be from a kind of Magnetism in some parts of the Earth as hath been imagin'd by some or from the reflected Particles of the Celestial Matter driving down into their places the earthy bodies they find above them or as they at other times are pleased to speak from the pressure of the Atmosphere which moves all Bodies continually downwards because it doth it self press always towards the Earth or whether it be as the Learned Isaac Vossius holds from the Diurnal Motion of the Earth whereby all heavy Bodies which move with greater difficulty than light ones tend to the middle or Center and light Bodies are expelled towards the Superficies or from the Center But a man that would be very serious in Philosophizing can hardly acquiesce in any of these Solutions He is not hereby satisfied how Non-gravitation can be and not be in a thing at the same time as in Water in the Sea or in a River for it is heavy and presses down and yet the parts do not gravitate for 't is known that those that dive and are under so great a heap of Waters yet feel it not upon them Here must be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 there must be acknowledged an other Cause besides those before mention'd if they may be said to be Causes at all And accordingly I find that some of the most Judicious Philosophers of our own Nation have averr'd that a God a Divine Incorporeal Substance may be evinced from the Phoenomena of Gravity This is made good by strong and nervous Arguments in an Undertaking of the Learned Dr. More Another Ripe-witted Naturalist positively determines that the common Phoenomenon of Gravity is impossible to be explain'd by any natural operation of Matter or any other law of Motion but the positive Will of a Superiour Being so ordering it And there is lately risen in our Horizon another Bright Philosophick Luminary from whom we may expect Great Discoveries it is his frank Acknowledgment that this wonderful Property of Bodies whereby the World is tied and link'd together and all things in it are kept from running back into their First Chaos and Confusion and which consequently is necessary for the welfare yea the very subsistence of the Universe is supernatural No power saith he of mere Nature can produce it it surpasses all the Mechanism of Matter And in several other Instances which might be offer'd there may be seen a despair of resolving the nature of them by material Causes wholly No meaner a Person than Doctor Lower who was voted by all the Faculty to be one of the most Accomplish'd Anatomists of this Age imputes the wonderful Motion of the Heart and the Circulation of the Blood to a Divine and Supernatural Cause He who was as well skill'd as any man in the Fabrick of the Parts and Vessels of the Body and knew all the Springs of their Actions and Operations was of opinion that these could not be solv'd by any ordinary Principle I mention this only to let the Reader see that some of the Bravest and Wisest Philosophers are forward to own a Divine Hand even in the Common Works of Nature They do not think it below a Man of Philosophy to resolve some things into an Immaterial Principle For a Pious and Christian Philosopher may plainly discern that there are some things above the Efforts of Matter and Motion It cannot be denied whatever some are pleas'd to say to the contrary that we live in as Learned Times as ever have been extant All Arts and Sciences are improved even to a Prodigy and particularly the Accessions which are made to Philosophy are very great and astonishing But yet I must needs concur with that very Thoughtful and Ingenious Gentleman before cited who hath most truly told the World that without the notion and allowance of Spirits our Philosophy will be lame and defective in one main part of it when it leaves out the Contemplation of the most Excellent and Powerful part of the Creation viz. those Immaterial Beings And herein he follows all the Great and Renowned Philosophers of our Age especially those of our own Country as Dr. More Sir Matthew Hale Dr. Willis Mr. Boyle Mr. Ray c. who pretend not to solve all things in Philosophy by mere Natural Causes who look not upon Man as a piece of Clockwork but have frequent recourse to those Springs and Causes which are Spiritual and Incorporeal and sometimes to the immediate hand of the Almighty Himself To conclude then let not the inestimable Blessing of Knowledge and Learning which is so peculiar to this Age make us forgetful of the Grand Source and Spring of all operations and effects in Nature Let us beware of those men who ascribe all the Phaenomena in the world to the power of the modified matter and will leave nothing for God to do himself Neither let us think that to Philosophize is to jar with the Sacred Writings and to deny the very Natural History of it The Scoffers at a Deity never had a more hopeful Harvest then since these Notions have prevail'd By this means it comes to pass that Philosophy which is the Study of Wisdom affronts the Truest and Highest Wisdom and even Natural Philosophy which is one of the Choicest Accomplishments of humane minds leads men even to the denial of the Author of Nature No wise man will disapprove of a Latitude either in Philosophy or in the dubious and controverted Points of Theology but then here he must be upon his guard for there are those that under the pretence of throwing off some precarious things in the Old Philosophy and discarding the empty Speculations of the Schools cast off those Principles which are useful and sound under the notion of the Advancements of Arts and Sciences and the Improvement of the belles lettres and carrying Learning up to a greater heighth they in the mean time help to pull these down Especially in Religion under the colour of searching further than others have done into Divine matters they abandon some of the choicest Principles under the pretext of Reason and Good Sense they obtrude any New Conceit upon the world and regard not the suffrage of the Holy Scriptures or of the Primitive Church This they call a Rational Religion and if you offer any thing against it they cry it down as a Dream a Romance a Fable a Phantom an Hobgoblin and which is a word which they think comprehends all the rest Priest-craft And here I might observe that among the Opinions which lead to Atheism the denial of Daemons and Witches which of late hath so much prevail'd is none of the least For besides that this is an open defiance to unquestionable History Experience and matter of Fact and so introduces the worst sort of Scepticism which is the high-way to Atheism it is evident that this supplants the belief of Spiritual Beings or Substances for Witchcraft and all Diabolick Transactions are
their Affairs to think of a God but in others of a higher Rank and Quality for by Ignorance I mean a wilful and sottish stifling of natural Notions and Impressions And this sometimes prevails in Men of great Parts and Knowledge Think it not strange that I reckon such Persons in the number of the Ignorant for to speak impartially they are so and this was the Sense of the wisest Pagans long since For to have no Knowledge and to stifle it is the same thing which is the Case of these Men they make it their business to choak the innate Principles of their Minds and to disregard those Notices which their Natures suggest to them Thus these Persons are stubbornly and obstinately Ignorant Whatever their Pretences and Boastings be their Atheism proceeds from want of Learning and Wit For 't is not the part of a Learned and Ingenious Man to destroy the Notions of Mankind and pull down what hath been built by the universal Suffrage of the World and in its place to erect a Conceit of his own Some may take such for Brainish and Scholar-like sort of Men but then these are so without Thinking for it is the want of this that makes them what they are Or to say the best of this kind of Men and Atheist is but a half-witted Person He hath perhaps made some Attempts in Science but to little purpose He hath attain'd to some slight and trivial Notions but hath not penetrated into the heart of Things and thence it comes to pass that he is full of Doubts and Cavils which he is able to raise but he hath not Skill and Ability enough to answer them Wherefore it was excellently said of my Lord Bacon A little Philosophy inclines mens minds to Atheism but depth in Philosophy brings mens minds about to Religion and a Deity Thus though this mis-shapen Monster would be thought to be the genuine issue of True Wisdom and Sound Knowledge yet it is really the daughter of an Affected Ignorance Wherefore to secure your selves against Atheism be careful that you blind not your minds willingly receive the rays of light into your souls cherish all sound notions and conceptions and by all proper methods bring your selves to a right understanding and steady embracing of all the Fundamental Principles of your Religion II. There is great Disingenuity and unhandsome Dealing in the case else we should not have so much Atheism Here I will prove that they do not act fairly but that they are Ungenteel which perhaps will affect these Persons more than any thing that I can say What they are willing and forward to grant in other matters and on other occasions they refuse to grant here yea they utterly deny it though there be the same reason for one as the other This plainly appears by their Objections As first they tell us they have no Sensible Notices of a God and therefore they can't admit of it for all the knowledge say they which we have of things is deriv'd to us from Sense But here we see that these Men are Partial and Disingenuous for they will not deny that there are many things which they judge not of by Sense they grant that the swiftness of Motion oftentimes out-runs the nimblest Sense and the Observation of the quickest eye yet they do not deny the Motion it self The Element of Air in which the daily converse is not seen nor is it heard or felt unless when 't is extraordinarily moved and disturbed which is but seldom nor will they say they taste it and 't is as certain that they cannot smell it for this is only the Vehicle of Smells but is not it self the object of that sense and yet these nice Gentlemen do not deny the Existence of the Air. They can by none of their Senses discern the Motion of the Sun Moon and Stars or as perhaps they think it most proper to say the Earth and yet there is not a man of them that denies that they move It can't be determin'd by Sense whether the Sun be bigger than it appears to be and therefore Epicurus who was a great Man for Sense held it was of no greater dimension than it seems to the Eye to be yea of no greater heat in it self than it seems to the Feeling to be here on Earth And the Atheistical Poet who borrow'd his Notions from him was of the same mind Nec nimio solis major rota nec minor ardor Esse potest nostris quà m sensibus esse videtur Lucret. lib. 5. This is certain that the things that are least discernible act most The Animal Spirits which do all the great things in our bodies are themselves Imperceptible They are the Insensible and Invisible Parts as Spirits Wind Subtile matter Exhalations which being agitated do the chiefest Exploits in Nature There are Fine Particles and Atoms diffused through all bodies whatsoever and these are the cause of Sense and Motion in Animals by help of these Minerals Plants and all Vegetables are brought to perfection These Invisible Agents effect strange things and act most wonderfully in the World The Nutritious Iuyce in the Nerves if we may credit the famous Glisson is of mighty use and influence yet as he confesses himself there are no Cavities to be seen to convey it and none of this Succus is ever discern'd in the dissecting of Animals Notwithstanding this some Physicians of the most piercing Judgment have granted whatever they do now the real being of it And in other Instances it might be shewed that Sense is not always made a Judge even in sensible Objects but we gather the being and operation of them from Reason and Discourse This the persons whom we are now dealing with do not deny but even practise it themselves and are willing to allow of it Why therefore are they so void of Ingenuity and fair-dealing as not to admit of the same in the case that is before us Why do they most irrationally deny a God because they do not apprehend him by Bodily sense whenas they judge not of some other things by Sense nay though they be proper objects of it This is a plain proof of these mens wilful Prejudice and Partiality especially if I add that God is infinitely farther removed from our most exalted Apprehensions than the Sun of which we spoke before is from this Earth This Glorious Sun dwelleth in that light which no man can approach unto whom no man hath see or can see Secondly they tell us that there are Great Difficulties in conceiving a God and they are loth to swallow these down and more especially the notion of a Spirit i. e. a Being that is void of Matter and Body is too hard to be conceiv'd by them and therefore seeing we hold God to be a Spirit they can form no conception of him I will reply to both the parts of this Objection distinctly and first as to the General Cavil That this notion is
as they do of their own Existence or any other Principle in Nature but this I have made my task in an other place Thirdly they tell us they cannot believe a Deity because there are no Proper Demonstrations to prove it For you must know that there Persons whom we have to do with at present are great men for Demonstrations But I answer The Existence of many things in the World cannot be made out by Demonstration strictly so called and yet no man questions the reality of them The skilfullest Mathematician under Heaven can't demonstrate that the Sun Shines and yet there is no doubt at all of it and he would be counted a Mad-man that denies it We are morally certain of many things which we cannot possibly demonstrate but this doth not hinder us from yielding a firm assent to them And 't is certain that an Assent is an firm on Moral grounds as on rigid Demonstrations when the matter is capable of no other grounds for the Evidence is proportionable to the Matter to be proved and that is as much as can be desired by any intelligent man There can be no greater than a Moral Certainty of a Deity for there are no grounds of it Mathematically Demonstrative But by being Morally Certain we are certain enough and as certain as the nature of the thing will bear This should content any Rational man and it is unreasonable to demand any more Then as for those Demonstrations which they talk so much of they cannot but acknowledge that as they are sometimes managed they yield but little Certainty For not to speak now of the old Academicks and Scepticks who denied Geometrical Principles or of Demetrius Sextus Empiricus Epicurus Zeno and others of the Ancient Philosophers who reason'd against them I will mention some of our Moderns and those of great Skill and Learning who have disagreed about Mathematical Proofs and thereby proclaim to the World their Uncertainty The greatest Astrologers hugely differ as to the distance of the Sun from the Earth It is nearer to it ten thousand miles than it was saith Copernicus But I. Scaliger would have the Writings of those Authors who hold the Sun is nearer to the Earth than 't was in former days to be razed out with sponges or the Writers themselves to be corrected with stripes And other very good Astronomers are so far from consenting to this that they maintain the Sun is farther off from the Earth than it was at first And yet on both sides they proceed on Mathematical grounds There is no Mathematical Demonstration for Comets being above or below the Moon saith Ricciolus a very skilful Mathematician but others of that Faculty have pretended much to the contrary The Paralax is well known to be a Mathematical business that by which the Planets are judged to be higher or lower but the greatest Astronomers have quarrell'd with one another about this Doctrine Tycho is for it but Claramontius is against it and Galilaeus even explodes the Proof brought from the Paralax Dr. Wallis and Mr. Hobbes's Contrasts in Print shew that Mathematicks are dubious and this latter who was so stiff an Opposer of the Notion of a Spirit and consequently of a Deity finds fault with all Geometricians old and new in his Book entituled The Principles and Ratiocination of Geometricians Cartes's Dioptricks and Geometry are pretended to be baffled by other Learned Mathematicians as Bourdin Hobbes Fermat Franciscus du Laurens and Dr. Wallis scuffle about a Mathematical Problem So that it seems it is not an Infallible Science I am certain saith Dr. Henry More that Mathematical Certitude it self is not absolute There is an Essay of Dr. Pell to shew the Errors and Mistakes of the best and most celebrated Astronomers for want of better Knowledge in Geometry Even Monsieur Malebranch a profound Admirer and Follower of Descarts acknowledges that in his Geometry there are some footsteps of the weakness of the humane mind And I will conclude with the Words of One that was known to be eminent in Mathematical Studies Even in Geometry and Arithmetick saith he how many things are forcibly concluded to be true which are inexplicable unimaginable incomprehensible Thus you see the Mathematical Certainty which some men talk of is not so easily to be attain'd as they fancy Disputes have place in Geometry Demonstrations sometimes prove to be Paralogisms But as for a Mathematical Demonstration for the proof of a GOD it is vainly and unreasonably required because there can be no such thing for the matter will not bear it Wherefore though Some Divines have been great Philosophers and Mathematicians yet they never attempted any such thing A man must not expect to have every thing proved the same way If we have things evidenced by the Arguments which they are capable of it is satisfactory and every wise man rests in it And these men themselves do so in other things they acquiesce in that Evidence which the things admit of and they seek no farther Which shews that in the present Case they are Disingenuous and Cross-grain'd and act merely out of Prejudice which was the thing I undertook to make good Their Insincerity nourishes their Atheism Therefore let us have a care that we give way to no such thing III. Another Cause of this Pernicious Opinion is Ostentation of Wit For you may take notice that this Mischievous Plant springs from Contrary Seeds As before this kind of men put on a very grave and solid Countenance so now they shew themselves to be very Pleasant and Airy and set up for the Art of Drolling Before they appear'd like Philosophers now they come upon the Stage like Buffoons Then with a Magisterial Grimace they affected Demonstrations now nothing will please them but the Comical part It is observable that they are a sort of Jesting Scoffing People giving themselves to Railery and Burlesque And it is this Jocular Humour that in part betrays them to Atheism for they take liberty to jest with their Maker These witty and facetious Folks must needs play with Heaven and laugh God out of his being They are defective in sound Learning and Judgment and in the place of these have a fanciful way of Jeering which they addict themselves immoderately to Democritus was the great Asserter of Eternal Matter and thought that the Casual Motion of it was the Cause of all things the influence of which Principle in his Cogitations made him at last laugh at every thing he saw and mock at all Actions and Occurrences of humane life for 't is certain that if they are all by Chance they are to be denied The Followers of this Great Man have learnt from him to be Laughing Philosophers and there are abundance of this Sect now-a-days This I look upon as one Cause of the great Atheism of this Age. They think their Tongues are their own and they may say what they please and they perswade themselves that what