subject to change He seems to consider the Will of God as the Cause of the Necessity of these Truths But if so he proves too much in the place where we complain he proves nothing at all for if what God wills be immutable because his Will is not subject to change it follows that whatever he wills must have an equal immutability since it is the same Will which is the Cause of it Mean while it is certain he wills things which are subject to change when he determines the Existence or Non-existence of Creatures in the Vicissitude of times h Thus though God should have fix'd these Truths but for some Ages his Will thereby would be no less immutable than for his producing daily all those admirable changes which make the Beauty of the Universe But the Author will say God wills that these Truths should be immutable for ever But how could he know this had he any particular Revelation yet he speaks as possitively as if he was very certain It may be he bottoms upon this that if these Truths seem immutable to us whilst they are subject to change we should err in pretending to Science l But if it were so all that could thence be concluded is that the first Philosophers the Academicks and Pyrronists have better Philosophiz'd than the Peripateticks Cartesians and other Dogmatists and I do not believe the Author would establish his Philosophy upon such a Sophism unless there were necessary Truths we could have no true Science therefore there are necessary Truths m But though we might suppose there were necessary Truths in Physick Medicine c. and might determine about this Question without being utterly excluded from the knowledge of Truth Though these Truths were necessary by their Nature and their immutability by some new Mystery was still an effect of the free determination of the Will of God Though the necessity of these Truths proceeded from the immutability of this Will whilst yet it is the Cause of all the Changes happening in the Universe Though we should be moreover assur'd that God had resolv'd to preserve these Truths in an entire immutability We must still suppose in order to enter into his Opinion the knowledge of the Existence of God and of his Will of his Liberty and of his Power n Which obliges me to make some Reflexions upon what he has borrowed from Faith to add to Reasons Philosophical which is what we may look upon as his third Supposition After having prov'd that we must yield only to Evidence except in matters of Faith which are not submitted to the disquisition of Reason I conclude with these words Mysteries then of Faith must be distinguished from things of Nature we ought equally to submit to Faith and to Evidence but in the concernments of Faith we must not look for Evidence as in those of Nature we ought not to take up with Faith that is with the Authority of Philosophers In a word to be a Believer 't is required to assent blindly but to be a Philosopher it is necessary to see plainly Mysteries of Faith must be distinguished from things of Nature Thus judiciously speaks the Author and concludes with these words which might even pass for o a Proverb To be a Believer 't is requir'd to assent blindly but to be a Philosopher 't is necessary to see plainly Mean while I wonder he observes not in his Book the Resolution he made of not p mingling the concerns of Religion with the decisions of Philosophy for it 's too visible that one half of his Book is nothing but Reflexions upon original Sin deprav'd Manners and corrupt Inclinations which Christian Morality is to correct q I blame not his Piety in this nor believe it a thing unbecoming a Christian to labour upon these Subjects But that ought to be reserv'd for Sermons r Or if he had design'd to take the occasion of insinuating these Morals as knowing that the true way of moving the Heart pathetically is to do it by discovering to the Mind the Truths that are of nearest concernment to it he might have satisfied that laudable desire but should have contriv'd for that purpose particular Chapters which he has done too in some places But once more a very little thing will serve to confound the Light we begin to receive in the Search after Truth s We cannot at the same time satisfie both Reason and Faith since Reason obliges us to open our Eyes and Faith commands us to shut them t And yet I find he has so interwoven his principal Propositions with the Credenda of Religion that he seems to talk
the Will of man as a Will it essentially depends on the Love that God bears to himself on the Eternal Law and in short on the Will of God It is only because God loves himself that we love any thing for if God did not love himself or did not continually influence the Soul of man with a Love like his own that is with the Motion of Love which a Man feels in himself for Good in general we should love nothing we should will nothing and consequently should be destitute of Will since Will is nothing else but that Impression of Nature that carries us towards Good in general as hath been said several times But the Will considered as the Will of Man essentially depends upon the Body since it is by reason of the Motion of the Blood and Animal Spirits that it feels its self affected with all its sensible Commotions And therefore I have called Natural Inclinations all the Motions which the Soul has common with pure Intelligences together with some in which the Body hath a great Share but of which it is only the indirect Cause and End and I have explained them in the foregoing Book Here I understand by Passions All the Motions which naturally affect the Soul on occasion of the extraordinary Motion of the Blood and Animal Spirits And so shall these sensible Commotions be the Subject of this Book Though the Passions be inseparable from the Inclinations and Men be only susceptible of a sensible Love and Hatred because they are capable of a Spiritual Love and Hatred however it was though fit to treat of them separately in order to prevent Confusion For if it be considered That the Passions are far stronger and livelyer than the Natural Inclinations that they have for the most part other Objects and are always produced by different Causes it will be granted That we do not distinguish without Reason things that are inseparable in their own Nature Men are capable of Sensations and Imaginations only because they are capable of pure Intellections the Senses and Imagination being inseparable from the Mind and yet none finds fault with those that distinctly treat of those Faculties of the Soul which are naturally inseparable Last of all the Senses and Imagination differ not more from the pure Understanding than the Passions from the Inclinations And therefore as the three first Faculties use to be distinguished so ought also the two last that we may the better distinguish what the Soul receives from its Author with Relation to its Body from that which it also has from him but without that Relation The only Inconveniency that may grow out of the distinction of two things so naturally united is the necessity of repeating some things that had been said before as is usual in the like occasions Man is one though he be Compounded of several parts and the union of those parts is so intimate that one of them cannot be affected without a Commotion of the whole All his Faculties are linked together and so subordinated that it is impossible to explain some of them without touching upon the others So that when we labour to find out a Method to prevent Confusion we necessarily fall into Repetitions but 't is better to repeat than not to be Methodical because we ought above all to be plain and intelligible and therefore whatever we can doe in this occasion is to repeat if possible without wearying the Reader The Passions of the Soul are Impressions of the Author of Nature which incline us to love our Body and whatever is useful for its preservation As the natural Inclinations are Impressions of the same Author that principally move us to love him as the Sovereign Good The natural or occasional Cause of these Impressions is the Motion of the Animal Spirits which disperse through the Body to produce and maintain in it a disposition suitable to the Object perceiv'd that the Mind and Body may in that conjuncture mutually help each other For 't is the Institution of God that our Willings be attended with such Motions of our Body as are fit to put them in execution and that the Motions of our Body which Machinally rise in us at the perception of some Object be follow'd with a Passion of the Soul that inclines us to will what seems at that time profitable to the Body It is the continual Impression of the Will of God upon us that keeps us so strictly united to a portion of matter for if that Impression of his Will should cease but a moment we should instantly be rid of the Dependency upon our Body and all the Changes it undergoes For I cannot understand what some people imagine that there is a necessary Connection betwixt the Motion of the Blood and Animal Spirits and the Commotions of the Soul Some small Particles of Choler violently move in the Brain must therefore the Soul be agitated with some Passion and must that Passion be Anger rather than Love What Relation can there be conceived betwixt the Idea of an Enemy's Imperfections the Passion of Contempt or Hatred and the Corporeal Motion of some Particles of the Blood that beat against some parts of the Brain How they can imagine that the one depend upon the other and that the Union or Connection of two things so distant and so incompatible as the Mind and Matter can be caused and preserved any otherwise than by the continual and Almighty Will of the Author of Nature is to me unconceivable Those that suppose that Bodies necessarily and by themselves communicate their Motion to each other in the instant of their concourse make but a probable supposition neither is their prejudice altogether groundless since Bodies seem to have an Essential Relation to Bodies But the Mind and Body are two sorts of Beings so opposite that those who think that the Commotions of the Soul necessarily follow upon the Motion of the Blood and Animal Spirits do it without the least probability For nothing but our own Consciousness of the Union of those two Beings and the Ignorance of the continual Operations of God upon his Creatures can make us imagine another Cause of the Union of our Soul and Body than the Will of God It is hard to determine whether that Union or Connection of the thoughts of the Mind of Man with the Motions of his Body is a punishment of Sin or a Gift of Nature And some persons believe it a rash and imprudent Attempt to chuse one of these Opinions rather than the other It is well known that Man before his Sin was not a Slave but absolute Master of his Passions and that he could merely by his Will stop at his pleasure the Agitation of the Blood that caused them But we can hardly persuade our selves that the Body did not importune the Soul of the first Man to find out such things as were fit for the preservation of his Life We can scarce believe but Adam before his
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
indeed whenever we will it and we may be call'd in that sense the natural cause of the Motion of our Arm yet natural Causes are not true but only occasional as acting by the mere force and efficacy of the Will of God as we have already explain'd For how is it possible for us to move our Arm To perform this 't is requir'd we should have Animal Spirits and send them through certain Nerves towards certain Muscles to swell up and contract them for so that Motion is perform'd as some pretend though others deny it and assert that the Mystery is not yet discover'd However it be most Men know not so much as that they have Spirits Nerves and Muscles and yet move their Arms with as much and more dexterity than the most skilful Anatomists Men therefore will the moving their Arm but 't is God that is able and knows how to doe it If a Man cannot overthrow a Tower yet he knows what must be done to effect it but not one amongst them knows what the Animal Spirits must doe to move one of his Fingers How should they then move the whole Arm of themselves These things appear very evident to me and I suppose to all thinking Persons though they may be incomprehensible to others such as are only used to the confused voice of the Senses But Men are so far from being the true Causes of the Motions produc'd in their Body that it seems to imply a Contradiction they should be so For a true Cause is that betwixt which and its Effect the Mind percieves a necessary connexion for so I understand it But there is none besides the infinitely perfect Being betwixt whose Will and the Effects the Mind can perceive a necessary Connexion and therefore none but God is the true Cause or has a real Power of moving Bodies Nay it seems unconceivable that God should communicate this Power either to Angels or Men And those that pretend that the Power we have of moving our Arm is a true Power must by Consequence grant that God can give Spirits the Power of creating annihilating and doing all possible things in short that he can make them Almighty as I am going to pove God needs not Instruments to act 't is enough he should Will the Existence of a thing in order to its Existing because it is contradictory that he should will a thing and his Will should not be fulfilled And therefore his Power is his Will and to communicate his Power is to communicate his Will so that to communicate his Will to a Man or an Angel can signifie nothing else but to will that whenever that Man or Angel shall desire that such or such a Body be moved it may actually be moved In which Case I see two Wills concurring together that of God and that of the Angel and to know which of them is the true Cause of the Motion of that Body I enquire which is the Efficacious I see a necessary Connexion betwixt the Will of God and the thing willed in this Case God wills that whenever the Angel shall desire that such a Body be moved it be really so There is then a necessary Connexion betwixt the Will of God and the Motion of that Body and consequently God is the true Cause of that Motion and the Will of the Angel is only occasional Again to make it more evidently manifest let us suppose God wills it should happen quite contrary to the Desire of some Spirits as may be thought of the Devils or some other wicked Spirits in Punishment of their Sins In that Case it cannot be said God communicates his Power to them since nothing happens of what they wish However the Will of those Spirits shall be the natural Cause of the produced Effects as such a Body shall be removed to the Right because they wish it were moved to the Left and the Desires of those Spirits shall determine the Will of God to act as the Will of moving the Parts of our Body determine the first Cause to move them and therefore the Desires of all finite Spirits are but occasional Causes If after all these Reasons it be still asserted that the Will of an Angel moving a Body is a true and not a bare occasional Cause 't is evident that the self-same Angel might be the true Cause of the Creation and Annihilation of all things since God might as well communicate to him his Power of Creating and annihilating Bodies as that of moving them if He should will that they should be created and annihilated in a word if he will'd that all things should be performed according to the Angel's Desires as he wills that Bodies be moved as the Angel pleases if therefore it may be said that an Angel or Man are true Movers because God moves Bodies as they desire that Man or Angel might likewise be call'd true Creatours since God might create Beings on occasion of their Will Nay perhaps it might be said that the vilest of Animals or even mere Matter is the real Cause of the Creation of some Substance if it be supposed with some Philosophers that God produces substantial Forms whenever the Disposition of Matter requires it And lastly since God has resolved from all Eternity to create some certain things at some certain times those Times might also be called the Causes of the Creation of such Beings with as much right as 't is pretended that a Ball meeting with another is the true Cause of the Motion that is communicated to it because God by his general Will that constitutes the Order of Nature has decreed that such or such Communication of Motions should follow upon the Concourse of two Bodies There is then but one true Cause as there is one true God Neither must we imagine that what precedes an Effect does really produce it God himself cannot communicate his Power to Creatures according to the Light of Reason He cannot make them true Causes and change them into Gods But though he might doe it we conceive not why he should will it Bodies Spirits pure Intelligences all can doe nothing 'T is he who has made Spirits that enlightens and moves them 't is he who has created Heaven and Earth that regulates all their Motions In fine 't is the Authour of our Being that performs our Desires Semel jussit semper paret He moves even our Arms when we use them against his Orders for he complains by his Prophets That we make him subservient to our unjust and criminal Desires All those little Divinities of the Heathens all those particular Causes of Philosophers are Chimeras which the wicked Spirit endeavours to set up that he may destroy the Worship of the true God The Philosophy we have received from Adam teaches us no such things but that which has been propagated by the Serpent for ever since the Fall the Mind of Man is turned Heathen That Philosophy join'd to the Errours of the Senses has made
which two Principles of Errour I remember to have been often seduc'd For to return to the Difficulty in hand 't is not possible to conceive how those little Fetters should be indivisible by their own Essence and Nature nor consequently how they should be inflexible since on the contrary I conceive them most divisible nay necessarily divisible by their own Essence and Nature For the Part A is most certainly a Substance as well as B and consequently 't is plain that A may exist without B since Substances may exist without one another otherwise they would be no Substances It cannot be said that A is no Substance for 't is plain that that is not a bare Mode whereas every Being is either a Substance or the Mode of a Substance And therefore since A is not a Mode it is a Substance and may exist without B and much more the Part A exists separately from B so that this Fetter is divisible into A and B. Moreover if this Fetter were indivisible or crooked by its own Nature and Essence there would happen a thing quite contrary to what we see by Experience for not one Body could be broken Let us suppose as before a Piece of Iron composed of many Fetters perplexed within one another and A a B b to be two of them I say it will not be possible to disintangle them and consequently to break the Iron For to break it the Fetters that make it up must be bent which however are supposed inflexible by their own Nature and Essence If they be not supposed inflexible but only indivisible by their own Nature the Supposition would be unserviceable for solving the Question For then the Difficulty will be Why those little Fetters obey not the Force that is used to bend a Bar of Iron Neither must they be supposed indivisible if they be not supposed inflexible For if the Parts of those Fetters could change their situation in reference to one another 't is visible that they might be separated since there is no Reason why if one part may be somewhat removed from the other it could not be entirely removed And therefore whether these little Fetters are supposed indivisible or inflexible the Question cannot be solved by that means for if they be only supposed indivisible a Piece of Iron must be broken without trouble and if they be supposed inflexible it will be impossible to break it since the little Fetters that make up the Iron being intricated within one another it will be impossible to disintangle them Let us therefore solve the Difficulty by clear and undeniable Principles and find the Reason why that little Band has two Parts A B so firmly united to one another 'T is needful I perceive to divide the Subject of my Meditation into Parts that I may examine it the more exactly and with less Intention of Thought since I could not at first at a single view and with the whole Attention I am capable of discover what I enquired after This I might have done at the beginning for when the Subjects of our Meditation are somewhat abstruse 't is always the best way to consider them by parts and not fruitlessly weary our selves with the vain Hopes of meeting happily with the Truth What I enquire after is The Cause of the strict Union betwixt the minute Parts that make up the little Fetter A B. Now I conceive only distinctly three Things that can be the Cause sought for viz. The very Parts of that little Fetter or the Will of the Author of Nature or lastly invisible Bodies surrounding such little Bands I might yet alledge as the Cause of these things the Form of Bodies the Qualities of Hardness or some occult Quality the Sympathy betwixt Parts of the same Species c. but since I have no distinct Idea of those fine things I neither must nor can ground my Reasonings thereupon so that if I find not the Cause I search after in those things of which I have distinct Ideas I will not fruitlessly trouble my self with the Contemplation of such rambling and general Notions of Logick and shall forbear speaking of what I understand not But let us examine the first of these things that may be the Cause why the Parts of that small Band are so firmly joined viz. the very Parts of which it is made up When I only consider the Parts of which hard Bodies are composed I am inclined to believe That no Cement which unites the Parts of that Fetter can be imagin'd besides themselves and their own Rest for of what Nature could it be It cannot be a thing subsisting of it self since all those minute Parts being Substances for what Reason should they be united by other Substances but themselves Neither can it be a Quality different from Rest because there is no Quality more contrary to Motion that may separate those Parts but their own Rest but besides Substances and their Qualities we know not any other sorts of things 'T is true that the Parts of hard Bodies remain united as long as they are in Rest one by another and that when they are once in Rest they remain of themselves in the same state as long as they can but this is not what I enquire after and I know not how too I came to mistake the Subject I endeavour here to discover why the Parts of hard Bodies have so great a strength to remain in Rest one by another that they withstand the Force that is used to move them I might however answer my self that every Body has truly Force of continuing fix'd in its present state and that this Force is equal whether in Motion or Rest But that the Reason why the parts of hard Bodies remain in Rest by one another and that we can difficultly move and separate them is our not imploying sufficient Motion to overpower the Rest. This is probable but I am seeking Certainty if it be to be found and not bare Probability And how can I know with Certainty and Evidence that each Body has this Force to continue in the state it 's in and that this Force is equal both as to Motion and Rest since Matter on the contrary seems indifferently passive to either and altogether destitute of Force Let us have recourse then with M. des Cartes to the Will of the Creatour which is it may be that Force which Bodies seem to have in themselves which is the second thing above mention'd suppos'd capable of preserving the Parts of this little Fetter we speak of so closely link'd to one another Certainly 't is possible that God may will every Body should remain in its present state and that his Will should be the Force which unites their Parts to one another as I otherwise know his Will to be the Moving Force which puts Bodies in Motion For since Matter is incapable of moving it self I have Reason methinks to conclude it is a Spirit and even the Author
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 grant that we ought not to consider a Vessel on the Water as at Rest. I grant likewise that all the parts of the environing Water are â—ubservient to the new Motion imprinted by the Waterman though it be but too visible by the decrease of the Boat 's Motion that they resist it more on the side where it makes than on the other whence it is driven Notwithstanding which supposition I say that of all the Parts of Water in the River according to M. Des Cartes there are none which can promote the Motion of the Vessel except those which immediately touch it on the side it is driven on For according to that Philosopher The Water being fluid all the parts that go to its Composition act not conjointly against the Body we would move but only those which touching it conjointly bear upon it But those which conjointly bear upon the Vessel and the Boat's-man together are twenty times more inconsiderable than the Boat 'T is plain therefore from the Explication given by M. Des Cartes in this Article concerning the difficulty we find to break a Nail between our Fingers that a little Body is capable of moving one much bigger than it self For in short our Hands are not so fluid as Water and when we would break a Nail there are more parts that act jointly in our hands than in the Water which pushes against a Vessel But here 's a more sensible Experiment Take a Plank well smooth'd or any other very hard Plain drive in it a Nail half way and set this Plain in a somewhat inclining posture then place a Bar of Iron an hundred times thicker than the Nail an Inch or two above it and letting it slide down it will not break it Mean time it is observable that according to Des Cartes all the parts of the Bar as being hard and solid act jointly upon the Nail If therefore there were no other Câ—ment than Rest to unite the parts of the Nail the Bar of Iron being an hundred times bigger ought by the Fifth Rule of M. Des Cartes and according to Reason communicate somewhat of its Motion to the part of the Nail it fell upon that is to break it and pass on even though this Bar should slide with a very gentle Motion Therefore we must seek some other Cause than the Rest of Bodies that makes them hard and capable of resisting the violence that is offer'd to break them since Rest has no Force to withstand Motion And I am persuaded these Experiences are sufficient to evince that the abstracted Proofs we have given are not false We must then examine the third Thing we supposed before might be the cause of the strict Union found between the Parts of hard Bodies namely an invisible Matter which surrounds them and which being rapidly mov'd pushes most violently the external and internal Parts of these Bodies and constringes them in such a manner as requires greater strength to separate them than has that invisible and extremely agitated Matter Methinks I might reasonably conclude that the Union of the constituent Parts of hard Bodies depends on an invisible Matter which surrounds and compresses them since the two other things supposed possible Causes of this union have been discover'd not to be truly so For since I meet with Resistance in breaking a Piece of Iron which Resistance proceeds not from the Iron nor the Will of God as I think I have proved it must necessarily proceed from some invisible Matter which can be no other than that which immediately surrounds and compresses it Nevertheless I shall give some positive Proofs of this Opinion after I have more largely explain'd it by some Instance Take a Globe of any hard Metal which is hollow within and divided in two Halfs join them together with a little Bond of Wax at the place of their Union and then extract the Air these two half Globes will be so firmly join'd to one another that two Teams of Horses fastned to the Rings on the opposite sides of the Globe shall not separate them provided they be large in proportion to the Number of Horses when yet if the Air be suffer'd to enter one Man shall separate them with a great deal of Ease From this Experiment 't is easie to conclude that what united the two Hemispheres to one another was the Pressure of the surrounding Air upon their outward and convex Surface whilst there was no Compression in their concave and inward parts so that the Action of the Horses which drew the two Hemispheres on either side could not conquer the Resistance made by innumerable little Parts of Air by their pressing these two Halfs But the least Force is capable of dividing them when the Air entring in the Copper Globe drives against the Concave and inward Surfaces as much as the external Air presses against the outward and convex Take on the contrary the Bladder of a Carp and put it in a Vessel from which the Air is pump'd this Bladder being full of Air will crack and burst because then there is no exteriour Air to resist that within the Bladder 'T is likewise for the same Reason I have given of the first Experiment that two Glass or Marble Plains ground and polish'd upon one another so cling together that Violence must be us'd to separate them one way because the two parts of the Marble are press'd and constring'd by the external Air that surrounds them and are not so strongly press'd by that between I might produce infinite other Experiments to prove that the gross Air which surrounds Bodies strongly unites their Parts But what I have said is enough to give a distinct Explication of my Thoughts upon the present Question I say then that what causes the Parts of hard Bodies and the little Fetters before-mentioned to hang so closely united to each other is there being other little Bodies infinitely more agitated than the course Air we breath which bear against them and compress them and that which makes it so hard to separate them is not their Rest but the Agitation of these little surrounding Bodies So that that which resists Motion is not Rest this being but the Privation of it and has no Force at all but some contrary Motion This simple Exposition of my Opinion perhaps seems reasonable yet I foresee that many Persons will not easily be induc'd to yield to it Hard Bodies make so great Impression on the Senses when they strike us or when we use Violence to break them that we are inclin'd to believe their Parts more strictly united than they really are And on the contrary the little Bodies which I have said encompass them and to which I have ascribed the Force of causing this Union making no Impression on our Senses seem too weak to produce so sensible an Effect But to take away this Prejudice which bottoms on the Impressions of our Senses and on the Difficulty we find to imagine Bodies more little
two parts as close as they are yet the Air cannot get in and therefore 't is that which compresses and constringes the two parts together and makes them so difficult to be disunited unless we glide them over one another For all this it is manifest that the Continuity Contiguity and Union of two Marbles would be one and the same thing in a vacuum for neither have we different Ideas of them so that it would be to talk without understanding our selves to make them differ absolutely and without any regard to the surrounding Bodies I now come to make some Reflexions upon M. Des Cartes's Opinion and the Original of his Errour I call his Opinion an Errour because I can find no sincere way of defending what he has said upon the Rules of Motion and the Cause of the Hardness of Bodies towards the end of the second Part of his Principles in several places and that he seems to have evidently prov'd the Truth of the contrary Opinion This great Man most distinctly conceiving that Matter could not naturally move it self but that the moving Force of all Bodies was nothing but the general Will of the Author of Nature and that therefore the Communications of their Motion upon their mutual Collision must come from the same Will yielded to be carry'd away with this Notion That the Rules of the different Communication of Motions must be fetch'd from the Proportion found between the different Magnitudes of Colliding Bodies it being impossible to penetrate into the Designs and Will of God And whereas he concluded that every thing had the Force to persevere in its present State whether it were in Motion or Rest because God whose Will constituted this Force acts always in the same manner he inferr'd that Rest had an equal Force with Motion Thus he measur'd the Effects of the Power of Rest by the Greatness of the Body it resided in as well as those of Motion And hence he gave the Rules of the Communication of Motion which are seen in his Principles and the Cause of the Hardness of Bodies which I have endeavour'd to refute 'T is a hard matter not to submit to the Opinion of Monsieur des Cartes when we contemplate it on the same side For once more since the Communication of Motions proceeds only from the Will of the Author of Nature and that we see all Bodies continue in the State they have once been put in whether it be Motion or Rest it seems that we ought to seek for the Rules of the different Communications of Motion upon the Concourse of Bodies not in the Will of God which is unknown to us but in the Proportion that is found between the Magnitudes of these same Bodies I do not therefore admire that Monsieur des Cartes should light upon this Notion but I only wonder he did not correct it when having push'd on his Discoveries he found out the Existence and some Effects of the subtile Matter which surrounds all Bodies I am surpriz'd to find him in the 132d Article of the Fourth Part attribute the Elastick Force of certain Bodies to the subtile Matter and yet not ascribe to it their Hardness and the Resistance they make to our Endeavours to bend and break them but only to the Rest of their Parts For I think it evident that the Cause of the Elasticity and Stiffness of some Bodies is the same with that which impowers them to resist the Violence that is us'd to break them For indeed the Force which is employ'd in breaking a piece of Steel has but an insensible Difference from that which is us'd to bend it I mean not to multiply Reasons here which one might give for the proving these things nor to answer some Difficulties possible to be urg'd about Bodies which are not sensibly springing and yet are difficultly bent For all these Difficulties vanish if we consider that the subtile Matter cannot easily make new Tracks in Bodies which break in bending as in Glass and temper'd Steel which it can easier do in such Bodies as are compos'd of branchy Parts and that are not brittle as in Gold and Lead And Lastly that there is no hard Body but has some kind of Elaterium 'T is a hard matter to persuade one's self that Monsieur des Cartes did positively believe the Cause of Hardness to be different from that which makes the Elasticity and what looks most likely is that he made not sufficient Reflexion on that matter When a Man has for a long time meditated on any Subject and is well satisfied about that of his present Enquiry he commonly thinks no farther on it he believes that the Conceptions he had of it are undeniable Truths and that it is needless to examine them any more But a Man has so many Things in him which disrelish his Application provoke him to precipitate Judgments and subject him to Errour that though his Mind remains apparently satisfied yet it is not always well instructed in the Truth Monsieur des Cartes was a Man like us No greater Solidity Accuracy Extent and Penetration of Thought is any where to be met with than in his Works I confess but yet he was not infallible Therefore 't is very probable he remain'd so settl'd in his Opinion from his not sufficiently reflecting that he asserted something in the Consequence of his Principles contrary to it He grounded it on very specious and probable Reasons but such notwithstanding as being not capable of themselves to force his Consent he might still have suspended his Judgment and consequently as a Philosopher he ought to have done it It was not enough to examine in a hard Body what was in it that might make it so but he ought likewise to have thought on the invisible Bodies which might give it Hardness as he did at the End of his Philosophical Principles when he ascrib'd to them the Cause of their Elasticity He ought to have made an exact Division and comprehensive of whatever might contribute to the Hardness of Bodies It was not enough to have sought the Causes of it in the Will of God he ought also to have thought on the subtile Matter which surrounds these Bodies For though the Existence of that violently agitated Matter was not yet proved in the place of his Principles where he speaks of Hardness it was not however rejected he ought therefore to have suspended his Judgment and have well remember'd that what he had written concerning the Cause of Hardness and of the Rules of Motion was fit to be revis'd which I believe was neglected by him or at least he has not sufficiently consider'd the true Reason of a thing very easie to be discover'd and which yet is of greatest Consequence in Natural Philosophy I thus explain my self Monsieur des Cartes well knew that to the Support of his System the Truth of which he could not reasonably suspect it was absolutely necessary that great Bodies should always communicate some
this That if two Bowls of Lead or of any other less Elastick Matter meet they rebound not after their Collision but proceed almost according to the Rules before establish'd which they keep to so much more exactly as they are less springing Bodies therefore rebound after their Percussion because they are hard that is as I have explain'd because there is an extremely agitated Matter which compresses them and which passing through their Pores with an extreme Violence repel the Bodies which strike against them But it ought to be suppos'd that the Percutient Bodies break not those which they dash against by a Motion over-powering the Resistance the little Parts of the subtile Matter are capable of making as when we discharge a Musket against a piece of Wood. 'T is true the subtile Matter compresses soft Bodies and passes with a rapid Course through their Pores no less than through those of hard and yet these soft Bodies have no Elasticity The Reason whereof is this that the Matter passing through soft Bodies can with a great deal of Ease open it self new Passages by reason of the Minuteness of the Parts composing them or of some other particular Configuration proper for that Effect which hard Bodies will not admit by reason of the Largeness and Situation of their Parts which are contrary to the same Thus when a hard Body strikes another that is soft it alters all the Roads the subtile Matter us'd to pass through which is commonly visible as in a Musket-Bullet which flattens when it is smitten But when a hard Body strikes against another like it it either makes none or very few new Paths and the subtile Matter in its Pores is oblig'd to return upon the same Ground or else must repel the Body which blocks up its little Avenues Lastly It seems evident that every mov'd Body continually endeavouring to tend in a Right Line and declining from it as little as is possible when it meets Resistance ought never to rebound since by that Motion it extremely deviates from a Right 'T is necessary therefore either that Bodies should grow flat or that the stronger should conquer the weaker and make it bear it company But because Bodies are springing and hard they cannot go in company since if A pushes a a repels A and so they must recede from one another Notwithstanding if two Bodies were in a Vacuum though never so hard they would go in company because having no Body to surround them they could have no Elastick Force the Striker making no Resistance to the Striking but Air Gravitation c. resisting the great Motion which the striking Body gives the stricken the stricken resists the striking and hinders it from following For Experience teaches us that Air and Gravity resist Motion and that this Resistance is so much greater as the Motion is more violent 'T is easie to discover from what I have been saying how it comes to pass that in the Percussion of different Bodies encompass'd with Air or Water c. sometimes the Smiting rebounds sometimes communicates all its Motion and remains as it were unmoveable and sometimes it follows the Smitten but always with less Degrees of Swiftness if one or other of them be not perfectly soft For all this depends on the Proportion that is found between the Magnitude the Hardness and the Weight of one and the other supposing them mov'd with an equal Swiftness If they are very hard the Smiting rebounds more because the Elaterium is stronger If the Smiting is very little the Smitten very large and weighty the Smiting rebounds still much because of the Weight and the great Mass of Air surrounding the Smitten which withstands the Motion Last of all If the Force of the Hardness is as it were abated by the little Volume of Air answering the Littleness of the stricken Body or the contrary it may happen that the Smiting may remain as immoveable after the Percussion We need therefore but compare the Hardness of percutient Bodies and the Air which the Percuss'd ought to agitate anew at the time of Percussion whereby to move to give a pretty exact Conjecture concerning what must happen in the Percussion of different Bodies I still suppose an equal Swiftness in the striking for the Air more resists a great Motion than a little one and there is as much Motion in a Body twice as little as in another when proceeding twice as fast as that other Thus the Smitten being driven as fast again may be consider'd as having a Volume of Air twice as big to repel in order to its moving But it ought still to be observ'd that at the Moment of one Body's striking another the Parts of this same Body have two contrary Motions for those on the Fore-side have a backward Tendency by reason of the Collision when at the same time those behind tend forwards on the Account of the first Motion and 't is that Counter-motion which flattens soft Bodies and is the Cause that some hard Bodies break in pieces but when Bodies are very hard this Counter-stroke which vibrates some of the Parts and makes a sort of Trepidation in them as appears from the Sound they give always produces some Changes in the Communication of Motion which are very difficult to be known for many Reasons and 't is in my Mind to little purpose to examine them in particular Would a Man meditate on all these things I believe he would easily answer some Difficulties which might still be rais'd upon the Subject but if I thought that what I have said were insufficient to shew that Rest has no Force to resist Motion and that the Rules of the Communication of Motions given by Monsieur des Cartes are in part false I would here make out that it is impossible by his Supposition to move our selves in the Air And that which makes the Circulation of Motion in Fluid Bodies possible without recurring to a Vacuum is that the first Element easily divides it self in several different manners the Repose of its Parts having no Force to resist Motion The CONCLUSION of the Three last BOOKS I Have if I mistake not sufficiently shewn in the Fourth and Fifth Books that Men's natural Inclinations and Passions frequently occasion their falling into Errour because they induce them more to a precipitate Judgment than a careful Examination of Things I have shewn in the Fourth Book that our Inclination for Good in general is the Cause of the Restlesness of the Will that this Restlesness of the Will puts the Mind in continual Agitation and that a Mind continually agitated is utterly unfit for the Discovery of any the least intricate and hidden Truths That the Love of new and extraordinary Things frequently prepossesses us in their behalf and that whatever bears the Character of Infinite is capable of confounding our Imagination and mis-leading us I have explain'd how our Inclination for Greatness Elevation and Independency insensibly engage us in a falsly-pretended
our Freedom on its respect But whereas this inward Sensation is sometimes absent from our Mind and we consult only what confus'd remains it has left in our Memory we may by the consideration of abstracted reasons which keep us from an inward feeling persuade our selves that 't is impossible for Man to be free Just as a Stoick who in want of nothing and Philosophizing at his Case may imagine that Pain is no Evil because the Internal Sense he has of himself does not actually convince him of the contrary and so he may prove like Seneca by reasons in one sense most true that 't is a contradiction for the wise man to be miserable But though our Self-consciousness were insufficient to convince us of our Freedom yet Reason might evince as much For since the light of Reason assures us that God acts only for himself and that he can give no Motion to us but what must tend towards him the Impression towards Good in general may be irresistible but 't is plain that that which we have for particular Goods must be necessarily free For if it were invincible we should have no Motion to carry us to God though he gives it only for himself and we should be constrain'd to settle on particular Goods though GOD ORDER and REASON forbid us So that Sin could not be laid at our door and God would be the real Cause of our Corruptions forasmuch as we should not be Free but purely Natural and altogether necessary Agents Thus though inward Sensation did not teach us we were free Reason would discover it was necessary for Man to be created so if we suppose him capable of desiring particular Goods and only capable of desiring them through the Impression or Motion which God perpetually gives us for himself Which likewise may be prov'd by Reason But our capacity to suffer Pain cannot be prov'd this way but can only be discover'd by Conscience or inward Sensation and yet no Man can doubt but a Man is liable to suffer Pain As we know not our Soul by any clear Idea we have of it as I have before explain'd so 't is in vain to try to discover what it is in us that terminates the Action which God impresses or that yields to be conquer'd by a resistible Determination and which we may change by our Will or by our Impression towards all Good and our Union with him who includes the Ideas of all Beings For in short we have no clear Idea of any Modification of our Soul Nothing but our Internal Sense can teach us that we are and what we are and this only must be consulted to convince us we are free And its Answers are clear and satisfactory enough upon the Point when we actually propose to our selves any particular Good for no Man whatever can doubt whether he be invinsibly inclin'd to eat of a Fruit or avoid some slight inconsiderable Pain But if instead of hearkning to our Inward Sensation we attend to abstracted Reasons which throw us off the Contemplation of our selves possibly losing sight of them we may forget that we are in Being and trying to reconcile the prescience of God and his absolute power over us with our Liberty we shall plunge into an Errour that will overturn all the Principles of Religion and Morality I produce here an Objection which is usually made against what I have been saying which though but very weak and defective is strong enough to give a great many trouble to evade The Hating of God say they is an Action which does not partake of Good and therefore is all the Sinner's God having no part in it And consequently Man acts and gives himself new Modifications by an action which does not come from God I Answer That Sinners hate not God but because they freely and falsly judge that he is Evil for Good consider'd as such cannot be the Object of Hatred Therefore they hate God with that very Motion of Love he influences them with towards Good Now the Reason why they conclude he is not Good is their making an undue use of their Liberty for being not convinc'd with irresistible Evidence that he is not Good they ought not to believe him Evil nor consequently to hate him In Hatred two things may be distinguish'd viz. the Sensation of the Soul and Motion of the Will This Sensation cannot be Evil for it is a Modification of the Soul and has neither Moral Good nor Ill in it Nor is the Motion more corrupt since it is not distinguishable from that of Love For External Evil being only the privation of Good 't is manifest that to fly Evil is to fly the privation of Good that is to pursue Good Wherefore all that is real and positive even in our Hatred of God himself has nothing Evil in it and the Sinner cannot hate God without an abominable abuse of the action which God incessantly gives to incline him to the Love of Him God works whatever is real in the Sensations of Concupiscence and yet is not the Author of Concupiscence AS the Difficulties that are rais'd about Concupiscence are near akin to those before explain'd I think it convenient to shew that God is not the Author of Concupiscence though it be he that works all in us even in the production of sensible Pleasure It ought I think to be granted for the Reasons produc'd in the Fifth Chapter of the First Book of the preceding Treatise and elsewhere that by the natural Laws of the Union of the Soul and Body Man even before the Fall was inclin'd by preventing Pleasures to the use of sensible Goods and that as often as such and such Traces were delineated in the principal part of his Brain such and such Thoughts arose in his Mind Now those Laws were most Proper and Equitable for the Reasons I there have given Which being suppos'd as before the Trangressions all things were perfectly well order'd so Man had necessarily that Power over his Body as that he could prevent the production of these Traces when he would Order requiring that his Mind should have the Dominion over his Body Which Power of his Mind precisely consisted in this that according to its different Desires and Applications it stopt the Communication of Motions which were produc'd in his own Body by circumambient Objects over which his Will had not an immediate and direct Authority as over his proper Body And it cannot I think be conceiv'd how he could hinder the Formation of the Traces in his Brain any other way Therefore the Will of God or the general Law of Nature which is the true Cause of the Communication of Motions depended on some occasions upon the Will of Adam For God had that consideration for him that he produc'd not without his consent new Motions in his Body or at least in the principal part to which his Soul was immediately uniâ—ed Such was the Institution of Nature before the Sin ORDER would
brought of their Existence MEN are commonly perfectly ignorant of what they presume best to understand and have a good Knowledge of other things whilst they imagine they have not so much as their Ideas When their Senses have to do in their Judgments they submit to what they do not comprehend at least to what they know but imperfectly and confusedly And when their Ideas are purely intellectual give me leave to use such Expressions they will hardly admit undeniable Demonstrations What Notion for Instance have the generality of Men when we prove to them most of Metaphysical Truths when we demonstrate the Existence of a God the Efficacy of his Will the Immutability of his Decrees That there is but one God or true Cause that works all in all things but one Supreme Reason which all Intelligent Beings participate but one necessary Love which is the Principle of all created Wills They think we pronounce Words without Sense that we have no Ideas of the things advanc'd and that we had better say nothing Metaphysical Truths and Arguments are not of a sensible Nature they have nothing moving and affecting and consequently leave not Conviction behind them Nevertheless abstract Ideas are certainly the most distinct and Metaphysical Truths the most clear and evident of all other Men sometimes say they have no Idea of God nor any Knowledge of his Will and commonly believe too what they say but 't is for want of knowing what they know it may be best For where 's the Man that hesitates in answering to the Question Whether God is Wise Just or Powerful Whether he is Divisible Triangular Movable or subject to any kind of Change whatever Whereas we cannot answer without scruple and fear of being mistaken whether certain Qualities do or do not belong to a Subject which we have no Idea of So again Who is it dares say that God acts not by the most simple Means That he is irregular in his Designs That he makes Monsters by a positive direct and particular Will and not by a kind of Necessity In a word That his Will is or may be contrary to ORDER whereof every Man knows something more or less But if a Man had no Idea of the Will of GOD he might at least doubt whether he acted according to certain Laws which he clearly conceives he is obliged to follow on Supposition HE will act Men therefore have the Ideas of things purely Intelligible which Ideas are much clearer than those of sensible Objects They are better assured of the Existence of a God than of that of Bodies and when they retire into themselves they more clearly discover certain Wills of God by which he produces and preserves all Beings than those of their best Friends or whom they have studied all their Lives For the Union of their Mind with God and that of their Will with his that is with the Law Eternal or Immutable Order is immediate direct and necessary whereas their Union with sensible Objects being founded only for the Preservation of their Life and Health gives them no Knowledge of these Objects but as they relate to that Design 'T is this immediate and direct Union which is not known says St. Austin but by those whose Mind is purified that enlightens our most secret Reason and exhorts and moves us in the inmost Recesses of our Heart By this we learn both the Thoughts and the Wills of God that is Eternal Truths and Laws For no one can doubt but we know some of them with Evidence But our Union with our choicest Friends teaches us not evidently either what they think or what they will We think we know right well but we are most commonly mistaken because we receive our Information only from their Lips Nor can our Union which we have through our Senses with circumambient Bodies instruct us For the Testimony of the Senses is never exactly true but commonly every way false as I have made appear in this Treatise and 't is for that Reason I say 't is an harder thing than is believ'd to prove positively the Existence of Bodies though our Senses tell us they exist because Reason does not so readily inform us as we imagine and it must be most attentively consulted to give us a clear Resolve But as Men are more Sensible than Reasonable so they more willingly listen to the Verdict of the Senses than the Testimony of internal Truth and because they have always consulted their Eyes to be assur'd of the Existence of Matter without troubling their Heads to advise with their Reason they are surpriz'd to hear it said it is hard to demonstrate it They think they need but open their Eyes to see that there are Bodies but if this does not take away all suspition of Illusion they believe it abundantly sufficient to come near and handle them after which they can hardly conceive we can have any possible Reasons to make us doubt of their Existence But if we believe our Eyes they 'll tell us that Colours are laid upon the surface of Bodies and Light diffus'd in the Air and Sun our Ears make us hear Sounds as undulated in the Air and ecchoing from the ringing Bodies and if we credit the Report of the other Senses Heat will be in the Fire Sweetness in the Sugar Odour in Musk and all sensible Qualities in the Bodies which seem to exhale or disperse them And yet it is certain from the Reasons I have given in the First Book concerning the Search after Truth that these Qualities are not out of the Soul that feels them at least it is not evident they are in the Bodies that are about us What Reason therefore is there from the Reports of our always-treacherous and delusive Senses to conclude there are actually Bodies without us and that they are like those we see I mean those which are the immediate Object of our Soul when we behold them with bodily Eyes Certainly this does not want Difficulty whatever may be said of it Farther If the Existence of any Body may be certainly prov'd upon the Testimony of our Senses none could have better Pretence than That to which the Soul is immediately united The liveliest Sensation and that which seems to have the most necessary relation to an actually-existing Body is Pain And yet it often happens that those who have lost an Arm feel most violent Pains in it long after it has been cut off They know well enough they want it when they consult their Memory or only look upon their Body but the Sense of Pain deceives them And if as it often happens they be suppos'd to have quite forgotten what formerly they were and to have no other Senses left them than that whereby they feel Pain in their imaginary Arm certainly they could not be convinc'd but that they had an Arm in which they felt so violent torment There have been those who have believ'd they had Horns on their Heads others who have
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
on Order and Eternal Laws and Truths we do not naturally enquire the Cause for they have none We do not clearly see the necessity of this Decree nor do we think immediately upon it On the contrary we perceive evidently by a simple view that the nature of numbers and intelligible Ideas is immutable necessary and independent We see clearly that it is absolutely necessary for 2 times 4 to be 8 and that the square of the Diagonal of a square is double to that square If we doubt of the absolute necessity of these Truths 't is because we turn our back upon their Light reason upon a false Principle and search for their nature their Immutability and independance out of themselves Thus the Decree for the Immutability of these Truths is a fiction of the mind which supposing it sees not what it sees in the Wisdom of God and knowing him to be the cause of all things thinks it self oblig'd to imagine a Decree to ascertain immutability to these Truths which it cannot choose but acknowledge to be immutable But this Supposition is false and we ought to beware of it 'T is only in the Wisdom of God that we see Eternal immutable and necessary Truths nor can we see any where else the Order which God himself is oblig'd to follow as I have said before The mind is made for that Wisdom and in one sence it can see nothing else For if it can see the Creatures 't is because He whom it sees though in a very imperfect manner during this life comprehends them all in the immensity of his Being in an intelligible manner and proportionate to the mind as I have shown in another place If we had not in our selves the Idea of Infinite and if we saw not all things by the natural union of our mind with universal and infinite Reason it seems evident that we could not have liberty to think on all things For the mind cannot desire to consider things except it has some Idea of them and it is not in its Power to think actually on any thing but what it may desire to think on And so we shall cashier Man of his Liberty of thinking on All if we separate his mind from him who comprehends all Again since we can love nothing but what we see if God should only give us particular Ideas it is manifest he would so determine all the Motions of our Will that it would be necessary for us to Love only particular Beings For in brief if we had not the Idea of infinite we could not love it and if those who positively affirm they have no Idea of God speak as they think I scruple not to affirm they have never lov'd God for nothing seems certainer to me than that nothing can be the Object of our Love which is not of our conception Lastly If Order and Eternal Laws were not immutable by the necessity of their nature the clearest and strongest proofs of Religion would I question not be destroy'd in their Principle as well as Liberty and the most certain Sciences For it is evident that the Christian Religion which proposes JESUS CHRIST as a Mediator and Restorer supposes the Corruption of nature by original Sin But what proof can we have of this Corruption The flesh wars you will say against the Spirit has brought it into subjection and tyrannizes over it This I grant But this says a Libertine is no Disorder This is as it pleas'd God who ordain'd it so who is the Master of his own decrees and who constitutes what Order he thinks fit amongst his Creatures How shall it be prov'd that 't is a Disorder for Minds to be subjected to Bodies unless we have a clear Idea of Order and necessity and know that God himself is oblig'd to follow it by a necessary Love which he bears to himself But farther supposing that Order depends on a free Decree of God we must still have recourse to him to be inform'd of it God must nevertheless be consulted notwithstanding the aversion which some of the Learned have to apply to him and this truth must still be granted that we have need of God to be instructed But that suppos'd free Decree which is the cause of Order is a meer fiction of mind for the Reasons I have given If it be not a necessary Order that Man should be made for his Author and that his will should be conformable to Order or to the essential and necessary will of God If it be not true that Actions are good or ill because agreeable or repugnant to an immutable and necessary Order and that this same order requires that the Good should be rewarded and the Evil punish'd Last of all if all Men have not naturally a clear Idea of Order even of such an one as God himself cannot will the contrary to what it prescribes since God cannot will Disorder certainly I can see nothing but Universal Confusion For what is there to be blam'd in the most infamous and unjust actions of the Heathens to whom God has given no Laws What will be the reason that will dare to judge them if there be no supream reason that condemns them There is a Poet who says 't is impossible to distinguish Justice from Injustice and a Philosopher that will have it an infirmity to blush or be asham'd for infamous actions These and the like Paradoxes are often asserted in the heat of Imagination and in the transport of the Passions But how can we condemn these Opinions if there be not an Universal and Necessary Order Rule or Reason which is also present to those who can retire into themselves We fear not on several occasions to judge others and also our selves but by what Authority should we do it if the inward Reason that judges when we seem to pronounce Sentence against others and our selves be not supream and common to all men But if this Reason were not present to those who retreat into their own Breast and if the Heathens too had not naturally some union with the order we speak of upon the score of what Sin or Disobedience could they be reckon'd culpable and by what Justice could God punish them This I say upon a Prophet's teaching me that God is willing to make Men the Arbiters betwixt him and his People provided they determine by the immutable and necessary order of Justice Nero kill'd his Mother it is true But in what has he done amiss He follow'd the natural Motion of his Hatred God gave him no Precept to the contrary the Laws of the Jews were not made for him You 'll say perhaps that such actions are restrain'd by the Natural Law and that was known to him But what proof can you have of it For my own part I agree to it because indeed this is an irresistible Proof for an Immutable and Necessary Order and for the Knowledge which every Mind has of it and that so much more clear
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
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
as Jesus Christ alone can merit Grace for us so it is he alone that can administer Occasions to the General Laws by which it is distributed to Men. For the Principle or Foundation of these General Laws or that which determines their Efficacy being necessarily either in us or in Jesus Christ since it is certain that it is not in us it must needs be found in him VIII Besides when Man had sinn'd did it behoove God to have any more regard to his Desires Being we are all in a disorder'd State we can no longer be an Occasion of God's shewing us Favour But a Mediatour was needful not only to give us Access towards God but to be the Occasional Cause of the Favours we hope from him IX Whereas God had a Design of making his Son the Head of his Church it was requisite he should constitute him the Occasional or Natural Cause of the Grace which sanctifies it For 't is the Head which communicates Life and Motion to the Limbs and with that Prospect God permitted Sin For if Man had continued in Innocence as his Will had been meritorious of Grace and even of Glory so the inviolable Laws of Order would have requir'd that God should have appointed in Man the Occasional Cause of his Perfection and his Happiness In so much that Jesus Christ would not have been the Head of the Church or at most had been but the Head of those Influences which all the Members might have easily dispens'd with X. If our Soul were in our Body before it was form'd and if by her diverse Volitions all the Parts which compose it were rang'd and postur'd with how many various Sensations and different Motions would she be touch'd upon consideration of all the Effects which were to follow her Volitions Especially if she were extremely desirous of forming the most vigorous and best made Body pobssile XI Now Holy Scripture does not only say that Jesus Christ is the Head of the Church but also that he begets it and fashions it and gives it increase that he suffers merits acts and influences continually in it The Zeal which Jesus Christ has for his Father's Glory and the Love he bears to his Church constantly suggest to him the Desire of making it the most ample the most magnificent and the perfectest that can be Therefore as the Soul of Jesus has not an infinite Capacity and yet would endow his Church with infinite Beauties and Ornaments we have all reason to believe that there is in his holy Soul a continual Chain of Thoughts and Desires with reference to the mystical Body which he constantly forms XII Now they are these continual Desires of the Soul of Jesus that tend to sanctifie his Church and render it worthy of his Father's Majesty which God has establish'd the Occasional Causes of the Efficacy of the general Laws of Grace For we are taught by Faith that God hath given his Son an absolute Power over Men in constituting him Head of his Church which yet cannot be conceiv'd unless the several Volitions of Jesus Christ are follow'd by their Effects For 't is manifest I should have no Power over my Arm if it mov'd when I would not have it and remain'd dead and motionless when I desir'd to move it XIII This Sovereign Power Jesus Christ has merited over Men as also that Quality of Head of the Church by the Sacrifice he offer'd upon Earth on full Possession of which Right he entred after his Resurrection 'T is now that he is High Priest of future Goods and that He by his diverse Desires prays indefatigably for Men to the Father And since his Desires are Occasional Causes his Prayers are always heard His Father denies him nothing as the Scripture assures us and yet his Prayers and Desires are necessary to obtain Because Occasional Physical Natural Causes for these three Terms have here the same Signification have no Power of themselves and all the Creatures even Jesus Christ consider'd as Man are in themselves but Weakness and Impotence XIV Therefore the Soul of Jesus having a Succession of various Thoughts with reference to the diverse Dispositions whereof Souls in general are capable has these Thoughts attended with certain Desires relating to the Sanctification of these Souls Which Desires being Occasional Causes of Grace ought to shed it on those Persons in particular whose Dispositions resemble that which the Soul of Jesus Christ actually thinks on and this Grace ought to be so much stronger and more abundant as his Desires are more strong and lasting XV. When a Person considers any Part of his Body that is not form'd as it ought to be he naturally has certain Desires relating to it and to the Use he would make of it in a sociable Life which Desires are prosecuted with certain insensible Motions of the Animal Spirits and tend to the posturing or proportioning it in a due manner When the Body is quite form'd and the Flesh is grown solid and consistent these Motions cannot change the Contexture of the Parts but only give them certain Dispositions which we call Corporeal Habits But when the Body is not completely form'd and the Flesh is extremely soft and tender these Motions which accompany the Desires of the Soul not only give the Body particular Dispositions but also change its Construction Which is sufficiently manifest in Children unborn For they are not only mov'd with the same Passions as their Mothers but also receive on their Bodies the Marks of these Passions from which their Mothers are always exempt XVI The Mystical Body of Jesus Christ is not yet grown into a Perfect Man nor will be till the Accomplishment of Ages but he continually is forming it For he is the Head which gives all the Members their increase by the Efficacy of his Influence according to the proportion convenient for each to the end it may be form'd and edified by Charity Which are Truths we are taught by St. Paul Now since Jesus Christ has no other Action than the diverse Motions of his Will 't is necessary that his Desires should be follow'd with the Influence of Grace which only can form him in his Members and give them that Beauty and Proportion which ought to be the Eternal Object of Divine Love XVII The diverse Motions of the Soul of Jesus being the Occasional Causes of Grace we need not wonder if it be sometimes given to the greatest Sinners or to Persons that make no use of it For the Soul of Jesus desiring to raise a Temple of a vast Extent and of infinite Beauty may wish that Grace may be given to the greatest Sinners and if in that Moment Jesus Christ thinks actually on the Covetous for Instance the Covetous shall receive Grace Or Jesus Christ wanting for the Construction of his Church Minds of a certain Character commonly not attainable but by those who suffer certain Persecutions whereof the Passions of Men are the natural
the Grace of the Creator XXXVI In the establish'd Order of Nature I can see but two Occasional Causes which shed Light on Minds and so determine the General Laws of the Grace of the Creator one which is in us and depends in some measure on us the other which is found in the Relation we have with surrounding Objects The former is nothing but the diverse Motions of our Will the second is the Occurrence of sensible Objects which act on our Mind in consequence of the Laws of Union of our Soul with our Body XXXVII We are taught by our own inward Consciousness That the Love of Light produces it and that Attention of Mind is a Natural Prayer by which we obtain Instruction of God for all the Enquirers of Truth who apply themselves to Truth discover it in proportion to their Application And if our Prayer were not interrupted nor our Attention disturb'd if we had any Idea of what we ask and should ask it with a competent Perseverance we should not fail to obtain whilst we were capable of receiving it But our Prayers are continually interrupted unless Self-interess'd our Senses and Imagination muddy and confound all our Ideas And â—hough the Truth we consult answers our Enquiries the confus'd Noise of our Passions deafens us to its Answers or makes us speedily forget them XXXVIII If it be consider'd that Man before the Fall was animated with Charity and possess'd with all that was requisite to his Perseverance in Innocence and that by his Perseverance and Application he ought to merit his Reward 't will easily be conceiv'd that the several Desires of his Will were establish'd the Occasional Causes of the Light receiv'd in his Understanding otherwise his Distraction had not been voluntary nor his Attention meritorious But Nature however corrupted is not destroy'd God has not desisted to will what he once will'd And the same Laws still subsist Therefore our manifold Volitions are still the Occasional or Natural Causes of the Presence of Ideas to our Mind But because the Union of the Soul with the Body is chang'd into a Dependence on it by a Natural Consequence of Sin and the immutable Will of God as I have explain'd elsewhere our Body at present disturbs our Ideas and speaks so loud in favour of its respective Goods that the Mind but seldom consults and distractedly listens to Internal Truth XXXIX Moreover Experience daily teaches us that our Conversation with Understanding Persons is capable of instructing us by raising our Attention that Preaching Reading Converse a thousand Occurrences of all sorts may raise some Ideas in us and likewise inspire us with good Thoughts The Death of a Friend is doubtless capable of putting us in Mind of Death unless some great Passion takes us up And when a Preacher of great Natural Endowments undertakes to demonstrate a most simple Truth and convince others of it it must be own'd that he may persuade his Hearers and even move their Conscience give them Fear and Hope and raise in them such other Passions as put them in a less State of Opposition to the Influence of the Grace of Jesus Christ. Men being made for a sociable Life 't was requisite they should mutually communicate their Thoughts and Motions 'T was fit they should be united in Mind as well as Body and that speaking by the Voice to their Ears and by Writing to their Eyes they should infuse Light and Understanding into one anothers Minds XL. But Light whatever way produc'd in us whether by particular Desires or fortuitous Instances as the Occasional Causes of it may be call'd Grace especially when it nearly relates to Salvation though it be but a Consequence of the Order of Nature because since Sin God owes us nothing and all the Good we have is merited for us by Jesus Christ in whom our very Being subsists But this kind of Grace though merited for us by Jesus Christ is not the Grace of our Lord but that of the Creator since Jesus Christ is not usually the Occasional Cause of it but the Cause of it is discoverable in the Order of Nature XLI There are still several other Natural Effects which we might reasonably look upon as Graces For Example Two Persons have at the same time two Desires of Curiosity The one to go see an Opera the other to hear a celebrated Preacher If they satisfie their Curiosity he that goes to the Opera shall find such Objects as according to his present Disposition of Mind shall raise in him Passions that will damn him whilst the other shall find in the Preacher so great Force and Light that the Grace of Conversion working in him at that moment shall be able to save him Which suppos'd Let but a shower of Rain or any other Accident happen that may stay them at home Though the Rain be a Natural Effect as depending on the Natural Laws of the Communication of Motions yet it may be said to be a Grace in respect of him whose Damnation it prevents and a Punishment to him whose Conversion it hinders XLII Grace being conjoin'd to Nature all the Motions of our Soul and Body have some relation to Salvation This Man is sav'd by having in a State of Grace made a false Step which happily broke his Neck and another is damn'd by having on some Occasion misfortunately avoided the Ruines of a falling House We know not what is for our Advantage but we well know there is nothing of it self so indifferent but has some reference to our Salvation because of the Mixture and Combination of Effects depending on the General Laws of Nature with others that depend on the General Laws of Grace XLIII As therefore Light points out to us the True Good the Means to obtain it our Duties to God in a word the Ways we are to follow it is sufficient to cause those who are animated with Charity to do good to merit new Graces and to conquer some Temptations as I shall explain in another Place so I think we may lawfully give it the Name of Grace though Jesus Christ be only the Meritorious Cause of it And whereas External Graces which have no immediate Influence on the Mind come nevertheless into the Order of Predestination of Saints I consider them also as True Graces In a word I see not why we may not give the Name of Grace to all Natural Effects when relating to Salvation subservient to the Grace of Jesus Christ and delivering us from some Hindrances to his Efficacy Yet if others will not agree with me I shall not contend with them about Words XLIV All these Graces if we may be allow'd to call them so being those of the Creator the General Laws of these Graces are the General Laws of Nature For we must still observe that Sin has not destroy'd Nature though it has corrupted it The General Laws of the Communications of Motions are always the same and those of the Union of the Soul
and Body are chang'd no otherwise than that the Union of the former is grown into a Dependence for the Reasons I have given elsewhere For at present we depend on that Body to which before Sin we were only united XLV Now the Laws of Nature are always most Simple and General For God acts not by particular Wills unless Order requires a Miracle Which Truth I have sufficiently prov'd in the First Discourse Thus when a Stone falls on the Head of a good Man and rids him of his Life it falls in consequence of the Laws of Motions and not because that Man is Just and God designs to recompense him When a like Accident destroys a Sinner 't is not because God will actually punish him For God on the contrary would have all Men sav'd But he is not to change the Simplicity of his Laws to suspend the Punishment of a Criminal So likewise when Light breaks into our Understanding 't is because our Desires are the Natural or Occasional Causes of it 't is because we hear some understanding Person and because our Brain is dispos'd to receive the Impressions of the Speaker And not that God has a particular Will on our behalf but that he follows the General Laws of Nature to which he has oblig'd himself I can see nothing Mysterious in the Distribution of these kinds of Graces and I stand not to draw Consequences deducible from these Truths XLVI 'T is to be observ'd that Jesus Christ who is the sole Meritorious Cause of the Goods we receive from God by the Order of Nature is sometimes the Occasional Cause of the Grace of Light as well as of that of Sensation yet I am of Opinion that this but rarely happens because indeed it is not necessary it should Jesus Christ as much as possible makes the Order of Nature subservient to that of Grace For besides that Reason evinces that Order will have it so because that Method is most simple it is sufficiently manifest by the Conduct he takes on Earth and the Order he has establish'd and still preserves in his Church Jesus Christ made use of Speech for the Instruction of the World and likewise sent his Disciples two by two to prepare the People to receive him He has settled Apostles Prophets Evangelists Doctors Bishops and Priests to labour in the Edification of the Church Is not this to make Nature Handmaid to Grace and to propagate the Light of Faith in Mens Minds by ways most Simple and Natural And indeed Jesus Christ on Earth was not to instruct Men by particular Wills since he might instruct them as Interiour Truth and Eternal Wisdom by the most simple and exuberant Laws of Nature XLVII That which lies most hidden and unreveal'd in the Order God has follow'd for the Establishment of his Church is doubtless the Time Place and other Circumstances of the Incarnation of his Son and the Preaching of the Gospel For why should Jesus Christ for whom the World was created become Man Four thousand Years after its Creation Why must he be born among the Jews he that was to reject that wretched Nation Why must he choose to be the Son of David when the Family of David was obscur'd and not rather to be born from Emperours who have commanded the whole World since he came to Convert and Enlighten all the Earth Why to elect his Apostles and Disciples out of the Ignorant and Illeterate to preach to the Inhabitants of Bethsaida and Corazin who remain in Incredulity and to leave Tyre and Sidon who would have been converted by the like Grace afforded them to hinder St. Paul from preaching the Word of God in Asia and to appoint him to pass into Macedonia A thousand other Circumstances which have accompanied the Preaching of the Gospel are no doubt such Mysteries as admit not clear and evident Reasons nor is it my Design to give them My Purpose is only to establish some Principles that may afford some Light to these and the like Difficulties or at least give us to understand that nothing can be thence concluded against what I have said of the Order of Nature and Grace XLVIII 'T is certain that Natural Effects are complicated and mix'd a thousand ways with the Effects of Grace and that the Order of Nature strengthens or weakens the Efficacy or Effects of the Orders of Grace according as these two Orders variously combine together Death which by the General Laws of Nature at a particular Juncture befals a good or ill Prince or Bishop occasions a great deal of Good or Evil in the Church because such kind of Accidents cause a great Diversity in the Sequel of Effects which depend on the Order of Grace But God would have all Men sav'd by the simplest ways Therefore we may and ought to say in general That He has chosen the Time the Place and Manners which in the process of Time and by the General Laws of Nature and Grace must all things consider'd introduce a greater Number of the Predestinate into the Church God does all things for his Glory Therefore among all the possible Combination of Nature and Grace he has from the infinite Extent of his Knowledge made choice of that which could form the perfectest Church and most suitable to his Majesty and Wisdom XLIX This one would think were sufficient to answer all the Difficulties that can arise about the Circumstances of our Mysteries For if it be said that Jesus Christ ought to be born to a Roman Emperour and to perform his Miracles in the Metropolis of the World that the Gospel might spread it self with greater Ease into the remotest Countries It may be boldly answer'd That though this seems so to Men yet that Combination of Nature and Grace had not been so worthy of the Wisdom of God as that which he has chosen I confess Religion had been propagated with greater ease but its Establishment had not been so Divine and Extraordinary nor consequently an invincible Proof of its Reality and Truth So â—hat according to that Combination Religion would at this Day have been destroy'd at least less disseminated abroad in the World Besides when we say that God acts by the simplest ways we ever suppose an Equality in the rest and especially in the Glory that ought to redound to God from his Work But the Church had not been so perfect nor so worthy of the Greatness and Holiness of God if it had been form'd with so much ease For the Beauty of the Heavenly Jerusalem consisting in the Variety of Rewards accruing upon the several Combats of Christians 't was requisite the Martyrs should lay down their Lives as well as Jesus Christ to enter into the Possession of their present Glory In a word this Principle That of all the infinite Combinations of Nature and Grace God has chosen that which ought to produce an Effect most worthy of his Greatness and Wisdom suffices for a General Answer to all the
our Love For to restore a Balance to an even poize or to change its propension we need not augment the lesser Weight but only retract from the over-loaden Scale Thus there are Graces of Sensation of several sorts and every sort is capable of infinite degrees For there are Pleasures Aversions and Dislikes greater and lesser ad infinitum What I have hitherto said of Delectation may be easily apply'd to other Species of the Grace of Sensation I only made choice of Pleasure or Delectation as a particular Example to explain my self clearly and without Ambiguity If there be any other Principle of our Determinations to Good besides the Grace of Sensation and that of Light I confess I am utterly ignorant of it and therefore I have resolv'd to explain the Effects of Grace necessary to the Conversion of Heart but by these two Principles for fear of incurring the blame of discoursing in general Terms that of themselves excite only confus'd Ideas which thing I avoid with all possible Care But though I have explain'd my self in Terms understood by all Mankind since there is no body but knows that the Knowledge and Sense of Good are Principles of our Determinations yet I presume not to impugn those who sticking not to these clear Ideas say in general that God operates the Conversion of our Souls by a particular Action different it may be from all I have here and elsewhere said that God works in us Experiencing in my self no other Motion than towards Good in general and that determin'd by Knowledge or Sensation I ought to suppose nothing more if by this alone I can account for all that the Scripture and Councils have determin'd about the present Subject In a word I am well assur'd that Light and Sensation are the Principles of our Determinations but I declare that I cannot tell but there may be some other whereof I have no Knowledge XXXV Besides Grace of it self efficacious and that the Effect whereof entirely depends on the good Dispositions of the Mind besides the Grace of Sensation and the Grace of Light the Righteous have moreover an Habitual Grace which makes them agreeable to God and capacitates them to work Actions meritorious of Salvation This Grace is Charity the Love of God or the Love of Order a Love which is not properly Charity unless it be stronger and greater than every other Love As it is commonly Pleasure which produces the Love of the Object that 's the true or apparent Cause of it so 't is the Delectation of Grace which produces the Love of God 'T is the Enjoyment of Sensible Pleasures which heightens Concupiscence and 't is the Grace of Sensation which encreases Charity Concupiscence diminishes by the deprivation of Sensible Pleasures and then Charity is easily preserv'd and nourish'd And whilst Charity faints by the privation of the actual Grace of Jesus Christ Concupiscence speedily thrives and grows upon it For these two Loves Charity and Cupidity constantly war with one another and gather Strength from the Weakness of their Enemy XXXVI Whatever participates of Charity is well-pleasing to God but Charity is not always active in the Just themselves In order to its working 't is necessary at least it be Illuminate For Knowledge is needful to determine the Motion of Love Thus the Grace necessary to every Good Work relating to Salvation is that of Sensation in those who begin their Conversion is that of Light at least or some Motion of Faith or Hope in those who are animated with Charity For though the Righteous may do Good Works without the Grace of Delectation they have always need of some actual Assistance to determine the Motion of their Charity But although Charity without Delectation is sufficient to conquer many Temptations yet the Grace of Sensation is necessary on many Occasions For Men cannot without the continual Help of the Second Adam resist the continual Action of the First They cannot persevere in Righteousness unless frequently assisted with the particular Grace of Jesus Christ which produces augments and maintains Charity against the continual Efforts of Concupiscence XXXVII The Effects of Pleasure and of all the Sensations of the Soul have a thousand several Dependencies on the actual Dispositions of the Mind The very same Weight has not always the same Effects It depends in its Action on the Structure of the Machine by which it is applied to the contrary Weight If a Balance be unequally suspended the force of the Weights being unequally applied the lighter may overweigh the heavier So it fares with the Weight of Pleasures They act one on another and determine the Motion of the Soul according as they are diversly applied Pleasure ought to have a greater Influence on the Person who has already a Love for the Object which causes it than on another who has an Aversion or that loves opposite Goods Pleasure forcibly determines a Person who clearly knows or vividly imagines the Advantages of Good which seems to cause it and acts feebly on the Mind of him who knows this Good but confusedly and is distrustful of it Lastly It acts with its whole Force on him who blindly follows all that gratifies Concupiscence and perhaps will have no Effect on him who has acquir'd some Habit of suspending the Judgment of his Love Now since the different degrees of Light Charity Concupiscence and the different degrees of Liberty are perpetually combining infinite ways with the different degrees of actual Pleasures which Pleasures are operative but according to their relation to the Dispositions of the Mind and Heart 't is manifest that no finite Mind can with any certainty pronounce of the Effect a particular Grace ought to produce in us For besides that there 's an infinite Combination in the things concurring to the Efficacy of Grace or the Production of its Effect this Combination is not like that of moving Springs and Forces which have always infallible and necessary Effects Therefore 't is impossible for any finite Mind to discover what passes in the Heart of Man XXXVIII But whereas God has an infinite Wisdom 't is visible that he clearly knows all the Effects that can result from the Mixture and Combination of all these things and that penetrating the Heart of Man he infallibly discovers even the Effects which depend on an Act or rather on a free Consent of our Wills Nevertheless I confess I cannot conceive how God can discover the Consequences of Actions which derive not their Infallibility from his absolute Decrees But I have no Mind to insist on Metaphysicks at the Expence of Morality and to affirm as undeniable Truths Opinions that are contrary to my own inward Consciousness of my self or in fine to speak to the Ears a certain Language which affords no clear Idea to the Mind I know well that such Objections may be made as would be too hard for me to answer satisfactorily and clearly But it may be these Objections are naturally
if God caus'd it to rain on this Meadow by a particular Benevolence to the Owner this Rain would not fall on the River where 't is insignificant since it could not fall there without a Cause or Will in God which has necessarily some End VII But we have still more Reason to think an Effect is produc'd by a general Will when this Effect is contrary or even useless to the Design which we are taught by Faith or Reason the Cause propos'd For Instance The End which God proposes in the various Sensations he affords the Soul in our tasting different Fruits is that we may eat those which are fit for Nourishment and reject the rest I suppose thus Therefore when God gives a grateful Sensation at the Instant of our eating Poisons or empoison'd Fruits he acts not in us by particular Wills So we ought to conclude since that agreeable Sensation is the Cause of our Death whilst the End of God's giving us diverse Sensations is to preserve our Life by a convenient Nourishment for I once more suppose thus For I speak only with reference to the Grace which God gives us doubtless to convert us so that 't is visible God showers it not on Men by particular Wills since it frequently renders them more Culpable and Criminal For God cannot have so Fatal a Design God gives us not therefore agreeable Sensations by particular Wills when we eat poisonous Fruits But because a poisonous Fruit excites in our Brain Motions like those produc'd by wholsome Fruits God gives us the same Sensations by reason of the general Laws which unite the Soul to the Body that she might be wakeful for its Preservation So likewise God gives not those who have lost an Arm Sensations of Pain relating to it but by a general Will For 't is useless to the Body of this Man that his Soul should suffer Pain relating to an Arm that 's lost 'T is the same case with Motions produc'd in the Body of a Man in the Commission of a Crime Finally supposing we are obliged to think that God scatters his Rain upon the Earth witâ— Intent to make it fruitful we cannot believe he distributes it by particular Wills since it falls upon the Sands and in the Sea as well as on plow'd Lands and is often so excessive on seeded Ground as to extirpate the Corn and frustrate the Labours of the Husbandman Thus it is certain that Rains which are useless or noxious to the Fruits of the Earth are necessary Consequences of the general Laws of the Communications of Motions which God has establish'd for the producing better Effects in the World supposing which I again repeat that God cannot will by a particular Volition that Rain should cause the Barrenness of the Earth VIII Lastly When an Effect happens which has something extraordinary 't is reasonable to believe it is not produc'd by a general Will. Nevertheless 't is impossible to be sure of it If for Example in the Procession of the Holy Sacrament it rains on the Assistants save on the Priests and those which carry it we have reason to think this proceeds from a particular Will of the universal Cause yet we cannot be certain because an occasional intelligent Cause may have this particular Design and so determine the Efficacy of the general Law to execute it IX When the preceding Marks are not sufficient for us to judge whether a certain Effect is or is not produc'd by a general Will we are to believe it is if it be certain there is an Occasional Cause establish'd for the like Effects For Example We see it rain to some Purpose in a Field we do not examine whether this Rain falls or not in the great Roads we know not whether it be noxious to the bordering Grounds nay we suppose it only does good and that all the attending Circumstances are perfectly accommodated to the Design for which we are oblig'd to believe that God would have it rain Nevertheless I say that we ought to judge this Rain is produc'd by a general Will if we know that God has setled an Occasional Cause for the like Effects For we must not have recourse to Miracles without Necessity We ought to suppose that God acts herein by the simplest ways and though the Lord of the Field ought to return Thanks to God for the Bounty yet he ought not to imagine it was caus'd in a miraculous manner by a particular Will The Owner of the Field ought to thank God for the Good he receives since God saw and will'd the good Effect of the Rain when he establish'd the general Laws whereof it is a necessary Consequence and that it was for the like Effects they were establish'd On the contrary if the Rains are sometimes hurtful to the Earth as it was not to render them unfruitful that God establish'd the Laws which make it rain since Drought suffices to make them barren 't is plain we ought to thank God and to adore the Wisdom of his Providence even when we do not â—eel the Effects of the Laws establish'd in our Favour X. But to conclude when we cannot be certified by the Circumstances which accompany certain Effects that there is an Occasional Cause establish'd to produce them 't is sufficient to know they are very common and relate to the principal Design of the general Cause in order to judge they are produc'd by a general Will. For Example The Springs which water the Surface of the Earth are subservient to the principal Design of God which is that Mâ—n should not want things necessary to Life I suppose so Besides these Fountains are very common therefore we ought to conclude they are foâ—m'd by some General Laws For as there is much more Wisdom in executing his Designs by Simple and General Means than by Complicated and Particular as I think I have sufficiently prov'd elsewhere We owe that Honour to God as to believe his way of acting is general uniform constant and proportion'd to the Idea we have of an infinite Wisdom These are the Marks by which we are to judge whether an Effect be produc'd by a general Will. I now come to prove that God bestows his Grace on Men by general Laws and that Jesus Christ has been establishâ—d the Occasional Cause to determine their Efficacy I begin by the Proofs of Holy Scripture XI St. Paul teaches us That Jesus Christ is the Head of the Church That he constantly influences it with Spirit and Life That he forms the Members and animates them as the Soul animates the Body or to speak still more clearly the Holy Scripture teaches us two things The first that Jesus Christ prays continually for his Members The second that his Prayers or Desires are always heard Whence I conclude that he was constituted by God the Occasional Cause of Grace and likewise that Grace is never given to Sinners but through his Means The Occasional Causes have constantly and readily
their Effect The Prayers and diverse Desires of Jesus Christ with reference to the Formation of his Body have likewise most constantly and speedily their Accomplishment God denies his Son nothing as we learn from Jesus Christ himself Occasional Causes produce not their Effect by their own Efficacy but by the Efficacy of the General Cause 'T is likewise by the Efficacy of the Power of God that the Soul of Jesus Christ operates in us and not by the Efficacy of Man's Will 'T is for this Reason that St. Paul represents Jesus Christ as praying to his Father without Intermission For he is oblâ—gâ—d to Pray in order to Obtain Occasional Causes have been establish'd by God for the determining the Efficacy of his General Wills and Jesus Christ according to the Scripture has been appointed by God after his Resurrection to govern the Church which he had purchas'd by his Blood For Jesus Christ became the Meritorious Cause of all Graces by his Sacrifice But after his Resurrection he entred 〈◊〉 the Holy of Holies as High Priest of future Goods to appear in the Presence of God and to endue us with the Graces which he has merited for us Therefore he himself applies and distributes his Gifts as Occasional Cause he disposes of all things in the House of God as a well-beloved Son in the House of his Father I think I have demonstrated in the Search after Truth that there is none but God who is the true Cause and who acts by his own Efficacy and that he communicates his Power to Creatures only in establishing them Occasional Causes for the producing some Effects I have proved for Example That Men have no Power to produce any Motion in their Bodies but because God has establish'd their Wills the Occasional Causes of these Motions That Fire has no power to make me feel Pain but because God has establish'd the Collision of Bodies the Occasional Cause of the Communication of Motions and the violent Vibration of the Fibres of my Flesh the Occasional Cause of my Pain I may here suppose a Truth which I have proved at large in the Third Chapter of the Second Part of the Sixth Book and in the Illustration upon the same Chapter and which those for whom it was principally written don't contest Now Faith assures us that all Power is given to Jesus Christ to form his Church All Power is given unto me in Heaven and in Earth Which cannot be understood of Jesus Christ as to his Divinity for as God he has never received any thing And therefore it is certain that Jesus Christ as to his Humanity is the Occasional Cause of Grace supposing I have well proved that God only can act on Minds and that Second Causes have no Efficacy of their own Which those ought first to examine who would understand my Sentiments and give a Judgment of them XII I say farther that no one is sanctified but through the Efficacy of the Power which God has communicated to Jesus Christ in constituting him the Occasional Cause of Grace For if any Sinner were converted by a Grace whereof Jesus Christ was not the Occasional but only the Meritorious Cause that Sinner not receiving his New Life through the Efficacy of Jesus Christ would not be a Member of the Body of which Jesus Christ is the Head in that manner explain'd by St. Paul by these Words of the Epistle to the Ephesians That we may grow up into him in all things who is the Head even Christ from whom the whole Body fitly join'd together and compacted by that which every Joint supplieth according to the effectual working in the measure of every Part maketh increase of the Body unto the edifying it self in Love Which Words not only say Jesus Christ is the Meritorious Cause of all Graces but likewise distinctly signifie that Christians are the Members of the Body whereof Jesus Christ is the Head that 't is in him we increase and live with an entire new Life that 't is by his inward Operation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that his Church is form'd and that thus he has been constituted by God the sole Occasional Cause who by his several Desires and Applications distributes the Graces which God as the True Cause showers down on Men. 'T is on this Account St. Paul says Christians are united to Jesus Christ as their Root Rooted and built up in him 'T is for the same Reason that Jesus Christ compares himself to a Vine and his Disciples to the Branches that derive their Life from him I am the Vine ye are the Branches On the same Grounds St. Paul affirms that Jesus Christ lives in us and that we live in him that we are rais'd up in our Head that our Life is hidden with Jesus Christ in God in a word that we have already Life Eternal in Jesus Christ. All these and many other Expressions of like nature clearly manifest that Jesus Christ is not only the Meritorious but also the Occasional Physical or Natural Cause of Grace and that as the Soul informs animates and consummates the Body so Jesus Christ diffuses through his Members as Occasional Cause the Graces he has merited to his Church by his Sacrifice For my part I cannot see how these Reasons can be call'd in question or upon what Grounds a most edifying Truth and as ancient as the Religion of Jesus Christ can be treated as a dangerous Novelty I grant my Expressions are novel but that 's because they seem to me the fittest of all others distinctly to explain a Truth which can be but confusedly demonstrated by Terms very loose and general These words Occasional Causes and Natural Laws seem necessary to give the Philosophers for whom I wrote this Treatise of Nature and Grace a distinct Understanding of what most Men are content to know confusedly New Expressions being no farther dangerous than involving Ambiguity or breeding in the Mind some Notion contrary to Religion I do not believe that Equitable Persons and conversant in the Theology of St. Paul will blame me for explaining my self in a particular manner when it only tends to make us Adore the Wisdom of God and strictly to unite us with Jesus Christ. First OBJECTION XIII 'T is Objected against what I have establish'd That neither Angels nor Saints of the Old Testament receiv'd Grace pursuant to the Desires of the Soul of Jesus since that Holy Soul was not then in Being and therefore though Jesus Christ be the meritorious Cause of all Graces he is not the Occasional Cause which distributes them to Men. As to Angels I Answer That 't is very probable Grace was given them but once So that if we consider things on that side I grant there is nothing can oblige the Wisdom of God to constitute an Occasional Cause for the Sanctification of Angels But if we consider these blessed Spirits as Members of the Body whereof Jesus Christ is the Head or suppose them
and absolute Lord of all things by right of Generation These Truths are evident as we are assur'd by Jesus Christ himself who says that his Father has given him power to judge Men because he is the Son of Man So we ought not to think that Scripture Expressions which make Jesus Christ the Author of Grace must be understood of him consider'd in his Divine Person For if so I confess I should not have prov'd him the Occasional Cause since he would be the True Cause of it But whereas it is certain that the Three Persons of the Trinity are equally the True Cause of Grace because all the External Operations of God are common to them all my Proofs are undeniable since Holy Scripture says of the Son and not of the Father or the Holy Spirit that he is the Head of the Church and that in this Capacity he communicates Life to the constituent Members of it Second OBJECTION XIV 'T is God who gives the Soul of Jesus Christ all the Thoughts and Motions relating to the Formation of his Mystical Body So that if on one hand the Wills of Jesus Christ as Occasional or Natural Causes determine the Efficacy of the General Wills of God on the other 't is God himself who determines the several Wills of Jesus Christ. And thus it comes to the same thing For in brief the Volitions of Jesus Christ are always conformable to those of his Father I grant that the particular Volitions of the Soul of Jesus Christ are always conformable to the Wills of his Father not as if there were any particular Wills in the Father which answer to those in the Son and determine them but only that the Volitions of the Son are always conform'd to Order in general which is the necessary Rule of the Will of God and of all those who love him For to love Order is to love God 't is to will what he wills 't is to be Just Wise Regular in our Love The Soul of Jesus desires to form to the Glory of his Father the largest most sumptuous and accomplish'd Temple possible Order demands this since nothing can be made too great for God All the several Thoughts of this Soul perpetually intent on the Execution of its Design proceed likewise from God or the Word to which it is united But its various Desires are certainly the Occasional Cause of these various Thoughts for it thinks on what it wills Now these diverse Desires are sometimes entirely free and probably the Thoughts which excite them do not invincibly determine the Soul of Jesus Christ to apply her self to the Means of executing them For in brief 't is equally advantageous to the Design of Jesus Christ whether it be Peter or John that causes the Effect which the Regularity of his Work requires 'T is true the Soul of Jesus is not indifferent in any thing that relates to his Father's Glory or that Order necessarily demands but is entirely free in all the rest there is nothing extraneous to God which invincibly determines his Love Thus we ought not to wonder if Jesus have particular Wills though there be not the like Wills in God to determine them But let it be granted that the Volitions of Jesus Christ are not free and that his Light invincibly carries him to will and to will always in a determinate manner in the Construction of his Church But it is Eternal Wisdom to which his Soul is united that must determine his Volitions We must not for that Effect suppose Particular Wills in God But all the Wills of Jesus Christ are Particular or have no Occasional Cause to determine their Efficacy as have those of God For the Soul of Jesus Christ having not an infinite Capacity of Thinking his Notices and consequently his Volitions are limited Therefore his Wills must needs be Particular since they change according to his diverse Thoughts and Applications For probably the Soul of Jesus Christ otherwise imploy'd in Contemplating and tasting the infinite Satisfactions of the True Good methinks ought not according to Order desire at once to think on all the Ornaments and Beauties he would bestow upon his Church nor on the different Ways of executing each of his Designs For Jesus Christ desiring to render the Church worthy of the infinite Majesty of his Father would gladly perfect it with infinite Beauties by Ways most conformable to Order He must then constantly change his Desires there being but one infinite Wisdom who can fore-see all and prescribe himself General Laws for the executing his Designs But the future World being to subsist eternally and to be infinitely more perfect than the present it was requisite that God should establish an Occasional Cause Intelligent and Enlightned by Eternal Wisdom to remedy the Defects which should unavoidably happen in the Works that were form'd by General Laws The Collision of Bodies which determines the Efficacy of the General Laws of Nature is an Occasional Cause without Understanding and Liberty and therefore 't is impossible but there must be Imperfections in the World and Monsters produc'd which are not of such account as that the Wisdom of God should descend to remedy them by Particular Wills But Jesus Christ being an Intelligent Occasional Cause illuminate with the Wisdom of the Word and susceptible of Particular Wills according to the particular Exigencies of the Work he forms 't is plain that the future World will be infinitely more perfect than the present that the Church will be without Spot or Wrinkle as we are taught by Scripture and that it will be a Work most worthy of the Complacency of God himself 'T is in this manner that Eternal Wisdom renders as I may say to his Father what he had taken from him For not permitting him to act by Particular Wills he seem'd to disable his Almighty Arm But becoming incarnate he so brings it to pass that God acting in a manner worthy of him by most Simple and General Laws produces a Work wherein the most Illuminate Intelligences cannot observe the least Imperfection PROOFS founded on REASON XV. Having demonstrated by the Authority of Scripture that the diverse Motions of the Soul of Jesus Christ are the Occasional Causes which determine the Efficacy of the General Law of Grace by which God would have all Men sav'd in his Son 't is necessary to shew in general by Reason that we are not to believe God acts in the Order of Grace by Particular Wills For though by Reason separate from Faith it cannot be demonstrated that God has constituted the Wills of Man-God the Occasional Causes of his Gifts yet it may without Faith be shewn that he distributes them not to Men by Particular Wills and that in two manners a priori and a posteriori that is by the Idea we have of God and by the Effects of Grace For there is nothing but serves to prove this Truth First then for the Proof of a priori A wise Being
videbimus eum sicuti est Joh. Ep. 1. ch 3. v. 2. * Corpus quod corrumpitur aggravat animam Sap. 9.10 Terrena inhabitatio deprimit sensum multa cogitantem difficile aestimamus quae in terra sunt quae in prospectu sunt invenimus cum labore Sap. 9.15 †Deus intelligibilis lux in quo a quo per quem intelligibiliter lucent omnia 1. Sol. Insinuavit nobis Christus animam humanam non vegetari non illuminari non beatificari nisi ab ipsa substantia Dei August in Joh. Illa autoritas divina dicenda est quae non solum in sensibilibus signis transcendit omnem humanam facultatem sed ipsum hominem agens ostendit ei quousque se propter ipsum depresserit non teneri sensibus quibus videntur illa miranda sed ad intellectum jubet evolare simul demonstrans quanta hic possit cur haec faciat quam parvi pendat Aug. 2. de Ord. 9. * Tract in Joan. 27. Et si cognovimus secundum carnem Christum jam non secundum carnem novimus 2 ad Cor. Nolite putare quenquam hominem aliquid discere ab homine Admonere possumus per strepitum vocis nostrae si non sit intus qui doceat inanis fit strepitus noster Aug. in Joan. Auditus per me factus intellectus per quem Dixit aliquis ad cor vestrum sed non eum videtis Si intellexistis fratres dictum est cordi vestro Munus Dei est intelligentia August Johan Tract 40. Noli putare te ipsam esse lucem Aug. in Psal. Sicut audio sic judico judicium meum justum est quia non quaero voluntatem meam Johan cap. 5.30 Qui hoc videre non potest oret agat ut posse mereatur nec ad hominem disputatorem pulset ut quod not legit legat sed ad Deum Salvatorem ut quod non valet valeat Epist. 112. cap. 12. Supplexque illi qui lumen mentis accendit attendat ut intelligat Conf. Ep. Fund cap. 33. Nullo modo resistitur Corporis sensibus quae nobis sacratissima disciplina est si per eos inflictis plagis vulneribusque blandimur Ep. 72. * See the 6 th Book Of the Nature Properties of the Vnderstanding II. Of the Nature and Properties of the Will and of its Liberty * See the Illustrations * See the Illustrations I. Of our Judgments and Reasonings II. That Judgments and Reasonings depend upon the Will Geometricians love not Truth but only the Knowledg of Truth tho' it be otherwise said III. What use should be made of our Liberty that we never may be deceiv'd IV. General Rules for the avoiding Error and Sin A necessary Reflexion on the two Rules I. The Answer to some Objections II. Observations on what has been said concerning the necessity of Evidence See the Illustrations I. Of the Occasional Causes of our Errors and that there are five principal II. The General Design of the whole Work III. The particular Design of the first Book I. Two ways of explaining how our Senses were corrupted by Sin S. Gregor Homil. 39. upon the Gospels * Fr. Son â—â—ur †Fr. Son Esprit See the Illustrations Deus ab initio constituit hominem reliquit illum in manu Consilii sui adjecit mandata praecepta sua c. Ec. 15.14 A Remedy for the Disorder which Original Sin has caus'd in the World and the Foundation of Christian Morality * See the Illustrations II. That our Liberty not our Senses is the true cause of our Errors III. A Rule for avoiding Error in the use of our Senses I. Of the Errors of sight in respect of Extension absolutely consider'd * See the Journal of the Learned Nov. 12. 1668. Fr. Le germe * The Cicatricle or the Sperm of the Egg is a little white spot upon the Yolk See Malpigh de Formatione Pulli in Ova †See Swammerdam 's Miraculum naturae II. A Continuation of these Errors about Invisible Objects III. Of the Errors of sight touching Extension relatively consider'd I. Of the Errors of sight about Figures II. We have no knowledge of the least of them III. The knowledge we have of the greater is not exact IV. An Explication of some Natural judgments which prevent our deception V. That these very judgments deceive us in some particular junctures See the 9. Chapter towards the end See the 3 d. Ch. of the 2 d. Part of the 6 Book I. That our Eyes are incapable of informing us of the Quantity or Swiftness of Motion consider'd in it self II. That Duration which is necessary to our knowledge of the Quantity of Motion is unknown to us III. An Instance of the Errors of Sight in respect of Motion and Rest. I. A general Demonstration of the Errors of our Sight concerning Motion II. That the Distance of Objects is necessary to be known in order to judge of the Quantity of their Motion III. The Mediums whereby we know the Distances of Objects are examined The Soul does not make all those judgments I aâ—tribute to her these Natural judgments are nothing but Sensations and I only speak thus the better to explain things The second Medium whereby to judge of the Distance of Objctes The third Medium whereby to judge of the Distance of Objects The fourtâ— and fifth Mediums The sixth Medium whereby to judge of the Distance of Objects * Seethe Illustrations * I call by the Name of Idea here whatever is the Immediate Object of the Mind I. The Distinction of the Soul and Body II. An Explication of the Organs of the Senses III. The Soul is immediately united to that part of the Brain where the Fibres of the Organs of the Senses centre IV. An Instance to explain the effect which Objects have upon our Bodies V. What it is that Objects produce in the Soul and the Reasons why the Soul perceives not the Motions of the Fiâ—res of the Body This confus'd Reasoning or this Natural Judgement is only a Compound Sensation See what I have said before of Natural Judgements and the first Ch. of the 3 d. Book VI. Four things which are generally confounded in every Sensation I. Of the Error we fall into concerning the Action of Objects against the External Fibres of our Senses III. The Cause of this Error III. An Objection and Answer I. Of our Errors concerning the Motions or Vibrations of the Fibres of our Senses II. That we confound them with the Sensations of our Soul and sometimes have no Perception of them III. An Experiment that proves it IV. An Explication of three sorts of Sensations of the Soul V. The Errors that accompany the Sensations I. The Definition of the Sensations II. That a Man knows his own Sensations better than he thinks he does III. An Objection and Answer IV. From whence it proceeds that a Man imagines he has no knowledge of
intreat those who interess themselves in the difference of others not to believe me on my bare word nor easily to imagine I am in the right I think I have Liberty to demand of them that they will carefully examine the Answers I have made to the Animadversions in that Preface and the Argumentations of the Animadverter in reference to the Book oppos'd so I think I may without offence to the Author of this Answer require of those who would judge of it not to imagine he has reason on his side upon a slight and transient reading of his Book I desire them not to judge of any of his Answers before having examined it with reference to this Preface and the preceeding Books Take here for an instance the first of his Answers which begins thus Vpon what the Author of the Search pretends the Animadverter imposes on him touching his Design 'T is not imposing on him to make his Book pass for a Collection of Observations thought by him useful to the discovery of Truth 'T is plain I have positively declared that I look upon his Book as a Collection of many Remarks c. If the Author had consider'd these words he would not have accus'd me of imposing on him for he could not deny but he had a Design of offering something serviceable to the discovery of Truth which is all that I attributed to him And lower Wherein I even prove that that is not to be imputed to him which he affirms I impose upon him Lastly he concludes this Article with these words 'T is therefore evident the Author of the Search cannot prove I impose on him unless he will maintain he had a Design of writing a Book altogether useless to the Search of Truth These Words might possibly make a Man imagine I had without Reason accus'd the Animadverter of imposing on me in the Design of the Search but whoever would but confront what he here says with the foregoing Preface or with what he has said himself pag. 9 10. of his Animadversions would I hope be of another mind That I may not give the trouble of turning to it these are my words Nevertheless as he is pleas'd to make me undertake a Design I do not execute that he may have the more to charge upon my Conduct so he goes to prove it was my Design to lay down a Method in that Book I do him no injury says he in looking on his Book as a Method to lay the Foundation of the Sciences For besides that the Title expresses so much he declares himself upon the Point in the following manner Let us examine the Causes and Nature of our Errours and since the Method of examining things by considering them in their Birth and Origin is the most regular and perspicuous and serves better than others to give us a thorough knowledge of them let us try to put it here in practice Methinks these words I do him no injury says he c. which I cite out of the Animadversions are clear enough and that a Man need but understand English to see that the Animadverter imposes on me a Design of giving a Method and pretends too to prove it by the Title of the Search as also by a passage of the same Book and yet he boldly concludes this Article with these words 'T is therefore evident the Author of the Search cannot prove I impose on him c. But what he has positively declar'd he look'd upon the Search after Truth as a Collection of many Observations I cannot deny says he but he had a Design of offering something useful to the discovery of Truth which is ALL mark that word I attribute to him Since he has a mind to be diverted see my Answer A Painter has drawn a Polyphemus and standing behind his Piece hears some Critick say Look here Gentlemen the Artist design'd to paint an Hercules but if you mind it it is a Polyphemus The Painter out of patience starts from behind the Scene and gives the Spectators to undrestand he had no Design of representing an Hercules and that he imposes on him The Critick surpriz'd addresses the Painter Sir why so angry what did you design to represent Polyphemus returns the Painter Strange Sir replies the Critick why do you say I impose on you I call these Gentlemen to witness that ALL that I said was you had drawn a Polyphemus upon which the Painter withdraws contented and says no more I think my self therefore obliged to rest silent upon such like Answers I have shewn by the Animadverter's own words that he imposes on me a Design of giving a Method in the first Book of the Search and that he likewise pretends to prove it I have cited the place of the Animadversions from whence I have taken my proof Nevertheless this Author affirms he does not impose on me that 't is evident I cannot prove it that he proves quite contrary that what I say he imposes on me is not to be imputed to me that ALL he atributes to me is a Design of offering something useful to the discovery of Truth In a word that he has positively declared he look'd on the Search as a Collection of many Observations as if from his regarding the Search as a Collection it were to be concluded I had no other Design I say no more then but hope this Example may keep Men from judging without examining I have taken the three first Pages of his Book and have not given my self the liberty of chusing which ought to be consider'd yet I intend not this for an Answer remembring the obligation I have laid on my self at the end of the preceding Preface and I had rather those who think I have not satisfied the Animadversions because I have answer'd but three Chapters at length should say this Book whereof I answer but three Pages remains without Reply than weary the World with Answers which tend only to the justifyng other Replies F. MALEBRANCHE's TREATISE Concerning the SEARCH after TRUTH TOME II. BOOK V. CHAP. I. Of the Nature and Original of Passions in general THE Mind of Man has two essential or necessary Relations extreamly different the one to God and the other to its Body As mere Mind it is essentially united to the Divine Word the Eternal Wisdom and Truth since it is only by that Union that 't is capable of thinking as is proved in the Third Book As a humane Mind it has an essential Relation to its Body since it is by Virtue of that Union that it imagines and perceives by its Senses as is explained in the First and Second Book We call the Mind Sense or Imagination when the Body is the natural or occasional Cause of its Thoughts and we call it Understanding when it acts by it self or rather when God acts in it or his Light illuminates it several different ways without a necessary Relation to what is done in the Body It 's even so with
Tediousness Regret Pity Indignation are so many kinds of Sorrow caused by the Consideration of something displeasing But besides those Passions and several others I pass by which particularly relate to some of the Primitive Passions there are yet many others whose Commotion is almost equally compounded either of Desire and Joy as Impudence Anger and Revenge or of Desire and Sorrow as Shame Regret and Vexation or of all Three together when Motives of Joy and Sorrow meet And though these last Passions have no particular Names that I know of they are however the most common because in this Life we scarce ever enjoy any Good without a Mixture of Evil nor suffer any Evil without Hopes of being freed of it and enjoying Good And though Joy be altogether contrary to Sorrow yet it allows of its Company and even admits it an equal Sharer in the Capacity of the Soul as Volent when the Sight of Good and Evil divide its Capacity as Intelligent All the Passions therefore are Species of Desire Joy and Sorrow and the chief difference betwixt those of the same sort must be taken from the different Perceptions or Judgments that cause or accompany them So that to become learned in the Nature of Passions and to make of them the most accurate Enumeration possible it is requisite to enquire into the different Judgments that may be made of Good and Evil. But as we especially intend to find out the Cause of our Errours we need not so much to insist upon the Judgments that precede or cause the Passions as upon those that follow them and which the Soul makes of Things when she is agitated by some Passion because those last Judgments are the most liable to Errour Such Judgments as precede and cause the Passions are almost ever false in something because they are for the most part grounded upon such Perceptions of the Soul as consider Objects in relation to her and not as they are in themselves But the Judgments that follow the Passions are false all manner of ways because such Judgments being only made by the Passions are only grounded upon the Perceptions the Soul has of Objects as relating to her or rather to her own Commotion In the Judgments that precede the Passions Truth and Falshood are join'd together but when the Soul is agitated and judges by every Inspiration of the Passion Truth vanishes and Falshood remains to be the Principle of so many more false Conclusions as the Passion is greater All Passions justifie themselves continually offering to the Soul the moving Object in the fittest way for preserving and increasing her Commotion The Judgment or the Perception that causes it gets still new Forces from the Increase of the Passion and the Passion likewise augments proportionably as the Judgment that produces it in its turn is strengthen'd Thus false Judgments and Passions join in Confederacy for their mutual Preservation And should the Heart never cease sending up Spirits for keeping open the Tracks of the Brain and supplying the Expences which that violent Sensation or Commotion make of the same Spirits Passions would perpetually increase and never allow us to be sensible of our Errours But as all our Passions depend on the Fermentation and Circulation of the Blood and that the Heart can never furnish as many Spirits as are necessary for their Preservation they must needs expire when the Spirits diminish and the Blood grows cool again Though it be an easie matter to discover the ordinary Judgments of Passions yet 't is not a thing to be neglected there being few Subjects that deserve more the Application of an Enquirer after Truth who endeavours to free himself from the Dominion of the Body and will judge of every thing by true Ideas We may instruct our selves in this Matter two ways either by pure Reason or by our inward Consciousness when we are agitated by some Passion For Instance Experience teaches us That we are apt to judge of those we love not to their Disadvantage and to spit all the Venom of our Hatred at the Object of our Passion We also know by Reason that as we cannot hate but what is Evil so 't is necessary for the preservation of Hatred that the Mind should represent to it self the worst part of its Object For 't is sufficient to suppose that all Passions justifie themselves and give such a Disposition first to the Imagination then to the Mind as is fit to preserve their own Commotion directly to conclude what are the Judgments which all the Passions cause us to make Those that are endued with a strong and lively Imagination that are extremely sensible and much subject to the Motions of Passions may perfectly inform themselves of those things by their own inward sense and it often comes to pass that they speak of them in a more pleasing and instructing manner than others whose Reason over-tops their Imagination yet it follows not that those that discover best the Springs of Self-love that penetrate farthest into Man's Heart and more sensibly discover its Recesses are always the greatest Understandings This only proves that they are livelier quicker of Imagination and sometimes more malicious than others But those that without consulting their inward Sense make use only of their Reason to enquire into the Nature and Effects of Passions though they be not always so quick-sighted as others are always more rational and less obnoxious to Errour because they judge of things as they are in themselves They see very near what Men posseâ—t with Passions can doe as they suppose them more or less agitated but do not rashly judge of the Actions of others by what they would doe themselves in such Occasions for they well know that Men are not equally sensible to the same things nor alike susceptible of involuntary Commotions and therefore 't is not by consulting our Sensations which the Passions create in us but by listening to Reason that we must treat of the Judgments that accompany them lest we should draw our own Picture instead of discovering the Nature of Passions in general CHAP. XI That all the Passions justifie themselves What Judgments they cause us to make in their Vindication WE need no long deduction of Arguments to demonstrate That all Passions justifie themselves That Principle is sufficiently evident both by our internal Consciousness of our selves and the Behaviour of those we see agitated by them and therefore we need only barely propound it to consider it as we should do The Mind is such a Slave to the Imagination that it always obeys when the Imagination is over-heated and dares not answer when the same is incensed because it meets with Abuses when it resists and is always rewarded with some Pleasure when it humours that imperious Faculty Even those whose unruly Imagination persuades them they are transmuted into Beasts find out Reasons to prove they must live as Beasts do walk Four-footed eat Grass and imitate every Action that is purely
Brutal They find Pleasure in living by the Impressions of their Passion and suffer inward Pain in resisting it which is sufficient to make Reason that commonly descends to be the Slave to Pleasure to argue in such a manner as may best defend the Cause of it If therefore it be true that all Passions justifie themselves 't is evident that Desire must of it self move us to judge favourably of its Object if it be a Desire of Love and unkindly if it be a Desire of Aversion The Desire of Love is a Motion of the Soul raised by the Spirits that provoke it to the Enjoyment or Use of such things as are not in its power for we desire even the Continuation of our Enjoyment because future things depend not on us 'T is then necessary for the Justification of that Desire that the Object which produces it be esteemed good in it self or in reference to something else the contrary must be said of that Desire which is a kind of Aversion I grant we cannot judge any thing to be good or bad without some Reason but Passions have no Object which is not good in some sense And if it may be said there are some which contain no real Goodness and therefore cannot be contemplated as Good by the Mind yet no one can say but they may be enjoyed as Good since they are supposed to agitate us and that Commotion Enjoyment or Sense is more than sufficient to move the Soul to entertain a kind Opinion of the Object If we so easily judge that Fire contains in it self the Heat we feel and Bread the Savour we relish because of the Sensation those Bodies excite in us though that be never so incomprensible to the Mind which cannot conceive Heat and Savour as Modifications of a Body thence it follows That there is no Object of our Passions how vile and contemptible soever it appears but we may judge it good when the Enjoyment of it affects us with pleasure For as we imagine that Heat goes out of Fire when we feel it so we blindly believe that the Objects of the Passions cause the pleasure which we receive in their Enjoyment and that therefore they are good since they are able to doe us good The like may be said of the Passions that have Evil for their Object But as I said just before there is nothing but deserves either Love or Aversion either by it self or by something else to which it relates and when we are agitated with some Passion we quickly discover in its Object the Good or Evil that may nourish the same It is therefore easie to know by Reason the Judgments which our Passions make whilst agitating us For if a Desire of Love move us we may well conceive that it will not fail to justifie it self by the favourable Judgments it shall make of its Object We easily perceive that those Judgments will have more Extent as the Desire shall be more violent and that they will be sometimes absolute and without exception though but a very small part of the thing appears good We may without difficulty understand that those favourable Judgments will reach all things that shall have or seem to have any Connection with the principal Object of the Passion proportionably to the strength of the Passion and the Extent of the Imagination The contrary will happen if it be a Desire of Aâ—version the Reasons of which are as easily comprehended and perfectly confirmed and made good by Experience But let us make these Truths more sensible and familiar by some Instances Men naturally desire Knowledge because all Minds are created for Truth But that Desire how just and reasonable soever it may be in it self often becomes a dangerous Vice by the false Judgments that attend it Curiosity frequently offers to the Mind vain Objects of its Study and Lucubrations ascribes to them false Ideas of Greatness ennobles them with the deceiving Lustre of Rarity and dresses them up with such gay and splendid Apparel that one can hardly forbear to Contemplate them with too much Pleasure and Application There is no Trifle but will wholly take up some Persons whose fruitless Toil is still justified by the false Judgments that arise from their vain Curiosity For instance those that bestow their time in Learning Tongues imagine that all the Sciences consist in the Knowledge of Terms and find out a Thousand Reasons to justifie themselves and the Veneration those pay them whom an unknown Term confounds is none of the weakest though the least reasonable Some Persons employ their whole lives in learning to speak who ought perhaps to hold their Peace all the while since 't is evident he ought to be silent who has nothing worth the hearing to say But 't is not that which they propose from their Learning They should know that he must think well use his Understanding to exactness discern Truth from Falshood clear Ideas from obscure those of the Mind from those of the Imagination that will speak accurately They imagine themselves fine and uncommon Wits because they know how to please the Ear with an Elegant Harmony how to flatter the Passions by Figures and â—aking Gestures how to rejoyce the Imagination by lively and sensible Expressions whilst they leave the Mind empty of Ideas void of Light and Understanding Some probable reason may justifie their Passion that spend a great deal of time in the study of their own Tongue since they make use of it all their Life but as to those who indifferently apply themselves to all sorts of Languages I know not what to say in their behalf The Passion of those who make a complete Library of all sorts of Dictionaries may be excusable as well as the Curiosity of those who make a collection of Coins and Medals of all Countries and Times that may be useful in some occasions and if it doe them not much good at least it does them no harm a Store-house of such Curiosities being not cumberâ—ome since they carry not with them either their Books or Medals But how may the Passion of those be justifiable that make their Head a Library of Dictionaries that neglect their Affairs and Essential Duties for words of no use They are smatterers in their own Tongue frequently mingling strange and unknown words in their Discourses and never paying their Countreymen with Current Money Their Reason seems not to be better guided than their Tongue for all the Corners and Recesses of their Memory are so full of Etymologies that their Minds must lie as stifl'd under the innumerable number of words that are perpetually flying about it However it must be granted that Philologers and Linguists will not stick for Reasons to justifie their capricious Studies Which to know you need but to listen to the Judgments those pretenders to Science make of Tongues or suppose some Opinions that are taken amongst them for undoubted Axioms together with the Inferences that may be deduc'd from
Will being not equal even among the Damn'd it is plain they are not all equally opposite to Order and that they do not hate it in all cases unless in consequence of their Hatred to God For as no one can hate Good consider'd barely as such so no one can hate Order but when it seems to thwart his Inclinations But though it seem contrary to our Inclinations it nevertheless retains the force of a Law which Condemns and also punishes us by a Worm that never dies Now then we see what Order is and how it has the strength of a Law by that necessary Love which God has for himself We conceive how this Law comes to be general for all Minds God not excepted and why it is necessary and absolutely indispensible Lastly we conceive or we may easily conceive in general that it is the Principle of all Divine and Humane Laws and that 't is according to this Law that all Intelligences are judg'd and all Creatures dispos'd in the respective rank that belongs to them I acknowledge it is not easie to explain all this in particular and I venture not to undertake it For should I go to show the Connexion particular Laws have with the general and account for the agreement which certain manners of acting have to Order I should be forc'd to engage in Difficulties that it may be I could not resolve and which would lead me out of sight of my subject Nevertheless if it be consider'd that God neither has nor can have any other Law than his own Wisdom and the necessary Love he has for it we shall easily judge that all Divine Laws must depend on it And if it be observ'd that he has made the World with reference only to that Wisdom and Love since he acts only for Himself we shall not doubt but all natural Laws must tend to the Preservation and Perfection of this World according to indispensable Order and by their dependance on necessary Love For the Wisdom and Will of God regulates all things There is no need I should explain at present this Principle more at large what I have already said being sufficient to infer this Consequence That in the first institution of Nature it was Impossible for Minds to be subjected to Bodies For since God cannot act without Knowledge and against his Will he has made the World by his Wisdom and by the motion of his Love He has made all things by his Son and in his Holy Spirit as we are taught in Scripture Now in the Wisdom of God Minds are perfecter than Bodies and by the necessary Love God has for himself he prefers what is more perfect to what is less so Therefore it is not possible that Minds should be subject to Bodies in the first institution of Nature Otherwise it must be said that God in creating the World has not follow'd the Rules of his Eternal Wisdom nor the Motions of his natural and necessary Love which not only is inconceivable but involves a manifest contradiction True it is that at present the created Mind is debas'd below a material and sensible Body but that 's because Order considered as a necessary Law will have it so 'T is because God loving himself by a necessary Love which is always his Inviolable Law cannot love Spirits that are repugnant to him nor consequently prefer them to Bodies in which there is nothing evil nor in the hatred of God For God loves not Sinners in themselves Nor would they subsist in the Universe but through JESUS CHRIST God neither preserves them nor loves them but that they may cease to be Sinners through the Grace of CHRIST JESUS or that if they remain eternally Sinners they may be eternally condemned by immutable and necessary Order and by the Judgment of our LORD by vertue of whom they subsist for the Glory of the Divine Justice for without Him they would be annihilated This I say by the way to clear some difficulties that might remain touching what I said elsewhere about Original Sin or the general Corruption of Nature 'T is if I mistake not a very useful reflection to consider that the Mind has but two ways of knowing Objects By Light and by Sensation It sees them by Light when it has a clear Idea of them and when by consulting that Idea it can discover all the properties whereof they are capable It sees things by Sensation when it finds not in it self their clear Idea to consult it and so cannot clearly discover their properties but only know them by a confus'd Sensation without Light and Evidence 'T is by Light and a clear Idea the mind sees the Essences of things Numbers and Extension 'T is by a confus'd Idea or Sensation that it judges of the Existence of Creatures and knows its own What the Mind perceives by Light or by a clear Idea it perceives in a most perfect manner moreover it sees clearly that all the Obscurity or Imperfection of its Knowledge proceeds from its own Weakness and Limitation or from want of Application and not from the Imperfection of the Idea it perceives But what the mind perceives by Sensation is never clearly known not for want of any Application on part of the Mind for we always are very applicative to what we feel but by the defectiveness of the Idea which is extreamly obscure and confus'd Hence we may conclude that it is in God or in an immutable nature that we see all that we know by Light or a clear Idea not only because we discover by Light only numbers Extension and the Essences of Beings which depend not on a free Act of God as I have already said but also because we know these things in a very perfect manner and we should even know them in an infinitely perfect manner if our thinking Capacity were infinite since nothing is wanting to the Idea that represents them We ought likewise to conclude that we see in our selves whatever we know by Sensation However this is not as if we could produce in our selves any new modification or that the sensations or modifications of our Soul could represent the Objects on occasion whereof God excites them in us But only that our Sensations which are not distinguished from our selves and consequently cannot represent any thing distinct from us may nevertheless represent the existence of Beings or cause us to judge that they exist For God raising Sensations in us upon the presence of Objects by an action that has nothing sensible we fancy we receive from the Object not only the Idea which represents its essence but also the Sensation which makes us judge of its existence For there is always a pure Idea and a confused Sensation in the Knowledge we have of things as actually existing if we except that of God and of our own Soul I except the Existence of God For this we know by a pure Idea and without Sensation since it depends not on any cause and
is included in the Idea of a necessary Being as the Equality of Diameters is included in the Idea of a Circle And I except the Existence of our Soul because we are inwardly conscious that we Think Will and Feel and have no clear Idea of our Soul as I have sufficiently explained in the seventh Chapter of the second Part of the third Book and elsewhere These are some of the Reasons which we have to add to those already given to prove that all our Light is deriv'd to us from God and that the immediate and direct Object of our clear and evident notices is an immutable and necessary Nature Some Objections are usually made against this Opinion which I shall now endeavour to solve Against what has been said that none but God enlightens us and that we see all things in him OBJECTION I. OUR Soul thinks because it is her Nature God in creating her gave her the faculty of thinking and she needs nothing more But if any thing else is wanting let us stick to what Experience teaches us of our senses which is that they are the manifest causes of our Ideas 'T is an ill way of Philosophizing to argue against Experience ANSWER I cannot but admire that the Cartesian Gentlemen who with so much reason reject and scorn the general Terms of Nature and faculty should so willingly employ them on this occasion They cry out against a Man that shall say the Fire burns by its nature and converts certain Bodies into Glass by a natural Faculty And yet some of them fear not to say that the Humane Mind produces the Ideas of all things in it self by its nature and because it has a thinking faculty But be it spoken without offence these words are no more significative in their Mouths than in the Peripateticks I know very well that the Soul is capable of thinking But I know likewise that extension is capable of Figures The Soul is capable of Will as matter is of Motion But as it is false that matter though capable of figure and motion has in it self a force faculty or nature by which it can move it self and give it self now a round figure and anon a square one so though the Soul be naturally and essentially capable of Knowledge and Will it is false that she has Faculties whereby she can produce in her Ideas or motion towards good There is a great difference between being Moveable and self moving Matter is by its nature moveable and capable of Figures nor can it subsist without a figure But it neither moves it self nor shapes it self nor has it any faculty to do it The Mind is of its nature capable of motion and Ideas I acknowledge But it neither moves nor enlightens its self But 't is God that does all in Minds as well as in Bodies Can we say that God effects the changes that happen in matter and that he causes not those which occur in the Mind Is this to give to God the things that are his to leave these latter sort of Beings to their own management Is he not equally Lord of all things Is he not the Creator Preserver and true mover of Minds as well as Bodies Certainly he makes all both Substances Accidents Beings and Modes of Being For in short he knows all But he knows nothing but what he does We therefore streighten him in his Knowledge if we limit him in his Action But if it must be said that Creatures have such faculties as are commonly conceived and that natural Bodies have a Nature which is the Principle of their Motion and Rest as says Aristotle and his Followers This indeed overthrows all my Ideas but yet I will rather agree to it than say the Mind enlightens it self Men may say that the Soul has the force of moving diversly the Limbs of her Body and of communicating to them Sense and Life They may say if they please that it is she that gives heat to the Blood motion to the Spirits and to the rest of her Body its Bulk Situation and Figure Only let them not say that the Mind gives Light and Motion to it self If God works not all let us allow him at least to do what is Noblest and Perfectest in the World And if Creatures do any thing let them move Bodies and range and posture them as they think fit But let them never act upon Minds We will say if that will serve that Bodies move each other after they have been mov'd themselves or rather will sit down ignorant of the different Dispositions of matter as not concerning us But let not our Minds be ignorant whence proceeds the Light that enlightens them Let them know from what hand they receive all that can make them more happy or more perfect let them acknowledge their dependence in its whole extent and know that whatever they actually have God gives them every moment for as says a great Father upon another Subject 'T is a very criminal Pride to use the gifts of God as our own innate Perfections Above all let us take heed of imagining that the Senses instruct Reason that the Body enlightens the Mind that the Soul receive of the Body what it wants it self We had better believe our selves independent than to believe we truly depend on Bodies 'T is much better to be our own Masters than to seek for Masters among inferior Creatures But we had much better submit our selves to Eternal Truth which assures us in the Gospel that none else is our Instructor than to believe the Testimony of our Senses or of some Men who presume to talk to us as our Teachers Experience whatever may be said does not countenance prejudices For our Senses no less than our Teachers after the Flesh are only occasional causes of the Instruction which Eternal Wisdom infuses into our most inward Reason But because this Wisdom enlightens us by an insensible Operation we imagine it is our Eyes or the words of those that verberate the Air against our Ears who produce this Light or pronounce that intelligible Voice which instructs us And for this Reason as I have said in another place our LORD thought it not enough to instruct us in an intellible manner by his Divinity unless he condescended also to inform us in a sensible way by his Humanity thereby teaching us that he is every way our Master And because we cannot easily retire into our selves to consult him in Quality of eternal Truth immutable Order intelligible Light he has rendred Truth sensible by his Words Order Amiable by his Example Light Visible by a Body which breaks the force of its Lustre and after all we are still so ungrateful unjust stupid and insensible as to respect as our Masters and that against his express prohibition not only other Men but it may be the most insensible and vilest Bodies OBJECTION II. Since the Soul is more perfect than Bodies how comes it that she cannot include
special a regard as to give it all things necessary to its preservation and likewise a Seed for perpetuating it's kind This proves second causes no more than the Plurality of Causes of contrary Principles of Good and Evil which the Manichees imagin'd to account for these effects But 't is a certain Sign of the Grandeur Wisdom and Magnificence of God For God does no works unbecoming an infinite Wisdom and he does them with that profusion as is a manifest proof of his Power and Greatness Whatever is destroy'd is repair'd again by the same Law that destroy'd it So great is the Wisdom Power and Fecundity of that Law God prevents not the destruction of Beings by any new Will not only because the first suffices to restore them but especially because his Wills are of much greater value than the Reparation of these Beings They are far more valuable than all that they produce And God had never made this World since not worthy of the Action by which it was produc'd unless he had other prospects than are known by the Philosophers and knew how to honour himself in JESUS CHRIST with an honour which the Creatures are not capable of giving him When a House falls and crushes an Honest Man to death a greater Evil happens than when one Beast devours another or when a Body is forc'd to rebound by the shock it receives from the Encounter of another But God does not multiply his Wills to redress either the true or apparent Disorders which are the necessary Consequences of natural Laws God ought not to correct nor change these Laws though they sometimes produce Monsters He is not to confound the Order and simplicity of his Ways He must neglect mean and little things I would say he must not have particular Wills to produce effects which are not equivalent to or worthy of the Action of the Producer God works not Miracles save when Order which he constantly follows requires it which Order requires that he should act by the most simple ways and make no exceptions to his general Wills but when 't is absolutely necessary to his designs or on particular occasions which we are absolutely ignorant of Though we are all united to Order or the Wisdom of God yet we know not all the Rules of it We see in it what we ought to do but we cannot discover in it what God ought to Will nor is it our business to be very sollicitous to know it A great instance of what I have said we have in the Damnation of an infinite number of Persons whom God suffer'd to perish in times of Ignorance and Error God is infinitely Good He loves all his Works He wills that all Men should be sav'd and come to the Knowledge of the Truth for he has made them to injoy him And yet the greatest number are Damn'd They live and die in blindness and will remain in it to all Eternity Comes not this from his acting by the simplest means and his following Order We have shown that according to Order God ought not to prevent by Indeliberate Pleasures the will of the first Man whose Fall has disorder'd Nature It was requisite that all Men should descend from one not only because that is the most simple way but for several too Theological and abstract Reasons to be here explain'd In fine we ought to believe this conformable to the Order which God follows and to the Wisdom he always consults in the intention and execution of his designs The first Man's Sin has produc'd infinite Evils I confess but certainly Order requir'd that God should permit it and that he should instate Man in a peccable condition God minded to repair his laps'd Work seldom gives Victorious Graces that prevail over the malice of the greatest Sinners Sometimes he gives Graces useless to the conversion of the Receiver though he foresees their inutility and sometimes sheds them in great Plenty yet with little effect Commonly he acts as it were by degrees giving Men secret inspirations of Self-denial and Repentance as formerly he gave them Counsels in his Gospel Thus he prepares them for the grace of Conversion and last of all bestows it Why all these round-about Methods and ways indirect Would it not have been enough for him to have positively Will'd the Conversion of a Sinner to have effected it in an efficacious and irresistible manner But is not it visible that this proceeds from his acting by the simplest Methods and Orders willing it though we do not always see it For God must necessarily follow Order and Wisdom in his actings though these are Unfathomable Abysses to the Mind of Man There are certain most simple Laws in the Order of Grace by which God for the most part acts For this Order has its Rules as well as that of Nature though we know them not as we see those of the Communications of Motions Only let us follow the Counsels which are given us in the Gospel by him who perfectly knows the Laws of Grace This I say to pacify the unjust Complaints of Sinners who despise the Counsels of JESUS CHRIST and charge their Malignity and disorders upon God They would have God show Miracles in their behalf and dispense with the general Laws of Grace They lead their Life in Pleasures they seek out for Honours and daily renew those wounds which sensible Objects have given their Brain and add more to them and after this expect God should cure them by a Miracle Not unlike wounded Men who in the excess of their Pain tear their Cloaths renovate their Wounds and when in the sight of approaching Death complain of the cruelty of their Surgeons They would have God to save them because say they God is Good Wise Powerful and needs but determine it to make us happy Why did he make us to damn and destroy us They ought to know that God Wills they should be sav'd and to that intent has done all that could be done by Order and Wisdom which he consults We cannot believe that he deserts us whilst he gives us his own Son to be our Mediator and Sacrifice Yes God is willing that all Mankind should be sav'd but by ways that we ought to study with care and follow with caution and weariness God is not to consult our Passions in the Execution of his designs He can have no regard but to his Eternal Wisdom nor follow any other rule than the Divine Order which Order will have us imitate JESUS CHRIST and obey his Counsels for our Sanctification and Salvation But if God has not predestin'd all Men to be conformable to the Image of his Son who is the Model and Exemplar of the Elect 'T is because herein God acts by the most simple means with reference to his designs which all make for his Glory 'T is because God is an universal Cause which ought not to act like particular Causes which have particular Volitions for all they do 'T