Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	action_n	necessary_a	voluntary_a	1,479	5	10.9108	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A28672	The arraignment and conviction of atheism, or, An exact and clear demonstration by natural arguments that there is a God presented to the view of all, but especially the learned / by Joshua Bonhome.	Bonhome, Joshua.	1679 (1679)	Wing B3593; ESTC R24212	68,915	170

is to say Necessary Causes all things required granted and having no impediments act and work necessarily and cannot keep back nor suspend their action Now then seeing that Matter is a Natural and not a Voluntary Cause a necessary and not a free Cause and that there is no impediment being supposed all alone it follows that if it may have produced these Forms it must necessarily have produced them before or without remaining an infinite time 3. Against the Epicures teaching that the Eternal Atomes by a casual concourse have made and disposed the World in the same case and state it is at present I say that this concourse of Atomes to frame and fashion the World cannot have happened without the local motion of some of them From whence I argue thus If the Atomes or the parts of the Matter had concurred and consequently had moved themselves locally to frame and fashion the World in the case and state it is at present it would follow that they would have moved themselves locally from all Eternity or that they would have remained either a finite or an infinite time without moving and then afterwards would have framed and fashioned the World in the case and state it is at present but they have not moved themselves locally from all Eternity neither have they remained a finite or an infinite time without moving as I have sufficiently proved in the precedent Chapter Num. 2 3 4. for the same things I have said there of the Heaven and the Elements may be said likewise of the Atomes 4. Finally That these Forms have not been produced by any thing differing from the Matters but by God himself appears because the Agent who should have produced them would have been Eternal or not if not Eternal he would have had a Beginning and consequently would have been produced of another of whom I would ask Whether he be Eternal or not and so always inquire until one should come to such an Agent as would not have been produced by another and consequently would be Eternal If Eternal he should be either a necessary and natural Agent or a free and voluntary Agent If a natural and necessary Agent he would have forthwith produced these Forms for a natural and necessary Agent acts and works as much as it can and cannot suspend his action and consequently these Forms would have been from all Eternity and consequently the World in the case and state it is at present which I have demonstrated already to be altogether impossible And if a free and intellectual Agent it can be no other but God sceing that by the word GOD we mean and conceive nothing else but a free and intellectual Agent who hath produced the world in the state and case it is at present CHAP. VII 1 The Sixth Answer of Atheists saying That men have their Original and Beginning from the Tritons and Sirens commonly called Mairmaids 2. The Confutation of this Answer 1. THe Sixth Answer of Atheists is That though men had not been from all Eternity it would not follow that they had been produced by some Divine and Superiour Cause for one might say That their Original is from some Tritons and Sirens who after the Universal Floods lived both in the Waters and on the Land and so in time became terrestrial And they say that some Historiographers relate several things which seem to justifie their allegation Herodotus in the Fourth Book of his History relates that Jason being carried away by a storm into Libia in the Countrey of the Lotophages in the dangerous places of the Tritonide Fenns and Marshes there appeared to him a Triton who demanded of him a Trevet promising to reward him with the discovery of the means whereby he might come out of that place which being performed by Jason the Triton shewed him the way and saved him Lewis Guicharden writes that in the year 1403 they brought to Harbem in Holland a Siren commonly called a Mair maid which by degrees learned to eat bread milk and other meat to spin and to make the Sign of the Cross Acosta in the Third Book Chapter the 18th of his Relations describes the Vros as a kind of men living in the waters and observes that they themselves said they were no men Nicolo Conti in Ramnusio relates That in the River of Cochin there are Fishes to be found with a humane Form and Resemblance that being taken the difference of Sex is to be seen both in Male and Female altogether like ours and further he saith that they are so industrious as to come out of the water at night to strike fire with flints they find there to make a fire with wood at the light whereof they catch all other fishes that come near them The Reply 2. Against this Answer I say First That there is no Author let him be never so fabulous that ever dreamed or writ that men have their Original from the Tritons and Sirens And Besides my reason respecting all terrestrial Creatures it would follow that Elephants Lions Bears Oxen and other terrestrial Creatures would have had their Original from the like Marine Creatures Secondly It is a Moral Maxime That every thing seeks and endeavours to better its Condition Now either it is better for waterish Creatures to become terrestrial or not If it be better for them how came it to pass that they do not seek after it And if it be not better for them why have they done it in time past Finally If they are become terrestrial in times past why do they not do the same now And if such a thing has happened heretofore some where why does it not come to pass again either there or in seme other place of the World Thirdly Histories make mention but of three Floods onely to wit that of Noah that of Ogyges and that of Deucalion now these two last have not been universal for they happened onely in one part of Greece so that it was an easie thing to furnish it again with neighbouring People And as for the first it cannot be believed except one believes a Divinity whether we respect the Miracles that went along with it or the Holy Man that writ the History of it who saith positively that God sent it and commanded Noah to build the Ark to save in it all kinds of Terrestrial Creatures so that it is needless to have recourse to Waterish Creatures Fourthly The Examples of Herodotus Guicharden and others prove indeed that there are Tritons and Sirens but they speak never a word concerning Men having had their original from them And as for the strange things they write of them it is certain they had them by hear-say from others who might have been deceived in the Narration and by the Declarer as well as themselves And this will soon appear to be true if we judge impartially of the Writings of Herodotus for most part of what he writes from others is so far from being a true History