such may be made evident from the Records of credible Writers Psellus in his Book ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã De Operat Daem averrs it of a certain Maniacal Woman That though she knew nothing but her own Mother tongue yet when a Stranger who was an Armânian was brought into the Room to her she spake to him presently in the Armânian Language ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã We all stood amazed when we heard a woman that had never seen an Armenian before in all her life nor had learnt any thing but the use of her Distaff to speak the Armenian Language readily Where the Relater also affirmeth the same Maniacal Person to have foretold certain Future Events which happened shortly after to himself ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Then looking upon me she or rather the Demon said thou shalt suffer wonderful pains and torments in thy Body For the Demons are extremely angry with thee for opposing their Services and Worship and they will inflict great evils upon thee out of which thou shalt not be able to escape unless a Power greater than that of Demons exempt thee from them All which things saith he happened shortly after to me and I was brought very low even near to Death by them but was by my Saviour wonderfully delivered Whereupon Psellus concludes ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Who is there therefore that considering this Oracle or Prediction will conclude as some Physicians do all kind of Madnesses to be nothing but the Exorbitant Motions of the Matter or Humours and not the Tragick Passions of the Demons But because this Instance is remoter from our present Times we shall set down another remarkable one of a later Date out of the forementioned Fernelius who was an eye-witness thereof A young man of a Noble Family who was strangly Convulsed in his Body having sometimes one member and sometimes another violently agitated insomuch that four several persons were scarcely able to hold them and this at first without any distemper at all in his head or crazedness in brain To whom Fernelius with other skilful Physicians being called applied all manner of remedies Blisters Purgations Cupping-Glasses Fomentations Unctions Plaisters and Strengthening Medicines but all in vain The reason whereof is thus given by the the same Fernelius Quoniam omnes longe aberamus à cognitione veri Nam Mense Tertio primum deprehensus Daemon quidam totius Mali Author Voce insuetisque verbis ac sententiis tum Latinis tum Graecis quanquam ignarus Linguae Graecae Laborans esset se prodens Is multa âssidentium maximáque medicorum Secreta detegebat ridens quòd irritis Pharmacis corpus hoc penè jugulassent Because we were all far from the Knowledge of the truth For in the Third Month it was first plainly discovered to us that it was a certain Demon who was the Author of all this mischief He manifesting himself by his Speech and by unusual Words and Sentences both in Greek and Latin though the Patient were altogether ignorant of the Greek Tongue and by his revealing many of the Secrets of those who stood by especially of the Physicians whom also he derided for tormenting the Patient in that manner with their frustraneous remedies Here therefore have we an unquestionable Instance of a Demoniack in these Latter times of ours and such a one who at first for two Moneths together had no manner of Madness or Mania at all upon him though afterward the Demon possessing his Whole Body used his tongue and spake therewith Fernelius concludes his whole Discourse in this manner These things do I produce to make it manifest that Evil Demons or Devils do sometimes enter into the very Bodies of men afflicting and tormenting them after an unheard of manner but that at other times though they do not enter into and possess their whole body yet partly by exagitating and disturbing the profitable humours thereof partly by traducing the noxious into the principal parts or else by by obstructing the Veins and other Passages with them or disordering the structure of the Members they cause innumerable Diseases There are many other Instances of this kind recorded by Modern Writers unexceptionable of Persons either wholly Demoniacal and Possessed by Evil Demons this appearing from their discovering Secrets and speaking Languages which they had never learnt or else otherwise so Affected and Infested by them as to have certain Vnusual and Super-Natural Symptoms which for brevities sake we shall here omit However we thought it necessary thus much to insist upon this Argument of Demoniacks as well for the Vindication of Christianity as for the Conviction of Atheists we finding some so staggering in their Religion that from this one thing alone of Demoniacks they being so strongly possessed that there neither is nor ever was any such they are ready enough to suspect the whole Gospel or New Testament it self of Fabulosity and Imposture We come now to the Second Head proposed of Miracles and Effects Supernatural That there hath been some thing Miraculous or Above Nature sometimes done even among the Pagans whether by Good or Evil Spirits appears not only from their own Records but also from the Scripture it self And it is well known that they pretended besides Oracles to Miracles also even after the times of Christianity and that not only in Apollonius Tyanaeus and Apuleius but also in the Roman Emperours themselves as Vespasian and Adrian but especially in the Temple of Aesculapius thus much appearing from that Greek Table therein hung up at Rome in which amongst other things this is Recorded That a blind man being commanded by the Oracle to kneel before the Altar and then passing from the Right side thereof to the Left to lay five fingers upon the Altar and afterwards lifting up his hand to touch his eyes therewith all this being done accordingly he recovered his sight the people all applauding that great Miracles were done under the Emperour Antoninus c. But we have in the Scripture an account of Miracles both greater in Number and of a higher Nature done especially by Moses and our Saviour Christ and his Apostles Wherefore it seems that there are Two Sorts of Miracles or Effects Supernatural First such as though they could not be done by any Ordinary and Natural Causes here amongst us and in that respect may be called Supernatural yet might notwithstanding be done God Permitting only by the Ordinary and Natural Power of other Invisible Created Spirits Angels or Demons As for example If a Stone or other Heavy body should first ascend upwards and then hang in the Air without any Visible either Mover or Supporter this would be to us a Miracle or Effect Supernatural and yet according to Vulgar Opinion might this be done by the Natural Power of Created Invisible Beings Angels or Demons God only permitting without whose special Providence it is conceived they cannot thus intermeddle with our humane affairs Again If a perfectly Illitterate Person should readily speak
Philosophers after Thales and before Anaxagoras were generally Atheistical And indeed from them the word ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã or Naturalists came to be often used as Synonymous with ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã or Atheists Now these Two are here condemned by Plutarch for Two Contrary Extremes the One who resolved all into Natural and Necessary Causes that is into Matter Motion and Qualities of Bodies leaving out the Divine Cause as guilty of Atheism the other who altogether neglecting the Natural and Necessary Causes of things resolved all into the Divine Cause as it were swallowing up all into God as guilty of a kind of Fanaticism And thus we see plainly that this was one Grand Arcanum of the Orphick Cabala and the ancient Greekish Theology That God is All things Some Fanaticks of Latter Times have made God to be All in a Gross Sence so as to take away all Real Distinction betwixt God and the Creature and indeed to allow no other Being besides God they supposing the Substance of every thing and even of all Inanimate Bodies to be the very Substance of God himself and all the variety of things that is in the World to be nothing but God under several Forms Appearances and Disguizes The Stoicks anciently made God to be All and All to be God in somewhat a different way they conceiving God properly to be the Active Principle of the whole Corporeal Universe which yet because they admitted of no Incorporeal Substance they supposed together with the Passive or the Matter to make up but one and the same complete Substance And others who acknowledged God to be an Incorporeal Substance distinct from the Matter have notwithstanding made All to be God also in a certain sence they supposing God to be nothing but a Soul of the World which together with the Matter made up all into One entire Divine Animal Now the Orphick Theologers cannot be charged with making God all in that First and Grosly-Fanatick Sence as if they took away all Real Distinction betwixt God and the Creature they so asserting God to be all as that notwithstanding they allowed other things to have Distinct Beings of their own Thus much appearing from that Riddle which in the Orphick Verses was proposed by the Maker of the World to Night ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã How can All things be One and yet Every thing have a distinct Being of its own Where ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã All things One. or One all things seems to be the Supreme Deity or Divine Intellect as Proclus also interprets it ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Jupiter who conteineth the Vniverse and All things within himself Vnitively and Intellectually according to these Orphick Oracles gives a Particular Subsistence of their own also to all the Mundane Gods and other parts of the Vniverse And this is ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã in that fore-cited Orphick Verse Every thing apart by it self the whole Produced or Created Universe with all its Variety of things in it which yet are Orphically said to be God also in a certain other sence that shall be declared afterward Nor can the Orphick Theologers be charged with making God All in the Second Stoical Sence as if they denied all Incorporeal Substance they plainly asserting as Damascius and others particularly note ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã an Incorporeal Deity But as for the Third way it is very true that the Orphick Theologers did frequently call the World The Body of God and its Several Parts His Members making the Whole Universe to be One Divine Animal Notwithstanding which they supposed not this Animated World to be the First and Highest God but either ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã as the Hermaick or Trismegistick Writers call it The Second God or else as Numenius and others of the Platonists speak ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã The Third God the Soul thereof being as well in the Orphick as it was in the Pythagorick and Platonick Trinity but the Third Hypostasis they supposing Two other Divine Hypostases Superiour thereunto which were perfectly Secrete from Matter Wherefore as to the Supreme Deity these Orphick Theologers made Him to be All things chiefly upon the Two following Accompts First because All things coming from God they inferred that therefore they were all conteined in Him and consequently were in a certain sence Himself thus much being declared in those Orphick Verses cited by Proclus and others ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Which Apuleius thus renders Namque Sinu Occultans dulces in luminis oras Cuncta tulit sacro versans sub pectore curas The Sence whereof is plainly this That God at first Hiding or Occultly conteining all things within himself did from thence display them and bring them forth into light or distinct Beings of their own and so make the World The Second is Because the World produced by God and really existing without him is not therefore quite cut off from him nor subsists alone by it self as a Dead Thing but is still Livingly united to him essentially Dependent on him always Supported and Upheld Quickned and Enlivened Acted and Pervaded by him according to that Orphick Passage ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã God passes through and intimately pervades All things Now it is very true that some Christian Theologers also have made God to be All according to these Latter sences as when they affirm the whole World to be nothing else but Deum Explicatum God Expanded or Vnfolded and when they call the Creatures as St. Jerom and others often do Radios Deitatis the Rays of the Deity Nay the Scripture it self may seem to give some countenance also hereunto when it tells us That Of Him and Through Him and To Him are All things which in the Orphick Theology was thus expressed God is the Beginning and Middle and End of All things That ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã All things were made in him as in the Orphick Verses ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã That ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã All things consist in him That In Him we Live and Move and have our Being That God doth ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Quicken all things and that he ought to be made ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã All in All which supposeth him in some sence to be so Notwithstanding which this is a very Ticklish Point and easily lyable to Mistake and Abuse and as we conceive it was the mistake and abuse of this One Thing which was the Chief Ground and Original of the both Seeming and Real Polytheism not only of the Greekish and European but also of the Egyptian and other Pagans as will be more particularly declared afterwards They concluding that because God was All things and consequently All things God that therefore God ought to be Worshipped in All things that is in all the several Parts of the World and Things of Nature but especially in those Animated Intellectual Beings which are Superiour to Men.
Animals the True and Proper Cause of Motion or the Determination thereof at least is not the Matter it self Organized but the Soul either as Cogitative or Plastickly-Self Active Vitally united thereunto and Naturally Ruling over it But in the whole World it is either God himselâ Originally impressing a certain Quantity of Motion upon the Matter of the Universe and constantly conserving the same according to that of the Sripture In him we Live Move which seems to have been the Sence also of that Noble Agrigentine Poet and Philosopher when he described God to be only A Pure or Holy Mind that with swift thoughts agitates the whole World or else it is Instrumentally an Inferiour Created Spirit Soul or Life of Nature that is a Subordinate Hylarchical Principle which hath a Power of Moving Matter Regularly according to the Direction of a Superiour Perfect Mind And thus do we see again that Ignorance of Causes is the Seed of Atheism and not of Theism no Atheists being able to assign a true Cause of Motion the Knowledge whereof plainly leadeth to a God Furthermore those Atheists who acknowledge no other Principle of things but Sensless Matter Fortuitously moved must needs be Ignorant also of the Cause of that Grand Phaenomenon called by Aristotle the ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã the Well and Fit in Nature that is of the most Artificial Frame of the whole Mundane System in General and of the Bodies of Animals in Particular together with the Conspiring Harmony of all For they who boasted themselves able to give Natural Causes of all things whatsoever without a God can give no other Cause at all of this Phaenomenon but only that the World Happened by Chance to be thus made as it is Now they who make Fortune and Chance to be the only Cause of this so Admirable Phaenomenon the most Regular and Artificial Frame and Harmony of the Vniverse they either make the meer Absence and Want of a Cause to be a Cause Fortune and Chance being nothing else but the Absence or want of an Intending Cause Or else do they make their own Ignorance of a Cause and They know not How to be a Cause as the Author of the Leviathan interprets the meaning hereof Many times saith he men put for Cause of Natural Events their own Ignorance but disguised in other words as when they say that Fortune is the Cause of things Contingent that is of things whereof they know no Cause Or they affirm against all Reason one Contrary to be the Cause of another as Confusion to be the Cause of Order Pulchritude and Harmony Chance and Fortune to be the Cause of Art and Skill Folly and Nonsence the Cause of the most Wise and Regular Contrivance Or Lastly they deny it to have any Cause at all since they deny an Intending Cause and there cannot Possibly be any other Cause of Artificialness and Conspiring Harmony than Mind and Wisdom Councel and Contrivance But because the Atheists here make some Pretences for this their Ignorance we shall not conceal any of them but bring them all to light to the end that we may discover their Weakness and Foolery First therefore they Pretend that the World is not so Artificially and Well made but that it might have been made much Better and that there are many Faults and Flaws to be found therein from whence they would infer that it was not made by a God he being supposed by Theists to be no Bungler but a Perfect Mind or a Being Infinitely Good and Wise who therefore should have made all things for the Best But this being already set down by it self as a Twelfth Atheistick Objection against a Deity we must reserve the Confutation thereof for its proper place Only we shall observe thus much here by the way That those Theists of Later times who either because they Fancy a meer Arbitary Deity or because their Faith in the Divine Goodness is but weak or because they Judge of things according to their own Private Appetites and Selfish Passions and not with a Free Uncaptivated Vniversality of Mind and an Impartial Regard to the Good of the Whole or because they look only upon the Present Scene of things and take not in the Future into consideration nor have a Comprehensive View of the whole Plot of Divine Providence together or lastly because we Mortals do all stand upon too Low a Ground to take a commanding view and Prospect upon the whole Frame of things and our shallow Understandings are not able to fathom the Depths of the Divine Wisdom nor trace all the Methods and Designs of Providence grant That the World might have been made much Better than now it is which indeed is all one as to say that it is Not Well made these Neoterick Christians I say seem hereby to give a much greater advantage to the Atheists than the Pagan Theists themselves heretofore did who stood their Ground and generously maintained against them that Mind being the Maker of all things and not Fortune or Chance nor Arbitary Self-will and Irational Humour Omnipotent the ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã that which is Absolutely the Best in every case so far as the Necessity of things would admit and in compliance with the Good of the Whole was the Measure and Rule both of Nature and Providence Again the Atomick Atheists further alledge that though there be many things in the world which serve well for Vses yet it does not at all follow that therefore they were made Intentionally and Designedly for those Vses because though things Happen by Chance to be so or so Made yet may they serve for something or other afterward and have their several Vses Consequent Wherefore all the things of Nature Happened say they by Chance to be so made as they are and their several Uses notwithstanding were Consequent or Following thereupon Thus the Epicurean Poet Nil ideo natum est in Corpore ut Vti Possemus sed quod Natum est id procreat Vsum. Nothing in mans Body was made out of design for any Vse but all the several Parts thereof happening to be so made as they are their Vses were Consequent thereupon In like manner the Old Atheistick Philosophers in Aristotle concluded ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã That the Former Teeth were made by Material or Mechanical Necessity Thin and Sharp by means whereof they became fit for Cutting but the Jaw-Teeth Thick and Broad whereby they became Vseful for the Grinding of Food But neither of them were Intended to be such for the sake of these Vses but Happened by Chance only And the like concerning all the other Parts of the Body which seem to be made for Ends. Accordingly the same Aristotle represents the sence of those ancient Atheists concerning the other Parts of the Universe or Things of Nature that they were all likewise made such by the Necessity of Material or Mechanical Motions Vndirected and yet had nevertheless their several
Ground as this does Modern Writer presume to determine that Knowledge and Vnderstanding are not to be attributed to God Almighty because they Imply Imperfection and Dependence upon Corporeal things without Quoniam Scientia Intellectus in nobis nihil aliud sunt quà m suscitatus à Rebus Externis Organa prementibus Animi Tumultus non est putandum aliquid tale accidere Deo Signum enim est Potentiae ab alio dependentis Which is again Englished thus Knowledge and Vnderstanding being in us nothing else but a Tumult in the Mind raised by External things that press the Organical parts of mans Body there is no such thing in God nor can they be attributed to him they being things which depend upon Natural Causes Where this Writer thus denying Knowledge and Vnderstanding to God upon pretence that it speaks Imperfection and Dependence upon External Corporeal things it being nothing but a Tumult raised by the Motions and Pressures of them he must needs Absolutely deny the First Principle of all things to be any Knowing Vnderstanding Nature unless he had asserted some other kind of Knowledge distinct from that of men and clearly attributed the Same to God Almighty Hitherto the sense of Atheists Now we shall for the present only so far forth concern our selves in Confuting this Atheistick Doctrine as to lay a Foundation thereby for the Demostration of the Contrary Namely the Existence of a God or a Mind Before the World from the Nature of Knowledge and Vnderstanding First therefore it is a Sottish Conceit of these Atheists proceeding from their not attending to their own Cogitations that not only Sense but also Knowledge and Vnderstanding in Men is but a Tumult raised from Corporeal things without pressing upon the Organs of their Body or else as they declare themselves more distinctly nothing but the Activity of Sensible Objects upon them and their Passion from them For if this were true then would every thing that Suffered and Reacted Motion especially Polite Bodies as Looking-Glasses have something both of Sense and of Vnderstanding in them It is plain that there comes nothing to us from Bodies without us but only Local Motion and Pressure Neither is Sense it self the meer Passion of those Motions but the Perception of their Passions in a way of Phancy But Sensible things themselves as for example Light and Colours are not Known or Vnderstood either by the Passion or the Phancy of Sense not by any thing meerly Forreign and Adventitious but by Intelligible Ideas Exerted from the Mind it self that is by something Native and Domestick to it nothing being more true than this of Boetius that Omne quod Scitur non ex Sua sed ex Comprehendentium Naturâ Vi Facultate Cognoscitur Whatsoever is Known is Known not by own Force and Power but by the Force and Power the Vigour and Activity of that thing it self which Knows or Comprehends it Wherefore besides the Phantasms of Singular Bodies or of Sensible things Existing without us which are not meer Passions neither it is plain that our Humane Mind hath other Cogitations or Conceptions in it namely the Ideas of the Intelligible Natures and Essences of things which are Vniversal and by and under which it understands Singulars It is a Ridiculous Conceit of a Modern Atheistick Writer that Vniversals are nothing else but Names attributed to many Singular Bodies because whatsoever Is is Singular For though whatsoever Exist without the Mind be Singular yet is it plain that there are Conceptions in our Minds Objectively Vniversal Which Universal Objects of our Mind though they Exist not as such any where without it yet are they not therefore Nothing but have an Intelligible Entity for this very reason because they are Conceivable for since Non-Entity is not Conceivable whatsoever is Conceivable and an Object of the Mind is therefore Something And as for Axiomatical Truths in which something is affirmed or denied as these are not all Passions from Bodies without us for what Local Motions could Impress this Common Notion upon our Minds That Things which agree in one Third agree amongst themselves or any other so neither are these things only gathered by Induction from repeated and reiterated Sensations we clearly apprehending at once that it is Impossible they should be otherwise Thus Aristotle Ingeniously ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã It is evident that there is no knowledge of the Vniversal Theorems of Geometry by Sense For if we could perceive by Sense that the Three Angles of a Triangle were equal to Two Right yet should we not rest satisfied in this as having therefore a sufficient Knowledge hereof but would seek further after a Demonstration of it Sense reaching only to Singulars but Knowledge to Vniversals When from the Vniversal Idea of a Triangle which is neither here nor there nor any where without our Mind but yet hath an Intelligible Entity we see a plain necessity that its Three Angles must be Equal to two Right then do we know the Truth of this Vniversal Theorem and not before as also we Understand that every Singular Triangle so far as it is true hath this Property in it Wherefore the Knowledge of this and the like Truths is not derived from Singulars nor do we arrive to them in way of Ascent from Singulars to Vniversals but on the contrary having first found them in the Vniversals we afterwards Descending apply them to Singulars so that our Knowledge here is not After Singular Bodies and Secundarily or Derivatively From them but in order of Nature Before them and Proleptical to them Now these Vniversal Conceptions some of which are also Abstract as Life Sense Reason Knowledge and the like many of them are of such things whose Singulars do not at all fall under Sense which therefore could never possibly be Impressed upon us from Singular Bodies by Local Motion and again some such as though they belong to Corporeal and Sensible things yet as their Accuracy cannot be reached to by Sense so neither did they ever Exist in that Matter of this lower world which here encompasseth us and therefore could not be stamped upon us from without as for example the Ideas of a Perfect Strait Line and a Plain Superficies or of an exact Triangle Circle Sphere or Cube no Material thing here amongst us being terminated in so Strait Lines but that even by Microscopes there may be discovered much Irregularity and Deformity in them and very probable it is that there are no Perfectly Strait Lines no such Triangles Circles Spheres or Cubes as answer to the Exactness of our Conceptions in any part of the whole Material Universe nor never will be Notwithstanding which they are not Absolute Non-Entities since we can Demonstrate things concerning them and though they never were nor will be yet are they Possible to Exist since nothing can be Conceived but it either Is or else is Possible to be The Humane Mind therfore hath a Power
of that Earthy Body into its Elements Certainly it can be no other than this Pneumatical or Spirituous Body which we now speak of For in this are Seated as their Subject the Irascible and Concupiscible Passions and they are inseparable from the same nor could they be in the Soul disunited from all Body And that Soul which is freed from these would be forthwith freed from Generation nor would it be concerned in those Subterraneous Judicatories and Prisons but be carried up aloft to the higher Celestial Regions c. After which he endeavours further to confirm this Opinion from the Vulgar Phaenomena ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Furthermore that there is such a Pneumatical Spirituous Vaporous or Airy Body which accompanieth Souls Vnpurged after Death is evident also from the Phaenomena themselves For what account can otherwise be given of those Spectres or Phantasms which appear Shadow-like about Graves or Sepulchres since the Soul it self is neither of any Figure nor yet at all Visible Wherefore these Ancients say that Impure Souls after their departure out of this Body wander here up and down for a certain space in their Spirituous Vaporous and Airy Body appearing about Sepulchres and haunting their former Habitations For which cause there is great reason that we should take care of Living Well as also of abstaining from a Fouler and Grosser diet these Ancients telling us likewise that this Spirituous Body of ours being fouled and incrassated by Evil Diet is apt to render the Soul in this Life also more Obnoxious to the Disturbances of Passions And here Philoponus goes on to gratifie us with a further Account of some other of the Opinions of these Ancients concerning this Spirituous or Airy Body accompanying the Soul after Death ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã They further add that there is Something of the Plantal and Plastick Life also Exercised by the Soul in those Spirituous or Airy Bodies after Death they being Nourished too though not after the same manner as these Gross Earthy Bodies of ours are here but by Vapours and that not by Parts or Organs but throughout the Whole of them as Sponges they imbibing every where those Vapours For which cause they who are wise will in this Life also take care of using a Thinner and Dryer Diet that so that Spirituous Body which we have also at this present time within our Grosser Body may not be Clogged and Incrassed but Attenuated Over and above which those Ancients made use of Catharms or Purgations to the same end and purpose also For as this Earthy Body is washed by Water so is that Spirituous Body Cleansed by Cathartick Vapours some of these Vapours being Nutritive others Purgative Moreover these Ancients further declared concerning this Spirituous Body that it was not Organized but did the Whole of it in every Part throughout exercise all Functions of Sense the Soul Hearing and Seeing and Perceiving all Sensibles by it every where For which Cause Aristotle himself affirmeth in his Metaphysicks That there is properly but One Sense and but One Sensory He by this One Sensory meaning the Spirit or Subtle Airy Body in which the Sensitive Power doth all of it through the Whole immediately apprehend all Variety of Sensibles And if it be demanded How it comes then to pass that this Spirit appears Organized in Sepulchres and most commonly of Humane Form but sometimes in the Form of some other Animals to this those Ancients Replied That their appearing so frequently in Humane Form proceedeth from their being Incrassated with Evil Diet and then as it were stamped upon with the Form of this Exteriour Ambient Body in which they are as Crystal is Formed and Coloured like to those things which it is fastned in or Reflects the Image of them And that their having sometimes other different Forms proceedeth from the Phantastick Power of the Soul it self which can at pleasure transform this Spirituous Body into any shape For being Airy when it is Condensed and Fixed it becometh Visible and again Invisible and Vanishing out of Sight when it is Expanded and Rarefied Now from these Passages cited out of Philoponus it further appeareth that the Ancient Asserters of the Souls Immortality did not suppose Humane Souls after Death to be quite strip'd Stark Naked from all Body but that the Generality of Souls had then a certain Spirituous Vaporous or Airy Body accompanying them though in different Degrees of Purity or Impurity Respectively to themselves As also that they conceived this Spirituous Body or at least something of it to hang about the Soul also here in this Life before Death as its Interiour Indument or Vestment which also then sticks to it when that other Gross Earthly Part of the Body is by Death put off as an Outer Garment And some have been inclinable to think by reason of certain Historick Phaenomena these Two to be things so distinct that it is not Impossible for this Spirituous Body together with the Soul to be Locally separated from the other Grosser Body for some time before Death and without it And indeed thus much canâot be denied that our Soul Acteth not Immediatly only upon Bones Flesh and Brains and other such like Gross Parts of this Body but first and chiefly upon the Animal Spirits as the Immediate Instruments of Sense and Phancy and that by whose Vigour and Activity the other Heavy and Unwieldy Bulk of the Body is so nimbly Moved And therefore we know no reason but we may assent here to that of Porphyrius ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã That the Blood is the Food and Nourishment of the Spirit that is that Subtle Body called the Animal Spirits and that this Spirit is the Vehicle of the Soul or the more Immediate Seat of Life Nevertheless the same Philoponus there addeth that according to these Ancients besides the Terrestial Body and this Spirituous and Airy Body too there is yet a Third kind of Body of a Higher Rank then either of the Former peculiarly belonging to such Souls after Death as are Purged and Cleansed from Corporeal Affections Lusts and Passions called by them ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã and ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã and ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã c. A Luciform and Celestial and Ethereal Body The Soul saith he continueth either in the Terrestrial or the Aereal Body so long ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Vntil that having Purged it self it be carried aloft and freed from Generation And then doth it put off both the Irascible and Concupisciple Passions at once together with this Second Vehicle or Body which we call Spirituous Wherefore these Ancients say that there is another Heavenly Body always conjoyned with the Soul and Eternal which they call Luciform and Star-like For it being a Mundane thing must of necessity have some Part of the World as a Province allotted to it which it may administer And since it is always Moveable and ought always to Act it must have a
Inanimate Bodies because he that acknowledgeth no Animant God acknowledges no God at all but is a downright Atheist Page 512 Neither ought this Physiological Theology of the Pagans that consisted in Personating and Deifying the Natures of things and Inanimate Bodies to be Confounded with that Natural and Philosophical Theology of Varro Scaevola and others which admitted of no other but Animant Gods and such as Really Existed in Nature for which Cause it was called Natural in opposition to the Fictitious and Phantastick Poetick Gods Page 512 S. Austin's just Censure and Condemnation of the Pagans for their thus Theologizing of Physiology or Fictitiously Personating and Deifying the Natures of things Page 512 513 But though the Pagans did thus verbally Personate and Deifie the things of Nature yet did not the Intelligent amongst them therefore account these True and Proper Gods Cotta in Cicero Though we call Corn Ceres and Wine Bacchus yet was there never any one so mad as to take that for a God which himself feeds upon and devours The Pagans really accounted that onely for a God by the Invoking whereof they might expect benefit to themselves and therefore Nothing Inanimate This proved from Plato Aristotle Lucretius Cicero and Plutarch Wherefore these Natures of things Deified but Fictitious and Phantastick Gods Nor can any other sense be made of them than this that they were really but so many several Names of one Supreme God as severally manifested in his works according to that Egyptian Theology That God may be called by the Name of every thing or every thing by the Name of God With which agreeth Seneca That there may be as many Names of God as there are Gifts and Effects of his and the Writer De Mundo That God may be Denominated from every Nature he being the Cause of all things Page 513 515 Wherefore these Deified Natures of things were not directly worshipped by the Intelligent Pagans but onely Relatively to the Supreme God or in way of Complication with him onely and so not so much Themselves as God worshipped in them The Pagans Pretence that they did not look upon the world with such Eyes as Oxen and Horses do but with Religious Eyes so as to see God in every thing They therefore worshipped the Invisible Deity in the Visible manifestations of himself God and the World together This sometimes called Pan and Jupiter Thus was the whole World said to be the Greatest God and the Circle of the Heavens worshipped by the Persians not as Inanimate Matter but as the Visible manifestation of the Deity displayed from it and pervaded by it When the Roman Sea-Captains Sacrificed to the Waves their worship intended to that God who Stilleth the Waves and Quieteth the Billows Page 515 516 These Pagans also apprehended a Necessity of permitting men to worship the Invisible God in his Visible Works This account given by them in Eusebius Plato himself approved of worshipping the Invisible God in the Sun Moon and Stars as his Visible Images And though Maximus Tyrius would have men endeavour to rise above the Starry Heavens and all Visible things yet does he allow the weaker to worship God in his Progeny And Socrates perswades Euthydemus to be contented herewith Besides which some Pagans worshipping the Elements directed their Intention to the Spirits of those Elements as Julian in Ammianus these being supposed also to be Animated or else to those Daemons whom they conceived to inhabit them or preside over them Page 516 518 XXXIII Further to be observed That amongst those Natures of things some were meerly Accidental as Hope Love Desire Memory Truth Vertue Piety Faith Justice Concord Clemency Victory Echo Night According to which the vulgar Athenians supposed S. Paul to have Deified Anastasis or made a Goddess of the Resurrection as well as a God of Jesus Vices also sometimes thus Deified by them as Contumely and Impudence to whom were Temples dedicated at Athens though to the end that these things might be Deprecated These Accidents sometimes Deified under Counterfeit Proper Names as Pleasure under the name of Volupia and Lubentina Venus Time under the name of Chronos or Saturn Prudence or Wisedom under the names of Athena or Minerva against which Origen in his answer to Celsus Cicero himself allowed of Dedicating Temples to Mind Vertue Piety Faith c. Page 518 520 But such Accidents and Affections of Things Deifyed could not possibly be Accounted True and Proper Gods they having not ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã any Reall Subsistence or Substantiall Essence of their own And thus does Origen again dispute against Minerva's Godship as Tropologized into Prudence As he doth also elsewhere upon the same Ground against that of Memory the Mother of the Muses and that of the Graces he concluding these and such like therefore to be nothing but Figments of the Greeks they being Things Personated and Feigned with Humane Members Thus the Pagans condemned by Prudentius also for Feigning Things Incorporeal with Counterfeit Members These Gods plainly Exploded by Cotta or Cicero in disguise as having onely Vim Rerum but not Deorum the Force of Things but not of Gods in them or being but Naturae Rerum and not Figurae Deorum Page 520 521 Wherefore the True meaning of these Deified Natures of Things could be no other then this that God was to be acknowledged and worshipped in All things or as the Pagans themselves declare it that the Force of every thing was both governed by God and it self Divine Pliny of this Breaking and Crumbling of the Deity into Parts Every one Worshipping that in God and for a God which himself most stood in need of This dividing of the Simple Deity and Worshipping it Brokenly by parcells and piece-meal as manifested in all the Several Things of Nature and Parts of the world Justly Censured and Elegantly Perstringed by Prudentius against Symmachus Where Prudentius grants that Symmachus who declared that it was One thing which all worshipped when he sacrificed to Victory did sacrifice to God Almighty under that Partiall Notion as the Giver of Victory This in the Egyptian Allegory Osiris Mangled and Cut in pieces by Typhon Victory and Vertue as well as Neptune Mars and Bellona but several names or Notions of Jupiter in the Prologue of Plautus his Amphitryo Page 521 522 Vossius his opinion that these Deified Accidents and Natures of Things as well as the other Pagan Invisible Gods were commonly lookt upon by the Vulgar as so many Single Substantiall Minds or Spirits Created by the Supreme God and appointed to preside over those several things respectively Where it is acknowledged that neither the Political nor the Poetical Gods of the Pagans were taken so much as by the Vulgar for so many Independent Deities Page 523 524 Probable that by these Gods the Wiser Pagans sometimes understood Demons in Generall or Collectively that is whosoever they were that were appointed to preside over those several Things or dispense them As
to wit of him who can Inflict Eternal Punishments Sensless Matter the Atheists Natural God the Leviathan or Civil Sovereign his Artificial One. Religion thus disowned and disclaimed by Politicians as Inconsistent with Civil Power could not be the Creature of Political Art Thus all the Three Atheistick Pretences to Salve the Phaenomenon of Religion from Fear Ignorance of Causes and Fiction of Politicians fully Confuted Page 698 700 But because besides those Ordinary Phaenomena before mentioned there are certain other Extraordinary ones that cannot be Salved by Atheists which therefore they will impute Partly to Mens Fear and Ignorance and Partly to the Fiction and Imposture of Civil Governours viz. Apparitions Miracles and Prophecies the Reality of these here also to be briefly Vindicated Page 700 First as for Apparitions Though much of Fabulosity in these Relations yet unquestionably something of Truth Atheists imputing these things to mens mistaking their Dreams and Phancies for Sensations Contradict their own Fundamental Principle That Sense is the onely Criterion of Truth as also Derogate more from Humane Testimony then they ought ibid. That some Atheists Sensible hereof have acknowledged the Reality of Apparitions concluding them nevertheless to be the Meer Creatures of Imagination as if a Strong Phancy could produce Real Substances or Objects of Sense The Fanaticism of Atheists who will rather Believe the greatest Impossibilities then endanger the Being of a God Invisible Ghosts Permanent easily introduce One Supreme Ghost of the whole World Page 700 701 Democritus yet further Convinced That there were Invisible Beings Superiour to Men Independent upon Imagination and Permanent called by him Idols but having nothing Immortal in them and therefore that a God could be no more proved from the Existence of them then of Men. Granted by him that there were not onely Terrestrial but also Aerial and Aetherial Animals and that all those Vast Regions of the Universe above were not Desert and Uninhabited Here something of the Fathers asserting Angels to have Bodies but more afterwards Page 701 702 To this Phaenomenon of Apparitions may be added those Two others of Witches and Demoniacks both of these proving That Spirits are not Phancies nor Inhabitants of mens Brains onely but of the World as also That there are some Impure Spirits a Confirmation of the Truth of Christianity The Confident Exploders of Witchcraft suspicable for Atheism As for Demoniacks or Energumeni certain from Josephus That the Jews did not take these Demons or Devils for Bodily Diseases but Real Substances possessing the Bodies of Men. Nor probable that they supposed as the Gnosticks afterward all Diseases to be the Infestation of Evil Spirits nor yet as some think all Demoniacks to be Mad-men But when there were any Unusual and Extraordinary Symptoms in any Bodily Distemper but especially that of Madness they supposing this to be Supernatural imputed it to the Infestation of some Devil Thus also the Greeks Page 702 704 That Demoniacks and Energumeni are a Real Phaenomenon and that there are such also in these Times of ours Asserted by Fernelius and Sennertus Such Maniacal Persons as not onely discover Secrets but also speak Languages which they had never learnt Vnquestionably Demoniacks or Energumeni That there have been such in the Times since our Saviour proved out of Psellus as also from Fernelius This for the Vindication of Christianity against those who suspect the Scripture Demoniacks for Figments Page 704 706 The Second Extraordinary Phaenomenon Proposed That of Miracles and Effects Supernatural That there have been such things amongst the Pagans and since the Times of Christianity too Evident from their Records But more Instances of these in Scripture Page 706 Two Sorts of Miracles First Such as though they cannot be done by Ordinary Causes yet may be effected by the Natural Power of Invisible Spirits Angels or Demons As Illiterate Demoniacks speaking Greek Such amongst the Pagans that Miracle of the Whetstone cut in two with a Razour Secondly Such as transcend the Natural Power of all Second Causes and Created Beings Page 706 707 That late Politico-Theological Treatise denying both these Sorts of Miracles Inconsiderable and not deserving here a Confutation Page 707 Supposed in Deut. That Miracles of the Former sort might be done by False Prophets in Confirmation of Idolatry Wherefore Miracles alone not sufficient to confirm every Doctrine ibid. Accordingly in the New Testament do we read of ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Lying Miracles that is Miracles done in Confirmation of a Lie and by the Power of Satan c. God permitting it in way of Probation of some and Punishment of others Miracles done for the promoting of Creature-Worship or Idolatry in stead of Justifying the same themselves Condemned by it Page 708 Had the Miracles of our Saviour been all of the Former Kind onely yet ought the Jews according to Moses Law to have acknowledged him for a True Prophet he coming in the Name of the Lord and not Exhorting to Idolatry Supposed in Deut. That God would not Permit False Prophets to doe Miracles save onely in the Case of Idolatry or when the Doctrine is discoverable to be False by the Light of Nature because that would be an Invincible Temptation Our Saviour That Eximious Prophet foretold by whom God would again reveal his Will to the World and no more out of Flaming Fire Nevertheless some Miracles of our Saviour Christ 's such also as could be done onely by the Power of God Almighty Page 708 709 All Miracles evince Spirits to disbelieve which is to disbelieve Sense or Vnreasonably to Derogate from Humane Testimony Had the Gentiles entertained the Faith of Christ without Miracles This it self would have been a Great Miracle Page 709 The Last Extraordinary Phaenomenon Divination or Prophecy This also evinces Spirits called Gods by the Pagans and thus that of theirs True If Divination then Gods 710 Two Sorts of Predictions likewise as of Miracles First such as might proceed from the Natural Presageing Power of Created Spirits Such Predictions acknowledged by Democritus upon account of his Idols Not so much Contingency in Humane Actions by reason of Mens Liberty of Will as some suppose Page 710 711 Another Sort of Predictions of Future Events Imputable onely to the Supernatural Prescience of God Almighty Epicurus his Pretence That Divination took away Liberty of Will either as Supposing or Making a Necessity Some Theists also denying the Prescience of God Almighty upon the same Account Certain That no Created Being can foreknow Future Events otherwise then in their Causes Wherefore Predictions of such Events as had no Necessary Antecedent Causes Evince a God Page 711 712 That there is Foreknowledge of Future Events Unforeknowable to Men formerly the general Perswasion of Mankind Oracles and Predictions amongst the Pagans which Evince Spirits as that of Actius Navius Most of the Pagan Oracles from the Natural Presageing Power of Demons Nevertheless some Instancâs of Predictions of a higher kind amongst them as that
Neoterick Christians is intended only to vindicate what was the constant Doctrine of the Christian Church in its greatest purity as shall be made manifest and not to introduce any New-fangled conceit of our own V. We must now proceed to give a more full and perfect account of these three several Fates or Hypotheses of the Mundane System before mentioned together with the Grounds of them beginning first with that which we Principally intend the Confutation of the Atheistical or Democritical Fate Which as it is a thing of the most dangerous Consequence of all so it seems to be most spreading and infectious in these latter times Now this Atheistical System of the World that makes all things to be Materially and Mechanically Necessary without a God is built upon a peculiar Physiological Hypothesis different from what hath been generally received for many Ages which is called by some Atomical or Corpuscular by others Mechanical of which we must therefore needs give a full and Perfect Account And we shall do it first in General briefly not descending to those minute Particularities of it which are disputed amongst these Atomists themselves in this manner The Atomical Physiology supposes that Body is nothing else but ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã that is Extended Bulk and resolves therefore that nothing is to be attributed to it but what is included in the Nature and Idea of it viz. more or less Magnitude with Divisibility into Parts Figure and Position together with Motion or Rest but so as that no part of Body can ever Move it Self but is alwaies moved by something else And consequently it supposes that there is no need of any thing else besides these simple Elements of Magnitude Figure Site and Motion which are all clearly intelligible as different Modes of extended Substance to salve the Corporeal Phaenomena by and therefore not of any Substantial Forms distinct from the Matter nor of any other Qualities really existing in the Bodies without besides the Results or Aggregates of those simple Elements and the Disposition of the Insensible Parts of Bodies in respect of Figure Site and Motion nor of any Intentional Species or Shews propagated from the Objects to our Senses nor lastly of any other kind of Motion or Action really distinct from Local Motion such as Generation and Alteration they being neither Intelligible as Modes of extended Substance nor any ways necessary Forasmuch as the Forms and Qualities of Bodies may well be conceived to be nothing but the Result of those simple Elements of Magnitude Figure Site and Motion variously compounded together in the same manner as Syllables and Words in great variety result from the different Combinations and Conjunctions of a few Letters or the simple Elements of Speech and the Corporeal Part of Sensation and particularly that of Vision may be salved only by Local Motion of Bodies that is either by Corporeal Effluvia called Simulachra Membranae and Exuviae streaming continually from the Surface of the Objects or rather as the later and more refined Atomists conceived by Pressure made from the Object to the Eye by means of Light in the Medium So that ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã The Sense taking Cognizance of the Object by the Subtle Interposed Medium that is tense and stretched thrusting every way from it upon the Optick Nerves doth by that as it were by a Staff touch it Again Generation and Corruption may be sufficiently explained by Concretion and Secretion or Local Motion without Substantial Forms and Qualities And lastly those sensible Ideas of Light and Colours Heat and Cold Sweet and Bitter as they are distinct things from the Figure Site and Motion of the insensible Parts of Bodies seem plainly to be nothing else but our own Phansies Passions and Sensations however they be vulgarly mistaken for Qualities in the Bodies without us VI. Thus much may suffice for a General Accompt of the Atomical Physiology We shall in the next Place consider the Antiquity thereof as also what notice Aristotle hath taken of it and what Account he gives of the same For though Epicurus went altogether this way yet it is well known that he was not the first Inventor of it But it is most commonly fathered on Democritus who was Senior both to Aristotle and Plato being reported to have been born the year after Socrates from whose Fountains Cicero saith that Epicurus watered his Orchards and of whom Sex Empiricus and Laertius testify that he did ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã cashier Qualities and Plutarch that he made the first Principles of the whole Universe ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Atoms devoid of all Qualities and Passions But Laertius will have Leucippus who was somewhat Senior to Democritus to be the first Inventor of this Philosophy though he wrote not so many Books concerning it as Democritus did Aristotle who often takes notice of this Philosophy and ascribes it commonly to Leucippus and Democritus jointly gives us this description of it in his Metaphysicks ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Leucippus and his Companion Democritus make the first Principles of all things to be Plenum and Vacuum Body and Space whereof one is Ens the other Non-ens and the differences of Body which are only Figure Order and Position to be the Causes of all other things Which Differences they call by these Names Rysmus Diathigte and Trope And in his Book De Anima having declared that Democritus made Fire and the Soul to consist of Round Atoms he describes those Atoms of his after this manner ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã They are saith he like those Ramenta or dusty Particles which appear in the Sun-Beams an Omnifarious Seminary whereof Democritus makes to be the first Elements of the whole Vniverse and so doth Leucippus likewise Elsewhere the same Aristotle tells us that these two Philosophers explained Generation and Alteration without Forms and Qualities by Figures and Local Motion ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Democritus and Leucippus having made Figures or variously figured Atoms the first Principles make Generation and Alteration out of these namely Generation together with Corruption from the Concretion and Secretion of them but Alteration from the change of their Order and Position Again he elsewhere takes notice of that Opinion of the Atomists that all Sense was a kind of Touch and that the Sensible Qualities of Bodies were to be resolved into Figures imputing it not only to Democritus but also to the Generality of the old Philosophers but very much disliking the same ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Democritus and most of the Physiologers here commit a very great Absurdity in that they make all Sense to be Touch and resolve sensible Qualities into the Figures of insensible Parts or Atoms And this Opinion he endeavours to confute by these Arguments First because there is Contrariety in Qualities as in Black and White Hot and Cold Bitter and Sweet but there is no Contrariety in Figures for a Circular Figure is not Contrary to a Square or Multangular and
the Rational Soul the Incorporeity of any Substance and by consequence the Existence of any Deity distinct from the Corporeal World And as for that Pretence of theirs that Senseless Matter may as well become Sensitive and as it were kindled into Life and Cogitation as a Body that was devoid of Light and Heat may be Kindled into Fire and Flame this seems to argue too much Ignorance of the Doctrine of Bodies in men otherwise Learned and Ingenious The best Naturalists having already concluded That Fire and Flame is nothing but such a Motion of the Insensible Parts of a Body as whereby they are violently agitated and many times dissipated and scattered from each other begetting in the mean time tââse Phancies of Light and Heat in Animals Now there is no difficulty at all in conceiving that the Insensible Particles of a Body which were before quiescent may be put into Motion this being nothing but a New Modification of them and no Entity reâlly distinct from the Substance of Body as Life Sense and Cogitation are There is nothing in Fire and Flame or a Kindled Body different from other Bodies but only the Motion or Mechanism and Phancie of it And therefore it is but a crude conceit which the Atheists and Corporealists of former times have been always so fond of That Souls are nothing but Firie or Flammeous Bodies For though Heat in the Bodies of Animals be a Necessary Instrument for Soul and Life to act by in them yet it is a thing really distinct from Life and a Red hot Iron hath not therefore any nearer approximation to Life than it had before nor the Flame of a Candle than the extinguisht Snuff or Tallow of it the difference between them being only in the Agitation of the Insensible Parts We might also add that according to this Hypothesis the Souls of Animals could not be Numerically the same throughout the whole space of their Lives Since that Fire that needs a Pabulum to prey upon doth not continue alwaies one and the same Numerical Substance The Soul of a new born Animal could be no more the same with the Soul of that Animal several years after than the Flame of a new lighted Candle is the same with that Flame that twinkles last in the Socket Which indeed are no more the same than a River or Stream is the same at several distances of time Which Reason may be also extended further to prove the Soul to be no Body at all since the Bodies of all Animals are in a perpetual Flux XXXVIII We have now sufficiently performed our first Task which was to show from the Origin of the Atomical Physiology that the Doctrine of Incorporeal Substance must needs spring up together with it We shall in the next place make it manifest that the Inward Constitution of this Philosophy is also such that whosoever really entertains it and rightly understands it must of necessity admit Incorporeal Substance likewise First therefore the Atomical Hypothesis allowing nothing to Body but what is either included in the Idaea of a thing Impenetrably extended or can clearly be conceived to be a Mode of it as more or less Magnitude with Divisibility Figure Site Motion and Rest together with the Results of their several Combinations cannot possibly make Life and Cogitation to be Qualities of Body since they are neither contained in those things before mentioned nor can result from any ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã or Conjugations of them Wherefore it must needs be granted that Life and Cogitation are the Attributes of another Substance distinct from Body or Incorporeal Again since according to the Tenour of this Physiology Body hath no other Action belonging to it but that of Local Motion which Local Motion as such is Essentially Heterokinesie that which never springs originally from the thing it self moving but alwaies from the Action of some other Agent upon it That is since no Body could ever move it self it follows undeniably that there must be something else in the World besides Body or else there could never have been any Motion in it Of which we shall speak more afterwards Moreover according to this Philosophy the Corporeal Phaenomena themselves cannot be salved by Mechanism alone without Phancie Now Phancie is no Mode of Body and therefore must needs be a Mode of some other kind of Being in our selves that is Cogitative and Incorporeal Furthermore it is evident from the Principles of this Philosophy that Sense it self is not a mere Corporeal Passion from Bodies without in that it supposeth that there is nothing really in Bodies like to those Phantastick Idaea's that we have of Sensible things as of Hot and Cold Red and Green Bitter and Sweet and the like which therefore must needs owe their Being to some Activity of the Soul it self and this is all one as to make it Incorporeal Lastly from this Philosophy it is also manifest that Sense is not the ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã of Truth concerning Bodies themselves it confidently pronouncing that those supposed Qualities of Bodies represented such by Sense are merely Phantastical things from whence it plainly follows that there is something in us superiour to Sense which judges of it detects its Phantastry and condemns its Imposture and determines what really is and is not in Bodies without us which must needs be a higher Self-active Vigour of the Mind that will plainly speak it to be Incorporeal XXXIX And now this Atomical Physiology of the Ancients seems to have two Advantages or Preeminences belonging to it the first whereof is this That it renders the Corporeal World Intelligible to us since Mechanism is a thing that we can clearly understand and we cannot clearly and distinctly conceive any thing in Bodies else To say that this or that is done by a Form or Quality is nothing else but to say that it is done we know not how or which is yet more absurd to make our very Ignorance of the Cause disguised under those Terms of Forms and Qualities to be it self the Cause of the Effect Moreover Hot and Cold Red and Green Bitter and Sweet c. formally considered may be clearly conceived by us as different Phancies and Vital Passions in us occasioned by different Motions made from the objects without upon our Nerves but they can never be clearly understood as absolute Qualities in the Bodies themselves really distinct from their Mechanical Dispositions nor is there indeed any more reason why they should be thought such than that when a Man is pricked with a Pin or wounded with a Sword the Pain which he feels should be thought to be an Absolute Qualitie in the Pin or Sword So long as our Sensible Idaea's are taken either for Substantial Forms or Qualities in Bodies without us really distinct from the Substance of the Matter so long are they perfectly unintelligible by us For which Cause Timaeus Locrus Philosophizing as it seemeth after this manner did consentaneously thereunto determine
it the greatest Impudence or Madness for men to assert that Animals also consisted of mere Mechanism or that Life and Sense Reason and Understanding were really nothing else but Local Motion and consequently that themselves were but Machins and Automata Wherefore they joyned both Active and Passive Principles together the Corporeal and Incorporeal Nature Mechanism and Life Atomology and Pneumatology and from both these united they made up one entire System of Philosophy correspondent with and agreeable to the true and real World without them And this System of Philosophy thus consisting of the Doctrine of Incorporeal Substance whereof God is the Head together with the Atomical and Mechanical Physiology seems to have been the only Genuine Perfect and Complete XLII But it did not long continue thus for after a while this entire Body of Philosophy came to be Mangled and Dismembred some taking one Part of it alone and some another some snatching away the Atomical Physiology without the Pneumatology and Theology and others on the contrary taking the Theology and Doctrine of Incorporeals without the Atomical or Mechanical Physiology The former of these were Democritus Leucippus and Protagoras who took only the dead Carcase or Skeleton of the old Moschical Philosophy namely the Atomical Physiology the latter Plato and Aristotle who took indeed the better Part the Soul Spirit and Quintessence of it the Theology and Doctrine of Incorporeals but Unbodied and Devested of its most Proper and convenient Vehicle the Atomical Physiology whereby it became exposed to sundry Inconveniences XLIII We begin with Leucippus and Democritus Who being Atheistically inclined quickly perceived that they could not in the ordinary way of Physiologizing sufficiently secure themselves against a Deity nor effectually urge Atheism upon others forasmuch as Heraclitus and other Philosophers who held that all Substance was Body as well as themselves did notwithstanding assert a Corporeal Deity maintaining that the Form of the whole Corporeal World was God or else that he was ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã a certain kind of Body or Matter as for Example a Methodical and Rational Fire pervading as a Soul the whole Universe the particular Souls of men and Animals being but as it were so many pieces cut and sliced out of the great Mundane Soul so that according to them the whole Corporeal Universe or Mass of Body was one way or other a God a most Wise and Understanding Animal that did frame all Particularities within it self in the best manner possible and providently govern the same Wherefore those Atheists now apprehending upon what ticklish and uncertain Terms their Atheistical Philosophy then stood and how that those very Forms and Qualities and the Self-moving power of Body which were commonly made a Sanctuary for Atheism might notwithstanding chance to prove contrariwise the Latibulum and Asylum of a Deity and that a Corporeal God do what they could might lie lurking under them assaulting mens minds with doubtful Fears and Jealousies Understanding moreover that there was another kind of Physiology set on foot which banishing those Forms and Qualities of Body attributed nothing to it but Magnitude Figure Site and Motion without any Self-moving Power they seemed presently to apprehend some great Advantage to themselves and Cause from it and therefore greedily entertained this Atomical or Mechanical Physiology and violently cutting it off from that other part the Doctrine of Incorporeals which it was Naturally and Vitally united to endeavoured to serve their turns of it And now joining these two things together the Atomical Physiology which supposes that there is nothing in body but Magnitude Figure Site and Motion and that Prejudice or Prepossession of their own Minds that there was no other Substance in the World besides Body between them both they begat a certain Mongrel and Spurious Philosophy Atheistically-Atomical or Atomically-Atheistical But though we have so well proved that Leucippus and Democritus were not the first Inventors but only the Depravers and Adulterators of the Atomical Philosophy yet if any will notwithstanding obstinately contend that the first Invention thereof ought to be imputed to them the very Principles of their Atheism seeming to lead them naturally to this to strip and devest Body of all those Forms and Qualities it being otherwise Impossible for them surely and safely to exclude a Corporeal Deity yet so as that the Wit of these Atheists was also much to be admired in the managing and carrying on of those Principles in such a manner as to make up so Entire a System of Philosophy out of them all whose parts should be so coherent and consistent together We shall only say thus much That if those Atheists were the first Inventors of this Philosophy they were certainly very unhappy and unsuccessful in it whilst endeavouring by it to secure themselves from the Possibility and Danger of a Corporeal God they unawares laid a Foundation for the clear Demonstration of an Incorporeal one and were indeed so far from making up any such coherent Frame as is pretended that they were forced every where to contradict their own Principles so that Non-sence lies at the bottom of all and is interwoven throughout their whole Atheistical System And that we ought to take notice of the invincible power and Force of Truth prevailing irresistibly against all Endeavours to oppress it and how desperate the Cause of Atheism is when that very Atomical Hypothesis of theirs which they would erect and build up for a strong Castle to garrison themselves in proves a most Effectual Engine against themselves for the battering of all their Atheistical Structure down about their Ears XLIV Plato's Mutilation and Interpolation of the old Moschical Philosophy was a great deal more excusable when he took the Theology and Metaphysicks of it the whole Doctrine of Incorporeals and abandoned the Atomical or Mechanical way of Physiologizing Which in all Probability he did partly because those forementioned Atheists having so much abused that Philosophy adopting it as it were to themselves he thereupon began to entertain a Jealousie and Suspicion of it and partly because he was not of himself so inclinable to Physiology as Theology to the study of Corporeal as of Divine things which some think to be the reason why he did not attend to the Pythagorick System of the Corporeal World till late in his old Age. His Genius was such that he was Naturally more addicted to Idaea's than to Atoms to Formal and Final than to Material Causes To which may be added that the way of Physiologizing by Matter Forms and Qualities is a more Huffie and Phanciful thing than the other and lastly that the Atomical Physiology is more remote from Sense and vulgar Apprehension and therefore not so easily understood For which cause many learned Greeks of later times though they had read Epicurus his Works and perhaps Democritus his too yet they were not able to conceive how the Corporeal and Sensible Phaenomena could possibly be salved without
Interpreters it being resolved by many of them to be the Divine Intellect and commonly by others a Foreign Thing Whence it must needs be left doubtful whether he acknowledged any thing Incorporeal and Immortal at all in us And the rather because laying down this Principle That nothing is Incorporeal but what acts independently upon the Body he somewhere plainly determines that there is no Intellection without Corporeal Phantasms That which led Aristotle to all this positively to affirm the Corporeity of Sensitive Souls and to stagger so much concerning the Incorporeity of the Rational seems to have been his Doctrine of Forms and Qualities whereby Corporeal and Incorporeal Substance are confounded together so that the Limits of each could not be discerned by him Wherefore we cannot applaud Aristotle for this but that which we commend him for is chiefly these Four things First for making a Perfect Incorporeal Intellect to be the Head of all and Secondly for resolving that Nature as an Instrument of this Intellect does not merely act according to the Necessity of Material Motions but for Ends and Purposes though unknown to it self Thirdly for maintaining the Naturality of Morality and Lastly for asserting the ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Autexousie or Liberty from Necessity CHAP. II. In this Chapter are contained all the pretended Grounds of Reason for the Atheistick Hypothesis 1. That the Democritick Philosophy which is made up of these two Principles Corporealism and Atomism complicated together is Essentially Atheistical 2. Though Epicurus who was an Atomical-Corporealist pretended to assert a Democracy of Gods yet he was for all that an Absolute Atheist And that Atheists commonly Equivocate and Disguise themselves 3. That the Democritical Philosophy is nothing else but a System of Atheology or Atheism swaggering under the glorious Appearance of Philosophy And though there be another Form of Atheism which we call Stratonical yet the Democritick Atheism is only considerable all whose Dark Mysteries will be here revealed 4. That we being to treat concerning the Deity and to produce all that Profane and Vnhallowed Stuff of Atheists in order to a Confutation the Divine Assistance and Direction ought to be implored 5. That there are Two things here to be performed First to shew what are the Atheist's pretended Grounds of Reason against the Deity and Secondly how they endeavour either to Salve or Confute the Contrary Phaenomena The First of those Grounds That no man can have an Idaea or Conception of God and that he is an Incomprehensible Nothing 6. The Second Atheistick Argument That there can be no Creation out of Nothing nor no Omnipotence because Nothing can come from Nothing and therefore whatsoever Substantially is was from Eternity Self-existent and Vncreated by any Deity 7. The Third pretended Reason against a Deity That the Strictest Notion of a God implying him to be Incorporeal there can be no such Incorporeal Deity because there is no other Substance but Body 8. The Atheists Pretence That the Doctrine of Incorporeal Substances sprung from a Ridiculous Mistaking of Abstract Names and Notions for Realities They Impudently make the Deity to be but the Chief of Spectres and an Oberon or Prince of Fairies and Phancies Their Fourth Argument against a Deity That to suppose an Incorporeal Mind to be the Original of all things is but to make a mere Accident and Abstract Notion to be the First Cause of all 9. Their Fifth Argument a Confutation of a Corporeal Deity from the Principles of Corporealism it self That Matter being the only Substance and all other Differences of things nothing but Accidents Generable and Corruptible no Living Vnderstanding Being can be Essentially Incorruptible The Stoical God Incorruptible only by Accident 19. Their Sixth Ratiocination from a Complication of Atomicism That the First Principle of all things whatsoever in the Vniverse is Atoms or Corpuscula devoid of all Qualities and consequently of Sense and Vnderstanding which spring up afterwards from a certain Composition of them and therefore Mind or Deity was not the First Original of all 11. In the Seventh place they disprove the Worlds Animation or its being govern'd by a Living Vnderstanding Animalish Nature presiding over the Whole Because Sense and Vnderstanding are a Peculiar Appendix to Flesh Blood and Brains and Reason is no where to be found but in Humane Form 12. The Eighth Atheistick Ground That God being taken by all for a most Happy Eternal and Immortal Animal or Living Being there can be no such thing because all Living Beings are Concretions of Atoms that were at first Generated and are liable to Death and Corruption by the Dissolution of their Compages And that Life is no simple Primitive Nature but an Accidental Modification of Compounded Bodies which upon the Disunion of their Parts vanisheth into Nothing 13. The Ninth pretended Atheistick Demonstration That by God is meant a first Cause or Mover which was not before moved by any thing else without it But Nothing can move it self and therefore there can be no Vnmoved Mover nor any First in the order of Causes that is a God 14. Their further Proof of this Principle That Nothing can move it self with an Atheistick Corollary from thence That no Thinking Being could be a First Cause no Cogitation arising of it self without a Cause which may be reckoned a Tenth Argument 15. Another Mystery of Atheism That all Knowledge and Mental Conception is the Information of the things themselves known existing without the Knower and a Passion from them and therefore the World must needs be before any Knowledge or Conception of it and no Knowledge or Conception before the World as its Cause 16. The Twelfth Argumentation That things could not be made by a God because they are so Faulty and Ill made that they were not contriv'd for the Good of Man and that the Deluge of Evils that overflows all shows that they did not proceed from any Deity 17. The Thirteenth Instance of the Atheists against a Deity from the Defect of Providence That in Humane Affairs all is Tohu and Bohu Chaos and Confusion 18. The Fourteenth Atheistick Ground That it is not possible for any one Being to Animadvert and Order all things in the distant places of the whole World at once But if it were possible That such Infinite Negotiosity would be Absolutely Inconsistent with Happiness 19. Several bold but slight Queries of Atheists Why the World was not made sooner and What God did before Why it was made at all since it was so long unmade and How the Architect of the World could rear up so huge a Fabrick 20. The Atheists Pretence That it is the great Interest of Mankind That there should be no God and that it was a Noble and Heroical Exploit of the Democriticks to chase away that affrightful Spectre out of the World and to free men from the continual Fear of a Deity and Punishment after Death imbittering all the Pleasures of Life 21. Another Pretence of
of Omnipotence can belong to nothing and this is all one as to say There can be no Deity VII Thirdly the Atheists argue against the stricter and higher sort of Theists who will have God to be the Creatour of the whole Corporeal Universe and all its Parts out of Nothing after this manner That which Created the whole Mass of Matter and Body cannot be it self Body Wherefore this Notion of God plainly implies him to be Incorporeal But there can be no Incorporeal Deity because by that word must needs be understood either that which hath no Magnitude nor Extension at all or else that which is indeed extended but otherwise than Body If the Word be taken in the former sence then nothing at all can be so Incorporeal as to be altogether Unextended and devoid of Geometrical Quantity because Extension is the very Essence of all Existent Entity and that which is altogether unextended is perfectly Nothing There can neither be any Substance nor Mode or Accident of any Substance no Nature whatsoever Unexended But if the Word Incorporeal be taken in the latter sence for that which is indeed Extended but otherwise than Body namely so as to penetrate Bodies and coexist with them this is also a thing next to Nothing since it can neither act upon any other thing nor be acted upon by or sensible of any thing It can neither do nor Suffer any thing Nam facere fungi nisi Corpus nulla potest res Wherefore to speak plainly this can be nothing else but empty Space or Vacuum which runs through all things without laying hold on any thing or being affected from any thing This is the only Incorporeal thing that is or can be in Nature Space or Place and therefore to suppose an Incorporeal Deity is to make Empty Space to be the Creatour of all Things This Argument is thus proposed by the Epicurean Poet. Quodcunque erit esse aliquid debebit id ipsum Augmine vel grandi vel parvo Cui si Tactus erit quamvis levis exiguúsque Corporum augebit numerum Summámque sequetur Sin Intactile erit nulla de parte quod ullam Rem prohibere queat per se transire meantem Scilicet hoc id erit Vacuum quod Inane vocamus Whatsoever is is Extended or hath Geometrical Quantity and Mensurability in it which if it be Tangible then it is Body and fills up a Place in the World being part of the whole Mass but if it be Intangible so that it cannot resist the Passage of any thing thorough it then it is nothing else but empty Space or Vacuum There is no Third thing besides these Two and therefore whatsoever is not Body is empty Space or Nothing Praeter Inane Corpora Tertia per se Nulla potest rerum in numero Natura relinqui Thus the Ancient Epicureans and Democriticks argued there being nothing Incorporeal but Space there can be no Incorporeal Deity But because this seems to give Advantage to the Theists in making Space Something or that which hath a Real Nature or Entity without our Conception from whence it will follow that it must needs be either it self a Substance or else a Mode of some Incorporeal Substance the Modern Democriticks are here more cautious and make Space to be no Nature really existing without us but only the Phantasm of a Body and as it were the Ghost of it which has no Reality without our Imagination So that there are not two Natures of Body and Space which must needs inferr two distinct Substances one whereof must be Incorporeal but only One Nature of Body The Consequence of which will be this That an Incorporeal Substance is all one with an Incorporeal Body and therefore Nothing VIII But because it is generally conceived that an Error cannot be sufficiently confuted without discovering ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã the Cause of the Mistake therefore the Atheists will in the next place undertake to show likewise the Original of this Doctrine of Incorporeal Substances and from what Misapprehension it sprung as also take occasion from thence further to disprove a Deity Wherefore they say that the Original of this Doctrine of Incorporeal Substances proceeded chiefly from the Abuse of Abstract Names both of Substances whereby the Essences of singular Bodies as of a Man or an Horse being Abstracted from those Bodies themselves are consider'd Universally as also of Accidents when they are consider'd alone without their Subjects or Substances The latter of which is a thing that Men have been necessitated to in order to the Computation or Reckoning of the Properties of Bodies the Comparing of them with one another the Adding Subtracting Multiplying and Dividing of them which could not be done so long as they are taken Concretely together with their Subjects But yet as there is some Use of those Abstract Names so the Abuse of them has been also very great Forasmuch as though they be really the Names of Nothing since the Essence of this and that Man is not any thing without the Man nor is an Accident any thing without its Substance yet men have been led into a gross mistake by them to imagine them to be Realities existing by themselves Which Infatuation hath chiefly proceeded from Scholasticks who have been so intemperate in the use of these Words that they could not make a Rational Discourse of any thing though never so small but they must stuff it with their Quiddities Entities Essences Haecceities and the like Wherefore these are they who being first deluded themselves have also deluded the World introducing an Opinion into the Minds of Men that the Essence of every thing is something without that thing it self and also Eternal and therefore when any thing is Made or Generated that there is no new Being produced but only an antecedent and Eternal Essence cloathed as it were with a new Garment of Existence As also that the mere Accidents of Bodies may exist alone by themselves without their Substances As for Example that the Life Sense and Understanding of Animals commonly call'd by the Names of Soul and Mind may exist without the Bodies or Substances of them by themselves after the Animals are dead which plainly makes them to be Incorporeal Substances as it were the Separate and Abstract Essences of Men. This hath been observed by a Modern Writer in these words Est Hominum Abstractorum tum in omni Vita tum in Philosophia magnus Vsus Abusus Abusus in eo consistit quòd cùm videant aliqui Considerari posse id est inferri in Rationes Accidentium Incrementa Decrementa sine Consideratione Corporum sive Subjectorum suorum id quod appellatur Abstrahere loquuntur de Accidentibus tanquam possent ab omni Corpore Separari Hinc enim Originem trahunt quorundam Metaphysicorum crassi Errores Nam ex eo quod Considerari potest Cogitatio sine consideratione Corporis inferre solent non esse Opus Corporis
Cogitantis It is a great Abuse that some Metaphysicians make of these Abstract Names because Cogitation can be considered alone without the consideration of Body therefore to conclude that it is not the Action or Accident of that Body that thinks but a Substance by it self And the same Writer elsewhere observes That it is upon this Ground that when a Man is dead and buried they say his Soul that is his Life can walk separated from his Body and is seen by night amongst the Graves By which means the Vulgar are confirmed in their Superstitious Belief of Ghosts Spirits Daemons Devils Fayries and Hob-goblins Invisible Powers and Agents called by several Names and that by those Persons whose work it ought to be rather to free men from such Superstition Which Belief at first had another Original not altogether unlike the former Namely from mens mistaking their own Phancies for Things Really existing without them For as in the sense of Vision men are commonly deceived in supposing the Image behind the Glass to be a Real thing existing without themselves whereas it is indeed nothing but their own Phancy In like manner when the Minds of Men strongly possess'd with Fear especially in the Dark raise up the Phantasms of Spectres Bug-bears or Affrightful Apparitions to them they think them to be Objects really existing without them and call them Ghosts and Spirits whilst they are indeed nothing but their own Phancies So the Phantasm or Phancy of a Deity which is indeed the Chief of all Spectres created by Fear has upon no other Accompt been taken for a Reality To this purpose a Modern Writer From the Fear that proceeds from the Ignorance it self of what it is that hath the Power to do men Good or Harm men are inclined to suppose and Feign to themselves several kinds of Powers Invisible and to stand in awe of their own Imaginations and in time of Distress to invoke them as also in the time of an expected good Success to give them thanks making the Creatures of their own Fancies their Gods Which though it be prudently spoken in the Plural Number that so it might be diverted and put off to the Heathen Gods yet he is very simple that does not perceive the reason of it to be the same concerning that one Deity which is now commonly worshipped and that therefore this also is but the Creature of Mens Fear and Phancie the Chief of all Phantastick Ghosts and Spectres as it were an Oberon or Prince of Fayries and Phancies This we say was the first Original of that Vulgar Belief of Invisible Powers Ghosts and Gods mens taking their own Phancies for Things really Existing without them And as for the Matter and Substance of these Ghosts they could not by their own natural Cogitation fall into any other Conceit but that it was the same with that which appeareth in a Dream to one that sleepeth or in a Looking-glass to one that is awake Thin Aerial Bodies which may appear and vanish when they please But the Opinion that such Spirits were Incorporeal and Immaterial could never enter into the minds of men by Nature Unabused by Doctrine but it sprung up from those deceiving and deceived Literati Scholasticks Philosophers and Theologers enchanting mens Understandings and making them believe that the Abstract Notions of Accidents and Essences could exist alone by themselves without the Bodies as certain Separate and Incorporeal Substances To Conclude therefore To make an Incorporeal Mind to be the Cause of all things is to make our own Phancie an Imaginary Ghost of the World to be a Reality and to suppose the mere Abstract Notion of an Accident and a Separate Essence to be not only an Absolute thing by it self and a Real Substance Incorporeal but also the first Original of all Substances and of whatsoever is in the Universe And this may be reckon'd for a Fourth Atheistick Ground IX Fifthly the Atheists pretend further to prove that there is no other Substance in the World besides Body as also from the Principles of Corporealism it self to evince that there can be no Corporeal Deity after this manner No man can devise any other Notion of Substance than that it is a thing Extended existing without the Mind not Imaginary but Real and Solid Magnitude For whatsoever is not Extended is Nowhere and Nothing So that Res Extensa is the only Substance the solid Basis and Substratum of all Now this is the very self-same thing with Body For ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã or Resistence seems to be a necessary Consequence and Result from Extension and they that think otherwise can show no reason why Bodies may not also penetrate one another as some Corporealists think they do From whence it is inferred that Body or Matter is the only Substance of all things And whatsoever else is in the World that is all the Differences of Bodies are nothing but several Accidents and Modifications of this Extended Substance Body or Matter Which Accidents though they may be sometimes call'd by the names of Real Qualities and Forms and though there be different apprehensions concerning them amongst Philosophers yet generally they agree in this that there are these two Properties belonging to them First that none of them can subsist alone by themselves without Extended Substance or Matter as the Basis and Support of them And Secondly that they may be all destroyed without the Destruction of any Substance Now as Blackness and Whiteness Heat and Cold so likewise Life Sense and Understanding are such Accidents Modifications or Qualities of Body that can neither exist by themselves and may be destroyed without the Destruction of any Substance or Matter For if the Parts of the Body of any Living Animal be disunited and separated from one another or the Organical Disposition of the Matter alter'd those Accidents Forms or Qualities of Life and Understanding will presently vanish away to Nothings all the Substance of the Matter still remaining one where or other in the Universe entire and Nothing of it lost Wherefore the Substance of Matter and Body as distinguished from the Accidents is the only thing in the world that is Uncorruptible and Undestroyable And of this it is to be understood that Nothing can be made out of Nothing and Destroyed to Nothing i. e. that every entire thing that is Made or Generated must be made of some preexistent Matter which Matter was from Eternity Self-existent and Unmade and is also undestroyable and can never be reduc'd to Nothing It is not to be understood of the Accidents themselves that are all Makeable and Destroyable Generable and Corruptible Whatsoever is in the World is but ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Matter so and so Modified or Qualified all which Modifications and Qualifications of Matter are in their own nature Destroyable and the Matter it self as the Basis of them not necessarily determin'd to this or that Accident is the only ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã the only Necessarily
at all Incorruptible but the Substance of Matter it self All Systems and Compages of it all ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã and ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã all Concretions and Coagmentations of Matter divided by Motion together with the Qualities resulting from them are Corruptible and Destroyable Quae est Coagmentatio rerum non dissolubilis Death destroys not the Substance of any Matter For as no Matter came from Nothing but was Self-eternal so none of it can ever vanish into Nothing but it dissolves all the Aggregations of it Non sic interimit Mors res ut Materiaï Corpora conficiat sed coetum dissupat ollis Life is no Substantial thing nor any Primitive or Simple Nature it is only an Accident or Quality arising from the Aggregation and Contexture of Atoms or Corpuscula which when the Compages of them is disunited and dissolved though all the Substance still remain scattered and dispersed yet the Life utterly perishes and vanisheth into Nothing No Life is Immortal there is no Immortal Soul nor Immortal Animal or Deity Though this whole Mundane System were it self an Animal yet being but an Aggregation of Matter it would be both Corruptible and Mortal Wherefore since no living Being can possibly have any security of its future Permanency there is none that can be perfectly Happy And it was rightly determined by our Fellow-Atheists the Hedonicks and Cyrenaicks ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Perfect Happiness is a mere Notion a Romantick Fiction a thing which can have no Existence any where This is recorded to have been one of Democritus his chief Arguments against a Deity because there can be no Living Being Immortal and consequently none perfectly Happy Cum Democritus quia nihil semper suo statu maneat neget esse quicquam sempiternum nonne Deum ità tollit omnino ut nullam Opinionem ejus reliquam faciat XIII A Ninth pretended Demonstration of the Democritick Atheists is as followeth By God is understood a First Cause or Mover which being not before acted upon by any thing else but acting Originally from it self was the Beginning of all things Now it is an indubitable Axiom and generally received amongst Philosophers that Nothing can move it self but Quicquid movetur ab alio movetur Whatsoever is moved is moved by something else nothing can act otherwise than it is made to act by something without it acting upon it The necessary Consequence whereof is this That there can be no such thing as any First Mover or First Cause that is no God This Argument is thus urged by a Modern Writer agreeably to the Sence of the Ancient Democriticks Ex eo quòd nihil potest movere seipsum non inferetur id quod inferri solet nempe Aeternum Immobile sed contrà Aeternum Motum siquidem ut verum est nihil moveri à seipso ita etiam verum est nihil moveri nisi à Moto From hence that Nothing can move it self it cannot be rightly inferred as commonly it is that there is an Eternal Immoveable Mover that is a God but only an Eternal Moved Mover or that one thing was moved by another from Eternity without any first Mover Because as it is true that nothing can be Moved but from it self so it is likewise true that nothing can be moved but from that which was it self also moved by something else before and so the progress upwards must needs be infinite without any Beginning or first Mover The plain Drift and Scope of this Ratiocination is no other then this to shew that the Argument commonly taken from Motion to prove a God that is a First Mover or Cause is not only Ineffectual and Inconclusive but also that on the contrary it may be demonstrated from that very Topick of Motion that there can be no Absolutely First Mover No First in the order of Causes that is no God XIV Tenthly because the Theists conceive that though no Body can move it self yet a perfect Cogitative and Thinking Being might be the Beginning of all and the first Cause of Motion the Atheists will endeavour to evince the contrary in this manner No man can conceive how any Cogitation which was not before should rise up at any time but that there was some cause for it without the Thinker For else there can be no reason given why this Thought rather than that and at this time rather than another should start up Wherefore this is universally true of all Motion and Action whatsoever as it was rightly urged by the Stoicks that there can be no ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã no Motion without a Cause i. e. no Motion which has not some Cause without the Subject of it Or as the same thing is expressed by a modern Writer Nothing taketh Beginning from it self but from the Action of some other Immediate Agent without it Wherefore no Thinking Being could be a First Cause any more than an Automaton or Machin could To this it is further argued that these two Notions the one of a Knowing Vnderstanding Being the other of a Perfectly Happy Being are Contradictious because all Knowledge Essentially implies Dependence upon something else as its Cause Scientia Intellectus signum est Potentiae ab alio Dependentis id quod non est Beatissimum They conclude that Cogitation and all Action whatsoever is really nothing else but Local Motion which is Essentially Heterokinesie that which can never rise of it self but is caused by some other Agent without its Subject XV. In the Eleventh place the Democritick Atheists reason thus If the World were made by any Antecedent Mind or Understanding that is by a Deity then there must needs be an Idaea Platform and Exemplar of the whole World before it was made and consequently Actual Knowledge both in order of Time and Nature before Things But all Knowledge is the Information of the things themselves known all Conception of the Mind is a Passion from the things Conceived and their Activity upon it and is therefore Juniour to them Wherefore the World and Things were before Knowledge and the Conception of any Mind and no Knowledge Mind or Deity before the World as its Cause This Argument is thus proposed by the Atheistick Poet Exemplum porro gignundis rebus ipsa Notities hominum Divis unde insita primùm Quid vellent facere ut seirent animoque viderent Quove modo est unquam Vis cognita Principiorum Quidnam inter sese permutato Ordine possent Si non ipsa dedit specimen Natura creandi How could the supposed Deity have a Pattern or Platform in his Mind to frame the World by and whence should he receive it How could he have any Knowledge of Men before they were made as also what himself should will to do when there was nothing How could he understand the Force and Possibility of the Principles what they would produce when variously combined together before Nature and Things themselves by Creating had given a Specimen XVI
That the first Elements Fire water Air and Earth were all made by Nature and Chance without any Art or Method and then that the bodies of the Sun Moon and Stars and the whole Heavens were afterward made out of those Elements as devoid of all manner of Life and only fortuitously moved and mingled together and lastly that the whole Mundane System together with the orderly Seasons of the year as also Plants Animals and Men did arise after the same manner from the mere Fortuitous Motion of sensless and stupid Matter In the very same manner does Plato state this Controversie again betwixt Theists and Atheists in his Philebus ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Whether shall we say O Protarchus that this whole Vniverse is dispensed ond ordered by a mere Irrational Temerarious and Fortuitous Principle and so as it happens or contrariwise as our fore-fathers have instructed us that Mind and a certain Wonderful Wisdom did at first frame and does still govern all things Wherefore we conclude that Plato took no notice of any other Form of Atheism as then set on foot than such as derives all things from a mere Fortuitous Principle from Nature and Chance that is the unguided Motion of Matter without any Plastick Artificialness or Methodicalness either in the whole Universe or the parts of it But because this kind of Atheism which derives all things from a mere Fortuitous Nature had been managed two manner of ways by Democritus in the way of Atoms and by Anaximander and others in the way of Forms and Qualities of which we are to speak in the next place therefore the Atheism which Plato opposes was either the Democritick or the Anaximandrian Atheism or else which is most probable both of them together IX It is hardly imaginable that there should be no Philosophick Atheists in the world before Democritus and Leucippus Plato long since concluded that there have been Atheists more or less in every Age when he bespeaks his young Atheist after this manner ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã The full sence whereof seems to be this Neither you my Son nor your friends Democritus Leucippus and Protagoras are the first who have entertained this Opinion concerning the Gods but there have been always some more or less sick of this Atheistick Disease Wherefore we shall now make a diligent search and enquiry to see if we can find any other Philosophers who Atheized before Democritus and Leucippus as also what Form of Atheism they entertained Aristotle in his Metaphysicks speaking of the Quaternio of Causes affirms that many of those who first Philosophized assigned only a Material Cause of the whole Mundane System without either Intending or Efficient Cause The reason whereof he intimates to have been this because they asserted Matter to be the only Substance and that whatsoever else was in the World besides the substance or bulk of Matter were all nothing else but ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã different Passions and Affections Accidents and Qualities of Matter that were all Generated out of it and Corruptible again into it the Substance of Matter always remaining the same neither Generated nor Corrupted but from Eternity unmade Aristotle's words are these ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Most of those who first philosophized took notice of no other Principle of things in the Vniverse than what is to be referred to the Material Cause for that out of which all things are and out of which they are first made and into which they are all at last corrupted and resolved the Substance always remaining the same and being changed only in its Passions and Qualities This they concluded to be the first Original and Principle of all things X. But the meaning of these old Material Philosophers will be better understood by those Exceptions which Aristotle makes against them which are Two First that because they acknowledged no other Substance besides Matter that might be an Active Principle in the Universe it was not possible for them to give any account of the Original of Motion and Action ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Though all Generation be made never so much out of something as the Matter yet the question still is by what means this cometh to pass and what is the Active Cause which produceth it because the Subject-matter cannot change it self As for example neither Timber nor Brass is the cause that either of them are changed for Timber alone does not make a Bed nor Brass a Statue but there must be something else as the Cause of the Change and to enquire after this is to enquire after another Principle besides Matter which we would call that from whence Motion springs In which words Aristotle intimates that these old Material Philosopers shuffled in Motion and Action into the World unaccountably or without a Cause forasmuch as they acknowledged no other Principle of Things besides Passive Matter which could never move change or alter it self XI And Aristotle's second Exception against these old Material Philosophers is this that since there could be no Intending Causality in Sensless and Stupid Matter which they made to be the only Principle of all things they were not able to assign ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã any Cause of Well and Fit and so could give no account of the Regular and Orderly Frame of this Mundane System ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã That things partly are so well in the World and partly are made so well cannot be imputed either to Earth or Water or any other sensless Body much less is it reasonable to attribute so noble and Excellent an Effect as this to mere Chance or Fortune Where Aristotle again intimates that as these Material Philosophers shuffled in Motion into the world without a Cause so likewise they must needs suppose this Motion to be altogether Fortuitous and Unguided and thereby in a manner make Fortune which is nothing but the absence or defect of an Intending Cause to supply the room both of the Active and Intending Cause that is Efficient and Final Whereupon Aristotle subjoyns a Commendation of Anaxagoras as the first of the Ionick Philosophers who introduced Mind or Intellect for a Principle in the Universe that in this respect he alone seemed to be sober and in his wits comparatively with those others that went before him who talked so idly and Atheistically For Anaxagoras his Principle was such saith Aristotle as was ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã at once a cause of Motion and also of Well and Fit of all the Regularity Aptitude Pulchritude and Order that is in the whole Universe And thus it seems Anaxagoras himself had determined ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Anaxagoras saith that Mind is the only Cause of Right and Well this being proper to Mind to aim at Ends and Good and to order one thing Fitly for the sake of another Whence it was that Anaxagoras concluded Good also as well as Mind to have been a Principle of the Universe ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã
Anaxagoras makes Good a Principle as that which moves For though Mind move Matter yet it moves it for the sake of something and being it self as it were first moved by Good So that Good is also a Principle And we note this the rather to show how well these three Philosophers Aristotle Plato and Anaxagoras agreed all together in this excellent Truth That Mind and Good are the First Principle of all things in the Universe XII And now we think it is sufficiently evident that these old Materialists in Aristotle whoever they were were downright Atheists not so much because they made all Substance to be Body or Matter for Heraclitus first and after him Zeno did the like deriving the Original of all things from Fire as well as Anaximenes did from Air and Thales is supposed by Aristotle to have done from Water and that with some little more seeming plausibility since Fire being a more Subtle and Moveable Body than any other was therefore thought by some of those Ancients to be ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã the most Incorporeal of all Bodies as Earth was for that cause rejected by all those Corporeal Philosophers from being a Principle by reason of the grossness of its parts But Heraclitus and Zeno notwithstanding this are not accounted Atheists because they supposed their Fiery Matter to have not only Life but also a perfect Vnderstanding Originally belonging to it as also the whole World to be an Animal Whereas those Materialists of Aristotle made Sensless and Stupid Matter devoid of all Vnderstanding and Life to be the first Principle and Root of all things For when they supposed Life and Vnderstanding as well as all other Differences of Things to be nothing but mere Passions and Accidents of Matter Generable out of it and Corruptible again into it and indeed to be produced but in a Secundary way from the Fortuitous Commixture of those first Elementary Qualities Heat and Cold Moist and Dry Thick and Thin they plainly implied the substance of Matter in it self to be devoid of all Life and Vnderstanding Now if this be not Atheism to derive the Original of all things even of Life and Mind it self from Dead and Stupid Matter Fortuitously Moved then there can be no such thing at all XIII Moreover Aristotle's Materialists concluded every thing besides the Substance of Matter which is in it self indifferent to al things and consequently all particular and determinate Beings to be Generable and Corruptible Which is a thing that Plato takes notice of as an Atheistick Principle expressing it in these words ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã that Nothing ever is but every thing is Made and Generated Forasmuch as it plainly follows from hence that not only all Animals and the Souls of men but also if there were any Gods which some of those Materialists would not stick at least verbally to acknowledge meaning thereby certain Understanding Beings superiour to men these likewise must needs have been all Generated and consequently be Corruptible Now to say that there is no other God than such as was Made and Generated and which may be again Unmade Corrupted and Die or that there was once no God at all till he was made out of the Matter and that there may be none again this is all one as to deny the thing it self For a Native and Mortal God is a pure Contradiction Therefore whereas Aristotle in his Metaphysicks tells us of certain Theologers ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã such as did Generate all things even the Gods themselves out of Night and Chaos we must needs pronounce of such Theologers as these who were Theogonists and Generated all the Gods without exception out of Sensless and Stupid Matter that they were but a kind of Atheistical Theologers or Theological Atheists For though they did admit of certain Beings to which they attributed the Name of Gods yet according to the true Notion of God they really acknowledged none at all i. e. no Understanding Nature as the Original of things but Night and Chaos Sensless and Stupid Matter Fortuitously Moved was to them the highest of all Numens So that this Theology of theirs was a thing wholly founded in Atheistical Non-sence XIV And now we think it seasonable here to observe how vast a difference there was betwixt these old Materialists in Aristotle and those other Philosophers mentioned before in the first Chapter who determined ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã That no Real Entity at all was Generated or Corrupted for this reason because Nothing could be made out of Nothing These were chiefly the Philosophers of the Italick or Pythagorick Succession and their design in it was not as Aristotle was pleased somewhere to affirm ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã to contradict common sence and experience in denying all Natural Generations and Alterations but only to interpret Nature rightly in them and that in way of opposition to those Atheistick Materialists after this manner That in all the Mutations of Nature Generations and Alterations there was neither any new Substance Made which was not before nor any Entity really distinct from the Preexisting Substances but only that Substance which was before diversly Modified and so Nothing Produced in Generations but new Modifications Mixtures and Separations of preexistent Substances Now this Doctrine of theirs drove at these Two things First the taking away of such Qualities and Forms of Body as were vulgarly conceived to be things really distinct from the Substance of extended Bulk and all its Modifications of more or less Magnitude Figure Site Motion or Rest. Because if there were any such things as these produced in the Natural Generations and Alterations of Bodies there would then be some Real Entity Made ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã out of Nothing Inexistent or Preexistent Wherefore they concluded that these supposed Forms and Qualities of Bodies were really nothing else but only the different Modifications of Pre-existent Matter in respect of Magnitude Figure Site and Motion or Rest or different Concretions and Secretions which are no Entities really distinct from the Substance but only cause different Phasmata Phancies and Apparitions in us The Second thing which this Doctrine aimed at was the establishing the Incorporiety and Ingenerability of all Souls For since Life Cogitation Sense and Understanding could not be resolved into those Modifications of Matter Magnitude Figure Site and Motion or into Mechanism and Phancie but must needs be Entities really distinct from Extended Bulk or Dead and Stupid Matter they concluded that therefore Souls could not be Generated out of Matter because this would be the Production of some Real Entity out of Nothing Inexisting or Preexisting but that they must needs be another kind of Substance Incorporeal which could no more be Generated or Corrupted than the Substance of Matter it self and therefore must either Preexist in Nature before Generations or else be divinely Created and Infused in them It hath been already proved in the First
Chapter that the Upshot of that Pythagorick Doctrine That Nothing could be Generated out of Nothing preexisting amounted to those Two things mentioned viz. the Asserting of the Incorporiety and Ingenerability of Souls and the Rejecting of those Phantastick Entities of Forms and Real Qualities of Bodies and resolving all Corporeal Phaenomena into Figures or Atoms and the different Apparitions or Phancies caused by them but the latter of these may be further confirmed from this passage of Aristotle's where after he had declared that Democritus and Leucippus made the Soul and Fire to consist of round Atoms or Figures like those ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã those Ramenta that appear in the Air when the Sun-beams are transmitted through Cranies he adds ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã And that which is said amongst the Pythagoreans seems to have the same sence for some of them affirm that the Soul is those very ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Ramenta or Atoms but others of them that it is That which Moves them which latter doubtless were the genuine Pythagoreans However it is plain from hence that the old Pythagoreans Physiologized by ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã as well as Democritus that is Figures and Atoms and not Qualities and Forms But Aristotle's Materialists on the contrary taking it for granted that Matter or Extended Bulk is the only Substance and that the Qualities and Forms of Bodies are Entities really distinct from those Modifications of Magnitude Figure Site Motion or Rest and finding also by experience that these were continually Generated and Corrupted as likewise that Life Sense and Understanding were produced in the Bodies of such Animals where it had not been before and again extinguished at the Death or Corruption of them concluded that the Souls of all Animals as well as those other Qualities and Forms of Bodies were Generated out of the Matter and Corrupted again into it and consequently that every thing that is in the whole World besides the Substance of Matter was Made or Generated and might be again Corrupted Of this Atheistick Doctrine Aristotle speaks elsewhere as in his Book de Coelo ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã There are some who affirm that Nothing is Ingenerable but that all things are Made as Hesiod especially and also among the rest they who First Physiologized whose meaning was that all other things are Made or Generated and did Flow none of them having any Stability only that there was one thing namely Matter which always remained out of which all those other things were transformed and Metamorphiz'd Though as to Hesiod Aristotle afterwards speaks differently So likewise in his Physicks after he had declared that some of the Ancients made Air some Water and some other Matter the Principle of all things he adds ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã This they affirmed to be all the Substance or Essence that was but all other things the Passions Affections and Dispositions of it and that this therefore was Eternal as being capable of no Change but all other things Infinitely Generated and Corrupted XV. But these Materialists being sometimes assaulted by the other Italick Philosophers in the manner before declared That no Real Entities distinct from the Modifications of any Substance could be Generated or Corrupted because Nothing could come from Nothing nor go to Nothing they would not seem plainly to Contradict that Theorem but only endeavoured to interpret it into a compliance with their own Hypothesis and distinguish concerning the Sence of it in this manner That it ought to be understood only of the Substance of Matter and Nothing else viz. That no Matter could be Made or Corrupted but that all other things whatsoever not only Forms and Qualities of Bodies but also Souls Life Sense and Understanding though really different from Magnitude Figure Site and Motion yet ought to be accounted only the ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã the Passions and Accidents of this Matter and therefore might be generated out of it and Corrupted again into it and that without the Production or Destruction of any real Entity Matter being the only thing that is accounted such All this we learn from these words of Aristotle ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã The sence whereof is this And therefore as to that Axiom of some Philosophers That Nothing is either Generated or Destroyed these Materialists admit it to be true in respect of the Substance of matter only which is always preserved the same As say they We do not say that Socrates is simply or absolutely Made when he is made either Handsom or Musical or that he is Destroyed when he loseth those Dispositions because the Subject Socrates still remains the same so neither are we to say that any thing else is absolutely ether Generated or Corrupted because the Substance or Matter of every thing always Continues For there must needs be some certain Nature from which all other things are Generated that still remaining one and the same We have noted this Passage of Aristotle's the rather because this is just the very Doctrine of Atheists at this day That the Substance of Matter or Extended Bulk is the only Real Entity and therefore the only Unmade thing that is neither Generable nor Creatable but Necessarily Existent from Eternity But whatever else is in the World as Life and Animality Soul and Mind being all but Accidents and Affections of this Matter as if therefore they had no Real Entity at all in them are Generable out of Nothing and Corruptible into Nothing so long as the Matter in which they are still remains the same The Result of which is no less than this That there can be no other Gods or God than such as was at first Made or Generated out of Sensless Matter and may be Corrupted again into it And here indeed lies the Grand Mystery of Atheism that every thing besides the Substance of Matter is Made or Generated and may be again Unmade or Corrupted However Anaxagoras though an Ionick Philosopher and therefore as shall be declared afterward Successor to those Atheistick Materialists was at length so far Convinced by that Pythagorick Doctrine That no Entity could be naturally Generated out of Nothing as that he departed from his Predecessors herein and did for this reason acknowledge Mind and Soul that is all Cogitative Being to be a Substance really distinct from Matter neither Generable out of it nor Corruptible into it as also that the Forms and Qualities of Bodies which he could not yet otherwise conceive of than as things really distinct from those Modifications of Magnitude Figure Site and Motion must for the same cause pre-exist before Generations in certain Similar Atoms and remain after Corruptions being only Secreted and Concreted in them By means whereof he introduced a certain Spurious Atomism of his own For whereas the Genuine Atomists before his time had supposed ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Dissimilar Atoms devoid of all Forms and Qualities to be the Principles of all Bodies Anaxagoras substituted in
fuit Inundatio quae non secus quà m Hyems quà m Aestas Lege Mundi venit Whatsoever from the beginning to the end of it it can either Do or Suffer it was all at first included in the Nature of the whole As in the Seed is conteined the Whole Delineation of the Future man and the Embryo or Vnborn infant hath already in it the Law of a Beard and Gray Hairs The Lineaments of the whole Body and of its following age being there described as it were in a little and obscure Compendium In like manner the Original and First Rudiments of the World conteined in them not only the Sun and Moon the Courses of the Stars and the Generations of Animals but also the Vicissitudes of all Terrestrial things And every Deluge or Inundation of Water comes to pass no less by the Law of the World its Spermatick or Plastick Nature than Winter and Summer doth XXVIII We do not deny it to be possible but that some in all Ages might have entertained such an Atheistical Conceit as this That the Original of this whole Mundane System was from one Artificial Orderly and Methodical but Sensless Nature lodge in the Matter but we cannot trace the footsteps of this Doctrine any where so much as among the Stoicks to which Sect Seneca who speaks so waveringly and uncertainly in this point Whether the World were an Animal or a Plant belonged And indeed diverse learned men have suspected that even the Zenonian and Heraclitick Deity it self was no other than such a Plastick Nature or Spermatick Principle in the Universe as in the Seeds of Vegetables and Animals doth frame their respective Bodies Orderly and Artificially Nor can it be denied but that there hath been just cause given for such a suspicion forasmuch as the best of the Stoicks sometimes confounding God with Nature seemed to make him nothing but an Artificial Fire Orderly and Methodically proceeding to Generation And it was Familiar with them as Laertius tells us to call God ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã the Spermatick Reason or Form of the World Nevertheless because Zeno and others of the chief Stoical Doctors did also many times assert that there was ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã a Rational and Intellectual Nature and therefore not a Plastick Principle only in the Matter of the Universe as likewise that the whole World was an Animal and not a mere Plant Therefore we incline rather to excuse the generality of the first and most ancient Stoicks from the imputation of Atheism and to account this Form of Atheism which we now speak of to be but a certain Degeneracy from the right Heraclitick and Zenonian Cabala which seemed to contain these two things in it First that there was an Animalish Sentient and Intellectual Nature or a Conscious Soul and Mind that presided over the whole World though lodged immediately in the Fiery Matter of it Secondly that this Sentient and Intellectual Nature or Corporeal Soul and Mind of the Universe did contain also under it or within it as the inferiour part of it a certain Plastick Nature or Spermatick Principle which was properly the Fate of all things For thus Heraclitus defined Fate ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã A certain Reason passing through the Substance of the whole World or an Ethereal Body that was the Seed of the Generation of the Vniverse And Zeno's first Principle as it is said to be an Intellectual Nature so it is also said to have contained in it ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã All the Spermatick Reasons and forms by which every thing is done according to Fate However though this seem to have been the genuine Doctrine both of Heraclitus and Zeno yet others of their Followers afterwards divided these two things from one another and taking only the latter of them made the Plastick or Spermatick Nature devoid of all Animality or Conscious Intellectuality to be the highest Principle in the Universe Thus Laertius tells us that Boethus an eminent and famous Stoical Doctor did plainly deny the World to be an Animal that is to have any Sentient Conscious or Intellectual Nature presiding over it and consequently must needs make it to be but Corpus Naturâ gubernante ut Arbores ut Sata A Body governed by a Plastick or Vegetative Nature as Trees Plants and Herbs And as it is possible that other Stoicks and Heracliticks might have done the like before Boethus so it is very probable that he had after him many Followers amongst which as Plinius Secundus may be reckoned for one so Seneca himself was not without a doubtful Tincture of this Atheism as hath been already shewed Wherefore this Form of Atheism which supposes one Plastick or Spermatick Nature one Plantal or Vegetative Life in the whole World as the Highest Principle may for distinction sake be called the Pseudo-Stoical or Stoical Atheism XXIX Besides these Philosophick Atheists whose several Forms we have now described it cannot be doubted but that there have been in all Ages many other Atheists that have not at all Philosophized nor pretended to maintain any particular Atheistick System or Hypothesis in a way of Reason but were only led by a certain dull and sottish though confident Disbelief of whatsoever they could not either See or Feel Which kind of Atheists may therefore well be accompted Enthusiastical or Fanatical Atheists Though it be true in the mean time that even all manner of Atheists whatsoever and those of them who most of all pretend to Reason and Philosophy may in some sence be justly stiled also both Enthusiasts and Fanaticks Forasmuch as they are not led or carried on into this way of Atheizing by any clear Dictates of their Reason or Understanding but only by an ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã a certain Blind and Irrational Impetus they being as it were Inspired to it by that lower Earthly Life and Nature which is called in the Scripture-oracles ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã the Spirit of the World or a Mundane Spirit and is opposed to the ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã the Spirit that is of God For when the Apostle speaks after this manner We have not received the Spirit of the World but the Spirit that is of God he seems to intimate thus much unto us That as some men were Led and Inspired by a Divine Spirit so others again are Inspired by a Mundane Spirit by which is meant the Earthly Life Now the former of these Two are not to be accompted Enthusiasts as the word is now commonly taken in a Bad Sence because the Spirit of God is no Irrational thing but either the very self same thing with Reason or else such a thing as Aristotle as it were Vaticinating concerning it somewhere calls ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã a certain Better and Diviner thing than Reason and Plotinus ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã the Root of Reason But on the contrary the Mundane Spirit or Earthly Life is Irrational Sottishness and they who are Atheistically Inspired by it how
be look'd upon as the Rising Sun of Atheism Et tanquam Spes altera Trojae it seeming to smile upon them and flatter them at a distance with some fairer hopes of supporting that Ruinous and Desperate Cause Whereas on the Contrary that other Atomick Atheism as it insists upon a True Notion of Body that it is nothing but Resisting Bulk by which means we joyning issue thereupon shall be fairly conducted on to a clear Decision of this present Controversie as likewise to the disintangling of many other points of Philosophy so it is that which hath filled the World with the Noise of it for Two Thousand years past that concerning which several Volumes have been formerly written in which it hath been stated and brought into a kind of System and which hath of late obteined a Resurrection amongst us together with the Atomick Physiology and been recommended to the World anew under a Specious Shew of Wit and profound Philosophy Wherefore as we could not here insist upon both these Forms of Atheism together because that would have been to confound the Language of Atheists and to have made them like the Cadmean Off-spring to do immediate Execution upon themselves so we were in all reason obliged to make our First and Principal Assault upon the Atomick Atheism as being the only considerable upon this accompt because it is that alone which publickly confronts the World and like that proud Vncircumcised Philistine openly defies the Hosts of the Living God Intending nevertheless in the Close of this whole Discourse that is the Last Book where we are to determine the Right Intellectual System of the Vniverse and to assert an Incorporeal Deity to demonstrate That Life Cogitation and Vnderstanding do not Essentially belong to Matter and all Substance as such but are the Peculiar Attributes and Characteristicks of Substance Incorporeal XXXVI However since we have now started these Several Forms of Atheism we shall not in the mean time neglect any of them neither For in the Answer to the Second Atheistick Ground we shall Confute them all together at once as agreeing in this One Fundamental Principle That the Original of all things in the Vniverse is Sensless Matter or Matter devoid of all Animality or Conscious Life In the Reply to the Fourth Atheistick Argumentation we shall briefly hint the Grounds of Reason from which Incorporeal Substance is Demonstrated In the Examination of the Fifth we shall confute the Anaximandrian Atheism there propounded which is as it were the First Sciography and Rude Delineation of Atheism And in the Confutation of the Sixth we shall shew how the ancient Atomick Atheists did preventively overtherthrow the Foundation of Hylozoism Besides all which in order to a Fuller and more Thorough Confutation both of the Cosmo-plastick and Hylozoick Atheism we shall in this very place take occasion to insist largely upon the Plastick life of Nature giving in the First Place a True Accompt of it and then afterwards shewing how grosly it is misunderstood and the Pretence of it abused by the Asserters of both these Atheistick Hypotheses The Heads of which Larger Digression because they could not be so conveniently inserted in the Contents of the Chapter shall be represented to the Readers View at the End of it XXXVII For we think fit here to observe that neither the Cosmo-plastick or Stoical nor the Hylozoick or Stratonical Atheists are therefore condemned by us because they suppose such a thing as a Plastick Nature or Life distinct from the Animal albeit this be not only exploded as an Absolute Non-entity by the Atomick Atheists who might possibly be afraid of it as that which approached too near to a Deity or else would hazard the introducing of it but also utterly discarded by some Professed Theists of later times who might notwithstanding have an Undiscerned Tang of the Mechanick Atheism hanging about them in that their so confident rejecting of all Final and Intending Causality in Nature and admitting of no other Causes of things as Philosophical save the Material and Mechanical only This being really to banish all Mental and consequently Divine Causality quite out of the World and to make the whole World to be nothing else but a mere Heap of Dust Fortuitously agitated or a Dead Cadaverous thing that hath no Signatures of Mind and Vnderstanding Counsel and Wisdom at all upon it nor indeed any other Vitality acting in it than only the Production of a certain Quantity of Local Motion and the Conservation of it according to some General Laws which things the Democritick Atheists take for granted would all be as they are though there were no God And thus Aristotle describes this kind of Philosophy That it made the whole World to consist ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã of nothing but Bodies and Monads that is Atoms or Small Particles of Matter only ranged and disposed together into such an order but altogether Dead and Inanimate 2. For unless there be such a thing admitted as a Plastick Nature that acts ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã for the sake of something and in order to Ends Regularly Artificially and Methodically it seems that one or other of these Two Things must be concluded That Either in the Efformation and Organization of the Bodies of Animals as well as the other Phenomena every thing comes to pass Fortuitously and happens to be as it is without the Guidance and Direction of any Mind or Vnderstanding Or else that God himself doth all Immediately and as it were with his own Hands Form the Body of every Gnat and Fly Insect and Mite as of other Animals in Generations all whose Members have so much of Contrivance in them that Galen professed he could never enough admire that Artifice which was in the Leg of a Fly and yet he would have admired the Wisdom of Nature more had he been but acquainted with the Use of Microscopes I say upon supposition of no Plastick Nature one or other of these Two things must be concluded because it is not conceived by any that the things of Nature are all thus administred with such exact Regularity and Constancy every where merely by the Wisdom Providence and Efficiency of those Inferior Spirits Daemons or Angels As also though it be true that the Works of Nature are dispensed by a Divine Law and Command yet this is not to be understood in a Vulgar Sence as if they were all effected by the mere Force of a Verbal Law or Outward Command because Inanimate things are not Commandable nor Governable by such a Law and therefore besides the Divine Will and Pleasure there must needs be some other Immediate Agent and Executioner provided for the producing of every Effect since not so much as a Stone or other Heavy Body could at any time fall downward merely by the Force of a Verbal Law without any other Efficient Cause but either God himself must immediately impel it or else there must be some other subordinate Cause in
And therefore though it be One yet notwithstanding it consists of Different and Contrary things For there being Hostility in its Parts it is nevertheless Friendly and Agreeable in the Whole after the same manner as in a Dramatick Poem Clashings and Contentions are reconciled into one Harmony And therefore the Seminary and Plastick Nature of the World may fitly be resembled to the Harmony of Disagreeing things Which Plotinick Doctrine may well pass for a Commentary upon Empedocles accordingly as Simplicius briefly represents his sence ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Empedocles makes Two Worlds the one Vnited and Intelligible the other Divided and Sensible and in this lower Sensible World he takes notice both of Vnity and Discord It was before observed that Heraclitus likewise did assert a Regular and Artificial Nature as the Fate of things in this Lower World for his Reason passing thorough the Substance of all things or Ethereal Body which was the Seed of the Generation of the Vniverse was nothing but that Spermatick or Plastick Nature which we now speak of And whereas there is an odd Passage of this Philosophers recorded ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã that neither any God nor Man made this World which as it is justly derided by Plutarch for its Simplicity so it looks very Atheistically at first sight yet because Heraclitus hath not been accompted an Atheist we therefore conceive the meaning of it to have been this That the World was not made by any whatsoever after such a manner as an Artificer makes an House by Machins and Engins acting from without upon the Matter Cumbersomly and Moliminously but by a certain Inward Plastick Nature of its own And as Hippocrates followed Heraclitus in this as was before declared so did Zeno and the Stoicks also they supposing besides an Intellectual Nature as the Supreme Architect and Master-builder of the World another Plastick Nature as the Immediate Workman and Operatour Which Plastick Nature hath been already described in the words of Balbus as a thing which acts not Fortuitously but Regularly Orderly and Artificially and Laertius tells us it was defined by Zeno himself after this manner ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Nature is a Habit moved from it self according to Spermatick Reasons or Seminal Principles perfecting and containing those several things which in determinate times are produced from it and acting agreeably to that from which it was secreted Lastly as the Latter Platonists and Peripateticks have unanimously followed their Masters herein whose Vegetative Soul also is no other than a Plastick Nature so the Chymists and Paracelsians insist much upon the same thing and seem rather to have carried the Notion on further in the Bodies of Animals where they call it by a new name of their own the Archeus Moreover we cannot but observe here that as amongst the Ancients They were generally condemned for down-right Atheists who acknowledged no other Principle besides Body or Matter Necessarily and Fortuitously moved such as Democritus and the first Ionicks so even Anaxagoras himself notwithstanding that he was a professed Theist and plainly asserted Mind to be a Principle yet because he attributed too much to Material Necessity admitting neither this Plastick Nature nor a Mundane Soul was severely censured not only by the Vulgar who unjustly taxed him for an Atheist but also by Plato and Aristotle as a kind of spurious and imperfect Theist and one who had given great advantage to Atheism Aristotle in his Metaphysicks thus represents his Philosophy ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Anaxagoras useth Mind and Intellect that is God as a Machin in the Cosmopoeia and when he is at a loss to give an accompt of things by Material Necessity then and never but then does he draw in Mind or God to help him out but otherwise he will rather assign any thing else for a Cause than Mind Now if Aristotle censure Anaxagoras in this manner though a professed Theist because he did but seldom make use of a Mental Cause for the salving of the Phaenomena of the World and only then when he was at a loss for other Material and Mechanical Causes which it seems he sometimes confessed himself to be what would that Philosopher have thought of those our so confident Mechanists of later times who will never vouchsafe so much as once to be beholding to God Almighty for any thing in the Oeconomy of the Corporeal World after the first Impression of Motion upon the Matter Plato likewise in his Phaedo and elsewhere condemns this Anaxagoras by name for this very thing that though he acknowledged Mind to be a Cause yet he seldom made use of it for salving the Phaenomena but in his twelfth de Legibus he perstringeth him Unnamed as one who though a professed Theist had notwithstanding given great Encouragement to Atheism after this manner ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Some of them who had concluded that it was Mind that ordered all things in the Heavens themselves erring concerning the Nature of the Soul and not making that Older than the Body have overturned all again for Heavenly Bodies being supposed by them to be full of Stones and Earth and other Inanimate things dispensing the Causes of the whole Vniverse they did by this means occasion much Atheism and Impiety Furthermore the same Plato there tells us that in those times of his Astronomers and Physiologers commonly lay under the prejudice and suspicion of Atheism amongst the vulgar merely for this reason because they dealt so much in Material Causes ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã The Vulgar think that they who addict themselves to Astronomy and Physiology are made Atheists thereby they seeing as much as is possible how things come to pass by Material Necessities and being thereby disposed to think them not to be ordered by Mind and Will for the sake of Good From whence we may observe that according to the Natural Apprehensions of Men in all Ages they who resolve the Phaenomena of Nature into Material Necessity allowing of no Final nor Mental Causality disposing things in order to Ends have been strongly suspected for Friends to Atheism 7. But because some may pretend that the Plastick Nature is all one with an Occult Quality we shall here show how great a Difference there is betwixt these Two For he that asserts an Occult Quality for the Cause of any Phaenomenon does indeed assign no Cause at all of it but only declare his own Ignorance of the Cause but he that asserts a Plastick Nature assigns a Determinate and proper Cause nay the only Intelligible Cause of that which is the greatest of all Phaenomena in the World namely the ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã the Orderly Regular and Artificial Frame of things in the Universe whereof the Mechanick Philosophers however pretending to salve all Phaenomena by Matter and Motion assign no Cause at all Mind and Understanding is the only true Cause of Orderly Regularity and he that asserts a Plastick Nature asserts Mental Causality in
several parts of Matter distant from one another acting alone by themselves without any common Directrix being not able to confer together nor communicate with each other could never possibly conspire to make up one such uniform and Orderly System or Compages as the Body of every Animal is The same is to be said likewise concerning the Plastick Nature of the whole Corporeal Universe in which ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã all things are ordered together conspiringly into One. It must be one and the same thing which formeth the whole or else it could never have fallen into such an Uniform Order and Harmony Now that which is One and the Same acting upon several distant parts of Matter cannot be Corporeal Indeed Aristotle is severely censured by some learned men for this that though he talk every where of such a Nature as acts Regularly Artificially and Methodically in order to the Best yet he does no where positively declare whether this Nature of his be Corporeal or Incorporeal Substantial or Accidental which yet is the less to be wondred at in him because he does not clearly determine these same points concerning the Rational Soul neither but seems to stagger uncertainly about them In the mean time it cannot be denied but that Aristotle's Followers do for the most part conclude this Nature of his to be Corporeal whereas notwithstanding according to the Principles of this Philosophy it cannot possibly be such For there is nothing else attributed to Body in it besides these three Matter Form and Accidents neither of which can be the Aristotelick Nature First it cannot be Matter because Nature according to Aristotle is supposed to be the Principle of Motion and Activity which Matter in it self is devoid of Moreover Aristotle concludes that they who assign only a Material Cause assign no Cause at all ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã of well and fit of that Regular and Artificial Frame of things which is ascribed to Nature upon both which accompts it is determined by that Philosopher that ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Nature is more a Principle and Cause than Matter and therefore it cannot be one and the same thing with it Again it is as plain that Aristotle's Nature cannot be the Forms of particular Bodies neither as Vulgar Peripateticks seem to conceive these being all Generated and Produced by Nature and as well Corruptible as Generable Whereas Nature is such a thing as is neither Generated nor Corrupted it being the Principle and Cause of all Generation and Corruption To make Nature and the Material Forms of Bodies to be one and the self-same thing is all one as if one should make the Seal with the Stamper too to be one and the same thing with the Signature upon the Wax And Lastly Aristotle's Nature can least of all be the Accidents or Qualities of Bodies because these act only in Vertue of their Substance neither can they exercise any Active Power over the Substance it self in which they are whereas the Plastick Nature is a thing that Domineers over the Substance of the whole Corporeal Vniverse and which Subordinately to the Deity put both Heaven and Earth into this Frame in which now it is Wherefore since Aristotle's Nature can be neither the Matter nor the Forms nor the Accidents of Bodies it is plain that according to his own Principles it must be Incorporeal 21. Now if the Plastick Nature be Incorporeal then it must of necessity be either an Inferiour Power or Faculty of some Soul which is also Conscious Sensitive or Rational or else a lower Substantial Life by it self devoid of Animal Consciousness The Platonists seem to affirm both these together namely that there is a Plastick Nature lodged in all particular Souls of Animals Brutes and Men and also that there is a General Plastick or Spermatick Principle of the whole Vniverse distinct from their Higher Mundane Soul though subordinate to it and dependent upon it ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã That which is called Nature is the Off-spring of an higher Soul which hath a more Powerful Life in it And though Aristotle do not so clearly acknowledge the Incorporeity and Substantiality of Souls yet he concurrs very much with this Platonick Doctrine that Nature is either a Lower Power or Faculty of some Conscious Soul or else an Inferiour kind of Life by it self depending upon a Superiour Soul And this we shall make to appear from his Book De Partibus Animalium after we have taken notice of some considerable Preliminary Passages in it in order thereunto For having first declared that besides the Material Cause there are other Causes also of Natural Generations namely these two ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã that for whose sake or the Final Cause and that from which the Principle of Motion is or the Efficient Cause he determines that the former of these Two is the principal ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã The chiefest of these two Causes seems to be the Final or the Intending Cause for this is Reason and Reason is alike a Principle in Artificial and in Natural things Nay the Philosopher adds excellently that there is more of Reason and Art in the things of Nature than there is in those things that are Artificially made by men ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã There is more of Final or Intending Causality and of the reason of Good in the works of Nature than in those of Humane Art After which he greatly complains of the first and most Ancient Physiologers meaning thereby Anaximander and those other Ionicks before Anaxagoras that they considered only ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã the Material Principle and Cause of things without attending to those Two other Causes the Principle of Motion and that which aims at Ends they talking only of Fire Water Air and Earth and generating the whole World from the Frotuitous Concourse of these Sensless Bodies But at length Aristotle falls upon Democritus who being Junior to those others before mentioned Philosophised after the same Atheistical manner but in a new way of his own by Atoms acknowledging no other Nature neither in the Universe nor in the Bodies of Animals than that of Fortuitous Mechanism and supposing all things to arise from the different Compositions of Magnitudes Figures Sites and Motions Of which Democritick Philosophy he gives his Censure in these following words ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã c. If Animals and their several parts did consist of nothing but Figure and Colour then indeed Democritus would be in the right But a Dead man hath the same Form and Figure of Body that he had before and yet for all that he is not a Man neither is a Brazen or Wooden Hand a Hand but only Equivocally as a Painted Physician or Pipes made of Stone are so called No member of a Dead Mans Body is that which it was before when he was alive neither Eye nor Hand nor Foot Wherefore this is but a rude way of Philosophizing and just as if a Carpenter should talk
aâfirms of these his Inferiour Intelligences likewise as well as of the Supreme Mover that they do ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Move only as the end Where it is Evident that though Aristotle did plainly suppose a Mundane Intellectual Soul such as also conteined either in it or under it a Plastick Nature yet he did not make either of these to be the Supreme Deity but resolved the First Principle of things to be One Absolutely Perfect Mind or Intellect Separate from Matter which was ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã an Immoveable Nature whose Essence was his Operation and which Moved only as being Lovâd or as the Final Cause of which he pronounces in this manner ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã That upon such a Principle as this Heaven and Nature depends that is the Animated Heaven or Mundane Soul together with the Plastick Nature of the Universe must of necessity depend upon such an Absolutely Perfect and Immoveable Mind or Intellect Having now declared the Aristotelick Doctrine concerning the Plastick Nature of the Universe with which the Platonick also agrees that it is ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã either Part of a Mundane Intellectual Soul that is a Lower Power and Faculty of it or else not without it but some inferior thing depending on it we think sit to add in this place that though there were no such Mundane Soul as both Plato and Aristotle supposed distinct from the Supreme Deity yet thâre might notwithstanding be a Plastick Nature of the Universe depending immediately upon the Deity it self For the Plastick Nature essentially depends upon Mind or Intellect and could not possibly be without it according to those words before cited ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Nature depends upon such an Intellectual Principle and for this Cause that Philosopher does elsewhere joyn ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã and ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Mind and Nature both together 25. Besides this General Plastick Nature of the Universe and those Particular Plastick Powers in the Souls of Animals it is not impossible but that there may be other Plastick Natures also as certain Lower Lives or Vegetative Souls in some Greater Parts of the Universe all of them depending if not upon some higher Conscious Soul yet at least upon a Perfect Intellect presiding over the whole As for Example Though it be not reasonable to think that every Plant Herb and Pile of Grass hath a Particular Plastick Life or Vegetative Soul of its own distinct from the Mechanism of the Body nor that the whole Earth is an Animal endued with a Conscious Soul yet there may possibly be for ought we know one Plastick Nature or Life belonging to the whole Terrestrial or Terraqueous Globe by which all Plants and Vegetables continuous with it may be differently formed according to their different Seeds as also Minerals and other Bodies framed and whatsoever else is above the Power of Fortuitous Mechanism effected as by the Immediate Cause though always Subordinate to other Causes the chief whereof is the Deity And this perhaps may ease the Minds of those who cannot but think it too much to impose all upon one Plastick Nature of the Universe 26. And now we have finished our First Task which was to give an Accompt of the Plastick Nature the Sum whereof briefly amounts to this That it is a certain Lower Life than the Animal which acts Regularly and Artificially according to the Direction of Mind and Vnderstanding Reason and Wisdom for Ends or in Order to Good though it self do not know the Reason of what it does nor is Master of that Wisdom according to which it acts but only a Servant to it and Drudging Executioner of the same it operating Fatally and Sympathetically according to Laws and Commands prescribed to it by a Perfect Intellect and imprest upon it and which is either a Lower Faculty of some Conscious Soul or else an Inferiour kind of Life or Soul by it self but essentially depending upon an Higher Intellect We procede to our Second Vndertaking which was to shew how grosly those Two Sorts of Atheists before mentioned the Stoical or Cosmo-plastick and the Stratonical or Hylozoick both of them acknowledging this Plastick Life of Nature do mistake the Notion of it or Pervert it and Abuse it to make a certain Spurious and Counterfeit God-Almighty of it or a First Principle of all things thereby excluding the True Omnipotent Deity which is a Perfect Mind or Consciously Vnderstanding Nature presiding over the Universe they substituting this Stupid Plastick Nature in the room of it Now the Chief Errors or Mistakes of these Atheists concerning the Plastick Nature are these Four following First that they make that to be the First Principle of all and the Highest thing in the Universe which is the Last and Lowest of all Lives a thing Essentially Secondary Derivative and Dependent For the Plastick Life of Nature is but the mere Vmbrage of Intellectuality a faint and shadowy Imitation of Mind and Vnderstanding upon which it doth as Essentially depend as the Shadow doth upon the Body the Image in the Glass upon the Face or the Eccho upon the Original Voice So that if there had been no Perfect Mind or Intellect in the World there could no more have been any Plastick Nature in it than there could be an Image in the Glass without a Face or an Eccho without an Original Voice If there be ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã then there must be ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã if there be a Plastick Nature that acts Regularly and Artificially in Order to Ends and according to the Best Wisdom though it self not comprehending the reason of it nor being clearly Conscious of what it doth then there must of necessity be a Perfect Mind or Intellect that is a Deity upon which it depends Wherefore Aristotle does like a Philosopher in joyning ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã and ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Nature and Mind both together but these Atheists do very Absurdly and Unphilosophically that would make a Sensless and Inconscious Plastick Nature and therefore without any Mind or Intellect to be the First Original of all things Secondly these Atheists augment the Former Error in supposing those Higher Lives of Sense or Animality and of Reason or Vnderstanding to rise both of them from that Lower Sensless Life of Nature as the only Original Fundamental Life Which is a thing altogether as Irrational and Absurd as if one should suppose the Light that is in the Air or Aether to be the Only Original and Fundamental Light and the Light of the Sun and Stars but a Secondary and Derivative thing from it and nothing but the Light of the Air Modificated and Improved by Condensation Or as if one should maintain that the Sun and Moon and all the Stars were really nothing else but the mere Reflections of those Images that we see in Rivers and Ponds of Water But this hath always been the Sottish Humour and Guise of Atheists to invert the Order of the
Universe and hang the Picture of the World as of a Man with its Heels upwards Conscious Reason and Vnderstanding being a far higher Degree of Life and Perfection than that Dull Plastick Nature which does only Do but not Know can never possibly emerge out of it neither can the Duplication of Corporeal Organs be ever able to advance that Simple and Stupid Life of Nature into Redoubled Consciousness or Self-perception nor any Triplication or indeed Milleclupation of them improve the same into Rea-Vnderstanding Thirdly for the better Colouring of the Former Errors the Hylozoists adulterate the Notion of the Plastick Life of Nature confounding it with Wisdom and Vnderstanding And though themselves acknowledge that no Animal-sense Self-perception and Consciousness belongs to it yet they will have it to be a thing Perfectly Wise and consequently every Atom of Sensless Matter that is in the whole World to be Infallibly Omniscient as to all its own Capacities and Congruities or whatsoever it self can Do or Suffer which is plainly Contradictious For though there may be such a thing as the Plastick Nature that according to the Former Description of it can Do without Knowing and is devoid of Express Consciousness or Self-perception yet Perfect Knowledge and Vnderstanding without Consciousness is Non-sence and Impossibility Wherefore this must needs be condemned for a great piece of Sottishness in the Hylozoick Atheists that they attribute Perfect Wisdom and Vnderstanding to a Stupid Inconscious Nature which is nothing but ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã the mere Drudging Instrument or Manuary Opificer of Perfect Mind Lastly these Atheists err in this that they make this Plastick Life of Nature to be a mere Material or Corporeal thing whereas Matter or Body cannot move it self much less therefore can it Artificially order and dispose its own Motion And though the Plastick Nature be indeed the Lowest of all Lives yet notwithstanding since it is a Life or Internal Energy and Self-activity distinct from Local Motion it must needs be Incorporeal all Life being Essentially such But the Hylozoists conceive grosly both of Life and Vnderstanding spreading them all over upon Matter just as Butter is spread upon Bread or Plaster upon a Wall and accordingly slicing them out in different Quantities and Bulks together with it they contending that they are but Inadequate Conceptions of Body as the only Substance and consequently concluding that the Vulgarly received Notion of God is nothing else but such an Inadeqaute Conception of the Matter of the Whole Corporeal Universe mistaken for a Complete and Entire Substance by it self that is supposed to be the Cause of all things Which fond Dream or Dotage of theirs will be furthâr confutâd in due place But it is now time to put a Period to this long though necessary Digression concerning the Plastick Life of Nature or an Artificial Orderly and Methodical Nature XXXVIII Plato gives an accompt why he judged it necessary in those times publickly to propose that Atheistick Hypothesis in order to a Confutation as also to produce Rational Arguments for the Proof of a Deity after this manner ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Had not these Atheistick Doctrines been publickly divulged and made known in a manner to all it would not have been needful to have confuted them nor by Reasons to prove a Deity but now it is necessary And we conceive that the same Necessity at this time will justifie our present undertaking likewise since these Atheistick Doctrines have been as boldly vented and publickly asserted in this latter Age of ours as ever they could be in Plato's time When the severity of the Athenian Government must needs be a great check to such Designs Socrates having been put to death upon a mere false and groundless Accusation of Atheism and Protagoras who doubtless was a Real Atheist having escaped the same punishment no otherwise than by flight his Books being notwithstanding publickly burnt in the Market-place at Athens and himself condemned to perpetual Exile though there was nothing at that time proved against him save only this one Sceptical Passage in the beginning of a Book of his ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Concerning the Gods I have nothing at all to say either that they be or be not there being many things that hinder the knowledge of this Matter both the Obscurity of the thing it self and the shortness of humane Life Whereas Atheism in this Latter Age of ours hath been impudently asserted and most industriously promoted that very Atomick Form that was first introduced a little before Plato's time by Leucippus Protagoras and Democritus having been also Revived amongst us and that with no small Pomp and Ostentation of Wisdom and Philosophy It was before observed that there were Two several Forms of Atomical Philosophy First the most Ancient and Genuine that was Religious called Moschical or if you will Mosaical and Pythagorical Secondly the Adulterated Atheistick Atomology called Leucippean or Democritical Now accordingly there have been in this Latter Age of ours Two several successive Resurrections or Restitutions of those Two Atomologies For Renatus Cartesius first revived and restored the Atomick Philosophy agreeably for the most part to that ancient Moschical and Pythagorick Form acknowledging besides Extended Substance and Corporeal Atoms another Cogitative Incorporeal Substance and joyning Metaphysicks or Theology together with Physiology to make up one entire System of Philosophy Nor can it well be doubted but that this Physiology of his as to the Mechanick part of it hath been Elaborated by the ingenious Author into an Exactness at least equal with the best Atomologies of the Ancients Nevertheless this Cartesian Philosophy is highly obnoxious to Censure upon some Accompts the Chief whereof is this That deviating from that Primitive Moschical Atomology in rejecting all Plastick Nature it derives the whole System of the Corporeal Universe from the Necessary Motion of Matter only divided into Particles Insensibly small and turned round in a Vortex without the Guidance or Direction of any Vnderstanding Nature By means whereof though it boast of Salving all the Corporeal Phaenomena by mere Fortuitous Mechanism and without any Final or Mental Causality yet it gives no Accompt at all of that which is the Grandest of all Phaenomena the ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã The Orderly Regularity and Harmony of the Mundane System The Occasion of which Miscarriage hath been already intimated namely from the acknowledging only Two Heads of Being Extended and Cogitative and making the Essence of Cogitation to consist in Express Consciousness from whence it follows that there could be no Plastick Nature and therefore either all things must be done by Fortuitous Mechanism or else God himself be brought Immediately upon the Stage for the salving of all Phaenomena Which Latter Absurdity our Philosopher being over careful to avoid cast himself upon the Former the banishing of all Final and Mental Causality quite out of the World and acknowledging no other Philosophick Causes beside Material and
those Atheistick Arguments and so stand upon our defensive Posture but we shall also assault Atheism even with its own Weapons and plainly demonstrate that all Forms of Atheism are unintelligible Nonsence and Absolute Impossibility to Humane Reason As we shall likewise over and above Occasionally insert some as we think Undeniable Arguments for a Deity The Digression concerning the Plastick Life of Nature or an Artificial Orderly and Methodical Nature N. 37. Chap. 3. 1. That neither the Hylozoick nor Cosmo-plastick Atheists are condemned for asserting an Orderly and Artificial Plastick Nature as a Life distinct from the Animal however this be a Thing exploded not only by the Atomick Atheists but also by some Professed Theists who notwithstanding might have an undiscerned Tang of the Mechanically-Atheistick Humour hanging about them 2. If there be no Plastick Artificial Nature admitted then it must be concluded that either all things come to pass by Fortuitous Mechanism and Material Necessity the Motion of Matter unguided or else that God doth ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã do all things himself Immediately and Miraculously framing the Body of every Gnat and Fly as it were with his own hands since Divine Laws and Commands cannot Execute themselves nor be the proper Efficient Causes of things in Nature 3. To suppose all things to come to pass Fortuitously or by the Vnguided Motion of Matter a thing altogether as Irrational as it is Atheistical and Impious there being many Phaenomena not only above the Powers of Mechanism but also contrary to the Laws of it The Mechanick Theists make God but an Idle Spectator of the Fortuitous Motions of Matter and render his Wisdom altogether Vseless and Insignificant Aristotle's Judicious Censure of the Fortuitous Mechanists with the Ridiculousness of that Pretence that Material and Mechanical Reasons are the Only Philosophical 4. That it seems neither decorous in respect of God nor congruous to Reason that he should ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã do all things himself Immediately and Miraculously Nature being quite Superseded and made to signifie nothing The same further confuted by the Slow and Gradual Process of things in Nature as also by those Errors and Bungles that are committed when the Matter proves Inept and Contumacious arguing the Agent not to be Irresistible 5. Reasonably inferred that there is a Plastick Nature in the Vniverse as a Subordinate Instrument of Divine Providence in the Orderly Disposal of Matter but yet so as not without a Higher Providence presiding over it forasmuch as this Plastick Nature cannot act Electively or with Discretion Those Laws of Nature concerning Motion which the Mechanick Theists themselves suppose really nothing else but a Plastick Nature 6. The Agreeableness of this Doctrine with the Sentiments of the best Philosophers in all Ages Aristotle Plato Empedocles Heraclitus Hippocrates Zeno and the Paracelsians Anaxagoras though a Professed Theist severely censur'd both by Aristotle and Plato as an Encourager of Atheism merely because he used Material and Mechanical Causes more than Mental and Final Physiologers and Astronomers why vulgarly suspected of Atheism in Plato's time 7. The Plastick Nature no Occult Quality but the only Intelligible Cause of that which is the Grandest of all Phaenomena the Orderly Regularity and Harmony of Things which the Mechanick Theists however pretending to salve all Phaenomena can give no accompt at all of A God or Infinite Mind asserted by them in vain and to no purpose 8. Two Things here to be performed by us First to give an Accompt of the Plastick Nature and then to shew how the Notion of it hath been Mistaken and Abused by Atheists The First General Accompt of this Plastick Nature according to Aristotle that it is to be conceived as Art it self acting Inwardly and Immediately upon the Matter as if Harmony Living in the Musical Instruments should move the Strings of them without any External Impulse 9. Two Preeminencies of the Plastick Nature above Humane Art First that whereas Humane Art acts upon the Matter from without Cumbersomely and Moliminously with Tumult and Hurliburly Nature acting on it from within more Commandingly doth its Work Easily Cleaverly and Silently Humane Art acts on the Matter Mechanically but Nature Vitally and Magically 10. The Second Preeminence of Nature above Humane Art that whereas Humane Artists are often to seek and at a loss anxiously Consult and Deliberate and upon Second thoughts Mend their former Work Nature is never to seek nor Vnresolved what to do nor doth she ever Repent afterwards of what she hath done changing her Former Course Humane Artists themselves Consult not as Artists but only for want of Art and therefore Nature though never Consulting may act Artificially Concluded that what is called Nature is really the Divine Art 11. Nevertheless that Nature is not the Divine Art Pure and Abstract but Concreted and Embodied in Matter Ratio Mersa Confusa Not the Divine Art Archetypal but Ectypal Nature differs from the Divine Art as the Manuary Opificer from the Architect 12. Two Imperfections of the Plastick Nature in respect whereof it falls short even of Humane Art First That though it act for Ends Artificially yet it self neither Intends those Ends nor Vnderstands the Reason of what it doth and therefore cannot act Electively The Difference between the Spermatick Reasons and Knowledge Nature doth but Ape or Mimick the Divine Art or Wisdom being not Master of that Reason according to which it acts but only a Servant to it and Drudging Executioner of it 13. Proved that there may be such a thing as acts Artificially though it self do not comprehend that Art by which its Motions are Governed First from Musical Habits The Dauncer resembles the Artificial Life of Nature 14. The same further evinced from the Instincts of Brute-animals directing them to act Rationally and Artificially in order to their own Good and the Good of the Vniverse without any Reason of their own The Instincts in Brutes but Passive Impresses of the Divine Wisdom and a kind of Fate upon them 15. The Second Imperfection of the Plastick Nature that it acts without Animal Phancy ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Express Con-sense and Consciousness and is devoid of Self-perception and Self-enjoyment 16. Whether this Energy of the Plastick Nature be to be called Cogitation or no but a Logomachy or Contention about Words Granted that what moves Matter Vitally must needs do it by some Energy of its own distinct from Local Motion but that there may be a simple Vital Energy without that Duplicity which is in Synaesthesis or clear and express Consciousness Nevertheless that the Energy of Nature might be called a certain Drowsie Vnawakened or Astonish'd Cogitation 17. Instances which render it probable that there may be a Vital Energy without Synaesthesis clear and express Con-sense or Consciousness 18. The Plastick Nature acting neither Knowingly nor Phantastically acts Fatally Magically and Sympathetically The Divine Laws and Fate as to Matter not mere Cogitation in the Mind of
God but an Energetick and Effectual Principle and the Plastick Nature the true and proper Fate of Matter or the Corporeal World What Magick is and that Nature which acts Fatally acts also Magically and Sympathetically 19. That the Plastick Nature though it be the Divine Art and Fate yet for all that it it neither God nor Goddess but a Low and Imperfect Creature it acting Artificially and Rationally no otherwise than compounded Forms of Letters when printing Coherent Philosophick Sence nor for Ends than a Saw or Hatchet in the hands of a skilful Mechanick The Plastick and Vegetative Life of Nature the Lowest of all Lives and Inferiour to the Sensitive A Higher Providence than that of the Plastick Nature governing the Corporeal World it self 20. Notwithstanding which forasmuch as the Plastick Nature is a Life it must needs be Incorporeal One and the same thing having in it an entire Model and Platform and acting upon several distant parts of Matter at once coherently cannot be Corporeal and though Aristotle no where declare whether his Nature be Corporeal or Incorporeal which he neither doth clearly concerning the Rational Soul and his Followers conclude it to be Corporeal yet according to the very Principles of that Philosophy it must needs be otherwise 21. The Plastick Nature being Incorporeal must either be a Lower Power lodged in Souls that are also Conscious Sensitive or Rational or else a distinct Substantial Life by it self and Inferiour Kind of Soul How the Platonists complicate both these together with Aristotle's agreeable Determination that Nature is either Part of a Soul or not without Soul 22. The Plastick Nature as to Animals according to Aristotle a Part or Lower Power of their Respective Souls That the Phaenomena prove a Plastick Nature or Archeus in Animals to make which a distinct thing from the Soul is to multiply Entities without necessity The Soul endued with a Plastick Power the chief Formatrix of its own Body the Contribution of certain other Causes not excluded 23. That besides that Plastick Principle in Particular Animals forming them as so many Little Worlds there is a General Plastick Nature in the whole Corporeal Vniverse which likewise according to Aristotle is either a Part and Lower Power of a Conscious Mundane Soul or else something depending on it 24. That no less according to Aristotle than Plato and Socrates our selves partake of Life from the Life of the Vniverse as well as we do of Heat and Cold from the Heat and Cold of the Vniverse from whence it appears that Aristotle also held the worlds Animation with further Vndeniable Proof thereof An Answer to Two the most considerable places of that Philosopher that seem to imply the contrary That Aristotles First Immoveable Mover was no Soul but a Perfect Intellect Abstract from Matter but that he supposed this to move only as a Final Cause or as being Loved and besides it a Mundane Soul and Plastick Nature to move the Heavens Efficiently Neither Aristotle's Nature nor his Mundane Soul the Supreme Deity However though there be no such Mundane Soul as both Plato and Aristotle conceived yet notwithstanding there may be a Plastick Nature depending upon a Higher Intellectual Principle 25. No Impossibility of some other Particular Plastick Principles and though it be not reasonable to think that every Plant Herb and Pile of Grass hath a Plastick or Vegetative Soul of its own nor that the Earth is an Animal yet that there may possibly be One Plastick Inconscious Nature in the whole Terraqueous Globe by which Vegetables may be severally organized and framed and all things performed which transcend the Power of Fortuitous Mechanism 26. Our Second Vndertaking which was to shew how grosly those Atheists who acknowledge this Plastick Nature Misunderstand it and Abuse the Notion to make a Counterfeit God-almighty or Numen of it to the exclusion of the True Deity First in their supposing that to be the First and Highest Principle of the Vniverse which is the Last and lowest of all Lives a thing as Essentially Derivative from and Dependent upon a Higher Intellectual Principle as the Eccho on the Original Voice 27. Secondly in their making Sense and Reason in Animals to Emerge out of a Sensless Life of Nature by the mere Modification and Organization of Matter That no Duplication of Corporeal Organs can ever make One Single Inconscious Life to advance into Redoubled Consciousness and Self-enjoyment 28. Thirdly in attributing Perfect Knowledge and Vnderstanding to this Life of Nature which yet themselves suppose to be devoid of all Animal Sense and Consciousness 29. Lastly in making the Plastick Life of Nature to be merely Corporeal the Hylozoists contending that it is but an Inadequate Conception of Body as the only Substance and fondly dreaming that the Vulgar Notion of God is nothing but such an Inadequate Conception of the Matter of the Whole Vniverse mistaken for a Complete and Entire Substance by it self the Cause of all things CHAP. IV. The Idea of God declared in way of Answer to the First Atheistick Argument The Grand Prejudice against the Naturality of this Idea as Essentially including Unity or Onelyness in it from the Pagan Polytheism removed Proved that the Intelligent Pagans generally acknowledged One Supreme Deity What their Polytheism and Idolatry was with some Accompt of Christianity 1. The either Stupid Insensibility or Gross Impudence of Atheists in denying the word GOD to have any Signification or that there is any other Idea answering to it besides the mere Phantasm of the Sound The Disease called by the Philosopher ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã the Petrification or Dead Insensibility of the Mind 2. That the Atheists themselves must needs have an Idea of God in their minds or otherwise when they deny his Existence they should deny the Existence of Nothing And that they have also the same Idea of him with Theists they denying the very same thing which the others affirm 3. A Lemma or Preparatory Proposition to the Idea of God That though some things be Made or Generated yet it is not possible that all things should be Made but something must of Necessity Exist of it self from Eternity Vnmade and be the Cause of those other things that are Made 4. The Two most Opposite Opinions concerning that which was Self-existent from Eternity or Vnmade and the Cause of all other things Made One That it was nothing but Sensless Matter the most Imperfect of all things The Other That it was something Most Perfect and therefore Consciously Intellectual The Asserters of this latter Opinion Theists in a strict and proper sence of the former Atheists So that the Idea of God in general is a Perfect Consciously Vnderstanding Being or Mind Self-existent from Eternity and the Cause of all other things 5. Observed That the Atheists who deny a God according to the true Idea of him do often Abuse the word calling Sensless Matter by that Name and meaning nothing else thereby but a
always the Soul of this World but at first a certain Self-moving Substance endowed with a Phantastick Power Irrational and Disorderly Existing such of it self from Eternity which God by Harmonizing and introducing into it fitting Numbers and Proportions Made to be the Soul and Prince of this Generated World According to which Doctrine of Plutarch's in the supposed Soul of the World though it had a Temporary beginning yet was it never Created out of Nothing but only that which preexisted disorderly being acted by the Deity was brought into a Regular Frame And therefore he concludes ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Soul partaking of Mind Reason and Harmony is not only the Work of God but also a Part of him nor is it a thing so much made by him as from him and existing out of him And the same must he likewise affirm concerning all other Souls as those of Men and Demons that they are either all of them the Substance of God himself together with that of the Evil Demon or else certain Delibations from both if any one could understand it blended and confounded together He not allowing any new Substance at all to be created by God out of nothing preexistent It was observed in the beginning of this Chapter that Plutarch was an Assertor of two ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã or Self-existent Principles in the Universe God and Matter but now we understand that he was an Earnest Propugnor of another Third Principle as himself calls it besides them both viz. a ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã a Mad Irrational and Maleficent Soul or Daemon So that Plutarch was both a Triarchist and a Ditheist an Assertor of Three Principles but of Two Gods according to that forementioned Notion of a God as it is taken for an Animalish or Perceptive Being Self-existent We are not ignorant that Plutarch endeavours with all his might to perswade this to have been the constant Belief of all the Pagan Nations and of all the Wisest men and Philosophers that ever were amongst them For this saith he in his Book De Iside Osiride is a most ancient Opinion that hath been delivered down from Theologers and Law-makers all along to Poets and Philosophers and though the first Author thereof be Vnknown yet hath it been so firmly believed every where that the Footsteps of it have been imprinted upon the Sacrifices and Mysteries or Religious Rites both of Barbarians and Greeks Namely That the World is neither wholly Vngoverned by any Mind or Reasan as if all things floated in the streams of Chance and Fortune nor yet that there is any one Principle steering and guiding all without Resistance or Control because there is a Confused Mixture of Good and Evil in every thing and nothing is Produced by Nature sincere Wherefore it is not one only Dispenser of things who as it were out of several Vessels distributeth those several Liquors of Good and Evil mingling them together and dashing them as he pleaseth But there are two Distinct and Contrary Powers or Principles in the World One of them always leading as it were to the Right hand but the other tugging a Contrary way Insomuch that our whole Life and the whole World is a certain Mixture and Confusion of these Two at least this Terrestrial World below the Moon is such all being every where full of Irregularity and Disorder For if nothing can be Made without a Cause and that which is Good cannot be the Cause of Evil there must needs be a distinct Principle in Nature for the Production of Evil as well as Good And this hath been the Opinion of the Most and Wisest Men some of them affirming ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã that there are Two Gods as it were of Contrary Crafts and Trades one whereof is the Maker of all Good and the other of all Evil but others calling the Good Principle only a God and the Evil Principle a Daemon as Zoroaster the Magician Besides which Zoroaster and the Persian Magi Plutarch pretends that the Footsteps of this Opinion were to be found also in the Astrology of the Chaldeans and in the Mysteries and Religious Rites not only of the Egyptians but also of the Grecians themselves and lastly he particularly imputes the same to all the most famous of the Greek Philosophers as Pythagoras Empedocles Heraclitus Anaxagoras Plato and Aristotle though his chiefest endeavour of all be to prove that Plato was an Undoubted Champion for it ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã But Plato was not guilty of that Miscarriage of Later Philosophers in overlooking the Third Power which is between the Matter and God and thereby falling into the Grossest of all Absurdities That the Nature of Evils was but an Accidental Appendix to the World and came into it merely by chance no body knows how So that those very Philosophers who will by no means allow to Epicurus the Smallest Declension of his Atoms from the Perpendicular alledging that this would be to introduce a Motion without a Cause and to bring something out of Nothing themselves do notwithstanding suppose all that Vice and Misery which is in the World besides innumerable other Absurdities and Inconveniences about Body to have come into it merely by Accidental Consequence and without having any Cause in the First Principles But Plato did not so but devesting Matter of all Qualities and Differences by means whereof it could not possibly be made the Cause of Evils and then placing God at the greatest distance from being the Cause thereof he consequently resolved it into a Third Vnmade Principle between God and the Matter an Irrational Soul or Demon moving the Matter disorderly Now because Plutarch's Authority passeth so uncontrolled and his Testimony in this particular seems to be of late generally received as an Oracle and consequently the thing taken for an Unquestionable Truth that the Ditheistick Doctrine of a Good and Evil Principle was the Catholick or Universal Doctrine of the Pagan Theists and particularly that Plato above all the rest was a Professed Champion for the same we shall therefore make bold to examine Plutarch's Grounds for this so confident Assertion of his and principally concerning Plato And his Grounds for imputing this Opinion to Plato are only these Three which follow First because that Philosopher in his Politicus speaks of a Necessary and Innate Appetite that may sometimes turn the Heavens a contrary way and by that means cause Disorder and Confusion Secondly because in his Tenth De Legibus he speaks of Two kinds of Souls whereof One is Beneficent but the other Contrary And Lastly because in his Timaeus he supposeth the Matter to have been Moved disorderly before the World was made which implies that there was a Disorderly and Irrational Soul consisting with it as the Mover of it Matter being unable âo move it self But as to the First of these Allegations out of Plato's Politicus we shall only observe that that Philosopher as if it had been purposely to prevent such an
Theologer only Xenophanes his One and All being nothing else but God Whom he proved to be One solitary Being from hence because God is the Best and Most Powerful of all things and there being many degrees of Entity there must needs be something Supreme to rule over all Which Best and most Powerful Being can be but One. He also did demonstrate it to be Vnmade as likewise to be neither Finite nor Infinite in a certain sence as he removed both Motion and Rest from God Wherefore when he saith that God always remaineth or resteth the same he understands not this of that Rest which is opposite to Motion and which belongs to such things as may be moved but of a certain other Rest which is both above that Motion and its Contrary From whence it is evident that Xenophanes supposed as Sextus the Philosopher also affirmeth God to be Incorporeal a Being unlike to all other things and therefore of which no Image could be made And now we understand that Aristotle dealt not ingenously with Xenophanes when from that expression of his that God was ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã or Spheryform he would infer that Xenophanes made God to be a Body and nothing else but the Round Corporeal World Animated which yet was repugnant also to another Physical Hypothesis of this same Xenophanes ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã that there were Infinite Suns and Moons by which Moons he understood Planets affirming them to be all habitable Earths as Cicero tells us Wherefore as Simplicius resolves God was said to be ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã or Spheryform by Xenophanes only in this sence as being ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã every way like and uniform However it is plain that Xenophanes asserting One God who was All or the Universe could not acknowledge a Multitude of Partial Self-existent Deities Heraclitus was no Clear but a Confounded Philosopher he being neither a Good Naturalist nor Metaphysician and therefore it is very hard or rather impossible to reconcile his Several Opinions with one another Which is a thing the less to be wondred at because amongst the rest of his Opinions this also is said to have been One That Contradictories may be true and his writings were accordingly as Plato intimates stuft with Unintelligible Mysterious Non-sence For First he is affirmed to have acknowledged no other Substance besides Body and to have maintained That All things did Flow and nothing Stand or remain the same and yet in his Epistles according to the common opinion of Philosophers at that time doth he suppose the Prae Post-existence of Humane Souls in these words ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã c. My soul seemeth to vaticinate and presage its approaching dismission and freedom from this its prison and looking out as it were through the cracks and cranies of this body to remember those its native Regions or Countries from whence descending it was cloathed with this Flowing Mortal Body which is made up and constipated of Flegm Choler Serum Blood Nerves Bones and Flesh. And not only so but he also there acknowledgeth the Souls Immortality which Stoicks allowing its Permanency after Death for some time at least and to the next Conflagration did deny ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã This Body shall be fatally changed to something else but my Soul shall not die or perish but being an Immortal thing shall fly away mounting upwards to Heaven those Etherial Houses shall receive me and I shall no longer converse with men but Gods Again though Heraclitus asserted the Fatal Necessity of all things yet notwithstanding was he a strict Moralist and upon this accompt highly esteemed by the Stoicks who followed him in this and other things and he makes no small pretence to it himself in his Epistle to Hermodorus ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã I have also had my difficult Labours and Conflicts as well as Hercules I hâve conquer'd Pleasures I have conquer'd Riches I have conquer'd Ambition I have subdued Cowardise and Flattery neither Fear nor Intemperance can control me Grief and Anger are afraid of me and fly away from me These are the Victories for which I am crowned not by Eurystheus but as being made Master of my self Lastly though Heraclitus made Fire to be the First Principle of all things and hath some odd Passages imputed to him yet notwithstanding was he a Devout Religionist he supposing that Fiery Matter of the whole Universe Animantem esse Deum to be an Animal and God And as he acknowledged Many Gods according to that which Aristotle recordeth of him That when some passing by had espied him sitting in a smoaky Cottage he bespake them after this manner Introite nam hic Dii sunt Come in I pray for here there are Gods also he supposing all places to be full of Gods Demons and Souls so was he an undoubted Asserter of One Supreme Numen that governs all things and that such as could neither be represented by Images nor confined to Temples For after he had been accused of Impiety by Euthycles he writes to Hermodorus in this manner ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã But O you unwise and unlearned teach us first what God is that so you may be believed in accusing me of Impiety Tell us where God is Is he shut up within the Walls of Temples Is this your Piety to place God in the dark or to make him a Stony God O you unskilful know ye not that God is not made with hands and hath no basis or fulcrum to stand upon nor can be inclosed within the Walls of any Temple the whole World variegated with Plants Animals and Stars being his Temple And again ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Am I Impious O Euthycles who alone know what God is Is there no God without Altars or are Stones the only witnesses of him No his own Works give testimony to him and principally the Sun Night and Day bear witness of him the Earth bringing forth fruits declares him the Circle of the Moon that was made by him is a Heavenly Testimony of him In the next place Anaxagoras the Clazomenian Philosopher comes to be considered whose Predecessors of the Ionick Order after Thales as Anaximander Anaximenes and Hippo were as hath been already observed Materialists and Atheists they acknowledging no other Substance besides Body and resolving all things into the Motions Passions and Affections of it Whence was that cautious advice given by Jamblichus ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Prefer the Italick Philosophy which contemplates Incorporeal Substances by themselves before the Ionick which principally considers Bodies And Anaxagoras was the first of these Ionicks who went out of that Road for seeing a necessity of some other Cause besides the Material Matter being not able so much as to move it self and much less if it could by Fortuitous Motion to bring it self into an Orderly System and Compages he therefore introduced Mind into the Cosmopoeia as the Principal Cause of the Universe
assigned but only from Airs and Ethers and Waters and such like Physical and Material things And he seemed to me to deal just as if one having affirmed that Socrates did all by Mind Reason and Vnderstanding afterward undertaking to declare the Causes of all my Actions as particularly of My Sitting here at this time should render it after this manner Because forsooth my Body is compounded of Bones and Nerves which Bones being solid have Joynts in them at certain distances and Nerves of such a nature as that they are capable of being both Intended and Remitted Wherefore my Bones being lifted up in the Joynts and my Nerves some of them intended and some remitted was the cause of the bending of my Body and of my sitting down in this place He in the mean time neglecting the true and proper Cause hereof which was no other than this Because it seemed good to the Athenians to condemn me to die as also to my self most Just rather to submit to their censure and undergo their punishment than by slight to escape it for certainly otherwise these Nerves and Bones of mine would not have been here now in this posture but amongst the Megarensians and Beotians carried thither ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã by the Opinion of the Best had I not thought it Better to submit to the sentence of the City than to escape the same by flight Which kind of Philosophers saith he do not seem to me to distinguish betwixt the True and Proper Cause of things and the Cause Sine qua non that without which they could not have been effected And such are they who devise many odd Physical Reasons for the firm Settlement of the Earth without any regard to that Power which orders all things for the Best as having ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã a Divine Force in it but thinking to find out an Atlas far more strong and immortal and which can better hold all things together ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Good and Fit being not able in their Opinions to Hold or Bind any Thing From which passage of Plato's we may conclude that though Anaxagoras were so far convinced of Theism as in Profession to mak One Infinite Mind the Cause of all things Matter only excepted yet he had notwithstanding too great a Tang of that Old Material and Atheistical Philosophy of his Predecessors still hanging about him who resolved all the Phaenomena of Nature into Physical and nothing into Mental or Final Causes And we have the rather told this long story of him because it is so exact a Parallel with the Philosophick Humour of some in this present Age who pretending to assert a God do notwithstanding discard all Mental and Final Causality from having any thing to do with the Fabrick of the World and resolve all into Material Necessity and Mechanism into Vortices Globuli and Striate Particles and the like Of which Christian Philosophers we must needs pronounce that they are not near so good Theists as Anaxagoras himself was though so much condemned by Plato and Aristotle forasmuch as he did not only assert God to be the Cause of Motion but also the Governour Regulator and Methodizer of the same for the production of this Harmonious System of the World and therefore ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã the Cause of Well and Fit Whereas these utterly reject the Latter and only admitting the Former will needs suppose Heaven and Earth Plants and Animals and all things whatsoever in this orderly Compages of the World to have resulted meerly from a certain Quantity of Motion or Agitation at first impressed upon the Matter and determin'd to Vortex XXXI The Chronology of the old Philosophers having some uncertainty in it we shall not Scrupulously concern our selves therein but in the next place consider Parmenides Xenophanes his Auditor and a Philosophick Poet likewise but who conversing much with two Pythagoreans Amenias and Diochoetes was therefore look'd upon as one that was not a little addicted to the Pythagorick Sect. That this Parmenides acknowledged Many Gods is evident from what hath been already cited out of him notwithstanding which he plainly asserted also One Supreme making him as Simplicius tells us ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã the Cause of all those other Gods of which Love is said to have been first produced Which Supreme Deity Parmenides as well as Xenophanes called ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã One that was All or the Vniverse but adding thereunto of his own that it was also ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Immovable Now though it be true that Parmenides his Writings being not without obscurity some of the Ancients who were less acquainted with Metaphysical Speculations understood him Physically as if he had asserted the whole Corporeal Vniverse to be all but One Thing and that Immovable thereby destroying together with the Diversity of things all Motion Mutation and Action which was plainly to make Parmenides not to have been a Philosopher but a Mad man Yet Simplicius a man well acquainted with the Opinions of Ancient Philosophers and who had by him a Copy of Parmenides his Poems then scarce but since lost assures us that Parmenides dreamt of no such matter and that he wrote ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã or ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã not concerning a Physical Element or Principle but concerning the True Ens or the Divine Transcendency Adding that though some of those Ancient Philosophers did not distinguish ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Natural things from Supernatural yet the Pythagoreans and Xenophones and Parmenides and Empedocles and Anaxagoras did all ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã handle these Two distinctly ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã however by reason of their obscurity it were not perceived by many for which cause they have been most of them misrepresented not only by Pagans but also by Christian Writers For as the same Simplicius informs us Parmenides propounded Two several Doctrines one after another the First concerning Theological and Metaphysical things called by him ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Truth the Second concerning Physical and Corporeal things which he called ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Opinion The Transition betwixt which was contained in these Verses of his ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã In the Former of which Doctrines Parmenides asserted One Immoveable Principle but in the Latter Two movable ones Fire and Earth He speaking of Souls also as a certain Middle or Vinculum betwixt the Incorporeal and the Coporeal World and affirming that God did ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã sometimes send and translate Souls from the Visible to the Invisible Regions and sometimes again on the contrary from the Invisible to the Visible From whence it is plain that when Parmenides asserted his One and All Immovable he spake not as a Physiologer but as a Metaphysician and Theologer only Which indeed was a thing so evident that Aristotle himself though he had a mind to obscure Parmenides his sence that he might have a fling at him in his
Wherefore the sence of Empedocles his words here was this that the whole created World together with all things belonging to it viz. Plants Beasts Men and Gods was made from Contention and Friendship Nevertheless since according to Empedocles Contention and Friendship did themselves depend also upon one Supreme Deity which he with Parmenides and Xenophanes called ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã or The Very One the Writer De Mundo might well conclude that according to Empedocles all things whatsoever and not only men but Gods were derived from One Supreme Deity And that this was indeed Empedocles his sence appears plainly from Aristotle in his Metaphysicks ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã c. Empedocles makes Contention to be a certain Principle of Corruption and Generation Nevertheless he seems to generate this Contention it self also from the Very One that is from the Supreme Deity For all things according to him are from this Contention God only excepted he writing after this manner From which that is Contention and Friendship all the things that have been are and shall be Plants Beasts Men and Gods derived their Original For Empedocles it seems supposed that were it not for ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Discord or Contention all things would be One So that according to him all things whatsoever proceded from Contention or Discord together with a mixture of Friendship save only the Supreme God who hath therefore no Contention at all in him because he is Essentially ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Vnity it self and Friendship From whence Aristotle takes occasion to quarrel with Empedocles as if it would follow from his Principles that the Supreme and most Happy God was the Least wise of all as being not able to know any thing besides himself or in the World without him ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã c. This therefore happens to Empedocles that according to his Principles the most Happy God is the least Wise of all other things for he cannot know the Elements because he hath no Contention in him all Knowledge being by that which is like himself writing thus We know Earth by Earth Water by Water Air by Air and Fire by Fire Friendship by Friendship and Contention by Contention But to let this pass Empedocles here making the Gods themselves to be derived from Contention and Friendship the Supreme Deity or most Happy God only excepted who hath no Contention in him and from whom Contention and Friendship themselves were derived plainly acknowledged both One Unmade Deity the Original of all things under the name of ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã The very One and many other Inferiour Gods generated or produced by him they being Juniors to Contention or Discord as this was also Junior to Vnity the First and Supreme Deity Which Gods of Empedocles that were begotten from Contention as well as Men and other things were doubtless the Stars and Demons Moreover we may here observe that according to Empedocles his Doctrine the true Original of all the Evil both of Humane Souls and Demons which he supposed alike Lapsable was derived from that ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Discord and Contention that is necessarily contained in the Nature of them together with the the Ill Use of their Liberty both in this Present and their Pre-existent State So that Empedocles here trode in the footsteps of Pythagoras whose Praises he thus loudly sang forth in his Poems ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã c. Horum de numero quidam praestantia norat Plurima Mentis Opes Amplas sub pectore servans Omnia Vestigans Sapientum Docta Reperta c. XXII Before we come to Socrates and Plato we shall here take notice of some other Pythagoreans and Eminent Philosophers who clearly asserted One Supreme and Vniversal Numen though doubtless acknowledging withal Other Inferiour Gods Philo in his Book De Mundi Opificio writing of the Hebdomad or Septenary Number and observing that according to the Pythagoreans it was called both a Motherless and Virgin Number because it was the only number within the Decad which was neither Generated nor did it self Generate tells us that therefore it was made by them a Symbol of the Supreme Deity ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã The Pythagoreans likened this Number to the Prince and Governour of All Things or the Supreme Monarch of the Vniverse as thinking it to bear a resemblance of his Immutability which Phancy of theirs was before taken notice of by us However Philo hereupon occasionally cites this Remarkable Testimony of Philolaus the Pythagorean ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã God saith he is the Prince and Ruler over all alwayes One Stable Immovable Like to himself but Vnlike to every thing else To which may be added what in Stobaeus is further recorded out of the same Philolaus ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã This World was from Eternity and will remain to Eternity One governed by One which is Cognate and the Best Where notwithstanding he seemeth with Ocellus to maintain the Worlds Pre-eternity And again ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Wherefore said Philolaus the World might well be called the Eternal Energy or Effect of God and of Successive Generation Jamblichus in his Protrepticks cites a Passage out of Archytas another Pythagorean to the same purpose ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã c. Whosoever is able to reduce all kinds of things under One and the same Principle this man seems to me to have found out an excellent Specula or high Station from whence he may be able to take a Large View and Prospect of God and of all other things and he shall clearly perceive that God is the Beginning and End and Middle of All things that are performed according to Justice and Right Reason Upon which words of Archytas Jamblichus thus glosseth Archytas here declares the End of all Theological Speculation to be this not to rest in Many Principles but to reduce all things under One and the same Head Adding ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã That this knowledge of the first Vnity the Original of All things is the end of all Contemplation Moreover Stobaeus cites this out of Archytas his Book of Principles viz. That besides Matter and Form ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã c. There is another more necessary cause which Moving brings the Form to the Matter and that this is the First and most Powerful Cause which is fitly called God So that there are Three Principles God Matter and Form God the Artificer and Mover and Matter that which is moved and Form the Art introduced into the Matter In which same Stobean Excerption it also follows afterwards ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã That there must be something better than Mind and that this thing better than Mind is that which we properly call God Ocellus also in the same Stobaeus thus writeth ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Life contains the bodies of Animals the Cause of which
glomeravit in Orbes In semet reditura meat Mentemque Profundam Circuit simili convertit Imagine Coelum Wherefore as well according to Plato's Hypothesis as Aristotle's it may be affirmed of the Supreme Deity in the same Boetius his Language that Stabilisque manens dat cuncta Moveri Being it self Immovable it causeth all other things to Move The Immediate Efficient Cause of which Motion also no less according to Aristotle than Plato seems to have been a Mundane Soul however Aristotle thought not so fit to make this Soul a Principle in all Probability because he was not so well assured of the Incorporiety of Souls as of Minds or Intellects Nevertheless this is not the only thing which Aristotle imputed to his First and Highest Immovable Principle or the Supreme Deity its turning Round of the Primum Mobile and that no otherwise than as being Loved or as the Final Cause thereof as Proclus supposed but he as well as Anaxagoras asserted it to be also ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã The Cause of Well and Fit or ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã that without which there could be no such thing as Well that is no no Order Aptitude Proportion and Harmony in the Universe He declaring excellently that ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Vnless there were something else in the world besides Sensibles there could be neither Beginning nor Order in it but one thing would be the Principle of another infinitly or without end and again in another place already cited ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã It is not at all likely that either Fire or Earth or any such Body should be the Cause of that Well and Fit that is in the World nor can so Noble an Effect as this be reasonably imputed to Chance or Fortune Wherefore himself agreeably with Anaxagoras concludes that it is ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã or Mind which is properly ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã The Cause of Well and Right and accordingly does he frequently call the Supreme Deity by that Name He affirming likewise that the Order Pulchritude and Harmony of the whole World dependeth upon that One Highest and Supreme Being in it after the same manner as the Order of an Army dependeth upon the General or Emperour who is not for the Order but the Order for him Which Highest Being of the Universe is therefore called by him also conformably to Plato ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã The Separate Good of the World in way of distinction from that Intrinsick or Inherent Good of it which is the Order and Harmony it self ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã It is to be considered also What is the Good and Best of the Vniverse Whether its own Order only or Something Separate and existing by it self Or rather Both of them together As the Good of an Army consisteth both in its Order and likewise in its General or Emperor but principally in this Latter because the Emperor is not for the Order of the Army but the Order of the Army is for him for all things are coordered together with God and respectively to him Wherefore since Aristotle's Supreme Deity by what name soever called whether Mind or Good is the proper Efficient Cause of all that Well and Fit that is in the Universe of all the Order Pulchritude and Harmony thereof it must needs be granted that besides its being the Final Cause of Motion or its Turning round the Heavens by being Loved it was also the Efficient Cause of the Whole Frame of Nature and System of the World And thus does he plainly declare his Sence where he applauds Anaxagoras for maintaining ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã that Mind is the Cause not only of all Order but also of the whole World and when himself positively affirms ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã that from such a Principle as this depends the Heaven and Nature Where by Heaven is meant the whole World and by Nature that Artificial Nature of his before insisted on which doth nothing in vain but always acteth for Ends Regularly and is the Instrument of the Divine Mind He also somewhere affirmeth that if the Heavens or World were Generated that is Made in Time so as to have had a Beginning then it was certainly Made not by Chance and Fortune but by such an Artificial Nature as is the Instrument of a Perfect Mind And in his Physicks where he contends for the Worlds Ante-Eternity he concludes nevertheless ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã That Mind together with Nature must of necessity be the Cause of this Whole Vniverse For though the World were never so much Coeternal with Mind yet was it in order of Nature after it and Juniour to it as the Effect thereof himself thus generously resolving ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã that though some that is the Atheists affirm the Elements to have been the First Beings yet it was the most reasonable thing of all to conclude that Mind was the Oldest of All things and Seniour to the World and Elements and that according to Nature it had a Princely and Sovereign Dominion over all Wherefore we think it now sufficiently evident that Aristotle's Supreme Deity does not only move the Heavens as being Loved or is the Final Cause of Motion but also was the Efficient Cause of this Whole Mundane System framed according to the Best Wisdom and after the Best manner Possible For perhaps it may not be amiss here to observe That God was not called Mind by Aristotle and those other ancient Philosophers according to that Vulgar Sence of many in these days of ours as if he were indeed an Vnderstanding or Perceptive Being and that perfectly Omniscient but yet nevertheless such as acted all things Arbitrarilily being not determined by any Rule or Nature of Goodness but only by his own Fortuitous Will For according to those ancient Philosophers that which acts without respect to Good would not so much be accounted Mens as Dementiae Mind as Madness or Folly and to impute the Frame of Nature or System of the World together with the Government of the same to such a Principle as this would have been judg'd by them all one as to impute them to Chance or Fortune But Aristotle and those other Philosophers who called the Supreme God ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã or Mind understood thereby that which of all things in the whole world is most opposite to Chance Fortune and Temerity that which is regulated by the ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã The Well and Fit of every thing if it be not rather the very Rule Measure and Essence of Fitness it self that which acteth all for Ends and Good and doth every thing after the Best manner in order to the Whole Thus Socrates in that place before cited out of Plato's Phaedo interprets the Meaning of that Opinion That Mind made the World and was the Cause of all things ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã That therefore every thing might be concluded to have been disposed of after the Best Manner possible
in the Poetick and Civil Theologies together with the subservient Ministry of other Inferiour Created Minds Vnderstanding Beings or Demons called also by them Gods It is very true as we have already declared that the more High-flown Platonick Pagans did reduce those Many Poetical and Political Gods and therefore doubtless all the Personated and Deified Things of Nature too to the Platonick Ideas or First Paradigms and Patterns of Things in the Archetypal World which they affirmed to have been begotten from the Supreme Deity that is from the First Hypostasis of the Platonick Trinity and which were commonly called by them ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Intelligible Gods as if they had been indeed so many Distinct Substances and Persons And as we have also proved out of Philo that this High-flown Paganick Theology was ancienter than either Julian or Apuleius so do we think it not unworthy our Observation here that the very same Doctrine is by Celsus imputed also to the Egyptian Theologers as pretending to worship Brute Animals no otherwise than as Symbols of those Eternal Ideas ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Celsus also addeth That we Christians deride the Egyptians without cause they having many Mysteries in their Religion for as much as they profess that perishing Brute Animals are not worshipped by them but the Eternal Ideas According to which of Celsus it should seem that this Doctrine of Eternal Ideas as the Paradigms and Patterns of all things here below in this Sensible World was not proper to Plato nor the Greeks but common with them to the Egyptians also Which Eternal Ideas however supposed to have been Generated from that First Divine Hypostasis of the Platonick and Egyptian Trinity and called Intelligible Gods were nevertheless acknowledged by them all to exist in One Divine Intellect according to that of Plotinus ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã that the Intelligibles exist no where of themselves without Mind or Intellect which Mind or Intellect being the Second Divine Hypostasis these Intelligible and Invisible Gods however Generated from God yet are therefore said by Julian in his Book against the Christians both to Coexist with God and to Inexist in him To which purpose also is this othâr Passage of Julian's in his Sixth Oration ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã For God is All things forasmuch as he conteineth within himself the Causes of all things that any way are whether of Immortal things Immortal or of Corruptible and Perishing things not Corruptible but Eternal also and always remaining which therefore are the Causes of their perpetual Generation and New production Now these Causes of All things conteined in God are no other than The Divine Ideas Wherefore from hence it plainly appears that these Platonick and Egyptian Pagans who thus reduced their Multiplicity of Gods to the Divine Ideas did not therefore make them to be so many Minds or Spirits really distinct from the Supreme God though dependent on him too but indeed only so many Partial Considerations of One God as being All things that is conteining within himself the Causes of all things And accordingly we find in Origen that as the Egyptian Theologers called their Religious Animals Symbols of the Eternal Ideas so did they also call them Symbols of God ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Celsus applauds the Egyptian Theologers talking so magnificently and mysteriously of those Brute Animals worshipped by them and affirming them to be certain Symbols of God And now we have given some account of the Polyonymy of the One Supreme God in the Theologies of the Pagans or of his being called by Many Proper Personal Names carrying with them an Appearance of So many Several Gods First that God had many several Names bestowed upon him from many Different Notions and Partial Considerations of him according to his Vniversal and All-comprehending Nature Janus as the Beginning of the World and All things and the First Original of the Gods Whom therefore that ancient Lyrick Poet Septimius Apher accordingly thus invoked O cate rerum Sator O PRINCIPIVM DEORVM Stridula cui Limina cui Cardinei Tumultus Cui reserata mugÃunt aurea Claustra Mundi Genius as the Great Mind and Soul of the whole World Saturn as that Hidden Source and Principle from which all Forms and Lives issue forth and into which they again retire being there laid up as in their Secret Storehouse Or else as one of the Egyptian or Hermaick Writers expresseth it that which doth ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã make all things out of it self and unmake them into it self again This Hetrurian Saturn answering to the Egyptian Hammon that likewise signified Hidden and is accordingly thus interpreted by Jamblichus ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã he that bringeth forth the secret Power of the Hidden Reasons of things conteined within himself into Light God was also called Athena or Minerva as Wisdom diffusing it self through all things and Aphrodite Vrania the Heavenly Venus or Love Thus Phanes Orpheus his Supreme God so called according to Lactantius Quia cum adhuc nihil esset Primus ex Infinito apparuerit because when there was yet nothing he First appeared out of that Infinite Abyss but according to Proclus because he did ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã discover and make manifest the Intelligible Vnities or Ideas from himself though we think the Conjecture of Athanasius Kircherus to be more probable than either of these that Phanes was an Egyptian Name this Phanes I say was in the Orphick and Egyptian Theology as Proclus upon Plato's Timaeus informs us styled ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Tender and Soft Love And Pherecydes Syrus likewise affirmed ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã That Jupiter was turned all into Love when he went about to make the world Besides which there were other such Names of the Supreme God and more than have been mentioned by us as for example Summanus amongst the ancient Romans that afterward grew obsolete of which St. Austin thus Romani veteres nescio quem Summanum cui Nocturna Fulmina tribuebant coluerunt magis quam Jovem ad quem Diurna Fulmina pertinebant Sed postquam Jovi Templum insigne ac sublime constructum est propter aedis dignitatem sic ad eum multitudo confluxit ut vix inveniatur qui Summani nomen quod audiri jam non potest se saltem legisse meminerit The ancient Romans worshipped I know not what God called Summanus more than they did Jupiter But after that a stately and magnificent Temple was erected to Jupiter they all betook themselves thither in so much that the Name of Summanus now not at all heard is scarcely to be found in any ancient writings Again as the Pagans had certain other Gods which they called Special so were these but Several Names of that Supreme God also according to Particular Considerations of him either as Presiding over certain Parts of the World and Acting in them or as Exercising certain Special Powers and Vertues in the World which Several Vertues and
singillatim minutatimque colerentur stultè dicitur Nulla quippe earum praetermitteretur cum ipse Vnus qui haberet Omnia coleretur All these things which we have now said and many more which we have not said for we did not think fit to mention all All these Gods and Goddesses let them be One and the same Jupiter whether they will have them to be his PARTS or his POWERS and VERTVES according to the sence of those who think God to be the Soul or Mind of the Whole World which is the opinion of many and great Doctors This I say if it be so which what it is we will not now examine What would these Pagans lose if in a more prudent compendium they should worship One only God For what of him could be despised when his whole self was worshipped But if they fear left his PARTS pretermitted or neglected should be angry or take offence then is it not as they pretend the Life of One Great Animal which at once conteins all the Gods as his VERTVES or MEMBERS or PARTS but every Part hath its own Life by it self separate from the rest since One of them may be angry when another is pleased and the contrary But if it should be said that all together that is the whole Jupiter might be offended if his Parts were not worshipped all of them Severally and Singly this would be foolishly said because none of the Parts can be pretermitted when He that hath All is Worshipped Thus do the Pagans in Athanasius also declare that they did not worship the several Parts of the World as Really so many True and Proper Gods but only as the Parts or Members of their One Supreme God that Great Mundane Animal or Whole Animated World taken all together as one thing ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã But the Pagans themselves will acknowledge that the Divided Parts of the World taken severally are but indigent and imperfect things nevertheless do they contend that as they are by them joyned all together into One Great Body enlivened by one Soul so is the whole of them truly and properly God And now we think it is sufficiently evident that though these Pagans Verbally Personated and Deified not only the several Powers and Vertues of the One Supreme God or Mundane Soul diffused thoroughout the whole World but also the several Parts of the World it self and the Natures of Things yet their meaning herein was not to make these in themselves really so many several True and Proper Gods much less Independent Ones but to worship One Supreme God which to them was the whole Animated World in those his several Parts and Members as it were by Piece-meal or under so many Inadequate Conceptions The Pagans therefore were plainly Divided in their Natural Theology as to their opinions concerning the Supreme God some of them conceiving him to be nothing Higher than a Mundane Soul Whereas others of them to use Origen's Language did ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Transcend all the sensible Nature and thinking God not at all to be seated there look'd for him above all Corporeal things Now the Former of these Pagans worshipped the whole Corporeal World as the Body of God but the Latter of them though they had Higher thoughts of God than as a Mundane Soul yet supposing Him to have been the Cause of all things and so at first to have Conteined all things within himself as likewise that the World after it was made was not Cut off from him nor subsisted alone by it self as a Dead Thing but was Closely united to him and Livingly dependent on him these I say though they did not take the World to be God or the Body of God yet did they also look upon it as ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã as that which was Divine and Sacred and supposed that God was to be worshipped in All or that the whole World was to be worshipped as his Image or Temple Thus Plutarch though much disliking the Deifying of Inanimate Things doth himself nevertheless approve of worshipping God in the whole Corporeal World he affirming it to be ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã a most Holy and most God-becoming Temple And the ancient Persians or Magi who by no means would allow of worshipping God in any Artificial Temples made with mens hands did notwithstanding thus worship God Sub Dio and upon the Tops of Mountains in the whole Corporeal World as his Natural Temple as Cicero testifieth Nec sequor Magos Persarum quibus auctoribus Xerxes inflammasse Templa Graeciae dicitur quod Parietibus includerent Deos quibus omnia deberent esse patentia ac libera quorumque hic Mundus Omnis Templum esset Domicilium Neither do I adhere to the Persian Magi by whose suggestion and perswasion Xerxes is said to have burnt all the Temples of the Greeks because they enclosed and shut up their Gods within walls to whom all things ought to be open and free and whose Temple and Habitation this whole World is And therefore when Diogenes Laertius writeth thus of these Magi that they did ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã make Fire and Earth and Water to be Gods but condemn all Statues and Images we conceive the meaning hereof to be no other than this that as they worshipped God in no Temple save only that of the whole World so neither did they allow any other Statues of Images of him than the Things of Nature and Parts of the World such as Fire and Earth and Water called therefore by them in this sence and no other Gods For thus are they clearly represented by Clemens Alexandrinus and that according to the express Testimony of Dino ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Dinon affirmeth that the Persian Magi sacrificed under the open Heavens they accounting Fire and Water to be the only Statues and Images of the Gods For I would not here conceal their ignorance neither who thinking to avoid One Errour fall into another whilest they allow not Wood and Stones to be the Images of the Gods as the Greeks do nor Ichneumones and Ibides as the Egyptians but only Fire and Water as Philosophers Which difference betwixt the Pagan Theologers that some of them look'd upon the whole World as God or as the Body of God others only as the Image or the Temple of God is thus taken notice of by Macrobius upon Scipio's Dream where the World was called a Temple Benè autem Vniversus Mundus Dei Templum vocatur propter illos qui aestimant nihil esse aliud Deum nisi Coelum ipsum Caelestia ista quae cernimus Ideò ut Summi Omnipotentiam Dei ostenderet posse vix intelligi nunquam posse videri quicquid humano subjicitur aspectui Templum ejus vocavit ut qui haec veneratur ut Templa cultum tamen maximum debeat Conditori sciatque quisquis in usum Templi hujus inducitur ritu sibi vivendum Sacerdotis The whole World is well calledhere the Temple of God
though Formally Idolaters according to their own false Hypothesis yet were not Materially and Really so whereas these Religious Angel and Saint-Worshippers must be as well Materially as Formally such And here it is observable that these Ancient Fathers made no such Distinction of Religious Worship into Latria as peculiar to the Supreme God it being that whereby he is adored as Self-Existent and Omnipotent or the Creator of all and Dulia such an Inferiour Religious Worship as is communicable to Creatures but concluded of Religious Worship Universally and without Distinction that the due Object of it all was the Creator only and not any Creature Thus Athanasius plainly in his Third Oration ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã If the Son or Word of God were to be Worshipped though a Creature because transcending us in glory and dignity then ought every Inferiour Being to Worship what is Superiour to it Whereas the case is otherwise For a Creature doth not Religiously worship a Creature but only God the Creator Now they who distinguish Religious Worship into Latria and Dulia must needs suppose the Object of it in general to be that which is Superiour to us and not the Creator only which is here contradicted by Athanasius But because it was objected against these Orthodox Fathers by the Arians that the Humanity of our Saviour Christ which is unquestionably a Creature did share in their Religious Worship also it is worth the while to see what account Athanasius gives of this ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã We give no Religious Worship to any Creature far be it from us For this is the Errour of the Pagans and of the Arians But We Worship the Word of God the Lord of the Creation Incarnated For though the Flesh of Christ considered alone by it self were but a part of the Creatures nevertheless was it made the Body of God And we neither Worship this Body by it self alone divided from the Word nor yet intending to worship the Word do we remove it at a great distance from this flesh but knowing that of the Scripture The Word was made Flesh we look upon this Word even in the Flesh as God And again to the same purpose ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Let these Arians Know at length that we who Worship the Lord in Flesh Worship no Creature but only the Creator cloathed with a Creaturely Body And for the same cause was it that Nestorius afterwards dividing the Word from the Flesh the Divinity of Christ from the Humanity and not acknowledging such an Hypostatick Vnion betwixt them as he ought but nevertheless Religiously Worshipping our Saviour Christ was therefore branded by the Christian Church with the Name of ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã A Man-Worshipper or Idolater To conclude they who excuse themselves from being Idolaters no otherwise than because they do not give that very same Religious Worship to Saints and Angels which is pecular to God Almighty and consists in honouring him as Self-Existent and the Creator of all things but acknowledge those others to be Creatures Suppose that to be Necessary to Idolatry which is Absolutely Impossible viz. to acknowledge more Omnipotents as Creators of all than One or to account Creatures as such Creators as they imply all those to be Uncapable of Idolatry who acknowledge One Supreme God the Creator of the whole World which is directly contradictious to the Doctrine of the Ancient Church Hitherto in way of Answer to an Atheistick Objection against the Naturality of the Idea of God as including Oneliness in it from the Pagan Polytheism have we largely proved that at least the Civilized and Intelligent Pagans generally acknowledged One Sovereign Numen and that their Polytheism was partly but Phantastical nothing but the Polyonymy of one Supreme God or the Worshipping him under different Names and Notions according to his several Vertues and Manifestations And that though besides this they had another Natural and Real Polytheism also yet this was only of Many Inferiour or Created Gods Subordinate to One Supreme ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã or Vncreated Which notwithstanding is not so to be understood as if we did confidently affirm that Opinion of Many Independent Deities never to have so much as entred into the Mind of any Mortal For since Humane Nature is so Mutable and Depravable as that notwithstanding the Connate Idea and Prolepsis of God in the Minds of Men some unquestionably do degenerate and lapse into Atheism there can be no reason why it should be thought absolutely impossible for any ever to entertain that false Conceit of More Independent Deities But as for Independent Gods Invisible we cannot trace the footsteps of such a Polytheism as this any where nor find any more than a Ditheism of a Good and Evil Principle Only Philo and others seem to have conceived That amongst the ancient Pagans some were so grosly sottish as to suppose a Plurality of Independent Gods Visible and to take the Sun and Moon and all the Stars for Such However if there were any such and these Writers were not mistaken as it frequently happened it is certain that they were but very few because amongst the most Barbarian Pagans at this day there is hardly any Nation to be found without an acknowledgment of a Sovereign Deity as appears from all those Discoveries which have been made of them since the improvement of Navigation Wherefore what hath been hitherto declared by us might well be thought a sufficient Answer to the forementioned Atheistick Objection against the Idea of God Notwithstanding which when we wrote the Contents of this Chapter we intended a further Account of the Natural and Real Polytheism of the Pagans and their Multifarious Idolatry chiefly in order to the Vindication of the Truth of Christianity against Atheists forasmuch as one grand Design hereof was unquestionably to destroy the Pagan Polytheism and Idolatry which consisted in Worshipping the Creature besides the Creator But we are very Sensible that we have been surprized in the Length of this Chapter which is already swelled into a Disproportionate Bigness by means whereof we cannot comprehend within the compass of this Volume all that belongs to the Remaining Contents together with such a Full and Copious Confutation of the Atheistick Grounds as was intended Wherefore we shall here Divide the Chapter and reserve those Remaining Contents together with a further Confutation of Atheism for another Volume which God affording Life Health and Leisure we intend shall follow Only subjoyning in the mean time a Short and Compendious Confutation of all the Atheistick Arguments proposed A CONFUTATION OF ATHEISM CHAP. V. HAving in the Second Chapter revealed all the Dark Mysteries of Atheism and producâd the utmost strength of that Cause and in the Tâird made an Introduction to the Coââutation of those Atheistick Grounds by representing all the several Forms and Schemes of Atheism and shewing both thâir Disagreements amongst themselves and wherein they all agree together
Dark denying it to be a Rule and Measure of Truth His own words are these There are Two Species of Knowledge the One Genuine the other Dark or Obscure The Dark and Obscure Knowledge is Seeing Hearing Smelling Tasting Touching But the Genuine Knowledge is another more Hidden and Recondit To which purpose there is another Fragment also of this Democritus preserved by the same Sextus ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Bitter and Sweet Hot and Cold are only in Opinion or Phancy Colour is only in opinion Atoms and Vacuum alone in Truth and Reality That which is thought to be are Sensibles but these are not according to Truth but Atoms and Vacuum only Now the chief Ground of this Rational Discovery of the ancient Atomists that Sensible things as Heat and Cold Bitter and Sweet Red and Green are no Real Qualities in the Objects without but only our own Phancies was because in Body there are no such things Intelligible but only Magnitude Figure Site Motion and Rest. Of which we have not only Sensible Ideas Passively impressed upon us from without but also Intelligible Notions Actively Exerted from the Mind it self Which Latter notwithstanding because they are not unaccompanied with Sensible Phantasms are by many unskilfully confounded with them But besides these we have other Intelligible Notions or Ideas also which have no Genuine Phantasms at all belonging to them Of which whosoever doubts may easily be satisfied and convinced by reading but a Sentence or two that he understands in any Book almost that shall come next to his hand and reflexively examining himself whether he have a Phantasm or Sensible Idea belonging to every Word or no. For whoever is modest and ingenuous will quickly be forced to confess that he meets with many Words which though they have a Sence or Intelligible Notion yet have no Genuine Phantasm belonging to them And we have known some who were confidently engaged in the other Opininon being put to read the beginning of Tully's Offices presently non-plust and confounded in that first word Quanquam they being neither able to deny but that there was a Sence belonging to it nor yet to affirm that they had any Phantasm thereof save only of the Sound or Letters But to prove that there are Cogitations not subject to Corporeal Sense we need go no further than this very Idea or Description of God A Substance Absolutely Perfect Infinitely Good Wise and Powerful Necessarily Self-existent and the Cause of all other things Where there is not One Word unintelligible to him that hath any Uunderstanding in him and yet no Considerative and Ingenuous Person can pretend that he hath a Genuine Phantasm or Sensible Idea answering to any one of those words either to Substance or to Absolutely Perfect or to Infinitely or to Good or to Wise or to Powerful or to Necessity or to Self-existence or to Cause or indeed to All or Other or Things Wherefore it is nothing but want of Meditation together with a Fond and Sottish Dotage upon Corporeal Sense which hath so far imposed upon some as to make them believe that they have not the least Cogitation of any thing not subject to Corporeal Sense or that there is nothing in Humane Vnderstanding or Conception which was not First in Bodily Sense a Doctrine highly favourable to Atheism But since it is certain on the contrary that we have many Thoughts not Subject to Sense it is manifesâ that whatsoever falls not under External Sense is not therefore Vnconceivable and Nothing Which whosoever asserts must needs affirm Life and Cogitation it self Knowledge or Vnderstanding Reason and Memory Volition and Appetite things of the greatest Moment and Reality to be Nothing but mere Words without any Significaetion Nay Phancy and Sense it self upon this Hypothesis could hardly scape from becoming Non-Entities too forasmuch as neither Phancy nor Sense falls under Sense but only the Objects of them we neither seeing Vision nor feeling Taction nor hearing Audition much less hearing Sight or seeing Tast or the like Wherefore though God should be never so much Corporeal as some Theists have conceived him to be yet since the Chief of his Essence and as it were his Inside must by these be acknowledged to consist in Mind Wisdom and Vnderstanding he could not possibly as to this fall under Corporeal Sense Sight or Touch any more than Thought can But that there is Substance Incorporeal also and therefore in it self altogether Insensible and that the Deity is such is demonstrated elsewhere We grant indeed that the Evidence of Particular Bodies existing Hîc Nunc without us doth necessarily depend upon the Information of Sense but yet nevertheless the Certainty of this very Evidence is not from Sense alone but from a Complication of Reason and Vnderstanding together with it Where Sense the only Evidence of things there could be no Absolute Truth and Falshood nor Certainty at all of any thing Sense as such being only Relative to Particular Persons Seeming and Phantastical and obnoxious to much Delusion For if our Nerves and Brain be inwardly so moved and affected as they would be by such an Object present when indeed it is absent and no other Motion or Sensation in the mean time prevail against it and obliterate it then must that Object of necessity seem to us present Moreover those Imaginations that spring and bubble from the Soul it self are commonly taken for Sensations by us when asleep and sometimes in Melancholick and Phanciful Persons also when awake That Atheistick Principle that there is no Evidence at all of any thing as Existing but only from Corporeal Sense is plainly contradicted by the Atomick Atheists themselves When they assert Atoms and Vacuum to be the Principles of all things and the Exuvious Images of Bodies to be the Causes both of Sight and Cogitation for Single Atoms and those Exuvious Images were never Seen nor Felt and Vacuum or Empty Space is so far from being Sensible that these Atheists themselves allow it to be the One Only Incorporeal Wherefore they must here go beyond the Ken of Sense and appeal to Reason only for the Existence of these Principles as Protagoras one of them in Plato professedly doth ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Have a Care that none of the Prophane and Vninitiated in the Mysteries over-hear you By the Prophane I mean saith he those who think nothing to Exist but what they can feel with their Fingers and exclude all that is Invisible out of the Rank of Being Were Existence to be allowed to nothing that doth not fall under Corporeal Sense then must we deny the Existence of Soul and Mind in our selves and others because we can neither Feel nor See any such thing Whereas we are certain of the Existence of our own Souls partly from an inward Consciousness of our own Cogitations and partly from that Principle of Reason That Nothing can not Act. And the Existence of other Individual Souls is manifest to us
Stratonick or Hylozoick Atheism because Sense and Conscious Vnderstanding could no more result either from those Qualities of Heat and Cold Moist and Dry contempered together or from the meer Organization of Inanimate and Sensless Matter than it could from the Concursus Motus Ordo Positura Figurae of Atoms devoid of all manner of Qualities Had there been once nothing but Sensless Matter Fortuitously Moved there could never have emerged into Being any Soul or Mind Sense and Vnderstanding because no Effect can possibly transcend the Perfection of its Cause Wherefore Atheists supposing Themselves and all Souls and Minds to have sprung from Stupid and Sensless Matter and all that Wisdom which is any where in the World both Political and Philosophical to be the Result of meer Fortune and Chance must needs be concluded to be Grosly Ignorant of Causes which had they not been they could never have been Atheists So that Ignorance of Causes is the Seed not of Theism but of Atheism true Philosophy and the Knowledge of the Cause of our Selves leading necessarily to a Deity Again Atheists are Ignorant of the Cause of Motion in Bodies also by which notwithstanding they suppose all things to be done that is they are never able to Salve this Phaenomenon so long as they are Atheists and acknowledge no other Substance besides Matter or Body For First it is undeniably certain that Motion is not Essential to all Body as such because then no Particles of Matter could ever Rest and consequently there could have been no Generation nor no such Mundane System produced as this is which requires a certain Proportionate Commixture of Motion and Rest no Sun nor Moon nor Earth nor Bodies of Animals since there could be no Coherent Consistency of any thing when all things flutter'd and were in continual Separation and Divulsion from one another Again it is certain likewise that Matter or Body as such hath no Power of Moving it self Freely or Spontaneously neither by Will or Appetite both because the same Inconvenience would from hence ensue likewise and because the Phaenomena or Appearances do plainly evince the contrary And as for that Prodigiously Absurd Paradox of some few Hylozoick Atheists that all Matter as such and therefore every Smallest Particle thereof hath not only Life Essentially belonging to it but also Perfect Wisdom and Knowledge together with Appetite and Self-moving Power though without Animal Sense or Consciousness this I say will be elsewhere in due place further confuted But the Generality of the ancient Atheists that is the Anaximandrians and Democriticks attributed no manner of Life to Matter as such and therefore could ascribe no Voluntary or Spontaneous Motion to the same but Fortuitous only according to that of the Epicurean Poet already cited Nam certè neque Consilio Primordia rerum Ordine se quaeque atque sagaci mente locarunt Nec quos quaeque darent Motus pepigere profectó Wherefore these Democriticks as Aristotle somewhere intimates were able to assign no other Cause of Motion than only this That One Body moved another from Eternity Infinitely so that there was no ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã no First Vnmoved Mover ever to be found because there is no Beginning nor First in Eternity From whence probably that Doctrine of some Atheistick Stoicks in Alex. Aphrodisius was derived That there is no First in the rank and order of Causes In the footsteps of which Philosophers a Modern Writer seemeth to have trodden when declaring himself after this manner Si quis ab Effectu quocunque ad Causam ejus Immediatam atque inde and Remotiorem ac sic perpetuò ratiocinatione ascenderit non tamen in aeternum procedere poterit sed defatigatus aliquando deficiet If any one will from whatsoever Effect ascend upward to its Immediate Cause and from thence to a Remoter and so onwards perpetually in his Ratiocination yet shall he never be able to hold on thorough all Eternity but at length being quite tyred out with his Journey be forced to desist or give over Which seems to be all one as if he should have said One thing Moved or Caused another Infinitely from Eternity in which there being no Beginning there is consequently no First Mover or Cause to be reach'd unto But this Infinite Progress of these Democriticks in the Order of Causes and their shifting off the Cause of Motion from one thing to another without end or beginning was rightly understood by Aristotle to be indeed the Assigning of No Cause of Motion at all ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã They acknowledging saith he no First Mover according to Nature must needs make an idle Progress Infinitely that is in the Language of this Philosopher assign no Cause at all of Motion Epicurus therefore to mend the matter though according to the Principles of the Atomick Physiology he discarded all other Qualities yet did he notwithstanding admit this One Quality of Gravity or Ponderosity in Atoms pressing them continually downwards in Infinite Space In which as nothing could be more Absurd nor Vnphilosophical than to make Vpwards and Downwards in Infinite Space or a Gravity tending to no Centre nor Place of Rest so did he not assign any Cause of Motion neither but only in effect affirm the Atoms therefore to tend Downwards because they did so a Quality of Gravity signifying only an Endeavour to tend Downwards but Why or Wherefore no body knows And it is all one as if Epicurus should have said that Atoms moved Downwards by an Occult Quality he either betaking himself to this as an Asylum a Sanctuary or Refuge for his Ignorance or else indeed more absurdly making his very Ignorance it self disguized under that name of a Quality to be the Cause of Motion Thus the Atheists universally either assigned no Cause at all for Motion as the Anaximandrians and Democriticks or else no True one as the Hylozoists when to avoid Incorporeal Substance they would venture to attribute Perfect Vnderstanding Appetite or Will and Self-moving Power to all Sensless Matter whatsoever But since it appears plainly that Matter or Body cannot Move it self either the Motion of all Bodies must have no manner of Cause or else must there of necessity be some other Substance besides Body such as is Self-active and Hylarchical or hath a Natural Power of Ruling over Matter Upon which latter account Plato rightly determin'd that Cogitation which is Self-activity or Autochinesie was in order of Nature before the Local Motion of Body which is Heterochinesie Though Motion considered Passively in Bodies or taken for their Translation or Change of Distance and Place be indeed a Corporeal thing or a Mode of those Bodies themselves moving yet as it is considered Actively for the Vis Movens that Active Force which causes this Translation or Change of Place so is it an Incorporeal thing the Energy of a Self-Active Substance upon that sluggish Matter or Body which cannot at all move it self Wherefore in the Bodies of
themselves Intend and act for Ends that therefore Nature doth the like And they might as well say that Nature Laughs and Cryes Speaks and Walks Syllogizes and Philosophizes because themselves do so But as a Modern Philosopher concludeth The Vniverse as one Aggregate of things Natural hath no Intention belonging to it And accordingly were all Final Causes rightly banished by Democritus out of Physiology as Aristotle recordeth of him ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã That he reduced all things to Natural and Necessary Causes altogether rejecting Final To all which we briefly reply That there are indeed two Extremes here to be avoided the One of those who derive all things from the Fortuitous Motions of Sensless Matter which is the Extreme of the Atomick Atheists the Other of Bigotical Religionists who will needs have God ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã to do all things himself immediately as if all in Nature were Miracle But there is a Middle betwixt both these Extremes namely to suppose that besides God and in Subordination to him there is a Nature not Fortuitous but Artificial and Methodical which governing the Motion of Matter and bringing it into Regularity is a Secondary or Inferiour Cause of Generations Now this Natura Artificiosa this Artificial Nature though it self indeed do not understand the Reason of what it doth nor properly Intend the Ends thereof yet may it well be conceived to act Regularly for the sake of Ends Vnderstood and Intended by that Perfect Mind upon which it depends As the Manuary Opificers understand not the Designs of the Architect but only drudgingly perform their several tasks imposed by him and as Types or Forms of Letters composed together Print Coherent Philosophick Sence which themselves understand nothing of upon which Artificial or Spermatick Nature we have largely insisted before in the Appendix to the Third Chapter And thus neither are all things performed Immediately and Miraculously by God himself neither are they all done Fortuitously and Temerariously but Regularly and Methodically for the sake of Ends though not Vnderstood by Nature it self but by that Higher Mind which is the Cause of it and doth as it were continually Inspire it Some indeed have unskilfully attributed their Own Properties or Animal Idiopathies to Inanimate Bodies as when they say that Matter desires Forms as the Female doth the Male and that Heavy Bodies descend down by Appetite toward the Centre that so they may rest therein and that they sometimes again Ascend in Discretion to avoid a Vacuum Of which Fanciful Extravagances if the Advancer of Learning be understood there is nothing to be reprehended in this following passage of his Incredibile est quantum agmen Idolorum Philosophiae immiserit Naturalism Operationum ad Similitudinem Actionum Humanarum Reductio It is incredible how many Errours have been transfused into Philosophy from this One Delusion of Reducing Natural actions to the Mode of Humane or of thinking that Nature acteth as a Man doth But if that of his be extended further to take away all Final Causes from the things of Nature as if nothing were done therein for Ends Intended by a Higher Mind then is it the very Spirit of Atheism and Infidelity It is no Idol of the Cave or Den to use that Affected Language that is no Prejudice or Fallacy imposed upon our selves from the attributing our own Animalish Properties to things without us to think that the Frame and System of this whole World was contrived by a Perfect Vnderstanding Being or Mind now also presiding over the same which hath every where Printed the Signatures of its own Wisdom upon the Matter As also that though Nature it self do not properly Intend yet it acteth according to an Intellectual Platform Prescribed to it as being the Manuary Opificer of the Divine Architectonick Art or this Art it self as it were Transfused into the Matter and Embodied in it Thus Cicero's Balbus long since declared concerning it that it was not Vis quaedam sine Ratione ciens Motus in Corporibus Necessarios sed Vis particeps Ordinis tanquam via progrediens cujus Solertiam nulla Ars nemo Artifex consequi potest imitando Not a force Vnguided by Reason Exciting Necessary Motions in Bodies Temerariously but such a Force as partakes of Order and proceeds as it were Methodically whose Cunning or Ingeniosity no Art or Humane Opificer can possibly reach to by Imitation For it is altogether Unconceivable how we Our Selves should have Mind and Intention in us were there none in the Universe or in that Highest Principle from which all proceeds Moreover it was truly affirmed by Aristotle that there is much more of Art in some of the things of Nature than there is in any thing Artificially made by men and therefore Intention or Final and Mental Causality can no more be secluded from the consideration of Natural than it can from that of Artificial things Now it is plain that Things Artificial as a House or Clock can neither be Understood nor any true Cause of them assigned without Design or Intention for Ends and Good For to say that a House is Stones Timber Mortar Iron Glass Lead c. all put together is not to give a Definition thereof or to tell what indeed it is it being such an Apt Disposition of all these Materials as may make up the whole fit for Habitation and the Vses of men Wherefore this is not sufficiently to assign the Cause of a House neither to declare out of what Quarry the Stones were dugg nor in what Woods or Forests the Timber was felled and the like Nor as Aristotle addeth ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã If any one should go about thus to give an account of a House from Material Necessity as the Atheistick Philosophers then did of the World and the Bodies of Animals That the Heavier things being carried downward of their own accord and the Lighter upward therefore the Stones and Foundation lay at the bottom and the Earth for the Walls being Lighter was Higher and the Timber being yet Lighter Higher than that but above all the Straw or Thatch it being the Lightest of all Nor lastly if as the same Aristotle elsewhere also suggesteth one should further pretend that a House was therefore made such ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã c. meerly because the Hands of the Labourers and the Axes and Hammers and Trowels and other Instruments Chanced all to be moved so and so We say that none of all these would be to assign the true cause of a House without declaring that the Architect first framed in his Mind a Model or Platform of such a thing to be made out of of those Materials so aptly disposed into a Foundation Walls Roof Doors Rooms Stairs Chimneys Windows c. as might render the whole fit for Habitation and other Humane uses And no more certainly can the Things of Nature in whose very Essence Final Causality is as much included be either rightly Understood or the Causes of
them assigned meerly from Matter and Mechanism or the Necessary and Vnguided Motion thereof without Design or Intention for Ends and Good Wherefore to say that the Bodies of Animals became such meerly because the Fluid Seed by Motion Happened to make such Traces and beget such Stamina and Lineamentâ as out of which that Compages of the whole resulted is not to assign a Cause of them but to Dissemble Smother and Conceal their True Efficient Cause which is the Wisdom and Contrivance of that Divine Architect and Geometer making them every way fit for the Inhabitation and uses of their respective Souls Neither indeed can we banish all Final that is all Mental Causality from Philosophy or the Consideration of Nature without banishing at the same time Reason and Vnderstanding from our selves and looking upon the Things of Nature with no other Eyes than Brutes do However none of the Ancient Atheists would ever undertake to assign Necessary Causes for all the Parts of the Bodies of Animals and their Efformation from meer Matter Motion and Mechanism Those small and pitiful attempts in order thereunto that have been made by some of them in a few Instances as that the Spina Dorsi came from the Flexure of the Bodies of Animals when they first sprung out of the Earth the Intestines from the Flux of Humours excavating a crooked and winding Channel for it self and that the Nostrils were broke open by the Eruption of breath these I say only showing the Vnfeisableness and Impossibility thereof And therefore Democritus was so wise as never to pretend to give an Account in this way of the Formation of the Foetus he looking upon it as a thing absolutely Desperate nor would he venture to say any more concerning it as Aristotle informeth us than ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã that it always cometh so to pass of necessity but stopp'd all further Enquiry concerning it after this manner ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã That to demand about any of these things for what Cause it was thus was to demand a Beginning of Infinite As if all the Motions from Eternity had an Influence upon and Contribution to whatsoever Corporeal thing was now produced And Lucretius notwithstanding all his swaggering and boasting that He and Epicurus were able to assign Natural and Necessary Causes for every thing without a God hath no where so much as one word concerning it We conclude therefore that Aristotle's Judgment concerning Final Causes in Philosophy is much to be preferred before that of Democritus ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã That Both kind of Causes Material and Final ought to be declared by a Physiologer but especially the Final the End being the Cause of the Matter but the Mâtter not the Cause of the End And thus do we see plainly that the Atomick Atheists are utterly ignorant of the Cause ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã of the Rââuâar and Artificial Frame of thâ things in Nâture and consâquently of the whâle Mundane Sâstem the True Knowledge whereof nâcâssârily leadeth to a God But it is prodigiously strange that these Atheists should in this their Ignorance and Sottâshnâss be Justified by any Professed Theists and Christians of Later times who Atomizing in their Physiology also would fain perswade us in like manner that this whole Mundane System together with Plants and Animals was derived meerly from the Necessary and Vnguided Motion of the Small Particles of Matter at first turned round in a Vortex or else jumbled all together in a Chaos without any Intention for Ends and Good that is without the Direction of any Mind God in the mean time standing by only as an Idle Spâctator of this Lusus Atomorum this Sportful Dance of Atoms and of the various Results thereof Nay these Mechanick Theists have here quite outstripped and out-done the Atomick Atheists themselves they being much more Immodest and Extravagant than ever those were For the Professed Atheists durst never venture to affirm that this Regular System of things Resulted from the Fortuitous Motions of Atoms at the very first before they had for a long time together produced many other Inept Combinations or Aggregate Forms of particular things and Nonsensical Systems of the whole And they supposed also that the Regularity of things here in this world would not always continue such neither but that some time or other Confusion and Disorder would break in again Moreover that besides this World of ours there are at this very instant Innumerable other worlds Irregular and that there is but One of a Thousand or ten Thousand amongst the Infinite Worlds that have such Regularity in them The reason of all which is because it was generally taken for granted and look'd upon as a Common Notion that ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã as Aristotle expresseth it that None of those things which are from Fortune or Chance come to pass constantly and always alike But our Mechanick or Atomick Theists will have their Atoms never so much as once to have Fumbled in these their Fortuitous Motions nor to have produced any Inept System or Incongruous Forms at all but from the very first all along to have taken up their Places and have Ranged themselves so Orderly Methodically and Discreetly as that they could not possibly have done it better had they been Directed by the most Perfect Wisdom Wherefore these Atomick Theists utterly Evacuate that grand Argument for a God taken from the Phaenomenon of the Artificial Frame of things which hath been so much insisted on in all Ages and which commonly makes the strongest impression of any other upon the Minds of men they leaving only certain Metaphysical Arguments for a Deity which though never so good yet by reason of their Subtilty can do but little Execution upon the Minds of the Generality and even amongst the Learned do oftentimes beget more of Doubtful Disputation and Scepticism than of Clear Conviction and Satisfaction The Atheists in the mean time laughing in their sleeves and not a little triumphing to see the Cause of Theism thus betrayed by its professed Friends and Assertors and the Grand Argument for the same totally Slurred by them and so their work done as it were to their hands for them Now as this argues the greatest Insensibility of Mind or Sottishness and Stupidity in Pretended Theists not to take the least notice of the Regular and Artificial Frame of things or of the Signatures of the Divine Art and Wisdom in them nor to look upon the World and things of Nature with any Other Eyes than Oxen and Horses do so are there many Phaenomena in Nature which being partly Above the Force of these Mechanick Powers and partly Contrary to the same can therefore never be Salved by them nor without Final Causes and some Vital Principle As for example that of Gravity or the Tendency of Bodies Downward the Motion of the Diaphragma in Respiration the Systole and Diastole of the Heart which was before declared to be a Muscular Constriction and
Relaxation and there-not Mechanical but Vital We might also add amongst many others the Intersection of the Plains of the Equator and Ecliptick or the Earth's Diurnal Motion upon an Axis not Parallel with that of the Ecliptick nor Perpendicular to the Plain thereof For though Carâesius would needs imagine this Earth of ours once to have been a Sun and so it self the Centre of a lesser Vortex whose Axis was then Directed after this manner and which therefore still kept the same Site or Posture by reason of the Striate Particles finding no fit Pores or Traces for their passage thorough it but only in this Direction yet does he himself confess that because these Two Motions of the Earth the Annual and Diurnal would be much more conveniently made upon Parallel Axes therefore according to the Laws of Mechanism they should perpetually be brought nearer and nearer together till at length the Equator and the Ecliptick come to have their Axes Parallel to one another Which as it hath not yet come to pass so neither hath there been for these last two Thousand years according to the best Observations and Judgments of Astronomers any nearer approach made of them to one another Wherefore the Continuation of these âwo Motions of the Earth the Annual and Diurnal upon Axes differânt or not Parallel is resolvable into nothing but a Final and Mental Cause or the ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã because it was Best it should be so the Variety of the Seasons of the year depending hereupon But the greatest of all the particular Phaenomena is the Organization and Formation of the Bodies of Animals consisting of such Variety and Curiosity which these Mechanick Philosophers being no way able to give an account of from the Necessary Motion of Matter Vnguided by Mind for Ends prudently therefore break off their System there when they should come to Animals and so leave it altogether untouch'd We acknowledge indeed that there is a Posthumous Piece extant imputed to Cartesius and entituled De la Formation du Foetus wherein there is some Pretence made to salve all this by Fortuitous Mechanism But as the Theory thereof is wholly built upon a False Supposition sufficiently confuted by the Learned Harvey in his Book of Generation That the Seed doth Materially enter into the Composition of the Egg so is it all along Precarious and Exceptionable nor does it extend at all to the Differences that are in several Animals or offer the least Reason why an Animal of one Species or Kind might not be Formed out of the Seed of another It is here indeed Pretended by these Mechanick Theists that Final Causes therefore ought not to be of any Regard to a Philosopher because we should not arrogate to Our selves to be as Wise as God Almighty is or to be Privy to his Secrets Thus in the Metaphysical Meditations Atque ob hanc Vnicam Rationem totum illud Causarum genus quod à Fine peti solet in Rebus Physicis nullum Vsum habere existimo non enim absque Temeritate me puto investigare posse Fines Dei And again likewise in the Principles of Philosophy Nullas unquam Rationes circa Res Naturales à Fine quem Deus aut Natura in iis faciendis sibi proposuit admittimus quia non tantum nobis debemus arrogare ut ejus Consiliorum participes esse possimus But the Question is not Whether we can always reach to the Ends of God Almighty and know what is Absolutely Best in every case and accordingly make Conclusions that therefore the thing is or ought to be so but Whether any thing at all were made by God for Ends and Good otherwise than would of it self have resulted from the Fortuitous Motion of Matter Nevertheless we see no Reason at all why it should be thought Presumption or Intrusion into the Secrets of God Almighty to affirm that Eyes were made by him for the End of Seeing and accordingly so contrived as might best conduce thereunto and Ears for the End of Hearing and the like This being so plain that nothing but Sottish Stupidity or Atheistick Incredulity masked perhaps under an Hypocritical Veil of Humility can make any doubt thereof And therefore Aristotle justly reprehended Anaxagoras for that Absurd Aphorism of his ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã That Man was therefore the Wisest or most Solert of all Animals because he Chanced to have hands He not doubting to affirm on the Contrary ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã That it was far more reasonable to think that because Man was the Wisest or most Solert and Active of all Animals therefore he had Hands given him For Nature saith he distributeth as a Wise man doth what is suitable to every one and it is more Proper to give Pipes to one that hath Musical Skill than upon him that hath Pipes to bestow Musical Skill Wherefore these Mechanick Theists would further alledge and that wiâh some more Colour of Reason That it is below the Dignity of God Almighty to condescend to all those mean and trivial Offices and to do the Things of Nature himself immediatly as also that it would be but a Botch in Nature if the Defects thereof were every where to be supplied by Miracle But to this also the Reply is easie That though the Divine Wisdom it self contrived the System of the whole World for Ends and Good yet Nature as an Inferiour Minister immediately Executes the same I say not a Dead Fortuiââus and meerly Mechanichal but a Vital Orderly and Artificial Nature Which Nature asserted by most of the Ancient Philosophers who were Theists is thus described by Proclus ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Nature is the Last of all those Causes that Fabricate this Corporeal and Sensible world and the utmost bound of Incorporeal Substances Which being full of Reasons and Powers Orders and Presides over all Mundane affairs It proceeding according to the Magic Oracles from that Supreme Goddess the Divine Wisdom which is the Fountain of all Life as well Intellectual as that which is Concrete with Matter Which Wisdom this Nature always essentially depending upon passes through all things unhinderably by means whereof even Inanimate things partake of a kind of Life and things Corruptible remain Eternal in their Species they being contained by its Standing Forms or Ideas as their Causes And thus does the Oracle describe Nature as presiding over the whole Corporeal Word and perpetually turning round the Heavens Here have we a Description of One Vniversal Substantial Life Soul or Spirit of Nature Subordinate to the Deity besides which the same Proclus elsewhere supposeth other Particular Natures or Spermatick Reasons in those Words of his ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã After the first Soul are there particular Souls and after the Vniversal Nature Particular Natures Where it may be
is some confirmation of the Truth of Christianity the Scripture insisting so much upon these Evil Demons or Devils and declaring it to be one design of our Saviour Christ's coming into the World to oppose these Confederate Powers of the Kingdom of Darkness and to rescue mankind from the Thraldom and Bondage thereof As for Wizards and Magicians Persons who associate and confederate themselves in a peculiar manner with these Evil Spirits for the gratification of their own Revenge Lust Ambition and other Passions besides the Scriptures there hath been so full an attestation given to them by persons unconcerned in all Ages that those our so confident Exploders of them in this present Age can hardly escape the suspicion of having some Hankring towards Atheism But as for the Demoniacks and Energumeni It hath been much wondred that there should be so many of them in our Saviour's time and hardly any or none in this present Age of ours Certain it is from the Writings of Josephus in sundry places that the Pharisaick Jews were then generally possessed with an Opinion of these ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Demoniacks men Possessed with Devils or Infested by them And that this was not a meer Phrase or Form of Speech only amongst them for persons very Ill-affected in their Bodies may appear from hence that Josephus declares it as his opinion concerning the Demons or Devils that they were ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã the Spirits or Souls of wicked men deceased getting into the Bodies of the Living From hence it was that Jews in our Saviour's time were not at all Surprised with his casting out of Devils it being usual for them also then to Exorcise the same an Art which they pretended to have learn'd from Solomon Of whom thus Josephus ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã God also taught Solomon an Art against Demons and Devils for the benefit and Cure of men Who composed certain Incantations by which diseases are cured and left forms of exorcisms whereby Devils are expelled and driven away Which Method of curing prevails much amongst us at this very day Notwithstanding which we think it not at all probable what a late Atheistick Writer hath asserted that the heads of the Jews were then all of them so full of Demons and Devils that they generally took all manner of Bodily Diseases such as Feavers and Agues and Dumbness and Deafness for Devils Though we grant that this very thing was imputed by Plotinus afterward to the Gnosticks that they supposed all Diseases to be Devils and therefore not to be cured by Physick but expelled by Words or Charms Thus he En. 2. Lib. 9. c. 14. ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã c. ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Now when they affirm Diseases to be Demons or Devils and pretend that they can expel them by words undertaking to do the same they hereby indeed render themselves considerable to the vulgar who are wont not a little to admire the powers of Magicians But they will not be able to perswade wise men that Diseases have no natural Causes as from Repletion or Inanition or Putrefaction or the like Which is a thing manifest from their cure they being oftentimes removed by purgation and bleeding and abstinence Vnless perhaps these men will say that the Devil is by this means Starved and made to Pine away Nor can we think that the Jews in our Saviour's time either supposed all Mad-men to be Demoniacks or all Demoniacks Mad-men though this latter seems to be asserted by an Eminent Writer of our own we reading of Devils cast out from others besides Mad-men and of a woman which had a Spirit of Infirmity only and was bowed together and could not lift up her self which is said by our Saviour Christ to have been bound by Satan Wherefore the sense of the Jews formerly seems to have been this that when there was any unusual and extraordinary Symptoms in any bodily Distemper but especially that of Madness this being look'd upon something more than Natural was imputed by them to the Possession or Infestation of some Devil Neither was this proper to the Jews only at that time to suppose Evil Demons to be the Causes of such bodily diseases as had extraordinary Symptoms and especially Madness but the Greeks and other Gentiles also were embued with the same Perswasion as appeareth from Apollonius Tyanaeus his curing a Laughing Demoniack at Athens he ejecting that Evil Spirit by threats and menaces who is said at his departure to have tumbled down a Royal Porch in the City with great noise As also from his freeing the City of Ephesus from the Plague by stoning an old Ragged Beggar said by Apollonius to have been the Plague which appeared to be a Demon by his changing himself into the form of a Shagged Dog But that there is some Truth in this Opinion and that at this very day Evil Spirits or Demons do sometimes really Act upon the Bodies of men and either Inflict or Augment bodily Distempers and Diseases hath been the Judgment of two very experienced Physicians Sennertus and Fernelius The Former in his Book De Mania Lib. 1. cap. 15. writing thus Etsi sine ulla Corporis Morbosa Dispositione Deo permittente hominem Obsidere Occupare Daemon possiâ tamen quandoque Morbis praecipuè Melancholicis sese immiscet Daemon forsan frequentius hoc accidit quam saepè creditur Although the Devil may by Divine permission Possess men without any Morbid Disposition yet doth he usually intermingle himself with Bodily Diseases and especially those of Melancholy and perhaps this cometh to pass ostner than is commonly believed or suspected The other in his De Abditis rerum Causis where having attributed real Effects upon the bodies of men to Witchcraft and Enchantment he addeth Neque solum morbos verum etiam Daemonas scelerati homines in corpora immittunt Hi quidem visuntur Furoris quadam specie distorti hoc uno tamen à Simplici Furore distant quod summè ardua obloquantur praeterita occulta renuntient assidentiúmque arcana reserent Neither do these wicked Magicians only inflict Diseases upon mens Bodies but also send Devils into them By means whereof they appear distorted with a kind of fury and madness which yet differs from a Simple Madness or the Disease so called in this that they speak of very high and difficult matters declare things past unknown and discover the Secrets of those that sit by Of which he subjoyns two Notable Instances of Persons well known to himself that were plainly Demoniacal Possessed or Acted by an Evil Demon one whereof shall be afterwards mentioned But when Maniacal Persons do not only discover Secrets and declare things Past but Future also besides this speak in Languages which they had never learnt this puts it out of all doubt and question that they are not meer Mad men or Maniaci but Demoniacks or Energumeni And that since the time of our Saviour Christ there have been often
from Eternity and without Beginning did so Exist Naturally and Necessarily or by the Necessity of its own Nature Now nothing could Exist of It self from Eternity Naturally and Necessarily but that which containeth Necessary and Eternal Self Existence in its own Nature But there is nothing which containeth Necessary Eternal Existence in its own Nature or Essence but only an Absolutely Perfect Being all other Imperfect things being in their Nature Contingently Possible either to Be or Not be Wherefore since something or other must and doth Exist of it self Naturally and Necessarily from Eternity Vnmade and nothing could do this but what included Necessary Self Existence in its Nature or Essence it is certain that it was a Perfect Being or God who did Exist of Himself from Eternity and nothing else all other Imperfect things which have no Necessary Self-Existence in their Nature deriving their Being from Him Here therefore are the Atheists Infinitely Absurd and Vnreasonable when they will not acknowledge that which containeth Independent Self-Existence or Necessity of Existence which indeed is the same with an Impossibility of Non-Existence in its Nature and Essence that is a Perfect Being so much as to Exist at all and yet in the mean time assert that which hath no Necessity of Existence in its Nature the most Imperfect of all Beings Inanimate Body and Matter to have Existed of It self Necessarily from all Eternity We might here add as a farther Confirmation of this Argument what hath been already proved that no Temporary Successive Being whose Duration is in a Continual Flux as if it were every moment Generated a new and therefore neither our Own Souls nor the World nor Matter Moving could possibly have Existed from Eternity and Independently upon any other thing but must have had a Beginning and been Caused by something else namely by an Absolutely Perfect Being whose Duration therefore is Permanent and without any Successive Generation or Flux But besides all these Arguments we may otherwise from the Idea of God already declared be able both exactly to state the Controversie betwixt Theists and Atheists and satisfactorily to decide the same In order whereunto there is yet something again to be Premised namely this that as it is certain Every thing was not Made but Something Existed of it Self from Eternity Vnmade so is it likewise certain That Every thing was not Vnmade neither nor Existed of It self from Eternity but something was Made and had a Beginning Where there is a full Agreement betwixt Theists and Atheists as to this one Point no Atheist asserting every thing to have been Vnmade but they all acknowledging themselves to have been Generated and to have had a Beginning that is their own Souls and Personalities as likewise the Lives and Souls of all other Men and Animals Wherefore since Something certainly Existed of It self from Eternity but other things were Made and had a Beginning which therefore must needs derive their being from that which Existed of It self Vnmade here is the State of the Controversie betwixt Theists and Atheists Whether that which Existed of It self from all Eternity and was the Cause of all other things were a Perfect Being and God or the most Imperfect of all things whatsoever Inanimate and Sensless matter The Former is the Doctrine of Theists as Aristotle affirmeth of those Ancients who did not write Fabulously Concerning the First Principles ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã As namely Pherecydes and the Magi and Empedocles and Anaxagoras and many others that they agreed in this That the first Original of all things was the Best and Most Perfect Where by the way we may observe also that according to Aristotle the Ancient Magi did not acknowledge a Substantial Evil Principle they making that which is the Best and Most Perfect Being alone by it self to be the First Begetter of all This I say is the Hypothesis of Theists that there is One Absolutely Perfect Being Existing of It self from all Eternity from whence all other lesser Perfections or Imperfect Beings did gradually Descend till at last they end in Sensless Matter or Inanimate Body But the Atheistick Hypothesis on the contrary makes Sensless Matter the most Imperfect thing to be the First Principle or the only Self-Existent Being and the Cause of all other things and Consequently all Higher Degrees of Perfections that are in the world to have Clombe up or Emerged by way of Ascent from thence as Life Sense Vnderstanding and Reason from that which is altogether Dead and Sensless Nay as it was before observed there hath been amongst the ancient Pagans a certain kind of Religious Atheists such as acknowledging Verbally a God or Soul of the world presiding over the whole supposed this notwithstanding to have first Emerged also out of Sensless Matter Night and Chaos and therefore doubtless to be likewise Dissolvable again into the same And of these is that place in Aristotle to be understood ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã They suppose not the First things as Night and the Heaven and Chaos and the Ocean but Jupiter or God to Rule and Govern all Where it is intimated that the Heaven Night Chaos and the Ocean according to these were Seniors to Jupiter or in Order of Nature before him they apprehending that things did Ascend upward from that which was most Imperfect as Night and Chaos to the more Perfect and at length to Jupiter himself the Mundane Soul who governeth the whole world as our Soul doth our Body Which same Opinion is afterwards again taken notice of and reprehended by Aristotle in these words ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Nor would he think rightly who should resemble the Principles of the Vniverse to that of Animals and Plants wherefrom Indeterminate and Imperfect things as Seeds do always arise the more Perfect For even here also is the case otherwise then they suppose For it is a man that generates a man nor is the Seed the First The Controversie being thus clearly Stated betwixt Theists and Atheists it may now with great ease and to the full Conviction of all Minds Unprejudiced and Unprepossessed with false Principles be determined It being on the one hand undenyably evident that Lesser Perfections may Naturally Descend from Greater or at least from that which is Absolutely Perfect and which Vertually containeth all but on the other hand utterly Impossible that Greater Perfections and Higher Degrees of Being should Rise and Ascend out of Lesser and Lower so as that which is the most Absolutely Imperfect of all things should be the First Fountain and Original of All. Since no Effect can possibly transcend the Power of its Cause Wherefore it is certain that in the Universe things did not thus Ascend and Mount or Climb up from Lower Perfection to Higher but on the contrary Descend and Slide down from Higher to Lower so that the first Original of all things was not the most Imperfect but the most Perfect Being But
that whereas the Democritick and Epicurean Atheists admit of no other Efficient Causality in Nature then only Local Motion and allow to Matter or Body their only Substance no Self-Moving Power they hereby make all the Motion that is in the whole world to be without a Cause and from Nothing Action without any Subject or Agent and the Efficiency of all things without an Efficient In the next place should we be so liberal as to grant to the Atomick Atheists Motion without a Cause or permit Strato and the Hylozoick Atheists to attribute to Matter a Self-Moving Power yet do we affirm that this Matter and Motion both together could not Possibly Produce any new Real Entity which was not before Matter as such Efficiently Causing Nothing and Motion only changing the Modifications of Matter as Figure Place Site and Disposition of Parts Wherefore if Matter as such have no Animal Sense and Conscious Vnderstanding Essentially belonging to it which no Atheists as yet have had the Impudence to assert then can no Motion or Modification of Matter no Contexture of Atoms Possibly beget Sense and Vnderstanding Soul and Mind because this would be to bring Something out of Nothing in the Impossible Sense or to suppose Something to be Made by It self without a Cause Which may Serve also for a Confutation of those Imperfect and Spurious Theists who will not allow to God Almighty whether supposed by them to be Corporeal or Incorporeal a Power of Making any thing but only out of Pre-Existent Matter by the new Modifying thereof as a Carpenter makes a House out of Pre-Existing Timber and Stone and a Taylor a Garment out of Pre-Existing Cloth For since Animal Life and Vnderstanding are not by them supposed to belong at all to Matter as such and since they cannot result from any Modifications or Contextures thereof it would plainly follow from hence that God could not Possibly make Animals or Produce Sense and Vnderstanding Souls and Minds which nevertheless these Theists suppose him to have done and therefore ought in reason to acknowledge him not only to be the Maker of New Modifications of Matter and one who Built the world only as a Carpenter doth a House but also of Real Entities distinct from the same And this was the very Doctrine as we have already declared of the most Ancient Atomick Physiologers not That every thing whatsoever might be Made out of Pre-Existing Matter but on the contrary that in all Natural Generations there is no Real Entity Produced out of the Matter which was not before in it but only New Modifications and Consequently that Souls and Minds being not meer Modifications of Matter in respect of Magnitude Figure Site and Motion could never be Produced out of it because they must then of necessity Come from Nothing that is be Made either by Themselves without a Cause or without a Sufficient Cause It hath also been before noted out of Aristotle how the Old Atheistick Materialists being assaulted by those Italick Philosophers after that manner that Nothing which was not before in Matter besides its Modifications could Possibly be Produced out of it because Nothing can Come out of Nothing and consequently that in all Natural Generations and Corruptions there is no Real Entity Made or Destroyed endeavoured without denying the words of that Proposition to Evade after this manner ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã c. That there is indeed Nothing Generated or Corrupted in some Sense for as much as the same Substance of Matter always remains it being never Made nor Destroyed For as men do not say that Socrates is Made when he is Made Musical or Handsome nor Destroyed when he looseth these Dispositions because the subject Socrates was before and still remaineth so neither is any Substantial thing or Real Entity in the world Made or Destroyed in this sense because Matter which is the Substance of all perpetually remains and all other things whatsoever are but ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Passions and Affections and Dispositions thereof as Musicalness and Unmusicalness in respect of Socrates Which is all one as if they should say that all things whatsoever besides Matter being but Accidents thereof are Generated out of it and Corruptible into it without the Production of any Real Entity out of Nothing or the Reduction of any into Nothing so long as the Substance of Matter which is the only Real Entity remains always the same Wherefore though Life Sense and Vnderstanding all Souls and Minds be Generated out of Matter yet does it not follow from thence that therefore there is any Real Entity Made or Produced because these are Nothing but Accidents and Modifications of Matter This was the Subterfuge of the Old Hylopathian Atheists Now it is true indeed that whatsoever is in the Universe is either Substance or Accidents and that the Accidents of any Substance may be Generated and Corrupted without the Producing of any Real Entity out of Nothing and Reducing of any into Nothing for as much as the Substance still remains entirely the same But the Atheists taking it for granted that there is no other Substance besides Body or Matter do therefore falsly suppose that which is really Incorporeal Substance or else the Attributes Properties and Modes thereof to be the meer Accidents of Matter and Consequently conclude these to be Generable out of it without the Production of any Real Entity out of Nothing We say therefore that it does not at all follow because the same Numerical Matter as for example a Piece of Wax may be Successively made Spherical Cubical Cylindrical Pyramidal or of any other Figure and the same man may Successively Stand Sit Kneel and Walk both without the Production of Anything out of Nothing or because a heap of Stones Bricks Morter and Timber lying altogether disorderly and confusedly may be made into a Stately Palace and that without the Miraculous Creation of any Real Entity out of Nothing that therefore the same may be affirmed likewise of every thing else besides the bare Substance of Matter as namely Life and Vnderstanding Soul and Mind that though there be No such thing in Matter it self yet the Production of them out of Matter would be no Production of Something out of Nothing One Ground of which mistake hath been from mens not rightly considering what the Accidents of a Substance are and that they are indeed Nothing but the Modes thereof Now a Mode is such a thing as cannot Possibly be conceived without that whereof it is a Mode as Standing Sitting Kneeling and Walking cannot be conceived without a Body Organized and therefore are but Modes thereof but Life and Cogitation may be clearly apprehended without Body or any thing of Extension nor indeed can a Thought Be conceived to be of such a Length Breadth and Thickness or to be Hewed and Sliced out into many Pieces all which laid together as so many Small Chips thereof would make up again the entireness of that whole
Thought From whence it ought to be concluded that Cogitation is no Accident or Mode of Matter or Bulky Extension but a Mode or Attribute of another Substance Really distinct from Matter or Incorporeal There is indeed Nothing else clearly conceivable by us in Body or Bulky Extension but only more or less Magnitude of Parts Figures Site Motion or Rest and all the Different Bodies that are in the whole World are but several Combinations or Syllables made up out of these few Letters but no Magnitudes Figures Sites and Motions can Possibly Spell or Compound Life and Sense Cogitation and Vnderstanding as the Syllables thereof and therefore to suppose these to be Generated out of Matter is plainly to suppose some Real Entity to be brought out of Nothing or Something to be made without a Cause which is Impossible But that which hath principally confirmed men in this Errour is the business of Sensible Qualities and Forms as they are vulgarly conceived to be distinct Entities from those forementioned Modifications of Matter in respect of Magnitude of Parts Figure Site Motion or Rest. For since these Qualities and Forms are unquestionably Generated and Corrupted there seems to be no Reason why the same might not be as well acknowledged of Life Sense Cogitation and Vnderstanding that these are but Qualities or Accidents of Matter also âhough of another Kind and consequently may be Generated out of it without the Making of any Real thing out of Nothing But the Democritick and Epicurean Atheists themselves have from the Principles of the Atomick Philosophy sufficiently Confuted and Rectified this mistake concerning Sensible Qualities they exploding and banishing them all as conceived to be Entities Really distinct from the forementioned Modifications of Matter and that for this very reason Because the Generation of them would upon this supposition be the Production of Something out of Nothing or without a Cause and concluding them therefore to be Really Nothing else but Mechanism or different Modifications of Matter in respect of the Magnitude of Parts Figure Site and Motion or Rest they only Causing different Phancies and Apparitions in us And in very truth this vulgar opinion of Real Qualities of Bodies seems to have no other Original at all than mens mistaking their own Phancies Passions and Affections for things Really Existing in the Objects without them For as Sensible Qualities are conceived to be things distinct from the forementioned âodifications of Matter so are they Really Nothing but our own Phancies Passions and Affections and Consequently no Accidents or Modifications of Matter but Accidents and Modifications of our own Souls which are Substances Incorporeal Now if these Democritick and Epicurean Atheists themselves concluded that Real Qualities considered as distinct from the Modifications of Matter could not possibly be Generated out of it because this would be the Production of Something out of Nothng they ought certainly much more to have acknowledged the same concerning Life and Cogitation Sense and Vnderstanding that the Generation of these out of sensless Matter would be an Impossible Production of Something out of Nothing and consequently that these are therefore no Corporeal Things but the Attributes Properties or Modes of Substance Incorporeal since they can no way be Resolved into Mechanism and Phancy or the Modifications of Matter as the Vulgar Sensible Qualities may and ought to be For though the Democriticks and Epicureans did indeed suppose all humane Cogitations to be Caused or Produced by the Incursion of Corporeal Atoms upon the Thinker yet did never any of them arrive to such a degree either of Sottishness or Impudence as a Modern Writer hath done to maintain that Cogitation Intellection and Volition are themselves really Nothing else but Local Motion or Mechanism in the inward Parts of the Brain and Heart or that Mens nihil aliud praeterquam Motus in partibus quibusdam Corporis Organici that Mind it self is Nothing but Motion in some parts of the Organized Body who therefore as if Cartesius had not been sufficiently Paradoxical in making Brute Animals though supposed by him to be devoid of all Cogitation Nothing but meer Machines and not contented herewith hath advanced much further in making this Prodigious Conclusion that all Cogitative Beings and Men themselves are Really Nothing else but Machines and Automata whereas he might as well have affirmed Heaven to be Earth Colour to be Sound Number to be Figure or any thing else in the world to be any thing as Cogitation and Local Motion to be very self same thing Nevertheless so strong was the Atheistick Intoxication in those Old Democriticks and Epicureans that though denying Real Qualities of Bodies for this very reason because Nothing could be Produced our of Nothing they Notwithstanding contradicting themselves would make Sense Life and Vnderstanding to be Qualities of Matter and therefore Generable out of it and so Unquestionably Produced Real Entities out of Nothing or Without a Cause Moreover it is observable that Epicurus having a mind to assert Contingent Liberty in men in way of opposition to that Necessity of all Humane Actions which had been before maintained by Democritus and his Followers plainly acknowledges that he could not Possibly do this according to the Grounds of his own Philosophy without supposing something of Contingency in the First Principles that is in the Motion of those Atoms out of which men and other Animals are Made Si semper motus connectitur omnis Et Vetere exoritur semper Novus Ordine Certo Nec Declinando faciunt Primor dia Motus Principium quoddam quod Fati foedera rumpat Ex Infinito ne Causam Causa sequatur Libera per Terras unde haec Animantibus extat Vnde est haec inquam Fatis Avolsa Voluntas The reason for which is afterwards thus expressed by him Quoniam De Nihilo Nil fit because Nothing can be Made out of Nothing Upon which account he therefore ridiculously Feigned besides his Two other Motions of Atoms from Pondus and Plagae Weight and Strokes a Third Motion of them which he calls Clinamen Principiorum a Contingent and Vncertain Declination every way from the Perpendicular out of Design to salve this Phaenomenon of Free Will in men Without bringing Something out of Nothing according as he thus subjoyneth Quare in Seminibus quoque idem fateare necesse est Esse aliam praeter Plagas Pondera causam Motibus unde haec est nobis Innata Potestas De NIHILO quoniam FIERI NIL posse videmus Pondus enim prohibet ne Plagis omnia fiant Externa quasi Vi. Sed ne Mens ipsa Necessum Intestinum habeat cunctis in rebus agendis Et devicta quasi cogatur Ferre Patique Id facit Exiguum CEINAMEN PRINCIPIORVM Nec ratione loci certa nec tempore certo Now if Epicurus himself conceived that Liberty of Will could not possibly be Generated in Men out of Matter or Atoms they having no such thing at all in
of Sense and Vnderstanding or the Entities of Soul and Mind could never have Resulted from any Modifications of Sensless Matter whatsoever Wherefore since it is Mathematically certain that our Humane Souls and Persons could not Possibly have been Generated out of Matter one of these Two things will undeniably follow That Either they must all have Existed Of Themselves from Eternity Vnmade or Else have been Created ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã out of an Antecedent Non-Existence by a Perfect Vnderstanding Being Vnmade or atleast have Derived their whole Substance from it So that it is altogether as certain that there is a God as that our Humane Souls and Persons did not all Exist from Eternity Of Themselves And that there must be some Eternal Vnmade Mind hath been already Demonstrated also from the same Principle Nothing out of Nothing Thus have We abundantly Confuted the Second Atheistick Argumentation that there can be no Omnipotence nor Divine Creation because Nothing can be Made out of Nothing we having plainly shewed that this very Principle in the True Sense thereof affordeth a Demonstration for the Contrary THe Six following Atheistick Argumentations driving at these Two things First the Disproving of an Incorporeal and then of a Corporeal Deity From both which the Atheists conceive it must follow of necessity that there can be none at all we shall take them all together and in order to the Confutation of them perform these Three Things First we shall Answer the Atheistick Argumentations against an Incorporeal Deity contained in the Third and Fourth Heads Secondly we shall shew that from the very Principles of the Atheistick Corporealism as represented in the Fifth and Sixth Heads Incorporeal Substance is Demonstrable And Lastly That there being undeniably Incorporeal Substance the Two following Atheistick Argumentations also against a Corporeal Deity in the Seventh and Eighth Sections prove altogether Insignificant We begin with the First of these To shew the Invalidity of the Atheistick Argumentations against an Incorporeal Deity It hath been already observed That though all Corporealists be not therefore of necessity Atheists yet Atheists universally have been Corporealists this being always their First and Grand Postulatum That there is no other Substance besides Body Thus Plato long ago declared Concerning them ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã They contend strongly that that only really Is which is Tangible or Can Resist their Touch concluding Body and Substance to be one and the self-same thing And if any one should affirm that there is any thing Incorporeal they will presently cry him down and not hear a word more from him For there can be no doubt but that the Persons here intended by Plato were those very Atheists which himself spake of afterward in the same Dialogue ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Whether shall we assent to that Opinion nâw adays entertained by so many That Nature Generateth all things from a certain Fortuitous Cause without the direction of any Mind or Vnderstanding or rather that it produceth them according to Reason and Knowledge proceeding from God Indeed the Philosopher there tells us that some of these Atheistick Persons began then to be somewhat ashamed of making Prudence and Justice and other Moral Vertues Corporeal Things or Bodys ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Though they affirm concerning the Soul it self that this seems to them to be Corporeal yet concerning Prudence and those other Vertues mentioned some have now scarcely the Confidence to maintain these to be either Bodies or Nothing But this saith he was indeed no less than the quite Giving up of the Cause of Atheism ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã because if it be but once granted that there is never so little Incorporeal this will be sufficient to overthrow the Atheistiek Foundation Wherefore he concludes that such as these were but Mongrel and Imperfect Atheists ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã For they who are thorough-paced and Genuine Atheists indeed will bogle at neither of those forementioned things but contend that whatsoever they cannot grasp with their hands is altogether Nothing That is that there is no other Substance nor Entity in the World but only Body that which is Tangible or Resists the Touch. Aristotle also representeth the Atheistick Hypothesis after the same manner ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã They affirm that Matter or Body is all the Substance that is and that all other things are but the Passions and Affections thereof And again in his Metaphysicks ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã These men maintain All to be One and that there is but one Only Nature as the Matter of all things and this Corporeal or endued with Magnitude And now we see plainly that the ancient Atheists were of the very same mind with these in our Days that Body or that which is Tangible and Divisible is the Only Substantial Thing from whence it follows that an Incorporeal Substance would be the same with an Incorporeal Body i. e. an Impossibility and that there can be no Incorporeal Deity But in the Management of this Cause there hath been some Disagreement amongst the Atheists themselves For First the Democriticks and Epicureans though consenting with all the other Atheists in this That whatsoever was Vnextended and devoid of Magnitude was therefore Nothing so that there could neither be any Substance nor Accident or Mode of any Substance Vnextended did notwithstanding distinguish concerning a Double Nature First That which is so Extended as to be Impenetrable and Tangible or Resist the Touch which is Body And Secondly That which is Extended also but Penetrably and Intangibly which is Space or Vacuum a Nature according to them really distinct from Body and the only Incorporeal Thing that is Now since this Space which is the only Incorporeal can neither Do nor Suffer any thing but only give Place or Room to Bodies to Subsist in or Pass thorough therefore can there not be any Active Vnderstanding Incorporeal Deity This is the Argumentation of the Democritick Atheists To which we Reply That if Space be indeed a Nature distinct from Body and a Thing Really Incorporeal as they pretend then will it undeniably follow from this very Principle of theirs that there must be Incorporeal Substance and this Space being supposed by them also to be Infinite an Infinite Incorporeal Deity Because if Space be not the Extension of Body nor an Affection thereof then must it of necessity be either an Accident Existing alone by it self without a Substance which is Impossible or else the Extension or Affection of some other Incorporeal Substance that is Infinite But here will Gassendus step in to help out his good Friends the Democriticks and Epicureans at a dead Lift and undertake to maintain that though Space be indeed an Incorporeal Thing yet it would neither follow of necessity from thence that it is an Incorporeal Substance or Affection thereof nor yet that it is an Accident Existing alone by it self without a Substance because this Space is really neither Accident nor
to be the same with that in another In like manner Simplicius proving that Body is not the first Principle because there must of necessity be Something Self-moving and what is so must needs be Incorporeal writeth thus ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Because what is such must of necessity be Indivisible and Indistant for were it Divisible and Distant it could not all of it be conjoyned with its whole self so that the whole should both actively move and be moved Which same thing seems further Evident in the Souls being All Conscious of It Self and Reflexive upon its whole Self which could not be were one part of it Distant from another Again the same Philosopher expresly denieth the Soul though a Self-moving Substance to be at all Locally Moved otherwise then by accident in respect of the Body which is moved by it ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã The Soul being not Moved by Corporeal or Local Motions for in respect of these it is Immoveable but by Cogitative ones only the names whereof are Consultation and Deliberation c. by these Moveth Bodies Locally And that this was Really Plato's meaning also when he determined the Soul to be a Self-moving Substance and the Cause of all Bodily Motion that moving it self in a way of Cogitation it moved Bodies Locally Notwithstanding that Aristotle would not take notice of it sufficiently appears from his own words and is acknowledged by the Greek Scholiasts themselves upon Aristotle's De Anima Thus again Simplicius elsewhere ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Since the Soul is not in a place it is not capable of any Local Motion We should omit the Testimonies of any more Philosophers were it not that we find Porphyrius so full and express herein who makes this the very beginning of his ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã his Manuduction to Intelligibles ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã That though Every Body be in a Place yet Nothing that is properly Incorporeal is in a Place and who afterwards further pursues it in this manner ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Neither does that which is Incorporeal move Locally by Will Place being Relative only to Magnitude and Bulk But that which is devoid of Bulk and Magnitude is likewise devoid of Local Motion Wherefore it is only present by a certain Disposition and Inclination of it to one thing more than another nor is its presence there discernible otherwise than by its operations and Effects Again concerning the Three Divine Hypostases he writeth thus ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã c. The Supreme God is therefore Every where because he is Nowhere and the same is true also of the Second and Third Divine Hypostasis Nous and Psyche The Supreme God is Every where and No where in respect of those things which are after him and only his own and in himself Nous or Intellect is in the Supreme God Every where and No where as to those things that are after him Psyche or the Mundane Soul is both in Intellect and the Supreme God and Every where and No where as to Bodies Lastly Body is both in the Soul of the World and in God Where he denies God to be Locally in the Corporeal World and thinks it more proper to say that the Corporeal World is in God then God in it because the World is held and contained in the Divine Power but the Deity is not in the Locality of the World Moreover he further declares his Sense after this manner ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Nor if there were conceived to be such an Incorporeal Space or Vacuum as Democritus and Epicurus supposed could Mind or God possibly Exist in this Empty Space as Co-extended with the same for this would be only Receptive of Bodies but it could not receive the Energie of Mind or Intellect nor give any Place or Room to that that being no Bulkie thing And again ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã The Corporeal World is Distantly present to the Intelligible or the Deity and that is Indivisibly and Indistantly present with the World But when that which is Indistant and Vnextended is present with that which is Distant and Extended then is the Whole of the Former one and the same Numerically in Every part of the Latter That is it is Indivisibly and Vnmultipliedly and Illocally there according to its own Nature present with that which is naturally Divisible and Multipliable and in a Place Lastly he affirmeth the same likewise of the Humane Soul that this is also ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã A Substance devoid of Magnitude and which is not Locally present to this or that Body but by Disposition and Energie and therefore the Whole of it in every part thereof Vndividedly And as for Christian Writers besides Origen who was so famous an Asserter of Incorporeal Substance that as Socrates recordeth the Egyptian Monks and Anthropomorphites threatned death to Theophilus the Alexandrian Bishop unless he would at once execrate and renounce the Writings of Origen and profess the Belief of a Corporeal God of Humane Form and who also maintained Incorporeal Substance to be Vnextended as might be proved from Sundry Passages both of his Book against Celsus and that Peri Archon we say besides Origen and others of the Greeks St. Austine amongst the Latins clearly asserted the same he maintaining in his Book De Quantitate Animae and else where concerning the Humane Soul that being Incorporeal it hath no Dimensions of Length Breadth and Profundity and is Illocabilis No where as in a Place We shall conclude with the Testimony of Boetius who was both a Philosopher and a Christian Quaedam sunt saith he Communes Animi Conceptiones per se notae apud Sapientes tantum Vt Incorporalia non esse In Loco There are certain Common Conceptions or Notions of the Mind which are known by themselves amongst wise men only as this for example That Incorporeals are in No Place From whence it is manifest that the generality of reputed Wise men were not formerly of this opinion Quod Nusquam est nihil est That what is No where or in no certain Place is Nothing and that this was not look'd upon by them as a Common Notion but only as a Vulgar Errour By this time we have made it unquestionably Evident that this Opinion of Incorporeal Substance being Vnextended Indistant and Devoid of Magnitude is no Novel or Recent thing nor first started in the Scholastick Age but that it was the general Perswasion of the most ancient and learned Asserters of Incorporeal Substance especially that the Deity was not Part of it Here and Part of it There nor the Substance thereof Mensurable by Yards and Poles as if there were so much of it contained in one Room and so much and no more in another according to their several Dimensions but that the whole Vndivided Deity was at once in Every Part of the world and consequently No where Locally after the manner of Bodies But because this
Body Eternally conjoyned with it which it may always Enliven And for these Causes do they affirm the Soul always to have a Luciform Body Which Lucid and Etherial Body of the Soul is a thing often mentioned by other Writers also as Proclus in his Commentary upon the Timaeus ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã The Humane Soul hath also saith he such an Ethereal Vehicle belonging to it as Plato himself intimâtâs when he affirmeth the Demiurgus at first to have placed it in a Chariot For of necâssity every Soul before this Mortal Body must have an Eternal and easily Moveable Body it being Essential to it to move And elsewhere the same Proclus ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Whilst we remain above we have no need of these Divided Organs which now we have descending into Generation but the Vniform Lucid or Splendid Vehicle is sufficient this having all Senses Vnited together in it Which Doctrine of the Vnorganized Luciform and Spirituous Vehicles seems to have been derived from Plato he in his Epinomis writing thus concerning a Good and Wise man after Death ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Of whom whether I be in Jest or Earnest I constantly affirm that when dying he shall yield to Fate he shall no longer have this Variety of Senses which now we have but One Vniform Body and live a happy Life Moreover Hiârocles much insisteth upon this ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã this Luciform and Ethereal Body ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Which also saith he the Oracles call the Thin and Subtle Vehicle or Chariot of the Soul he meaning doubtless by these Oracles the Magical or Chaldaick Oracles before mentioned And amongst those now Extant under that Title there seems to be a clear acknowledgment of these Two Vehicula of the Soul or Interiour Induments thereof the Spirituous and the Luciform Body the latter of which is there Enigmatically called ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã or a Plain Superficies in these words ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Take care not to Defile or Contaminate the Spirit nor to make the Plain Superficies Deep For thus Psellus glosseth upon that Oracle ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã The Chaldaick Philosophers bestow upon the Soul Two Interiour Tunicles or Vestments the one of which they called Pneumatical or the Spirituous Body which is weaved out as it were to it and compounded of the Gross Sensible Body it being the more Thin and Subtle part thereof the other the Luciform Vestment of the Soul Pure and Pellucide and this is that which is here called the Plain Superficies Which saith Pletho is not so to be understood as if it had not Three Dimensions for as much as it is a Body also but only to denote the Subtlety and Tenuity thereof Wherefore when the aforesaid Hierocles also calls this Luciform and Etherial Body ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã The Spiritual Vehicle of the Rational Soul he takes not the Word ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã in that Sense wherein it is used by Philoponus and Others as if he intended to confound this Etherial Body with that other Spirituous or Airy Body and to make but one of them but rather styles it Spiritual in a higher Sense and which cometh near to that of the Scripture as being a Body more Suitable and Cognate with that Highest and Divinest Part of the Soul Mind or Reason then the other Terrestial Body is which upon that account is called also by the same Hierocles as well as it is by St. Paul ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã the Animal or Natural Body So that this Spiritual Body of Hierocles is not the Airy but the Etherial Body and the same with Synesius his ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã His Divine Body And that this Distinction of two Interior Vehicles or Tunicles of the Soul besides that Outer Vestment of the Terrestial Body styled in Plato ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã the Crustaceous or Ostrâaceous Body is not a meer Figment of the latter Platonists since Christianity but a Tradition derived down from Antiquity appeareth plainly from Virgil in his Sixth Aenead where though not commonly understood he writeth first of the Spirituous or Airy Body in which Unpurged Souls receive Punishment after Death thus Quin Supremo cum Lumine Vita reliquit Non tamen omne Malum miseris nec funditus omnes Corporeae excedunt pestes penitusque necesse est Multa diu concreta modis inolescere miris Ergo exercentur poenis veterumque malorum Supplicia expendunt aliae panduntur inanes Suspensae ad Ventos aliis sub gurgite Vasto Infectum eluitur Scelus aut exuritur Igni And then again of the other Pure Ethereal and Fiery Body in this manner Donec Longa dies perfecto temporis Orbe Concretam exemit labem Purumque reliquit Aethereum Sensum atque Aurai Simplicis Ignem Now as it was before observed that the Ancient Asserters of the Souls Immortality supposing it to have besides this Terrestial Body another Spirituous or Airy Body conceived this not only to accompany the Soul after Death but also to hang about it here in this Life as its Interiour Vest or Tunicle they probably meaning hereby the same with that which is commonly called the Animal Spirits diffused from the Brain by the Nerves throughout this whole Body in like manner is it certain that Many of them supposing the Soul besides those Two forementioned to have yet a Third Luciform or Etherial Body conceived this in like manner to adhere to it even in this Mortal Life too as its Inmost Clothing or Tunicle yet so as that they acknowledged the Force thereof to be very much weakned and abâted and its Splendour altogether obscured by the Heavy Weight and Gross Steams or Vapours of the Terrestial Body Thus Suidas âpoâ the Word ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã tells us out of Isidore ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã That according to some Philosophers the Soul hath a certain Luciform Vehicle called also Star or Sun-like and Eternal which Luciform Body is now shut up within this Terrestrial Body as a Light in a dark Lanthorn it being supposed by some of them to be included within the Head c. With which agreeth Hierocles ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã The Splendid or Luciform Body lieth in this Mortal Body of ours continually Inspiring it with Life and containing the Harmony thereof The ground of which opinion was because these Philosophers generally conceived the Humane Soul to have Pre-Existed before it came into this Earthly Body and that either from Eternity or else from the First beginning of the World's Creation and being never without a Body and then in a Perfect State to have had a Lucid and Etherial Body either Co-Eternal or Co-Eve with it though in order of Nature Junior to it as its Chariot or Vehicle which being Incorruptible did always inseparably adhere to the Soul in its After Lapses and Descents into an Aerial first and then a Terrestrial Body this being as it were the Vinculum of Union betwixt the Soul
not that the Soul Is a Body but that it Hath a Body after Death conjoyned with it and that of the same Form and Figure with that Body which it had before here in this Life Plenissimè autem Dominus docuit non solum perseverare non de corpore in corpus transgredientes animas sed Characterem corporis in quo etiam adaptantur custodire eundem Et meminisse eas Operum quae egerunt hîc à quibus cessaverunt in Enarratione quae scribitur de Divite de Lazaro qui refrigerabatur in Sinu Abrahae in qua ait Divitem cognoscere Lazarum post mortem Et manere in suo ordine unumquemque ipsorum Our Lord hath most plainly taught us that Souls do not only continue after Death without passing out of one Body into another but also that they keep the Character of Body wherein they are then also adapted the same which they had before as likewise that they remember the Actions and Omissions of their Life past in that Enarration which is written concerning the Rich Man and Lazarus who was refreshed in Abraham 's bosom wherein he affirmeth the Rich Man to have known both Lazarus and Abraham after Death as also each of them to remain in their own Order And thus again in the following Chapter Per haec manifestissimè declaratum est Perseverare Animas non de corpore in corpus Exire habere Hominis Figuram ut etiam cognoscantur meminisse eorum quae hic sint Dignam Habitationem Vnamquamque Gentem percipere etiam antè Judicium By these things it is most manifestly declared that Souls do both Persevere after Death and that they do not Transmigrate out of one Body into another and that they have a Humane Figure or Shape whereby they may be known as also that they remember the things here upon the Earth and their own Actions and Lastly that each kind of Good and Bad have their distinct and suitable Habitations assigned them even before the Judgment Now that Irenaeus did not here mean that Souls are themselves Bodily Substances and consequently have a certain Character Form and Figure of their own but only that they have certain Bodies conjoyned with them which are Figurate is First of all evident from the words themselves Characterem corporis in quo etiam adaptantur custodire Eundem The Natural Sense whereof is this That they keep the Character of Body wherein they are then also adapted after Death the same with that which these Bodies before had here in this Life And it is further manifest from hence because he else where plainly declareth Souls themselves to be Incorporeal as in his Fifth Book and Seventh Chapter Flatus autem Vitae Incorporalis est But the breath of Life is Incorporeal Furthermore Origen was not only of the same Perswasion that Souls after Death had certain Subtle Bodies united to them and that those Bodies of theirs had the same ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Characterizing Form which these their Terrestrial Bodies before had but also thinks that this together with the Souls Immortality may be sufficiently proved from the frequent Apparitions of Ghosts or Departed Souls in way of opposition to Celsus endeavouring to invalidate the Scripture Testimonies concerning the Apparitions of our Saviour Christ and Imputing them either to Magical Imposture or Fanatick Phrenzy or the Disciples mistaking their own Dreams and Phancies for Visions and Sensations after the Epicurean way ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Though this might seem to have been smartly opposed by Celsus yet are those very Apparitions of Ghosts notwithstanding a sufficient Argument or Proof of a certain Necessary Opinion that Souls do subsist after Death Neither did Plato vainly conclude the Immortality and Permanency of the Soul besides other things from those Shadow-like Phantasms of the Dead that have appeared to many about Graves and Monuments Whereupon he giveth this further account of these Apparitions ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã For these Apparitions of the Dead are not meer Groundless Imaginations but they proceed from Souls themselves really remaining and surviving after Death and subsisting in that which is called a Luciform Body Where notwithstanding Origen takes this ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Or Luciform Body in a Larger Sense than the Greek Philosophers were wont to do namely so as to comprehend under it that Aiery or Vaporous Body also which belongeth to Vnpurged Souls who do therein most frequently appear after Death whereas it is thought proper to the Purged Souls to be cloathed with the Luciform Body only Besides which the same Origen tells us that the Thing which St. Thomas the Apostle disbelieved was not our Saviour's appearing after Death as if he had thought it Impossible for Ghosts or Souls departed Visibly to appear but only his Rising and Appearing in that same Solid Body which had been before Crucified and was laid in the Sepulchre ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Thomas also as well as the other Apostles assented to the woman affirming that she had seen Jesus as not thinking it at all Impossible for the Soul of a Dead man to be Seen but he did not believe him to have Risen and Appeared in that self same Solid Body which before he lived In for which cause he said not only Vnless I see him but added also And Vnless I shall put my finger into the print of the nails and thrust my hand into his side I will not believe Where again Origen subjoyns ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã These things were said by Thomas not as doubting at all but that the Body of a Soul departed to wit Condensed might be seen with the Eyes of Sense every way resembling that Form which it had before in this Life both in respect of Bigness Figure Colour and Voice and oftentimes also in the same Customary garments Wherefore according to Origen the Jews were at that time Generally possessed with this Opinion that Souls after Death had certain Bodies united to them wherein they might Visibly appear neither is that of any great moment to the contrary which a Learned Critick objecteth that Josephus writing of their Opinions maketh no mention hereof he omitting besides this other Considerable Dogmata of theirs also as that of the Resurrection However this at least is certain from hence that Origen himself took it for granted that Humane Souls departed were not altogether Naked or Unclothed but Clothed with a certain Subtle Body wherein they could also Visibly appear and that in their pristine Form Moreover it might be here observed also that when upon our Saviour's first Apparition to his Disciples it is said that they were affrighted as supposing they had seen a Spirit our Saviour does not tell them that a Spirit or Ghost had no Body at all wherein it could Visibly appear but as rather taking that for granted that a Spirit had no Flesh and Bones no
ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã no such Solid Body as they might find him to have bidding them therefore handle him to remove that Scruple of theirs As if he should have said Though Spirits or Ghosts and Souls Departed have Bodies or Vehicles which may by them be so far Condensed as sometimes to make a Visible appearance to the Eyes of men yet have they not any such Solid Bodies as those of Flesh and Bone and therefore by Feeling and Handling may you satisfie your selves that I am not a meer Spirit Ghost or Soul Appearing as others have frequently done without a Miracle but that I appear in that very same Solid Body wherein I was Crucified by the Jews by miraculous Divine Power raised out of the Sepulchre and now to be found no more there Agreeable to which of our Saviour Christ is that of Apollonius in Philostratus ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Touch me and Handle me and if you find me to avoid the Touch then may you conclude me to be a Spirit or Ghost that is a Soul departed but if I firmly resist the same then believe me Really to live and not yet to have cast off the Body And indeed though Spirits or Ghosts had certain Subtle Bodies which they could so far Condense as to make them sometimes Visible to men yet is it reasonable enough to think that they could not Constipate or Fix them into such a Firmness Grossness and Solidity as that of Flesh and Bone is to continue therein or at least not without such Difficulty and Pain as would hinder them from attempting the same Notwithstanding which it is not denied but that they may possibly sometimes make use of other Solid Bodies Moving and Acting them as in that famous Story of Phlegons where the Body Vanished not as other Ghosts use to do but was left a Dead Carcase behind Now as for our Saviour Christ's Body after his Resurrection and before his Ascension which notwithstanding its Solidity in Handling yet sometimes Vanished also out of his Disciples sight this probably as Origen conceived was purposely conserved for a time in a certain Middle State betwixt the Craâsities of a Mortal Body and the Spirituality of a Perfectly Glorified Heavenly Etherial Body But there is a place of Scripture which as it hath been interpreted by the Generality of the Ancient Fathers would Naturally Imply even the Soul of our Saviour Christ himself after his Death and before his Resurrection not to have been quite Naked from all Body but to have had a certain Subtle or Spirituous Clothing and it is this of St. Peter ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Which being understood by those Ancients of our Saviour Christ's descending into Hades or Hell is accordingly thus rendered in the Vulgar Latin Put to Death In the Flesh bút Quickned in the Spirit In which Spirit also he went and preached to those Spirits that were in Prison c. So that the Word ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã or Spirit here according to this interpretation is to be taken for a Spirituous Body the Sense being this That when our Saviour Christ was put to death in the Flesh or the Fleshly Body he was Quickned in the Spirit or a Spirituous Body In which Spirituous Body also he went and preached to those Spirits that were in Prison c. And doubtless it would be said by the Asserters of this Interpretation that the word Spirit could not here be taken for the Soul of our Saviour Christ because this being Naturally Immortal could not properly be said to be Quickned and Made Alive Nor could He that is our Saviour Christ's Soul be so well said to go In this Spirit neither that is In it self the Soul in the Soul to preach to the Spirits in Prison They would add also that Spirit here could not be taken for the Divine Spirit neither which was the Efficient Cause of the Vivification of our Saviour's Body at his Resurrection because then there would be no direct Opposition betwixt Being put to Death in the Flesh and Quickned in the Spirit unless they be taken both alike Materially As also the following Verse is thus to be understood That our Saviour Christ went in that Spirit wherein he was Quickned when he was Put to Death In the Flesh and therein preached to the Spirits in Prison By which Spirits in Prison also would be meant not Pure Incorporeal Substances or Naked Souls but Souls Clothed with Subtle Spirituous Bodies as that word may be often understood elsewhere in Scripture But thus much we are unquestionably certain of from the Scripture That not only Elias whose Terrestrial Body seems to have been in part at least Spiritualized in his Ascent in that Fiery Chariot but also Moses appeared Visibly to our Saviour Christ and his Disciples upon the Mount and therefore since Piety will not permit us to think this a meer Prestigious thing in Real Bodies which Bodies also seem to have been ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Luciform or Lucid like to our Saviour's then Transfigured Body Again there are sundry places of Scripture which affirm that the Regenerate and Renewed have here in this Life a certain Earnest of their Future Inheritance which is their Spiritual or Heavenly Body as also the Quickning of their Mortal Bodies is therein attributed to the Efficiency of the Spirit Dwelling in them Which is a Thing that hath been taken notice of by Some of the Ancients as Irenaeus Nunc autem Partem aliquam Spiritus ejus sumimus ad Perfectionem Praeparationem Incorruptelae paulatim assuescentes Capere Portare Deum Quod Pignus dixit Apostolus hoc est Partem ejus Honoris qui à Deo nobis promissus est Si ergo Pignus hoc habitans in nobis jam Spirituales effecit absorbetur Mortale ab Immortalitate Now have we a Part of that Spirit for the Preparation and Perfection of Incorruption we being accustomed by little and little to Receive and Bear God Which also the Apostle hath called an Earnest that is a Part of that Honour which is promised to us from God If therefore this Earnest or Pledge dwelling in us hath made us already Spiritual the Mortal is also swallowed up by Immortality And Novatian Spiritus Sanctus id agit in nobis ut ad Aeternitatem ad Resurrectionem Immortalitatis corpora nostra perducat dum illa in se assuefacit cum Caelesti Virtute misceri This is that which the Holy Spirit doth in us namely to bring and lead on our Bodies to Eternity and the Resurrection of Immortality whilst in it self it accustometh us to be mingled with the Heavenly Vertue Moreover there are some places also which seem to imply that Good Men shall after Death have a Further Inchoation of their Heavenly Body the full Completion whereof is not to be expected before the Resurrection or Day of Judgment We know that If our Earthly House of this Tabernacle were dissolved we
the Deity by Theists is generally supposed to be a Living Being Perfectly Happy and Immortal or Incorruptible there can be no such Living Being Immortal and Consequently none Perfectly Happy Because all Living Beings whatsoever are Concretions of Atoms which as they were at first Generated so are they again liable to Death and Curruption Life being no Simple Primitive Nature nor Substantial thing but a meer Accidental Modification of Compounded Bodies only which upon the Disunion of their Parts or the Disordering of their Contexture vanisheth again into Nothing And there being no Life Immortal Happiness must needs be a meer Insignificant Word and but a Romantick Fiction Where first This is well that the Atheists will confess that according to their Principles there can be no such thing at all as Happiness because no Security of Future Permanency all Life perpetually coming Out of Nothing and whirling back into Nothing again But this Atheistick Argument is likewise Founded upon the Former Errour That Body is the Only Substance the First Principles whereof are devoid of all Life and Vnderstanding whereas it is certain that Life cannot possibly result from any Composition of Dead and Lifeless things and therefore must needs be a Simple and Primitive Nature It is true indeed that the Participated Life in the Bodies of Animals which yet is but improperly called Life it being Nothing but their being Actuated by a Living Soul is a meer Accidental thing Generable and Corruptible since that Body which is now Vitally united to a Living Soul may be Disunited again from it and thereby become a Dead and Lifeless Carcase but the Primary or Original Life it self is Substantial nor can there be any Dead Carcase of a Humane Soul That which hath Life Essentially belonging to the Substance of it must needs be Naturally Immortal because no Substance can of it self Perish or Vanish into Nothing Besides which there must be also some not only Substantial but also Eternal Vnmade Life whose Existence is Necessary and which is Absolutely Vnannihilable by any thing else which therefore must needs have Perfect Security of its own future Happiness And this is an Incorporeal Deity And this is a Brief Confutation of the Eight Atheistick Argument BUt the Democritick Atheist proceeds endeavouring further to Disprove a God from the Phaenomena of Motion and Cogitation in the Three following Argumentations First therefore whereas Theists commonly bring an Argument from Motion to Prove a God or First Vnmoved Mover the Atheists contend on the contrary that from the very Nature of Motion the Impossibility of any such First Vnmoved Mover is clearly Demonstrable For it being an Axiom of undoubted Truth concerning Motion That Whatsoever is Moved is Moved by some other thing Or That Nothing can Move it self it follows from thence Unavoydably That there is no Aeternum Immobile No Eternal Vnmoved Mover but on the contrary that there was Aeternum Motum an Eternal Moved Or That One thing was Moved by Another from Eternity Infinitely Without any First Mover or Cause Because as Nothing could move it self So could nothing ever Move Another but what was it self before Moved by Something else To which we Reply That this Axiom Whatsoever is Moved is Moved by Another and not by It self was by Aristotle and those other Philosophers who made so much use thereof restrained to the Local Motion of Bodies only That no Body Locally Moved was ever Moved Originally from it self but from something else Now it will not at all follow from hence That therefore Nihil Movetur nisi à Moto That No Body was ever Moved but by some othâr Body that was also before Moved by Something else or That of necessity One Body was moved by another Body and that by another and so backwards Infinitely without any First Vnmoved or Self-Moving and Self-Active Mover as the Democritick Atheist fondly Conceits For the Motion of Bodies might proceed as Unquestionably it did from something else which is not Body and was not Before Moved Moreover the Democritick Atheist here also without any Ground imagines That were there but One Push once given to the world and no more this Motion would from thence forward always continue in it one Body still moving another to all Eternity For though this be indeed a Part of the Cartesian Hypothesis that according to the Laws of Nature A Body Moving will as well continue in Motion as a Body Resting in Rest until that Motion be Communicated and Transferred to some other Body yet is the Case different here Where it is supposed not only one Push to have been given to the world at first but also the same Quantity of Motion or Agitation to be constantly Conserved and Maintained But to let this pass because it is something a Subtle Point and not so rightly Understood by many of the Cartesians themselves We say that it is a thing Utterly Impossible That One Body should be Moved by Another Infinitely without any first Cause or Mover which was Self Active and that not from the Authority of Aristotle only Pronouncing ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã c. That in the Causes of Motion there could not Possibly be an Infinite Progress but from the Reason there subjoyned by Aristotle Because ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã If there were no First Vnmoved Mover there could be no Cause of Motion at all For were all the Motion that is in the World a Passion from something else and yet no First Vnmoved Active Mover then must it be a Passion from no Agent or without an Action and Consequently proceed from Nothing and either Cause it self or be Made without a Cause Now the Ground of the Atheists Errour here is only from hence because He taketh it for granted That there is no other Substance besides Body nor any other Action but Local Motion from whence it comes to pass that to Him this Proposition No Body can Move it self is one and the same with this Nothing can Act from It self or be Self-Active And thus is the Atheistick Pretended Demonstration against a God or First Cause from Motion abundantly Confuted we having made it Manifest that there is no Consequence at all in this Argument That because No Body can Move it Self therefore there can be no First Vnmoved Mover as also having discovered the Ground of the Atheists Errour here their taking it for granted that there is Nothing but Body and lastly having plainly showed that it implies a Contradiction there should be Action and Motion in the World and yet Nothing Self-Moving or Self-Active So that it is Demonstratively certain from Motion that there is a First Cause or Vnmoved Mover We shall now further add That from the Principle acknowledged by the Democritick Atheists themselves That No Body can move it self it follows also undeniably that there is some Other Substance besides Body something Incorporeal which is Self-Moving and Self-Active and was the First Vnmoved Mover of the Heavens or World For
if no Body from Eternity was Ever able to Move it self and yet there must of necessity be some Active Cause of that Motion which is in the World since it could not Cause it self then is there unquestionably some Other Substance besides Body which having a Power of Moving Matter was the First Cause of Motion it Self being Vnmoved Moreover it is certain from hence also That there is another Species of Action distinct from Local Motion and such as is not Heterochinesie but Autochinesie or Self-Activity For since the Local Motion of Body is Essentially Heterochinesie not Caused by the Substance it self Moving but by something else Acting upon it that Action by which Local Motion is First Caused cannot be it self Local Motion but must be Autochinesie or Self-Activity That which is not a Passion from any other Agent but springs from the immediate Agent it self which Species of Action is called Cogitation All the Local Motion that is in the World was First Caused by some Cogitative or Thinking Being which not Acted upon by any thing without it nor at all Locally Moved but only Mentally is the Immoveable Mover of the Heaven or Vortices So that Cogitation is in Order of Nature before Local Motion and Incorporeal before Corporeal Substance the Former having a Natural Imperium upon the Latter And now have we not only Confuted the Ninth Atheistick Argument from Motion but also Demonstrated against the Democritick Atheists from their own Principle that there is an Incorporeal and Cogitative Substance the First Immoveable Mover of the Heavens and Vortices that is an Incorporeal Deity But the Democritick Atheist will yet make a futher Attempt to prove that there can be Nothing Self-Moving or Self-Active and that no Thinking Being could be a First Cause He laying his Foundation in this Principle That Nothing taketh its Beginning from it self but from the Action of some other Agent without it From whence he would infer that Cogitation it self is Heterochinesie the Passion of the Thinker and the Action of something without it no Cogitation ever rising up of it self without a Cause and that Cogitation is indeed Nothing but Local Motion or Mechanism and all Living Vnderstanding Beings Machines Moved from without and then make this Conclusion That therefore no Vnderstanding Being could possibly be a First Cause He further adding also that no Vnderstanding Being as such can be Perfectly Happy neither as the Deity is supposed to be because Dependent upon Something without it and this is the Tenth Atheistick Argumentation Where we shall First consider that which the Democritick Atheist makes his Fundamental Principle or Common Notion to disprove all Autochinesie or Self-Activity by That Nothing taketh Beginning from it self but from the Action of some other thing without it Which Axiom if it be Understood of Substantial Things then is it indeed acknowledged by us to be unquestionably true it being the same with this That No Substance which once was not could ever possibly cause it self or bring it self into Being but must take its Beginning from the Action of something else but then it will make Nothing at all against Theism As it is likewise True That No Action whatsoever and therefore no Cogitation taketh Beginning from it self or causeth it self to be but is always produced by some Substantial Agent but this will no way advantage the Atheist neither Wherefore if he would direct his Force against Theism he ought to understand this Proposition thus That No Action whatsoever taketh Beginning from the Immediate Agent which is the Subject of it but from the Action of some other thing without it or That Nothing can Move or Act otherwise then as it is Moved and Acted upon by something else But this is only to beg the Question or to Prove the thing in Dispute Identically That Nothing is Self-Active because Nothing can Act from it self Whereas it is in the mean time undeniably certain That there could not possibly be any Motion or Action at all in the Universe were there not something Self-Moving or Self-Active for as much as otherwise all that Motion or Action would be a Passion from Nothing and be Made without a Cause And whereas the Atheists would further prove that no Cogitation Taketh its Beginning from the Thinker but always from the Action of some other thing without it after this manner Because it is Conceivable why This Cogitation rather then that should start up at any time were there not some Cause for it without the Thinker Here in the first place we freely grant that our Humane Cogitations are indeed commonly Occasioned by the Incursions of Sensible Objects upon us as also that the Concatenations of those Thoughts and Phantasms in us which are distinguished from Sensations whether we be asleep or awake do many times depend upon Corporeal and Mechanical Causes in the Brain Notwithstanding which that all our Cogitations are Obtruded and Imposed upon us from without and that there is no Transition in our Thoughts at any time but such as had been before in Sense which the Democritick Atheist averrs this is a Thing which we absolutely deny For had we no Mastery at all over our Thoughts but they were all like Tennis Balls Bandied and Struck upon us as it were by Rackets from without then could we not steadily and constantly carry on any Designs and Purposes of Life But on the contrary that of Aristotle's is most true as will be elsewhere further Proved that Man and all Rational Beings are in some sense ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã a Principle of Actions subordinate to the Deity which they could not possibly be were they not also a Principle of Cogitations and had some Command over them but these were all as much determined by Causes without as the Motions of the Weathercock are The Rational Soul is it self an Active and Bubling Fountain of Thoughts that perpetual and Restless Desire which is as Natural and Essential to us as our very Life Continually Raising up and Protruding New and New Ones in us which are as it were Offered to us Besides which we have also a further Self Recollective Power and a Power of Determining and Fixing our Mind and Intention upon some certain Objects and of Ranging our Thoughts accordingly But the Atheist is here also to be taught yet a Further Lesson that an Absolutely Perfect Mind such as the Deity is supposed to be doth not as Aristotle writeth of it g d = fo Sometimes Vnderstand and sometime not Vnderstand it being Ignorant of Nothing nor Syllogizing about any thing but comprehending all Intelligibles with their Relations and Verities at once within it self and its Essence and Energie being the same Which Notion if it be above the Dull Capacity of Atheists who measure all Perfection by their own Scantling this is a thing that We cannot help But as for that Prodigious Paradox of Atheists that Cogitation it self is nothing but Local Motion or Mechanism we
could not have thought it possible that ever any man should have given entertainment to such a Conceit but that this was rather a meer Slander raised upon Atheists were it not certain from the Records of Antiquity That whereas the old Religious Atomists did upon Good Reason reduce all Corporeal Action as Generation Augmentation and alteration to Local Motion or Translation from place to place there being no other Motion besides this Conceivable in Bodies the ancient Atheizers of that Philosophy Leucippus and Democritus not contented herewith did Really carry the business still on further so as to make Cogitation it self also Nothing but Local Motion As it is also certain that a Modern Atheistick Pretender to Wit hath publickly owned this same Conclusion That Mind is Nothing else but Local Motion in the Organick parts of Mans Body These men have been sometimes indeed a little Troubled with the Phancy Apparition or Seeming of Cogitation that is The Consciousness of it as knowing not well what to make thereof but then they put it off again and satisfie themselves worshipfully with this that Phancy is but Phancy but the Reality of Cogitation nothing but Local Motion as if there were not as much Reality in Phancy and Consciousness as there is in Local Motion That which inclined these men so much to this Opinion was only because they were Sensible and Aware of this that if there were any other Action besides Local Motion admitted there must needs be some other Substance acknowledged besides Body Cartesius indeed undertook to defend Brute Animals to be Nothing else but Machines but then he supposed that there was Nothing at all of Cogitation in them and Consequently nothing of true Animality or Life no more than is in Artificial Automaton as a Wooden Eagle or the like Nevertheless this was justly thought to be Paradox enough But that Cogitation it self should be Local Motion and Men nothing but Machines this is such a Paradox as none but either a Stupid and Besotted or else an Enthusiastick Bigotical or Fanatick Atheist could possibly give entertainment to Nor are such men as these fit to be Disputed with any more than a Machine is But whereas the Atheistick Objecter adds also over and above in the last place that no Vnderstanding Being can be Perfectly Happy neither and therefore not a God because Essentially Dependent upon something else without it This is all one as if he should say That there is no such thing as Happiness at all in Nature Because it is certain that without Consciousness or Vnderstanding nothing can be Happy since it could not have any Fruition of it self and if no Vnderstanding Being can be Happy neither then must the Conclusion needs be that of the Cyrenaicks that ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Happiness is a meer Chimera a Phantastick Notion or Fiction of Mens Minds a thing which hath no Existence in Nature These are the men who afterwards Argue from Interesse also against a God and Religion Notwithstanding that they confess their own Principles to be so far from promising Happiness to any as that they absolutely Cut off all Hopes thereof It may be further observed also in the last place that there is another of the Atheists Dark Mysteries here likewise couched That there is no Scale or Ladder of Entity and Perfection in Nature one above another the whole Universe from top to bottom being Nothing but One and the same Sensless Matter diversly Modified As also that Vnderstanding as such rather speaks Imperfection it being but a meer Whisling Evanid and Phantastick thing so that the most absolutely Perfect of all things in the Universe is Grave Solid and Substantial Sensless Matter of which more afterwards And thus is the Tenth Atheistick Argumentation also Confuted But the Democritick and Epicurean Atheists will make yet a further Assault from the Nature of Knowledge Vnderstanding after this manner If the World were Made by a God or an Antecedent Mind and Understanding having in it self an Exemplar or Platform thereof before it was made then must there be Actual Knowledge both in order of Nature and Time before Things whereas Things which are the Objects of Knowledge and Vnderstanding are unquestionably in order of Nature before Knowledge this being but the Signature of them and a Passion from them Now the only Things are Singular Sensibles or Bodies From whence it follows that Mind is the Youngest and most Creaturely Thing in the world or that the World was before Knowledge and the Conception of any Mind and no Knowledge or Mind before the world as its Cause Which is the Eleventh Atheistick Argumentation But we have Prevented our selves here in the Answer to this Argument which would make all Knowledge Mind and Vnderstanding Junior to the World and the very Creature of Sensibles having already Fully Confuted it and clearly Proved That Singular Bodies are not the only Things and Objects of the Mind but that it containeth its Immediate Intelligibles within it self which Intelligibles also are Eternal and That Mind is no Phantastick Image of Sensibles nor the Stamp and Signature of them but Archetypal to them the First Mind being That of a Perfect Being comprehending it self and the Extent of its own Omnipotence or the Possibilities of all things So that Knowledg is Older than all Sensible things Mind Senior to the World and the Architect thereof Wherefore we shall refer the Reader for an Answer to this Argument to Page 729. and so onwards where the Existence of a God that is a Mind before the World is Demonstrated also from this very Topick viz. the Nature of Knowledge and Vnderstanding We shall in this place only add that as the Atheists can no way Salve the Phaenomenon of Motion so can they much less that of Cogitation or Life and Vnderstanding To make which yet the more Evident we shall briefly represent a Syllabus or Catalogue of the many Atheistick Hallucinations or Delirations concerning it As First That Sensless Matter being the only Substance and all things else but Accidental Modifications thereof Life and Mind is all a meer Accidental Thing Generable and Corruptible Producible out of Nothing and Reducible to Nothing again and that there is no Substantial Life or Mind any where In Opposition to which we have before proved That there must of necessity be some Substantial Life and that Humane Souls being Lives Substantial and not meer Accidental Modifications of Matter they are consequently in their own Nature Immortal since No Substance of it self ever vanisheth into Nothing Again the Democriticks and other Atheists conclude that Life and Mind are no Simple and Primitive Natures but Secondary and Compounded things they resulting from certain Concretions and Contextures of Matter and either the Commixtures and Contemporations of Qualities or else the Combinations of those Simple Elements of Magnitude Figure Site and Motion and so being Made up of that which hath Nothing of Life or Mind in it For as Flesh is
not Made out of Fleshy Particles nor Bone out of Bony as Anaxagoras of old dreamed so may Life as they conceive be as well Made out of Lifeless Principles and Mind out of that which hath no Mind or Vnderstanding at all in it just as Syllables Pronounceable do result from Combinations of Letters some of which are Mutes and cannot by themselves be Pronounced at all others but Semi-Vocal And from hence do these Atheists Infer that there could be no Eternal Vnmade Life or Mind nor any that is Immortal or Incorruptible since upon the Dissolution of that Compages or Contexture of Matter from whence they Result they must needs Vanish into Nothing Wherefore according to them there hath probably sometime heretofore been no Life nor Vnderstanding at all in the Universe and there may Possibly be None again From whence the Conclusion is That Mind and Vnderstanding is no God or Principle in the Vniverse it being Essentially Factitious Native and Corruptible or as they express it in Plato ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Mortal from Mortal things as also That the Souls of men cannot subsist Separately after Death and walk up and down in Airy Bodies no more than the Form of a House or Tree after the Dissolution thereof can subsist by it self Separately or appear in some other Body But all this Foolery of Atheists hath been already Confuted we having before shewed that Life and Vnderstanding are Active Powers Vigours and Perfections that could never possibly result from meer Passive Bulk or Dead and Sensless Matter however Modified and Compounded because Nothing can come Effectively from Nothing Neither is there any Consequence at all in this that because Flesh is not made out of Fleshy Principles nor Bone out of Bony Red out of Red things nor Green out of Green therefore Life and Vnderstanding may as well be Compounded out of things Dead and Sensless because these are no Syllables or Complexions as the others are nor can either the Qualities of Heat and Cold Moist and Dry or else Magnitudes Figures Sites and Motions however Combined together as Letters Spell them out and make them up but they are Simple and Primitive things And accordingly it hath been proved that there must of necessity be some Eternal Vnmade Life and Mind For though there be no necessity that there should be any Eternal Vnmade Red or Green because Red and Green may be Made out of things not Red nor Green they and all other Corporeal Qualities so called being but several Contextures of Matter or Combinations of Magnitudes Figures Sites and Motions causing those several Phancies in us and though there be no necessity that there should be Eternal Motion because if there were once no Motion at all in Matter but all Bodies Rested yet might Motion have been Produced by a Self Moving or Self Active Principle And Lastly though there be no necessity that there should be Eternal Vnmade Matter or Body neither because had there been once no Body at all yet might it be Made or Produced by a Perfect Omnipotent Incorporeal Being nevertheless is there an Absolute Necessity that there should be Eternal Vnmade Life and Mind because were there once no Life nor Mind at all these could never have been produced out of Matter altogether Lifeless and Mindless And though the Form of a House cannot possibly Exist Separately from the Matter and Substance thereof it being a Meer Accidental Thing resulting from such a Compages of Stone Timber and Morter yet are Humane Souls and Minds no such Accidental Forms of Compounded Matter but Active Substantial things that may therefore subsist Separately from these Bodies and Enliven other Bodies of a different Contexture And however some that are no Atheists be over prone to conceive Life Sense Cogitation and Consciousness in Brutes to be Generated out of Dead Sensless and Vnthinking Matter they being disposed thereunto by certain Mistaken Principles and ill Methods of Philosophy nevertheless is this unquestionably in it self a Seed of Atheism because if any Life Cogitation and Consciousness may be Produced out of Dead and Sensless Matter then can no Philosophy hinder but that all might have been so But the Democritick Atheists will yet venture further to deny that there is any thing in Nature Self-Moving or Self-Active but that whatsoever Moveth and Acteth was before Moved by something else and Made to Act thereby and again that from some other thing and So backward Infinitely from whence it would follow that there is no First in the Order of Causes but an Endless Retro-Infinity But as this is all one as to Affirm that there is no such thing at all as Life in the World but that the Universe is a Compages of Dead and Stupid Matter so has this Infinity in the Order of Causes been already exploded for an Absolute Impossibility Nevertheless the Atheists will here advance yet an Higber Paradox That all Action whatsoever and therefore Cogitation Phancy and Consciousness it self is Really Nothing else but Local Motion and Consequently not only Brute-Animals but also Men themselves meer Machins Which is an equal either Sottishness or Impudence as to assert a Triangle to be a Square or a Sphere a Cube Number to be Figure or any thing else to be any thing and it is Really all one as to affirm that there is indeed no such thing in our selves as Cogitation there being no other Action in Nature but Local Motion and Mechanism Furthermore the Democritick and Epicurean Atheists Universally agree in this that not only Sensations but also all the Cogitations of the Mind are the meer Passions of the Thinker and the Actions of Bodies Existing without upon him though they do not all declare themselves after the same manner herein For First the Democriticks conclude that Sense is Caused by certain Grosser Corporeal Effluvia streaming from the Surfaces of Bodies Continually and entering through the Nerves But that all other Cogitations of the Mind and mens either sleeping or waking Imaginations proceed from another sort of Simulachra Idols and Images of a more Fine and Subtle Contexture coming into the Brain not through those open Tubes or Channels of the Nerves but immediately through all the smaller Pores of the Body so that as we never have sense of Any thing but by means of those Grosser Corporeal Images obtruding themselves upon the Nerves so have we not the least Cogitation at any Time in our Mind neither which was not Caused by those Finer Corporeal Images and Exuvious Membranes or Effluvia rushing upon the Brain or Contexture of the Soul ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Leucippus and Democritus determined that as well Noesis as Aisthesis Mental Cogitation as External Sensation was Caused by certain Corporeal Idols coming from Bodies without since neither Sensation nor Cogitation could otherwise possibly be produced And thus does Laertius also represent the sense of these Atheistick Philosophers that the Effluvia from Bodies called Idols were the only Causes
Soul and Mind to have sprung up afterwards out of them Nay they do not only Seem to suppose this but also in Express Words declare the same And thus by Jupiter have we discovered the very Fountain of that Atheistick Madness of the Ancient Physiologers to wit their making Inanimate Bodies Senior to Soul and Mind And accordingly that Philosopher addresses himself to the Confutation of Atheism no otherwise than thus by proving Soul not to be Junior to Sensless Body or Inanimate Matter and Generated out of it ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã That which is the First Cause of the Generation and Corruption of all Things the Atheistick Doctrine supposes not to have been First Made but what is indeed the Last thing to be the First And hence is it that they erre concerning the Essence of the Gods For they are ignorant what kind of thing Soul is and what power it hath as also especially concerning its Generation and Production That it was First of all made before Body it being that which Governs the Motions Changes and Transformations thereof But if Soul be First in Order of Nature before Body then must those things which are Cognate to Soul be also before the Things which appertain to Body and so Mind and Vnderstanding Art and Law be before Hard and Soft Heavy and Light and that which these Atheists call Nature the Motion of Inanimate Bodies Junior to Art and Mind it being Governed by the same Now that Soul is in order of Nature before Body this Philosopher demonstrates only from the Topick or Head of Motion because it is Impossible that one Body should Move another Infinitely without any First Cause or Mover but there must of Necessity be something Self-Moving and Self-Active or which had a power of Changing it Self that was the first Cause of all Local Motion in Bodies And this being the very Notion of Soul that it is such a thing as can Move or Change it self in which also the Essence of Life consisteth He thus inferreth ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã It is therefore sufficiently demonstrated from hence that Soul is the Oldest of all things in the Corporeal World it being the Principle of all the Motion and Generation in it And his Conclusion is ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã It hath been therefore rightly affirmed by us that Soul is Older than Body and was Made Before it and Body Younger and Junior to Soul Soul being that which Ruleth and Body that which is Ruled From whence it follows that the Things of Soul also are Older than the things of Body and therefore Cogitation Intellection Volition and Appetite in order of Nature before Length Breadth and Profundity Now it is Evident that Plato in all this Understood not only the Mundane Soul or his Third Divine Hypostasis the Original of that Motion that is in the Heavens and the whole Corporeal Universe but also all other Particular Lives and Souls whatsoever or that whole Rank of Beings called Soul he supposing it all to have been at first made before the Corporeal System or at least to have been in order of Nature Senior to it as Superiour and more excellent that which Ruleth being Superiour to that which is Ruled and no Soul or Life whatsoever to be Generated out of Sensless Matter Wherefore we must needs here condemn that Doctrine of some Professed Theists and Christians of Latter Times who Generate all Souls not only the Sensitive in Brutes but also the Rational in Men out of Matter For as much as hereby not only that Argument for the Existence of a God from Souls is quite taken away and nothing could hinder but that Sensless Matter might be the Original of all things if Life and Vnderstanding Soul and Mind sprung out of it but also the Atheist will have an advantage to prove the Impossibility of a God from hence Because if Life and Vnderstanding in their own Nature be Factitious and Generable out of Matter then are they no Substantial Things but Accidental only from whence it will plainly follow that no Mind could possibly be a God or First Cause of all things it being not so much as able to Subsist by it Self Moreover if Mind as such be Generable and Educible out of Nothing then must it needs be in its own Nature Corruptible also and Reducible to Nothing again whereas the Deity is both an Vnmade and Incorruptible Being So that there could not possibly be according to this Hypothesis any other God than such a Jupiter or Soul of the World as the Atheistick Theogonists acknowledged that Sprung out of Night Chaos and Non-Entity and may be again Swallowed up into that Dark Abyss Sensless Matter therefore being the only Vnmade and Incorruptible thing and the Fountain of all things Even of Life and Vnderstanding it must needs be acknowledged to be the Only Real Numen Neither will the Case be much different as to some others who though indeed they do not professedly Generate the Rational but only the Sensitive Soul both in Men and Brutes yet do nevertheless maintain the Humane Soul it self to be but a meer Blank or White Sheet of Paper that hath nothing at all in it but what was Scribled upon it by the Objects of Sense and Knowledge or Understanding to be nothing but the Result of Sense and so a Passion from Sensible Bodies existing without the Knower For hereby as they plainly make Knowledge and Vnderstanding to be in its own Nature Junior to Sense and the very Creature of Sensibles so do they also imply the Rational Soul and Mind it self to be as well Generated as the Sensitive wherein it is Vertually Contained or to be nothing but a Higher Modification of Matter agreeably to that Leviathan Doctrine That men differ no otherwise from Brute Animals then only in their Organization and the Use of Speech or Words In very truth Whoever maintaineh that any Life or Soul any Cogitation or Consciousness Self-Perception and Self-Activity can spring out of Dead Sensless and Unactive Matter the same can never possibly have any Rational Assurance but that his own Soul had also a like Original and Consequently is Mortal and Corruptible For if any Life and Cogitation can be thus Generated then is there no Reason but that all Lives may be so they being but Higher Degrees in the same Kind and neither Life nor any thing else can be in its own Nature Indifferent to be either Substance or Accident and sometimes one sometimes the other but either all Life Cogitation and Consciousness is Accidental Generable and Corruptible or else none at all That which hath inclined so many to think the Sensitive Life at least to be nothing but a Quality or Accident of Matter Generable out of it and Corruptible into it is that strange Protean Transformation of Matter into so many seemingly Unaccountable Forms and Shapes together with the Scholastick Opinion threupon of Real Qualities that is Entities distinct from the Substance of
and Phancies This the Fourth Atheistick Argument That to suppose an Incorporeal Mind to be the Original of all things is nothing else but to make the Abstract Notion of a meer Accident to be the First Cause Page 67 IX A Fifth Pretended Ground of Atheism That an Incorporeal Deity being already confuted a Corporeal one may be disproved also from the Principles of Corporealism in General Because Matter being the onely Substance and all other Differences of things nothing but the Accidents thereof Generable and Corruâtible no Living Vnderstanding Being can be Essentially Incorruptible The Stoical God Incorruptible onely by Accident Page 69 X. Their further Attempt to doe the same Atomically That the First Principle of all things whatsoever in the Vniverse being Atoms or Corpuscula devoid of all manner of Qualities and consequently of Sense and Understanding which sprung up afterwards from a certain Composition or Contexture of them Mind or Deity could not therefore be the First Original of all Page 70 XI A farther Atheistick Attempt to impugn a Deity by disproving the World's Animation or its being governed by a Living Vnderstanding Animalish Nature presiding over the whole Because forsooth Sense and Understanding are peculiar Appendices to Flesh Bloud and Braines and Reason is no where to be found but in Human Form Page 73 XII An Eighth Atheistick Instance That God being taken by all for a Most Happy Eternal and Immortal Animal or Living Being there can be no such thing because all living Beings are Concretions of Atoms that were at first generated and are liable to Death and Corruption by the Dissolution of their Compages Life being no Simple Primitive Nature but an Accidental Modification of compounded Bodies onely which upon the Disunion of their Parts or Disturbance of their Contexture vanisheth into Nothing Page 75 XIII A Ninth Pretended Atheistick Demonstration That by God is meant a First Cause or Mover and such as was not before moved by any thing else without it but Nothing can move it self and therefore there can be no unmoved Mover nor any First in the Order of Causes that is a God Page 76 XIV Their farther Improvement of the same Principle That there can be no Action whatsoever without some external Cause or that Nothing taketh Beginning from it self but from the Action of some other Agent without it so that no Cogitation can arise of it self without a Cause all Action and Cogitation being really nothing but Local Motion from whence it follows that no Thinking Being could be a First Cause any more than a Machin or Automaton Page 76. XV. Another Grand Mystery of Atheism That all Knowledge and Mental Conception is the Information of the things themselves known existing without the Knower and a meer Passion from them and therefore the world must needs have been before any Knowledge or Conception of it but no Knowledge or Conception before the world as its Cause Page 77 XVI A Twelfth Atheistick Argumentation That things could not be made by a God because they are so Faulty and Ill made That they were not contrived for the Good of Man and that the Deluge of Evils which overflows all shows them not to have proceeded from any Deity ibid. XVII A Thirteenth Instance of Atheists from the Defect of Providence That in Human Affairs all is Tohu and Bohu Chaos and Confusion Page 79 XVIII A Fourteenth Atheistick Objection That it is impossible for any one Being to Animadvert and Order all things in the distant places of the whole world at once But if it were possible That such Infinite Negotiosity would be absolutely inconsistent with Happiness Page 80 XIX Quaeries of Atheists Why the world was not made sooner and What God did before Why it was made at all since it was so long unmade and How the Architect of the world could rear up so huge a Fabrick Page 81 XX. The Atheists Pretence That it is the great Interesse of Mankind There should be no God And that it was a Noble and Heroical Exploit of the Democriticks to Chase away that Affrightfull Spectre out of the world and to free men from the Continual Fear of a Deity and Punishment after Death Embittering all the Pleasures of Life Page 83 XXI The Last Atheistick Pretence That Theism is also inconsistent with Civil Sovereignty it introducing a Fear greater than the Fear of the Leviathan and that any other Conscience besides the Civil Law being Private Judgment is Ipso Facto a Dissolution of the Body Politick and a Revolt to the State of Nature Page 84 XXII The Atheists Conclusion from all the former Premisses as it is set down in Plato and Lucretius That all things sprung Originally from Nature and Chance without any Mind or God or proceeded from the Necessity of Material Motions Vndirected for Ends. And that Infinite Atoms Devoid of all Life and Sense Moving in Infinite Space from Eternity did by their Fortuitous Rencounters and Entanglements produce the System of this whole Vniverse and as well all Animate as Inanimate things Page 97 CHAP. III. An Introduction to the Confutation of the Atheistick Grounds wherein is contained a particular Account of all the Severall Forms of Atheism together with a necessary Digression concerning a Plastick or Artificial Nature I. THat the Grounds of the Hylozoïck Atheism could not be insisted on by us in the former Chapter together with those of the Atomick they being directly opposite each to other with a farther Account of this Hylozoïck Atheism P. 104. II. A Suggestion in way of Caution for the Preventing of all mistakes That every Hylozoïst must not therefore be presently condemned as an Atheist or but a meer Counterfeit Histrionical Theist Page 105 III. That nevertheless such Hylozoïsts as are also Corporealists or acknowledge no other Substance besides Body can by no means be excused from the Imputation of Atheism for Two Reasons Page 106 IV. That Strato Lampsacenus commonly called Physicus was probably the First Asserter of the Hylozoïck Atheism he acknowledging no other God but the Life of Nature in Matter Page 107 V. Further Proved that this Strato was an Atheist and of a different Form from Democritus he attributing an Energetick Nature but without Sense and Animality to all Matter Page 108 VI. That Strato not deriving all things from a meer Fortuitous Principle as the Democritick Atheists did nor yet acknowledging any one Plastick Nature to preside over the whole but deducing the Original of things from a Mixture of Chance and Plastick Nature both together in the several parts of Matter must therefore needs be an Hylozoïck Atheist ibid. VII That the Famous Hippocrates was neither an Hylozoïck nor Democritick Atheist but rather an Heraclitick Corporeal Theist Page 109 VIII That Plato took no notice of the Hylozoïck Atheism nor of any other save what derives the Original of all things from a meer Fortuitous Nature and therefore either the Democritical or the Anaximandrian Atheism which Latter will be next
different from the Hylozoick in that it takes away all Fortuitousness Subjecting all things Vniversally to the Fate of this One Methodical Unknowing Nature Page 132 XXVIII Possible that some in all ages might have entertained this Atheistical Conceit That all things are dispensed by One Regular and Methodical Senseless Nature nevertheless it seemeth to have been chiefly asserted by certain Spurious Heracliticks and Stoicks Vpon which account this Cosmo-plastick Atheism may be called Pseudo-zenonian Page 133 XXIX That besides the Philosophick Atheists there have been always in the World Enthusiastick and Fanatick Atheists though indeed all Atheists may in some sense be said to be both Enthusiasts and Fanaticks as being meerly led by an ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã or Irrational Impetus Page 134 XXX That there cannot easily be any other Form of Atheism besides these Four already mentioned because all Atheists are Corporealists and yet not all Corporealists Atheists but onely such of them as make the First Principle not to be Intellectual ibid. XXXI A Distribution of Atheisms Producing the forementioned Quaternio and shewing the Difference that is betwixt them Page 136 XXXII That they are but meer Bunglers at Atheism who talk of Sensitive and Rational Matter Specifically Differing And that the Canting Astrological Atheists are not at all considerable because not Vnderstanding themselves Page 137 XXXIII Another Distribution of Atheisms That they either derive the Original of all things from a meerly Fortuitous Principle and the Unguided Motion of Matter or else from a Plastick Regular and Methodical but Senseless Nature What Atheists denied the Eternity of the World and what asserted it Page 138 XXXIV That of these Four Forms of Atheism the Atomick or Democritical and the Hylozoick or Stratonical are the Principal which Two being once confuted all Atheism will be confuted Page 142 XXXV These Two Forms of Atheism being contrary to each other that we ought in all Reason to insist rather upon the Atomick nevertheless we shall elsewhere confute the Hylozoick also and further prove against all Corporealists that no Cogitation nor Life can belong to Matter Page 145 XXXVI That in the mean time we shall not neglect the other Forms of Atheism but Confute them all together as they agree in one Principle As also by way of Digression here insist largely upon the Plastick Life of Nature in order to a fuller Confutation as well of the Hylozoick as the Cosmo-plastick Atheism Page 146 1. That these Two Forms of Atheism are not therefore Condemned by us meerly because they suppose a Life of Nature distinct from the Animal Life however this be a thing altogether Exploded by some professed Theists therein symbolizing too much with the Democritick Atheists ibid. 2. That if no Plastick Artificial Nature be admitted then one of these two things must be concluded That either all things come to pass by Fortuitous Mechanism or Material Necessity the Motion of Matter Vnguided or else that God doth ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã doe all things Himself Immediately and Miraculously framing the Body of every Gnat and Fly as it were with his own hands forasmuch as Divine Laws and Commands cannot execute themselves nor be alone the proper Efficient Causes of things in Nature Page 147 3. To suppose the Former of these that all things come to pass Fortuitously by the Unguided Motion of Matter and without the Direction of any Mind a thing altogether as Irrational as Impious there being many Phaenomena both Above the Mechanick Powers and Contrary to the Laws thereof That the Mechanick Theists make God but an Idle Spectatour of the Fortuitous Motions of Matter and render his Wisedom altogether useless and insignificant Aristotle's Judicious Censure of this Fortuitous Mechanism and his Derision of that Conceit that Material and Mechanical Reasons are the onely Philosophical Page 148 4. That it seems neither Decorous in respect of God nor Congruous to Reason that he should ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã doe all things Himself Immediately and Miraculously without the Subserviency of any Natural Causes This further Confuted from the Slow and Gradual Process of things in Nature as also from those Errours and Bungles that are Committed when the Matter proves Inept and Contumacious which argue the Agent not to be Irresistible Page 149 5. Reasonably inferred from hence That there is an Artificial or Plastick Nature in the Vniverse as a Subordinate Instrument of Divine Providence in the Orderly Disposal of Matter but not without a Higher Providence also presiding over it forasmuch as this Plastick Nature cannot Act Electively or with Discretion Those Laws of Nature concerning Motion which the Mechanick Theists themselves suppose Really Nothing else but a Plastick Nature or Spermatick Reasons Page 150 6. The Argeeableness of this Doctrine with the Sentiments of the best Philosophers of all Ages Anaxagoras though a professed Theist severely Censured both by Plato and Aristotle as an encourager of Atheism meerly because he used Material and Mechanical Causes more than Mental and Final Physiologers and Astronomers for the same Reason also vulgarly suspected of Atheism in Plato's time Page 151 7. The Plastick Artificial Nature no Occult Quality but the onely Intelligible Cause of that which is the Grandest of all Phaenomena the Orderly Regularity and Harmony of Things which the Mechanick Theists however pretending to Salve all Phaenomena give no accompt of A God or Infinite Mind asserted by these in vain and to no purpose Pag. 154 8. Two things here to be Performed To give an accompt of the Plastick Artificial Nature and then To show how the Notion thereof is Mistaken and Abused by Atheists The First General Accompt of this Nature according to Aristotle That it is to be conceived as Art it self acting Inwardly and Immediately upon the Matter as if Harmony Living in the Musical Instruments should move the Strings thereof without any External Impulse Page 155 9. Two Preeminences of Nature above Humane Art First That whereas Humane Art acts upon the Matter without Cumbersomely or Moliminously and in a way of Tumult or Hurlyburly Nature acting upon the same from Within more Commandingly doth its work Easily Cleverly and Silently Humane Art acteth on Matter Mechanically but Nature Vitally and Magically Page 155 10. The Second Preeminence of Nature That whereas Human Artists are often to seek and at a loss Anxiously Consult and Deliberate and upon Second thoughts Mend their former work Nature is never to seek or Vnresolved what to doe nor doth she ever Repent of what she hath done and thereupon correct her Formâr Course Human Artists themselves Consult not as Artists but always for want of Art and therefore Nature though never Consulting nor Deliberating may notwithstanding act Artificially and for Ends. Concluded that what is by us called Nature is Really the Divine Art Page 156 11. Nevertheless That Nature is not the Divine Art Pure and Abstract but Concreted and Embodied in Matter the Divine Art not Archetypal but Ectypal Nature differs from
the Divine Art or Wisedom as the Manuary Opificer from the Architect Page 155 12. Two Imperfections of Nature in respect whereof it falls short of Humane Art First That though it act for Ends Artificially yet it self neither Intends those Ends nor Understands the Reason of what it doeth for which cause it cannot act Electively The Difference betwixt Spermatick Reasons and Knowledge That Nature doth but Ape or Mimick the Divine Art or Wisedom being it self not Master of that Reason according to which it acts but onely a Servant to it and Drudging Executioner thereof Page 156 13. Proved that there may be such a thing as acteth Artificially though it self do not comprehend that Art and Reason by which its Motions are Governed First from Musical Habits the Dancer resembles the Artificial Life of Nature Page 157 14. The same further Evinced from the Instincts of Brute Animals Directing them to act Rationally and Artificially in order to their own Good and the Good of the Vniverse without any Reason of their own These Instincts in Brutes but Passive Impresses of the Divine Wisedom and a kind of Fate upon them Page 158 15. The Second Imperfection of Nature that it Acteth without Animal Phancy ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Con-sense or Consciousness and hath no express Self-Perception and Self-Enjoyment ibid. 16. Whether this Energy of the Plastick Nature be to be called Cogitation or no Nothing but a Logomachy or Contention about Words Granted that what moves Matter Vitally must needs do it by some Energy of its own distinct from Local Motion but that there may be a Simple Vital Energy without that Duplicity which is in Synaesthesis or clear and express Consciousness Nevertheless that the Energy of Nature may be called a certain Drousie Unawakened or Astonished Cogitation Page 159 17. Severall Instances which render it probable that there may be a Vital Energy without Synaesthesis clear and express Con-sense or Consciousness Page 160 18. Wherefore the Plastick Nature acting neither Knowingly nor Phantastically must needs act Fatally Magically and Sympathetically The Divine Laws and Fate as to Matter not meer Cogitation in the Mind of God but an Energetick and Effectual Principle in it And this Plastick Nature the True and Proper Fate of Matter or of the Corporeal World What Magick is and that Nature which acteth Fatally acteth also Magically and Sympathetically P. 161 19. That Nature though it be the Divine Art or Fate yet for all that is neither a God nor Goddess but a Low and Imperfect Creature it acting Artificially and Rationally no otherwise than Compounded Forms of Letters when Printing Coherent Philosophick Sense nor for Ends than a Saw or Hatchet in the hands of a skillfull Mechanick The Plastick and Vegetative Life of Nature the Lowest of all Lives and Inferiour to the Sensitive A Higher Providence than that of the Plastick Nature governing the Corporeal World it self ibid. 20. Notwithstanding which forasmuch as the Plastick Nature is a Life it must needs be Incorporeal One and the self same thing having in it an entire Model and Platform of the Whole and acting upon several Distant parts of Matter cannot be a Body And though Aristotle himself do no where declare this Nature to be either Corporeal or Incorporeal which he neither clearly doth concerning the Rational Soul and his Followers commonly take it to be Corporeal yet according to the Genuine Principles of that Philosophy must it needs be otherwise Page 165 21. The Plastick Nature being Incorporeal must either be a Lower Power lodged in Souls which are also Conscious Sensitive or Rational or else a distinct Substantial Life by it Self and Inferiour Soul That the Platonists affirm Both with Aristotle's agreeable Determination That Nature is either Part of a Soul or not without Soul ibid. 22. The Plastick Nature as to the Bodies of Animals a Part or Lower Power of their respective Souls That the Phaenomena prove a Plastick Nature or Archeus in Animals to make which a distinct thing from the Soul would be to Multiply Entities without Necessity The Soul endued with a Plastick Nature the Chief Formatrix of its own Body the contribution of other Causes not excluded Page 166 23. That besides the Plastick in Particular Animals Forming them as so many Little Worlds there is a General Plastick or Artificial Nature in the Whole Corporeal Vniverse which likewise according to Aristotle is either a Part and Lower Power of a Conscious Mundane Soul or else something depending thereon Page 167 24. That no less according to Aristotle than Plato and Socrates Our selves partake of Life from the Life of the Universe as well as we do of Heat and Cold from the Heat and Cold of the Vniverse From whence it appears that Aristotle also held the World's Animation which is further Vndeniably proved An Answer to Two the most considerable Places in that Philosopher objected to the contrary That Aristotle's First Immoveable Mover was no Soul but a Perfect Intellect abstract from Matter which he supposed to move onely as a Final Cause or as Being Loved and besides this a Mundane Soul and Plastick Nature to move the Heavens Efficiently Neither Aristotle's Nature nor Mundane Soul the Supreme Deity However though there be no such Mundane Soul as both Plato and Aristotle conceived yet may there be notwithstanding a Plastick or Artificial Nature depending upon a Higher Intellectual Principle Page 168 25. No Impossibility of other Particular Plasticks and though it be not reasonable to think every Plant Herb and Pile of Grass to have a Plastick or Vegetative Soul of its own nor the Earth to be an Animal yet may there possibly be one Plastick Artificial Nature presiding over the Whole Terraqueous Globe by which Vegetables may be severally organized and framed and all things performed which transcend the Power of Fortuitous Mechanism Page 171 26. Our Second Undertaking which was to Show How grosly those Atheists who acknowledge this Artificial Plastick Nature without Animality Misunderstand it and Abuse the Notion to make a Counterfeit God Almighty or Numen of it to the exclusion of the True Deity First In their Supposing That to be the First and Highest Principle of the Vniverse which is the Last and Lowest of all Lives a thing as Essentially Derivative from and Dependent upon a Higher Intellectual Principle as the Echo on the Original Voice Secondly In their making Sense and Reason in Animals to emerge out of a Sensless Life of Nature by the meer Modification and Organization of Matter That no Duplication of Corporeal Organs can ever make One Single Inconscious Life to advance into Redoubled Consciousness and Self-Enjoyment Thirdly In attributing some of them Perfect Knowledge and Understanding to this Life of Nature which yet themselves suppose to be devoid of all Animal Sense and Consciousness Lastly In making this Plastick Life of Nature to be meerly Corporeal The Hylozoïsts contending That it is but an Inadequate Conception of Body as the onely
Demonstrable of a Perfect Being as the Properties of a Triangle or a Square and therefore can neither be Contradictious to it nor one another Page 652 Nay the Genuine Attributes of the Deity not onely not Contradictious but also all Necessarily Connected together ibid. In Truth All the Attributes of the Deity but so many Partial and Inadequate Conceptions of One and the Same Perfect Being taken into our Minds as it were by Piece-meal ibid. The Idea of God neither Fictitious nor Factitious Nothing Arbitrarious in it but a most Natural and Simple Idea to which not the Least can be Added nor any thing Detracted from it Nevertheless may there be different Apprehensions concerning God every one that hath a Notion of a Perfect Being not Vnderstanding all that Belongeth to it no more then of a Triangle or of a Sphear ibid. 653 Concluded therefore That the Attributes of God No Confounded Non-sense of Religiously Astonished Minds huddling up together all Imaginable Attributes of Honour Courtship and Complement but the Attributes of Necessary Philosophick Truth and such as do not onely speak the Devotion of mens Hearts but also declare the Reall Nature of the thing Here the Wit of a Modern Atheistick Writer ill placed Though no doubts but some either out of Superstition or Ignorance may Attribute such things to the Deity as are Incongruous to its Nature Thus the Fourth Atheistick Pretence against the Idea of God Confuted Page 653 654 In the next place The Atheists think themselves concerned to give an Account of this Unquestionable Phaenomenon the General Persuasion of the Existence of a God in the Minds of men and their Propensity to Religion whence this should come if there were no Reall Object for it in Nature And this they would doe by Imputing it partly to the Confounded Nonsense of Astonished Minds and partly to the Imposture of Politicians Or else to these Three Things To Mens Fear and to their Ignorance of Causes and to the Fiction of Law-Makers and Civil Sovereigns Page 654 The First of these Atheistick Origins of Religion That Mankind by reason of their Natural Imbecillity are in continual Solicitude and Fear concerning Future Events and their Good and Evil Fortune And this Passion of Fear raises up in them for an Object to it self a most Affrightfull Phantasm of An Invisible Understanding Being Omnipotent c. They afterwards Standing in awe of this their own Imagination and Tremblingly Worshipping the Creature of their own Fear and Phancy Page 654 The Second Atheistick Origin of Theism and Religion That Men having a Naturall Curiosity to Enquire into the Causes of things wheresoever they can discover no Visible and Naturall Causes are prone to Feign Causes Invisible and Supernatural As Anaxagoras said never to have betaken himself to a God but onely when he was at a loss for Necessary Materiall Causes Wherefore no wonder if the Generality of Mankind being Ignorant of the Causes of all or most Things have betaken themselves to a God as to a Refuge and Sanctuary for their Ignorance Page 654 655 These two Accounts of the Phaenomenon of Religion from mens Fear and Solicitude and from their Ignorance of Causes and Curiosity Joyned together by a Modern Writer As if the Deity were but a Mormo or Bugbear raised up by mens Fear in the Darkness of their Ignorance of Causes The Opinion of other Ghosts and Spirits also deduced from the same Originall Mens taking things Casuall for Prognosticks and being so addicted to Omens Portents Prophecies c. From a Phantastick and Timorous Supposition That the things of the World are not disposed of by Nature but by some Understanding Person Page 655 But lest these Two Accounts of the Phaenomenon of Religion should prove Insufficient the Atheists superadde a Third Imputing it also to the Fiction and Imposture of Civill Soveraigns who perceiving an advantage to be made from hence for the better keeping men in Subjection have thereupon Dextrously laid hold of mens Fear and Ignorance and Cherished those Seeds of Religion in them from the Infirmities of their Nature Confirming their Belief of Ghosts and Spirits Miracles Prodigies and Oracles by Tales publickly Allowed and Recommended And that Religion might be every way Obsequious to their Designs have perswaded the People that Themselves were but the Interpreters of the Gods from whom they Received their Laws Religion an Engin of State to keep men busily Employed Entertain their Minds render them Tame and Gentle apt for Subjection and Society Page 655 656 All this not the Invention of Modern Atheists But an Old Atheistick Cabbal That the Gods made by Fear Lucretius That the Causes of Religion Terrour of Mind and Darkness and that the Empire of the Gods owes all its Being to mens Ignorance of Causes as also that the Opinion of Ghosts proceeded from mens not knowing how to distinguish their Dreams other Frightfull Phancies from Sensations Page 656 657 An Old Atheistick Surmize also That Religion a Political Invention Thus Cicero The Atheists in Plato That the Gods are not by Nature but by Art and Laws onely Critias one of the Thirty Tyrants of Athens his Poem to this purpose Page 657 658 That the Folly and Falsness of these Three Atheistick Pretences for the Origin of Religion will be fully Manifested First As to that of Fear and Phancy Such an Excess of Fear as makes any one constantly Believe the Existence of that for which no manner of Ground neither in Sense nor Reason highly tending also to his own Disquiet Nothing less then Distraction Wherefore the generality of mankind here affirmed by Atheists to be Frighted out of their Wits and Disstempered in their brains onely a few of themselves who have escaped this Panick Terrour remaining Sober or in their Right Senses The Sobriety of Atheists nothing but Dull Stupidity and Dead Incredulity they Believing onely what they can See or Feel Page 658 True That there is a Religious Fear Consequent upon the Belief of a God as also that the Sense of a Deity is often awakened in mens Minds by their Fears and Dangers But Religion no Creature of Fear None lesse Solicitous about their Good and Evill Fortune then the Pious and Vertuous who place not their Chief Happiness in things Aliene but onely in the Right Vse of their own Will Whereas the Good of Atheists wholly in things Obnoxious to Fortune The Timorous Complexion of Atheists from building all their Politicks and Justice upon the Foundation of Fear Page 658 659 The Atheists Grand Errour here That the Deity according to the generall Sense of Mankind Nothing but a Terriculum a Formidable Hurtfull and Undesirable thing Whereas men every where agree in that Divine Attribute of Goodness and Benignity ibid. ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã in the worst Sense taken by none but a few Ill-natured Men painting out the Deity according to their own Likeness This condemned by Aristotle in the Poets he calling them therefore Liars by
Plutarch in Herodotus as spoken Universally Plutarch himself restraining the Sense thereof to his Evill Principle Plato's ascribing the World to the Divine Goodness who therefore made all things most like Himself The true meaning of this Proverb That the Deity affecteth to Humble and Abase the Pride of men Lucretius his Hidden Force that hath as it were a Spite to all Overswelling Greatnesses could be no other then the Deity Those amongst Christians who make the worst Representation of God yet Phansy him Kind and Gracious to Themselves Page 659 660 True that Religion often expressed by the Fear of God Fear Prima Mensura Deitatis the First Impression that Religion makes upon men in this Lapsed State But this not a Fear of God as Mischievous and Hurtfull nor yet as a meer Arbitrary Being but as Just and an Impartiall Punisher of Wickedness Lucretius his acknowledging mens Fear of God to be conjoyned with a Conscience of Duty A Naturall Discrimination of Good and Evill with a Sense of an Impartiall Justice presiding over the World and both Rewarding and Punishing The Fear of God as either a Hurtfull or Arbitrary and Tyrannicall Being which must needs be joyned with something of Hatred not Religion but Superstition Fear Faith and Love Three Steps and Degrees of Religion to the Son of Sirach Faith better Defined in Scripture then by any Scholasticks God such a Being as if he were not Nothing more to be Wished for Page 660 661 The Reason why Atheists thus mistake the Notion of God as a Thing onely to be Feared and consequently Hated from their own Ill Nature and Vice The latter disposing them so much to think that there is no Difference of Good and Evill by Nature but onely by Law which Law Contrary to Nature as Restraint to Liberty Hence their denying all Naturall Charity and Acknowledging no Benevolence or Good Will but what arises from Imbecillity Indigency and Fear Their Friendship at best no other then Mercatura Utilitatum Wherefore if there were an Omnipotent Deity this according to the Atheistick Hypothesis could not have so much as that Spurious Love or Benevolence to any thing because standing in Need of Nothing and Devoid of Fear Thus Cotta in Cicero All this asserted also by a late Pretender to Politicks He adding thereunto that God hath no other Right of Commanding then his Irresistible Power nor men any Obligation to obey him but onely from their Imbecillity and Fear or because they cannot Resist him Thus do Atheists Transform the Deity into a Monstrous Shape an Omnipotent Being that hath neither Benevolence nor Justice in him This indeed a Mormo or Bugbear Page 661 662 But as this a false Representation of Theism so the Atheistick Scene of things most Uncomfortable Hopeless and Dismall upon severall Accounts True that no Spightfull Designs in Sensless Atoms in which Regard Plutarch Preferred even this Atheistick Hypothesis before that of an Omnipotent Mischievous Being However no Faith nor Hope neither in Sensless Atoms Epicurus his Confession that it was better to believe the Fable of the Gods then that Materiall Necessity of all things asserted by the other Atheistick Physiologers before himself But he not at all mending the Matter by his supposed Free Will The Panick Fear of the Epicureans of the Frame of Heaven's Cracking and this Compilement of Atoms being dissolved into a Chaos Atheists running from Fear plunge themselves into Fear Atheism rather then Theism from the Imposture of Fear Distrust and Disbelief of Good But Vice afterwards prevailing in them makes them Desire there should be No God Page 663 664 Thus the Atheists who derive the Origin of Religion from Fear First put an Affrightfull Vizard upon the Deity and then conclude it to be but a Mormo or Bugbear the Creature of Fear and Phancy More likely of the Two that the Opinion of a God sprung from Hope of Good then Fear of Evill but neither of these True it owing its Being to the Imposture of no Passion but supported by the Strongest and clearest Reason Nevertheless a Naturall Prolepsis or Anticipation of a God also in mens Minds Preventing Reason This called by Plato and Aristotle a Vaticination Page 664 665 The Second Atheistick Pretence to salve the Phaenomenon of Religion from the Ignorance of Causes and mens innate âuriosity Vpon which Account the Deity said by them to be nothing but an Asylum of Ignorance or the Sanctuary of Fools next to be Confuted Page 665 That the Atheists both Modern and Ancient here commonly Complicate these Two together Fear and Ignorance of Causes making Theism the Spawn of both as the Fear of Children in the Dark raises Bugbears and Spectres Epicurus his Reason why he took such great pains in the Study of Physiology that by finding out the Naturall Causes of things he might free men from the Terrour of a God that would otherwise Assault their Minds ibid. The Atheists thus Dabbling in Physiology and finding out Materiall Causes for some of those Phaenomena which the unskilfull Vulgar salve onely from a Deity therefore Confident that Religion had no other Originall then this Ignorance of Causes as also that Nature or Matter does all things alone without a God But we shall make it manifest That Philosophy and the True Knowledge of Causes Lead to a Deity and that Atheism from Ignorance of Causes and want of Philosophy Page 665 666 For First No Atheist who derives all from Senslesse Matter can possibly assign any Cause of Himself his own Soul or Mind it being Impossible that Life and Sense should be Naturally produced from what Dead and Sensless or from Magnitudes Figures Sites and Motions An Atheistick Objection nothing to the purpose That Laughing and Crying things are made out of Not-Laughing and Crying Principles because these result from the Mechanism of the Body The Hylozoists never able neither to produce Animal Sense and Consciousness out of what Sensless and Inconscious The Atheists supposing their own Life and Understanding and all the Wisedom that is in the World to have sprung meerly from Sensless Matter and Fortuitous Motion Grossely Ignorant of Causes The Philosophy of Our Selves and True Knowledge of the Cause of our own Soul and Mind brings to God Page 666 667 Again Atheists Ignorant of the Cause of Motion by which they suppose all things done this Phaenomenon being no way Salvable according to their Principles First undeniably certain That Motion not Essential to all Body or Matter as such because then there could have been no Mundane System no Sun Moon Earth c. All things being continually Torn in Pieces and Nothing Cohering Certain also That Dead and Sensless Matter such as that of Anaximander Democâitus and Epicurus cannot Move it self Spontaneously by Will or Appetite The Hylozoists further considered elsewhere Democritus could assign no other Cause of Motion then this That one Body moved another from Eternity Infinitely without any First Cause or Mover Thus also a Modern Writer To
Assert an Infinite Progress in the Causes of Motion according to Aristotle to assign no Cause thereof at all Epicurus though an Exploder of Qualities forced here to fly to an Occult Quality of Gravity Which as Absurd in Infinite Space and without any Centre of Rest so indeed nothing but to make his own Ignorance and He Knows not Why to be a Cause The Motion of Body from the Activity of something Incorporeal Though Motion taken for Translation be a Mode of Matter yet as it is taken for the Vis Movens a Mode or Energy of Something that is Incorporeal and Self-Active The Motion of the whole Corporeal Universe Originally from the Deity Thus the Ignorance of the Cause of Motion another Ground of Atheism Page 667 669 Thirdly The Atheists also Ignorant of the Cause of that Grand Phaenomenon the ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã the Regular and Artificial Frame of the Mundane System and of the Bodies of Animals together with the Harmony of all They who boast they can give Causes of all things without a God able to give no Cause of this but onely that it Happened by Chance so to be This either to make the Absence of a Cause a Cause Chance being but the Absence of an Intending Cause or their Own very Ignorance of the Cause and They Know not Why to be a Cause or to make One Contrary the Cause of Another Confusion of Order and Harmony Chance of Art and Skill or Lastly to deny it to have any Cause at all since they deny an Intending Cause Page 669 But here the Atheists make several Pretenâes for this their Ignorance First That the World is not so Well Made but that it might have been much Better and many Flaws to be found therein whereas a God or Perfect Being would have Bungled in Nothing but have made all things after the Best manner But this a Twelfth Athâistick Argumentation and the Confutation thereof to be expected afterward Reasons why some Modern Theists give Atheists so much advantage here as to acknowledge Things be Ill Made whilst the Ancient Pagan Theists stood their Ground and generously maintained that Mind being the Maker of all things and not Blind Fortune or Chance nor Arbitrary Will and Irrational Humane Omnipotent the ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã That which is Absolutely the Bâst in order to the Good of the Whole so far as the Necessity of things would admit the Measure and Rule of Nature and Providence Page 669 670 Again the Atomick and Epicurean Atheists Pretend That though many things serve for Uses yet it does not therefore folâow that they were made Intentionally for those Uses because things that Happen by Chance may have Uses Consequent Thus Lucretius and the old Atheistick Philosophers before Aristotle of the Parts of the Bodies of Animals and all other things The Answer That when things consist of many Parts all Artificially Proportioned together with much Curiosity as for example the Eye no man who considers the Anatomy thereof and its whole Structure can reasonably conclude that it Happened so to be made and the Use of Seeing Followed but that it was made Intentionally for the Use of Seeing But to maintain that not onely Eyes Happened to be so made and the Use of Seeing Followed but also Ears and a Mouth and Feet and Hands and all the other parts Organical and Similar without any of which the Whole would be Inept or Vseless all their several Uses Vn-Intended following Gross Insensibility and Stupidity Galen of the Use of Parts Page 671 672 Democritus his Dotages Countenanced also by Cartesius His Book of Meteors first written with design to Salve all those Phaenomena without a God but Vnsuccessfully Nevertheless we acknowledge That God and Nature doe all things in the most Frugal and Compendious way and that the Mechanick Powers are taken in so far as they will serviceably comply with the Intellectual Platform But Nature not Mechanical and Fortuitous onely but also Vital and Artificial the Archeus of the whole World ibid. Again Atheists further Pretend That though it may well seem strange that Matter Fortuitously Moved should at the very First fall into such a Regularity and Harmony as is now in the World yet not at all strange that Atoms moving from all Eternity and making all manner of Combinations and Contexturâs and trying all Experiments should after innumerable other Inept and Discongruous Forms at length fall into such a System as This. They say therefore That the Earth at first brought forth divers Monstrous and Irregular Shapes of Animals some wanting Feet some Hands some without a Mouth c. to which the Ancients added Centaurs Scylla's and Chimaera's mixtly Boviform and Hominiform Animals Though Epicurus ashamed to own these would seem to exclude them but without Reason But because we have now no such Irregular Shapes Produced out of the Earth they say that the Reason is because none could Continue and Propagate their kind by Generation but onely such as Happened to be fitly made Thus Epicurus and the Atheists before Aristotle They also adde hereunto their Infinite Worlds amongst which they Pretend not one of a Thousand or of Ten thousand hath so much Regularity in it as this of ours Lastly they Presage likewise that this World of ours shall not always continue such but after a while fall into Confusion and Disorder again and then may we have Centaurs Scylla's and Chimaera's as before Page 672 674 Nevertheless because this Universal and Constant Regularity of things for so many Ages together is so Puzzling they would perswade us that the Sensless Atoms Playing and Toying up and down from Eternity without any Care or Thought were at length Taught by the Necessity of things and driven to a kind of Trade or Habit of Artificialness and Methodicalness Page 674 675 To all which Atheistick Pretences Replied First That this an Idle Dream or Impudent Forgery That there was once an Inept Mundane System and in this World of ours all manner of Irregular Shapes of Animals not onely because no Tradition of any such thing but also because no Reason possibly to be given why such should not be Produced out of the Earth still though they could not Continue long That also Another Atheistick Dream That in this World of ours all will quickly fall into Confusion and Nonsense again And as their Infinite Worlds an Impossibility so their Assertion of the Irregularity of the supposed other Worlds well enough Answered by a Contrary Assertion That were every Planet a Habitable Earth and every Fixed Star a Sun having all more or fewer such Habitable Planets moving round about them and none of them Desert or Un-inhabited there would not be found so much as one Ridiculous or Inept System amongst them all the Divine Act being Infinite Page 675 Again That the Fortuitous Motions of Sensless Atoms should in length of Time grow Artificial and contract a Habit or Trade of Acting as Regularly as if directed
of Vectius Valens and the Sibyls Thus Balaam Divinely assisted to Predict our Saviour Page 712 713 Scriptures Triumphing over Pagan Oracles Predictions concerning our Saviour Christ and the Conversion of the Gentiles Amongst which that remarkable one of the Seventy Weeks Page 713 714 Other Predictions concerning the Fates of Kingdoms and of the Church Daniel's Fourth Ten-Horned Beast the Roman Empire This Prophecy of Daniel's carried on further in the Apocalyps Both of them Prophetick Calendars of Times to the End of the World ibid. That this Phaenomenon of Scripture-Prophecies cannot Possibly be Imputed by Atheists as some others to Fear or Ignorance of Causes or to the Fiction of Politicians They not onely Evince a Deity but also the Truth of Christianity To this Purpose of more Vse to us who now live then the Miracles themselves Recorded in Scripture Page 714 715 These Five Extraordinary Phaenomena all of them evince Spirits to be no Fancies but Substantiall Inhabitants of the World from whence a God may be Inferred Some of them Immediately prove a Deity ibid. Here have we not onely fully Confuted all the Atheistick Pretences from the Idea of God but also by the way already Proposed several Substantiall Arguments for a Deity The Existence whereof will now be further proved from its very Idea ibid. True That some of the Ancient Theists themselves Declare God Not to be Demonstrable Thus Alexander Aphrodis Clemens Alexand. But their meaning therein no more then this That God cannot be Demonstrated à Priori from any Antecedent Necessary Cause Not follow from hence That therefore no Certainty or Knowledge of the Existence of a God but onely Conjectural Probability Faith and Opinion We may have a Certain Knowledge of things the ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã whereof cannot be Demonstrated à Priori as That there was Something or other Eternal without Beginning Whensoever a thing is Necessarily Inferred from what is altogether Undeniable this may be called a Demonstration Many Geometricall Demonstrations such or of the ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã onely Page 715 716 A Sceptical Position of Cartesius That there can be no Certainty of any thing no not of Geometrical Theorems nor Common Notions before we be Certain of the Existence of a God Essentially Good who therefore cannot Deceive From whence it would follow That neither Atheists nor such Theists as assert an Arbitrary Deity can ever be certain of anything as That Two and Two are Four Page 716 717 However some appearance of Piety in this Assertion yet is it a Foundation of Eternal Scepticism both as to all other things and the Existence of a God That Cartesius here went Round in a Circle proving the Existence of a God from our Faculties and then the Truth of our Faculties from the Existence of a God and consequently Proved nothing If it be possible that our Faculties might be False then must we confess it possible that there may be no God and Consequently remain for ever Sceptical about it ibid. Wherefore a Necessity of Exploding and Confuting this New Sceptical Hypothesis of the Possibility of our Faculties being so made as to Deceive us in all our Clearest Perceptions Omnipotence it self cannot make any thing to be Indifferently True or False Truth not Factitious As to the Universal Theorems of Abstract Science the Measure of Truth no Forrein or Extraneous thing but onely our own Clear and Distinct Perception Here whatsoever is Clearly Perceived Is. The very Essence of Truth Perceptibility Granted by all That there can be no False Knowledge or Understanding The Perception of the Understanding never False but onely Obscure Not Nature that Erreth in us but We Our selves in Assenting to things not Clearly Perceived Conclusion That Omnipotence cannot Create any Understanding Faculties so as to have as Clear and Distinct Conceptions of all Falshoods and Non-Entities as of Truths because whatsoever is Clearly and Distinctly Perceived hath therefore an Entity and Omnipotence it self to speak with Reverence cannot make Nothing to be Something or Something Nothing This no more then That it cannot doe Things Contradictious Conception the Measure of Power Page 717 719 True That Sense as such is but Phantastical and Relative and were there no other Perception all Truth would be Private Relative and Seeming none Absolute This probably the Reason why some have suspected the same of Knowledge also But Mind and Understanding reaches beyond Phancy and Appearance to the Absoluteness of Things It hath the Criterion of Truth within it self Page 719 720 Objected That this an Arrogance for Creatures to Pretend to an Absolute Certainty of any thing Answer That God alone is Ignorant of Nothing and Infallible in All things but no Derogation from the Deity to suppose that he should make Created Minds such as to have a Certainty of Something as the Whole to be Greater then the Part and the like since otherwise they would be but a meer Mockery Congruous to think that God hath made Men so as that they may Possibly attain to some Certainty of his own Existence Origen That Knowledge is the onely thing that hath Certainty in it Page 720 721 Having now some Firm Ground or Footing to stand upon a Certainty of Common Notions without which nothing could be proved by Reason we shall endeavour by means hereof to Demonstrate the Existence of a God from his Idea ibid. Cartesius his Vndertaking to doe this with Mathematical Evidence as this Idea includeth in it Necessary Existence This Argument hitherto not so Successfull it being by many concluded to be a Sophism That we shall impartially set down all that we can both For it and Against it leaving others to make a Judgment Page 721 First Against the Cartesian Demonstration of a God That because we can frame an Idea of a Necessarily Existent Being it does not at all follow that It Is since we can frame Idea's of things that Never Were nor Will be Nothing to be gathered from hence but onely that it is Not Impossible Again from this Idea Including Necessary Existence nothing else Inferrible but That what hath no Necessary âxistence is not Perfect and That if there be a Perfect Being its Existence always was and will be Necessary but not Absolutely That it doth Exist A Fallacy when from the Necessity of Existence affirmed onely Hypothetically the Conclusion is made Absolutely Though a Perfect Beâng Must Exist Necessarily yet not therefore follow that it Must and Doth Exist The Latter a thing Indemonstrable Page 721 723 For the Cartesian Demonstration of a God As from the Notion of a thing Impossible we conclude That it never Was nor Will be and of that which hath a Contingent Schesis to Existence That it Might be or Might not be so from that which hath Necessary Existence in its Nature That it Actually Is. The force of the Argumentation not meerly Hypotheticall If there be a Perfect Being then is its Existence Necessary because this supposes that a Necessary
Original Knowledge a Mind before the World and all Sensibles not Ectypall but Archetypall and the Framer of all Wherefore not Atheism but Theism Demonstrable from Knowledge and Understanding Page 733 734 This further Confirmed from hence Because there are Eternal Verities such as were never Made nor had any Beginning That the Diagonal of a Square Incommensurable to the Sides an Eternal Truth to Aristotle Justin Martyr's ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã or Eternal Moralls Geometrical Truths not Made by any man's Thinking but before all Men as also before the World and Matter it self Page 734 Now if there be Eternal Verities the Simple Reasons and Intelligible Essences of Things must needs be Eternal likewise These called by Plato Things that Always Are but were never Made Ingenerable and Incorruptible However Aristotle quarrels with Plato's Idea's yet does he also agree with him in this That the Forms or Species of things were Eternal and Never Made and that there is No Generation of them and that there are other things besides Sensibles the Immutable Objects of Science Certain That there could be no Immutable Science were there no other Objects of the Mind but Sensibles The Objects of Geometrical Science no Material Triangles Squares c. These by Aristotle said to be No where The Intelligible Natures of things to Philo the most Necessary Essences Page 735 736 Now if there be Eternal Truths and Intelligibles whose Existence also is Necessary since these can be no where but in a Mind there must be an Eternal Necessarily Existing Mind Comprehending all these Idea's and Truths at once or Being them Which no other then the Mind of a Perfect Omnipotent Being Comprehending it self and all Possibilities of things the Extent of its own Power Page 736 737 Wherefore there can be but One onely Original Mind which all other Minds Partake of Hence Idea's or Notions exactly alike in several men and Truths Indivisibly the Same Because their Minds all Stamped with the same Original Seal Themistius That One man could not Teach Another were there not the same Notion both in the Learner and Teacher Nor could men confer together as they doe were there not One Mind that All Partaked of That Anti-Monarchical Opinion of Many Understanding Beings Eternal and Independent Confuted And now have we not onely asserted the Idea of God and Confuted all the Atheistick Pretences against it but also from this Idea Demonstrated his Existence Page 737 738 SECT II. A Confutation of the Second Atheistick Argument Against Omnipotence and Divine Creation That Nothing can by any Power whatsoever be Made out of Nothing In Answer to which Three things to be Insisted on First That De Nihilo Nihil Nothing out of Nothing is in some Sense an Axiome of Vnquestionable Truth but then makes Nothing against Theism or Divine Creation Secondly That Nothing out of Nothing in the Sense of the Atheistick Objectors viz. That Nothing which once was Not could by any Power whatsoever be brought into Being is Absolutely False and that if it were True it would make no more against Theism then it doth against Atheism Lastly That from this very Axiome Nothing from Nothing in the True Sense thereof the Absolute Impossibility of Atheism is Demonstrable Page 738 De Nihilo Nihil Nothing from Nothing in some Sense is a Common Notion of Vnquestionable Truth For First Certain That Nothing which once was Not could ever Of it Self come into Being or That Nothing can take beginning of Existence from It self or That Nothing can be Made or Produced without an Efficient Cause From whence Demonstrated That there was never Nothing or That every thing was not Made but Something did Exist of It Self from Eternity Unmade or Underived from any thing else Page 738 739 Again Certain also That Nothing could be Efficiently Produced by what hath not at least Equal Perfection and a Sufficient Active or Productive Power That of an Effect which Transcends the Perfection of its supposed Cause must Come from Nothing or be Made without a Cause Nor can any thing be Produced by another though having Equal Perfection unless it have also a Sufficient Active or Productive Power Hence Certain That were there once no Motion at all in the world and no other Substance besides Body which had no Self-Moving Power there could never Possibly be any Motion or Mutation to all Eternity for want of a Sufficient Cause or Productive Power No Imperfect Being hath a Productive Power of any New Substance which was not before but onely of New Accidents and Modifications that is No Creâture can Create Which Two forementioned Senses respect the Efficient Cause Page 739 Thirdly Nothing can be Materially Produced out of Nothing Prae-Existing or Inexisting And therefore in all Natural Generations where the Supernaturall Power of the Deity interposes not No New Reall Entity or Substance Produced which was not Before but onely New Modifications of what Substantially Prae-Existed Page 739 740 Nothing out of Nothing so much Insisted on by the old Physiologers before Aristotle in this Sense commonly misunderstood by Modern Writers as if they designed thereby to take away all Divine Creation out of Nothing Prae-Existing Granted This to have been the Sense of the Stoicks and of Plutarch He affirming the World to have been no otherwise Made by God then a House is by a Carpenter or a Garment by a Tailour Plutarch and the Stoicks therefore Imperfect Theists but nevertheless Zealous Religionists But the Ancient Italick Philosophers here Acted onely as Physiologers and not as Theologers or Metaphysicians they not directing themselves against a Divine Creation out of Nothing Prae-Existing but onely contending That neither in Naturall Generations any new Reall Entity was Created nor in Corruptions Annihilated but onely the Modifications of what before Existed Changed or That No New Reall Entity could be Made out of Matter Page 740 741 That this was the True meaning of those Ancient Physiologers Evident from the Use which they made of this Principle Nothing out of Nothing Which Twofold First Vpon this Foundation they Endeavoured to establish a Peculiar Kind of Physiology and some Atomology or other either Similar or Dissimilar Homoeomery or Anomoeomery Anaxagoras from hence concluded because Nothing could be Made out of Nothing Prae-Existing and Inexisting that therefore there were in every Body Similar Atoms of all Kinds out of which by Concretions and Secretions all Naturall Generations Made so that Bone was Made out of Bony Atoms Prae-Existing and Inexisting Flesh out of Fleshy and the like This the Anaxagorean Homoeomery or Similar Atomology built upon this Princile Nothing out of Nothing Page 741 742 But the Ancient Italicks both before and after Anaxagoras whom Leucippus Democritus and Epicurus here followed with greater Sagacity concluded from the same Principle Nothing out of Nothing That those Qualities and Forms of Bodies Naturally Generated and Corrupted were therefore no Reall Entities distinct from the Substance of Matter but onely Different
be a Modification of Sensless Matter or Result from Figures Sites Motions and Magnitudes Humane Souls Substantiall and therefore according to this Doctrine must have been Never Made whereas Atheists stifly deny both their Prae and Post-Existence Those Pagan Theists who held the Eternity of Humane Minds supposed them notwithstanding to have Depended upon the Deity as their Cause Before Proved That there can be but One Understanding Being Self-Existent If Humane Souls Depend upon the Deity as their Cause then Doubtless Matter also Page 749 750 A Common but Great Mistake That no Pagan Theist ever acknowledged any Creative Power out of Nothing or else That God was the Cause of any Substance Plato's Definition of Effective Power in General and his Affirmation That the Divine Efficiency is that whereby things are Made after they had Not been Certain That he did not understand this of the Production of Souls out of Matter he supposing them to be Before Matter and therefore Made by God out of Nothing Prae-Existing All Philosophers who held the Immortality and Incorporeity of the Soul asserted it to have been Caused by God either in Time or from Eternity Plutarch's Singularity here Vnquestionable That the Platonists supposed One Substance to receive its whole Being from Another in that they derive their Second Hypostasis or Substance though Eternal from the First and their Third from Both and all Inferiour Ranks of Beings from all Three Plotinus Porphyrius Iamblichus Hierocles Proclus and Others derived Matter from the Deity Thus the Chaldee Oracles and the old Egyptian or Hermaick Theology also according to Iamblichus Those Platonists who supposed the World and Souls Eternal conceived them to have received their Being as much from the Deity as if Made in Time Page 750 752 Having now Disproved this Proposition Nothing out of Nothing in the Atheistick Sense viz. That no Substance was Caused or Derived its Being from Another but whatsoever is Substantial did Exist Of It self from Eternity Independently we are in the next place to make it appear also That were it True it would no more oppose Theism then it doth Atheism Falshoods though not Truths may Disagree Plutarch the Stoicks and Others who made God the Creatour of no Substance though not Genuine yet Zealous Theists But the Ancient Atheists both in Plato and Aristotle Generated and Corrupted All things that is Produced All things out of Nothing or Non-Existence and Reduced them into Nothing again the bare Substance of Matter onely Excepted The same done by the Democritick and Epicurean Atheists themselves the Makers of this Objection though according to the Principles of their own Atomick Physiology it is Impossible that Life and Unerstanding Soul and Mind should be meer Modifications of Matter As Theists give a Creative Power of All out of Nothing to the Deity so do Atheists to Passive and Dead Mattâr Wherefore this can be no Argument against Theism it Equally opposing Atheism Page 752 756 An Anacephalaeosis wherein Observable That Cicero makes De Nihilo fieri and Sine Causa To be made out of Nothing and to be made without a Cause One and the Self-same thing as also that he doth not Confine this to the Material Cause onely Our Third and Last Undertaking To Prove that Atheists Produce Real Entities out of Nothing in the First Impossible Sense that is Without a Cause Page 756 757 A Brief Synopsis of Atheism That Matter being the onely Substance is therefore the onely Un-made Thing and That whatsoever else is in the World besides the Bare Substance thereof was Made out of Matter or Produced from that alone Page 757 The First Argument When Atheists affirm Matter to be the onely Substance and all things to be Made out of that they Suppose all to be Made without an Efficient Cause which is to bring them from Nothing in an Impossible Sense Though Something may be Made without a Material Cause Prae-Existing yet cannot any thing Possibly be Made without an Efficient Cause Wherefore if there be any thing Made which was Not before there must of Necessity be besides Matter some other Substance as the Active Efficient Cause thereof The Atheistick Hypothesis supposes Things to be Made without any Active or Effective Principle Whereas the Epicurean Atheists Attribute the Efficiency of all to Local Motion and yet deny Matter or Body their onely Substance a Self-moving Power They hereby make all the Motion that is in the World to have been Without a Cause or to Come from Nothing all Action without an Agent all Efficiency without an Efficient Page 758 Again Should we grant these Atheists Motion without a Cause yet could not Dead and Sensless Matter together with Motion ever beget Life Sense and Understanding because this would be Something out of Nothing in way of Causality Local Motion onely Chânging the Modifications of Matter as Figure Place Site and Disposition of Parts Hence also those Spurious Theists Confuted who Conclude God to have done no more in the Making of the World then a Carpenter doth in the Building of a House upon this Pretence That Nothing can be made out of Nothing and yet suppose him to Make Souls out of Dead and Sensless Matter which is to bring them from Nothing in way of Causality Page 758 759 Declared before That the Ancient Italicks and Pythagoricks Proved in this manner That Souls could not possibly be Generated out of Matter because Nothing can come from Nothing in way of Causality The Subterfuge of the Atheistick Ionicks out of Aristotle That Matter being the onely Substance and Life Sense and Unâerstanding Nothing but the Passions Affections and Dispositions thereof the Production of them out of Matter no Production of any new Reall Entity Page 759 Answer Atheists taking it for granted That there is no other Substance besides Body or Matter therefore falsly conclude Life Sense and Understanding to be Accidents or Modes of Matter they being indeed the Modes or Attributes of Substance Incorporeal and Self-Active A Mode That which cannot be Conceived without the Thing whereof it is a Mode but Life and Cogitation may be Conceived without Corporeal Extension and indeed cannot be Conceived with it Page 759 760 The chief Occasion of this Errour from Qualities and Forms as Because the Quality of Heat and Form of Fire may be Generated out of Matter therefore Life Cogitation and Understanding also But the Atomick Atheists themselves Explode Qualities as things Really distinct from the Figure Site and Motion of Parts for this very reason Because Nothing can be made out of Nothing Causally The Vulgar Opinion of such Real Qualities in Bodies onely from mens mistaking their own Phancies Apparitions Passions Affections and Seemings for things Really Existing without them That in these Qualities which is distinct from the Figure Site and Motion of Parts not the Accidents and Modifications of Matter but of Our own Souls The Atomick Atheists infinitely Absurd when exploding Qualities because Nothing can come out
things without the Direction of any Mind affirmeth That They held Body and Substance to be One and the Self-same thing From whence it follows That Incorporeal Substance is Incorporeal Body or Contradictious Nonsense and That whatsoever is not Body is Nothing He likewise addeth That they who asserted the Soul to be a Body but had not the Confidence to make Prudence and other Vertues Bodies or Bodily quite overthrew the Cause of Atheism Aristotle also representeth the Atheistick Hypothesis thus That there is but One Nature Matter and this Corporeal or endued with Magnitude the onely Substance and all other things the Passions and Affections thereof Page 767 769 In Disproving Incorporeal Substance some Difference amongst the Atheists themselves First Those who held a Vacuum as Epicurus and Democritus c. though taking it for grantâd That what is Un-extended or Devoid of Magnitude is Nothing yet acknowledged a Double Extended Nature the First Impenetrable and Tangible Body the Second Penetrable and Intangible Space or Vacuum To them the Onely Incorporeal Their Argument thus Since Nothing Incorporeal besides Space which can neither Doe nor Suffer any thing therefore no Incorporeal Deity The Answer If Space be a Real Nature and yet not Bodily then must it needs be either an Affection of Incorporeal Substance or else an Accident without a Substance Gassendus his Officiousness here to help the Atheists That Space is neither Accident nor Substance but a Middle Nature or Essence betwixt Both. But whatsoever Is must either Subsist by it Self or else be an Attribute Affection or Mode of Something that Subsisteth by it Self Space either the Extension of Body or of Incorporeal Substance or of Nothing but Nothing cannot be Extended wherefore Space supposed not to be the Extension of Body must be the Extension of an Incorporeal Substance Infinite or the Deity as some Theists Assert Page 769 770 Epicurus his Pretended Gods Such as could neither Touch nor be Touched and had not Corpus but Quasi Corpus onely and therefore Incorporeals distinct from Space But Granted that He Colluded or Juggled in this Page 770 Other Atheists who denied a Vacuum and allowed not Space to be a Nature but a meer Imaginary thing the Phantasm of a Body or else Extension considered Abstractly Argued thus Whatsoever is Extended is Body or Bodily But whatsoever Is is Extended Therefore whatsoever Is is Body Page 770 771 This Argument against Incorporeal Substance Answered Two manner of ways Some Asserters of Incorporeal Substance denying the Minor Whatsoever Is is Extended others the Major of it Whatsoever is Exended is Body First The Generality of Ancient Incorporealists realây maintained That there was Something Un-Extended Indistant Devoid of Quantity and of Magnitude Without Parts and Indivisible Plato That the Soul is before Longitude Latitude and Profundity He also Denies That whatsoever is in no Place is Nothing Aristotle's First Immovable Mover also Devoid of Magnitude So likewise is Mind or That which Understands to him He also denies Place and Local Motion to the Soul otherwise then by Accident with the Body Page 771 773 Philo's Double Substance Distant and Indistant God also to him both Every-where because his Powers Extend to all things and yet No-where as in a Place Place being Created by him together with Bodies Plotinus much concerned in this Doctrine Two Books of his upon this Subject That One and the same Numerical thing viz. the Deity may be All or the Whole Every-where God to him Before all things that are in a Place therefore Wholly Present to whatsoever Present This would he prove also from Natural Instincts He Affirmeth likewise That the Humane Soul is Numerically the Same both in the Hand and in the Foot Simplicius his Argument for Un-Extended Substance That Whatsoever is Self-Moving must be Indivisible and Indistant His Affirmation That Souls Locally Immovable Move the Body by Cogitation Page 773 775 None more full and express in this then Porphyrius His Assertion That were there such an Incorporeal Space as Democritus and Epicurus supposed Mind or God could not be Co-Extended with it but onely Body The whole Deity Indivisibly and Indistantly Present to every Part of Divisible and Distant things Page 775 776 Thus Origen in his Against Celsus Saint Austine That the Humane Soul hath no Dimensions of Length Breadth and Thickness and is in it Self Illocabilis Boëtius reckons this amongst the Common Notions known onely to wise men That Incorporeals are in No Place Page 776 This therefore no Novel or Recent Opinion That the Deity is not Part of it Here and Part of it There nor Mensurable by Yards and Poles but the Whole Undivided Present to every Part of the World But because many Objections against this we shall further Shew how these Ancient Incorporealists endeavoured to Quit themselves of them The First Objection That to suppose the Deity and other Incorporeal Substances Un-Extended is to make them Absolute Parvitudes and so Contemptible things Plotinus his Answer That what is Incorporeal not so Indivisible as a Little thing either a Physical Minimum or Mathematical Point for thus God could not Congruere with the whole World nor the Soul with the whole Body Again God not so Indivisible as the Least he being the Greatest of all not in Magnitude but Power He so Indivisible as also Infinite This an Errour proceeding from Sense and Imagination That what Un-Extended therefore Little Incorporeal Substance the Whole of which is Present to every Part of Body therefore Greater then Body Porphyrius to the same purpose That God is neither to be look'd upon as the Least nor as the Greatest in a way of Magnitude Page 776 778 The Second Objection That what neither Great nor Little and possesses no Place a Non-Entity This according to Plato Plotinus and Porphyrius a Mistake proceeding from mens adhering to Sense and Imagination They Grant That an Un-Extended Being Is ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Un-Imaginable Porphyrius That Mind and Phancy are not the same as some maintain That which can either Doe or Suffer not Nothing though it swell not out into Distance Two Kinds of Substances to Plotinus Bulky Tumours and Un-bulky Active Powers Which latter said by Simplicius to have nevertheless a certain Depth or Profundity in them Something ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Un-imaginable even in Body it self We cannot Possibly Imagine the Sun of such a Bigness as Reason Evinces it to be Vrged also by Plotinus That an Un-stretcht-Out Duration or Timeless Eternity as difficult to be Conceived as an Un-Extended Substance and yet must this needs be Attributed to the Deity Page 778 781 That God and Humane Souls no otherwise Incorporeal then as ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã a Thin or Subtile Body False Because the Difference of Grosseness and Subtilty in Bodies according to True Philosophy onely from Motion That the most Subtile Body may possibly be made as Grosse as Lead or Iron and the Grossest as Subtile as Aether No Specifick
All is Body and That the First Principles of Body are devoid of Life and Understanding it would follow unavoidably That there is no God Therefore the Stoicks who were Corporeal Theists denied the Latter they supposing an Understanding Fire Eternal and Unmade the Maker of the whole Mundane System Truly Observed by Origen That this Corporeal God of the Stoicks was but by Accident Incorruptible and Happy and onely because Wanting a Destroyer This no Genuine Theism Page 837 838 But an Absolute Impossibility in both these Atheistick Corporealisms not onely because they suppose no Active Principle but also because they bring Life and Understanding that is Something out of Nothing or Make them without a Cause Where the Atomick Atheists of the Two most to be Condemned because so grosly Contradicting themselves From that True Principle That Matter as such is devoid of Life and Understanding an Absolute Necessity of another Substance Incorporeal which is Essentially Vital and Intellectual That All Life cannot possibly be Factitious and Accidental Generable and Corruptible but there must be Substantial Life and also some Eternal Page 838 839 The Truth of this Vnderstood and Acknowledged by the Hylozoists That there must of Necessity be both Substantial and Unmade Life and Understanding who therefore Attribute the same to all Matter as such but without Animality which according to them is all Factitious and Accidental Wherefore this Hylozoick Atheism also brings Conscious Life and Animality out of Nothing or Makes them without a Cause The Argument of the Epicurean Atheists against Stratonism or Hylozoism Unanswerable That upon this Supposition there must be in every Man and Animal a Heap of Innumerable Percipients as many as there are Atoms of Matter and so no One Thinker The Pretence of the Hylozoists That all the Particles of Matter in every Animal do Confederate Ridiculous and Impossible Page 839 840 Thus the Fifth and Sixth Atheistick Argumentations fully Confuted and from that True Supposition in them That Matter as such is Devoid of Life and Understanding Incorporeal Substance plainly Demonstrated Which was our Second Undertaking Page 840 The Third and Last That there being Vndeniably Substance Incorporeal the Two Following Atheistick Argumentations built upon the Supposition of the Contrary altogether Insignificant The Seventh not properly directed against Theism but against a Religious kind of Atheism or Theogonism which supposed a God or Soul of the World Generated out of Sensless Matter and the Offspring of Night and Chaos A Sober and True Sense of the World's Animation That there is a Living Sentient and Understanding Nature Presiding over the whole World But the Sense of Pagan Theists That the Whole Corporeall World Animated is a God Exploded by us This Argument therefore being not against Theism but Theogonism the Confutation thereof might be here well Omitted without any Detriment to our Cause But because the denying of a Living Understanding Nature presiding over the World is Atheisticall the Ground of this Assertion briefly Declared That Life and Understanding are Accidents of Bodies resulting onely from Such a Contexture of Atoms as produce Flesh Bloud and Brains in Bodies Organized and That there is no Reason to be found any-where but onely in Humane Form which also Confuted A Brutish Passage of a Modern Writer That it is Vnconceivable by Men How God can Understand without Brains Page 840 841 The Next which is the Eighth Atheistick Argumentation That there can be no Living Being Immortall nor Perfectly Happy built upon that False Supposition also That all Life and Understanding results from a Contexure of Dead and Sensless Atoms and therefore is Dissolvible and Annihilable But that there is Life Essentiall and Substantiall which Naturally Immortall as also a Necessity of an Eternall Life and Mind Unmade and Unannihilable which Perfectly Happy Page 841 842 SECT IV. THE Epicurean Atheists further Endeavour to Disprove a God from the Phaenomena of Motion and Cogitation in the Three Following Argumentations the Ninth Tenth and Eleventh From Motion thus That from this Principle Nothing can move It Self but Whatsoever is Moved is moved by Another it will follow That there can be no First Cause and Unmoved Mover but One thing Moved Another from Eternity Infinitely Because Nothing could Move Another which was not It Self First Moved by Something else Page 842 843 Answer The meaning of this Axiome Not That Nothing can Act from It Self as the Atheist Supposes he taking it for granted that every Thing is Body and that all Action is Locall Motion but That no Body Resting could ever Locally Move It Self A False Supposition of the Atheists and some Cartesians That were there but once Motion in the Matter this would of it Self continue to all Eternity True that of Aristotle That to make an Infinite Progress in the Causes of Motion and no First Mover is all one as to say That there is No Cause at all thereof or That all the Motion in the World is a Passion without an Agent or Comes from Nothing Clearly Impossible That there should be any Motion at all were there Nothing Self-Moving or Self-Active Page 843 Wherefore from this Principle That no Body can Move It Self it follows Vndeniably That there is Some other Substance in the World besides Body that hath an Active Power of Moving Body Page 843 844 Another Corollary from the same Principle That there is another Species of Action distinct from Locall Motion and which is not Heterokinesy but Autokinesy That the Action by which Local Motion is first Caused could not be it self Local Motion All Local Motion Caused Originally by Cogitation Thus the Ninth Atheistick Argument from Motion Confuted and from hence That no Body can Move it Self Demonstrated That there is Something Incorporeal the First Cause of Local Motion by Cogitation ibid. But the Atheists further Pretend to Prove That Cogitation it self is Heterokinesy the Passion of the Thinker and the Action of some other External Agent upon him Because Nothing taketh Beginning from It Self and No Cogitation can rise of It Self without a Cause That therefore Thinking Beings themselves are Machines and Cogitation Local Motion And No Understanding Being a First Cause nor Perfectly Happy because Dependent upon something else Page 844 845 Answer True That no Substance taketh Beginning from it Self as also That no Action Causeth it Self But False That No Action taketh Beginning from the Immediate Agent or That Nothing can Act otherwise then as Acted upon by Something else Atheists here Affirm onely what they should Prove and so Beg the Question If Nothing Self-Active then all the Motion and Action in the Universe must Come from Nothing or be Made without a Cause Page 845 True also That our Humane Cogitations are frequently occasioned from Externall Objects and that the Concatenations of Thoughts and Phantasms often depend upon Mechanick Causes But False That all Cogitations are Obtruded upon us from without and That no Transition in our Thoughts which was not
of a Wooden Hand For thus these Physiologers declare the Generations and Causes of Figures only or the Matter out of which things are made as Air and Earth Whereas no Artificer would think it sufficient to render such a Cause of any Artificial Fabrick because the Instrument happened to fall so upon the Timber that therefore it was Hollow here and Plane there but rather because himself made such strokes and for such Ends c. Now in the close of all this Philosopher at length declares That there is another Principle of Corporeal things besides the Material and such as is not only the Cause of Motion but also acts Artificially in order to Ends ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã there is such a thing as that which we call Nature that is not the Fortuitous Motion of Sensless Matter but a Plastick Regular and Artificial Nature such as acts for Ends and Good declaring in the same place what this Nature is namely that it is ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Soul or Part of Soul or not without Soul and from thence inferring that it properly belongs to a Physiologer to treat concerning the Soul also But he concludes afterwards ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã that the whole Soul is not Nature whence it remains that according to Aristotle's sence Nature is ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã either part of a Soul or not without Soul that is either a lower Part or Faculty of some Conscious Soul or else an Inferiour kind of Life by it self which is not without Soul but Suborditate to it and dependent on it 22. As for the Bodies of Animals Aristotle first resolves in General that Nature in them is either the whole Soul or else some part of it ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Nature as the Moving Principle or as that which acts Artificially for Ends so far as concerns the Bodies of Animals is either the whole Soul or else some Part of it But afterward he determines more particularly that the Plastick Nature is not the whole Soul in Animals but only some part of it ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã that is Nature in Animals properly so called is some Lower Power or Faculty lodged in their respective Souls whether Sensitive or Rational And that there is Plastick Nature in the Souls of Animals the same Aristotle elsewhere affirms and proves after this manner ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã What is that which in the Bodies of Animals holds together such things as of their own Nature would otherwise move contrary ways and flie asunder as Fire and Earth which would be distracted and dissipated the one tending upwards the other downwards were there not something to hinder them now if there be any such thing this must be the Soul which is also the Cause of Nourishment and Augmentation Where the Philosopher adds that though some were of Opinion that Fire was that which was the Cause of Nourishment and Augmentation in Animals yet this was indeed but ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã only the Concause or Instrument and not simply the Cause but rather the Soul And to the same purpose he philosophizeth elsewhere ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Neither is Concoction by which Nourishment is made in Animals done without the Soul nor without Heat for all things are done by Fire And certainly it seems very agreeable to the Phaenomena to acknowledge something in the Bodies of Animals Superiour to Mechanism as that may well be thought to be which keeps the more fluid parts of them constantly in the same Form and Figure so as not to be enormously altered in their Growth by disproportionate nourishment that which restores Flesh that was lost consolidates dissolved Continuities Incorporates the newly received Nourishment and joyns it Continuously with the preexistent parts of Flesh and Bone which regenerates and repairs Veins consumed or cut off which causes Dentition in so regular a manner and that not only in Infants but also Adult persons that which casts off Excrements and dischargeth Superfluities which makes things seem ungrateful to an Interiour Sense that were notwithstanding pleasing to the Taste That Nature of Hippocrates that is the Curatrix of Diseases ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã and that Archeus of the Chymists or Paracelsians to which all Medicaments are but Subservient as being able to effect nothing of themselves without it I say there seems to be such a Principle as this in the Bodies of Animals which is not Mechanical but Vital and therefore since Entities are not to be multiplied without necessity we may with Aristotle conclude it to be ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã or ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã a certain part of the Soul of those Animals or a Lower Inconscious Power lodged in them 23. Besides this Plastick Nature which is in Animals forming their several Bodies Artificially as so many Microcosms or Little Worlds there must be also a general Plastick Nature in the Macrocosm the whole Corporeal Universe that which makes all things thus to conspire every where and agree together into one Harmony Concerning which Plastick Nature of the Universe the Author de Mundo writes after this manner ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã One Power passing thorough all things ordered and formed the whole World Again he calls the same ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã a Spirit and a Living and Generative Nature and plainly declares it to be a thing distinct from the Deity but Subordinate to it and dependent on it But Aristotle himself in that genuine Work of his before mentioned speaks clearly and positively concerning this Plastick Nature of the Universe as well as that of Animals in these words ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã It seemeth that as there is Art in Artificial things so in the things of Nature there is another such like Principle or Cause which we our selves partake of in the same manner as we do of Heat and Cold from the Vniverse Wherefore it is more probable that the whole World was at fiâst made by such a Cause as this if at least it were made and that it is still conserved by the same than that Mortal Animals should be so For there is much more of Order and determinate Regularity in the Heavenly Bodies than in our selves but more of Fortuitousness and inconstant Regularity among these Mortal things Notwithstanding which some there are who though they cannot but acknowledge that the Bodies of Animals were all framed by an Artificial Nature yet they will needs contend that the System of the Heavens sprung merely from Fortune and Chance although there be not the least appearance of Fortuitousness or Temerity in it And then he sums up all into this Conclusion ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã Wherefore it is manifest that there is some such thing as that which we call Nature that is that there is not only an Artificial Methodical and Plastick Nature in Animals by which their respective Bodies are Framed and Conserved but also that there is such a General Plastick Nature likewise in the Vniverse by which the Heavens
Substance and fondly dreaming that the Vulgar Notion of a God is Nothing but such an Inadequate Conception of the Matter of the whole Vniverse Mistaken for an Entire Substance by it self the Cause of all things And thus far the Digression Page 172 XXXVIII That though the Confutation of the Atheistick Grounds according to the Laws of Method ought to have been reserved for the last part of this Discourse yet we having reason to violate those Laws crave the Reader 's Pardon for this Preposterousness A considerable Observation of Plato's That it is not onely Gross Sensuality which inclines men to Atheize but also an Affectation of seeming Wiser than the Generality of mankind As likewise that the Atheists making such Pretence to Wit it is a seasonable and proper Vndertaking to Evince that they Fumble in all their Ratiocinations And we hope to make it appear that the Atheists are no Conjurers and that all Forms of Atheism are Nonsense and Impossibility Page 174 CHAP. IV. The Idea of God declared in way of Answer to the First Atheistick Argument and the Grand Objection against the Naturality of this Idea as Essentially including Vnity or Oneliness in it from the Pagan Polytheism removed Proved That the Intelligent Pagans Generally acknowledged One Supreme Deity A fuller Explication of whose Polytheism and Idolatry intended in order to the better giving an Accompt of Christianity I. THE either Stupid Insensibility or Gross Impudence of Atheists in denying the Word God to have any Signification or that there is any other Idea answering to it besides the meer Phantasm of the Sound The Disease called by the Philosopher ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã ãâã The Petrification or Dead Insensibility of the Mind Page 192 II. That the Atheists themselves must needs have an Idea of God in their Minds or otherwise when they deny his Existence they should deny the Existence of Nothing That they have also the same Idea of him in Generall with the Theists the One Denying the very same thing which the Others Affirm Page 194 III. A Lemma or Preparatory Proposition to the Idea of God That though some things be Made or Generated yet it is not possible that all things should be Made but something must of necessity Exist of it Self from Eternity Unmade and be the Cause of those other things that are Made ibid. IV. The Two most Opposite Opinions concerning what was Self-Existent from Eternity or Unmade and the Cause of all other things Made One That it was Nothing but Sensless Matter the Most Imperfect of all things The Other That it was Something Most Perfect and therefore Consciously Intellectual The Asserters of this Latter opinion Theists in a Strict and Proper Sense of the Former Atheists So that the Idea of God in Generall is A Perfect Consciously Understanding Being or Mind Self-Existent from Eternity and the Cause of all other things Page 194 195. V. Observable That the Atheists who deny a God according to the True Idea of him do Notwithstanding often Abuse the Word calling Sensless Matter by that name they meaning Nothing else thereby but onely a First Principle or Self-Existent Unmade thing according to which Notion of the word God there can be no such thing at all as an Atheist no man being able to persuade himself That all things sprung from Nothing Page 195 VI. In order to a more Punctual Declaration of this Divine Idea the Opinion of those taken notice of who suppose Two Self-Existent Unmade Principles God and Matter according to which God not the Principle of all things nor the Sole Principle but onely the Chief Page 196 197. VII These Materiarians Imperfect and Mistaken Theists Not Atheists because they suppose the World Made and Governed by an Animalish Sentient and Understanding Nature whereas no Atheists acknowledge Conscious Animality to be a First Principle but conclude it to be all Generable and Corruptible Nor yet Genuine Theists because they acknowledge not Omnipotence in the full Extent thereof A Latitude therefore in Theism and none to be condemned for Absolute Atheists but such as deny an Eternal Unmade Mind the Framer and Governour of the whole World Page 198 199. VIII An Absolutely Perfect Being the most Compendious Idea of God Which Includeth in it not onely Necessary Existence and Conscious Intellectuality but also Omni-Causality Omnipotence or Infinite Power Wherefore God the Sole Principle of all things and Cause of Matter The True Notion of Infinite Power And that Pagans commonly acknowledged Omnipotence or Infinite Power to be included in the Idea of God Page 200 201. IX That Absolute Perfection implies yet something more than Knowledge and Power A Vaticination in mens Minds of a Higher Good than either That according to Aristotle God is better than Knowledge and hath Morality in his Nature wherein also his Chief Happiness consisteth This borrowed from Plato to whom the Highest Perfection and Supreme Deity is Goodness it self Substantiall above Knowledge and Intellect Agreeably with which the Scripture makes God and the Supreme Good Love This not to be understood of a Soft Fond and Partiall Love God being rightly called also an Impartial Law and the Measure of all things Atheists also suppose Goodness to be included in the Idea of that God whose Existence they deny This Idea here more largely declared Page 202 203 c. X. That this forementioned Idea of God Essentially Includeth Unity Oneliness or Solitariety in it since there cannot possibly be more than One Absolutely Supreme One Cause of All things One Omnipotent and One Infinitely Perfect Epicurus and his Followers professedly denyed a God according to this Notion of him Page 207 XI The Grand Objection against the Idea of God as thus Essentially Including Oneliness and Singularity in it from the Polytheism of all Nations formerly the Jews excepted and of all the Wisest men and Philosophers From whence it is Inferred that this Idea of God is not Natural but Artificial and owes its Original to Laws and Arbitrary Institutions onely An Enquiry therefore here to be made concerning the True Sense of the Pagan Polytheism the Objectors securely taking it for granted that the Pagan Polytheists universally asserted Many Unmade Self-Existent Intellectual Beings and Independent Deities as so many Partial Causes of the World Page 208 209. XII The Irrationality of which Opinion and its manifest Repugnancy to the Phaenomena render it less probable to have been the Belief of all the Pagan Polytheists Page 210 XIII That the Pagan Deities were not all of them Vniversally look'd upon as so many Unmade Self-Existent Beings Vnquestionably Evident from hence Because they Generally held a Theogonia or Generation of Gods This Point of the Pagan Theology insisted upon by Herodotus the most ancient Prosaïck Greek Writer In whom the meaning of that Question Whether the Gods were Generated or Existed all from Eternity seems to have been the same with this of Plato's Whether the World were Made or Unmade Page 211 Certain also that amongst