in his Reasons for his Opinion That he that reflecteth on himself cannot but be satisfied That a Free Agent is he that can do if he will and forbear if he will And such an Agent he allows Man to be and saith he hath proved it too But how he will reconcile this with his Assertion that no Man can be free from Necessitation and that all our Actions have necessary Causes and therefore are necessitated I cannot imagine As to Spinoza's Account of the Deity in Reference to this Point I have given a hint or two of it already He makes God to be the same with Nature or the Universe to be Corporeal and an absolutely necessary Agent one who cannot possibly help doing as he doth one who hath no Power of Creation nor doth act according to free Will But is Limited and Restrained to one constant Method of Acting by the Absolute Necessity of his Nature or by his Infinite Power And lest any one should misunderstand him so far as to imagine that he means by this that God is by the Excellency and Perfection of his Nature in all his Operations exactly conformable to the Rules of Justice Goodness and Right Reason He plainly excludes that Notion in these words Qui dicunt Deum omnia sub Ratione Boni agere Hi aliquid extra Deum videntur ponere quod à Deo non dependet ad quod Deus tanquam ad Exemplar in Operando attendit vel ad quod tanquam ad certum scopum collimat Quod profectò nihil aliud est quam Deum Fato subjicere Now I think nothing can more shew the wicked Perversness of this Writer's Mind than this Passage For he could not but know very well that when Divines assert the Deity to be Essentially and necessarily Good they do not mean that Goodness is any thing Extrinsical to the Divine Nature much less that it is something which hath no dependance upon it but only that the Excellency and Perfection of his Nature is such as that it is in every thing exactly conformable to Right Reason and therefore this was certainly a wilful Perversion of their Sense set up on purpose to overthrow the Notion of Moral Goodness in the Deity But how vain is it for him to tell us that for the Deity to Act sub Ratione Boni is for Him to be Subject to Fate when at the same time he Himself Asserts that God is in every respect a Necessary Agent without any free Will nay without any Knowledge or Vnderstanding in his Nature at all This is so plain a Demonstration that it was his chief and Primary Design to banish out of Mens Minds the Notion of Moral Goodness that nothing can be more and therefore tho' he was resolved to Introduce absolute Necessity into all Actions both Divine and Human yet it should be such an one as should leave no Umbrage for any distinction between Good and Evil or any Foundation for Rewards and Punishments And in this Notion of Necessity these Writers follow Democritus Heraclitus Leucippus and that Atheistical Sect who maintain'd that there was Nothing in all Nature but Matter and Motion And therefore when these Modern Writers assert that there is nothing in the Universe but Body as they do they run Fate farther than most of the Old Heathen Patrons of Necessity did For there was none but the Democritick Sect that supposed Fate to have a Power over the Will of Man and in this particular even they were deserted by Epicurus as I observe below The Pythagoreans Platonists and Stoicks agreed that the Mind of Man was free And 't is well known that the Stoicks did in this Free Power of the Will of Man found that arrogant Assertion of theirs That a Wise Man was in one respect more excellent than the Gods for they were Good by the Necessity of their Nature and could not help it whereas Man had a Power of being otherwise and therefore was the more commendable for being so There was indeed some of the Poets and some few of the Philosophers too who did subject the Gods themselves to Fate or Necessity Thus Seneca in one place saith Necessitas Deos alligat Irrevocabilis Divina pariter ac Humana Cursus vehit Ille ipse omnium Conditor ac Rector scripsit quidem Fata sed sequitur semper paret semel jussit Which Opinion is effectually refuted and exposed by Lucian in that Dialogue of his called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 As also by Lactantius in his First Book De falsâ Religione Chap. 11. But this as I doubt not but Seneca and some others understood in a softer sense than at first sight it appears to have so was it the Doctrine of but a few for generally the Heathens did fully believe that Prayers and Sacrifices would alter a Man's Fortune and Circumstances for the better that they would appease the Anger and gain the Favour and Blessing of the Gods and that Their Nature was not so absolutely Fatal and Necessary but that they could freely deal with their Creatures according as they deserved at their hands For we find Balbus the Stoick mentioned by Cicero telling us That the Nature of God would not be most Powerful and Excellent if it were Subject to the same Necessity or Nature Quâ Coelum maria terraeque reguntur Nihil Enim est praestantius Deo Nulli igitur est Naturae Obediens Subjectus So that these Writers tread in the Steps of the worst and most Atheistical of the Heathen Philosophers and maintain a more rigid Fate and a more irresistible Necessity than most of them did But 2 I come next to shew the Groundlesness of those Reasons and Arguments on which these Men build their Hypothesis of Absolute Necessity And first as to the Reasons of Mr. Hobbs The Chief that he brings against the freedom of Human Actions are these saith Mr. Hobbs In all Deliberations and alternate Successions of Contrary Appetites 't is the last only which we call Will this is immediately before the doing of any Action or next before the doing of it become Impossible Also Nothing saith he can take beginning from it self but must do it from the Action of some other immediate Agent without it if therefore a Man hath a Will to something which he had not before the Cause of his Willing is not the Will it self but something else not in his own disposing So that whereas 't is out of Controversie that of Voluntary Actions the Will is the Necessary Cause and by this which is now said the Will is also Caused by Other things whereof it disposeth not it follows that Voluntary Actions have all of them Necessary Causes and therefore are necessitated Agen also Every sufficient Cause saith he is a Necessary one for if it did not produce its Effect necessarily 't was because something was wanting to its Production and then it was not sufficient Now from hence it follows that
whatsoever is produced is produced Necessarily and consequently all Voluntary Actions are Necessitated And to define a Free Agent to be that which when all things are present which are necessary to produce the Effect can nevertheless not produce it is Contradiction and Nonsense for 't is all one as to say the Cause may be sufficient i. e. Necessary and yet the Effect shall not follow This is the Substance of all Mr. Hobbs his Proof against Free Will in which there are almost as many Mistakes as there are Sentences and from hence it plainly will appear that either he had no clear Idea's of what he wrote about or else did designedly endeavour to perplex darken and confound the Cause For in the first place He confounds the Power or Faculty of Willing in Man with the last act of Willing or Determination after Deliberating And consequently doth not distinguish between what the Schools would call Hypothetical and Absolute Necessity which yet ought to be carefully done in the Point between us for an Agent may be free and no doubt every Man is free to deliberate on and to compare the Objects offered to his Choice and yet not be so after he hath chosen Then indeed Necessity comes in 't is impossible for any one to choose and not to choose or to determine and not to determine and after the Election is made no one ever supposed that a Man is free not to make it And therefore if by the Will Mr. Hobbs means that last Act of Willing or Electing which immediately precedes Acting or which is next before the doing of a thing become impossible as he expresseth himself he fights with his own shadow and opposes that which no body ever denied for no Man ever supposed Freedom and Determination to be the same thing but only that Man before he determined was free whether he would determine so and so or not And accordingly he himself defines a voluntary Agent to be him that hath not made an end of Deliberating Agen 2. 'T is hard to know what he means here by Nothing taking its beginning from it self he is talking about Voluntary Actions and about the freedom of Human Nature and therefore should referr this to the Will of Man but the Instances he afterwards produces are of Contingent Things which are nothing at all to his purpose But if this be spoken of the Will what will it signifie I grant Nothing can take its beginning from itself the Will of Man took its beginning from God and Voluntary Actions we say take their beginning from the Faculty or Power of Willing placed in our Souls But what then doth it follow from thence that those Actions we call Voluntary are Necessitated because that they take their Original from that free Power of Election God hath placed in our Natures and not from themselves I dare say no one can see the consequence of this part of the Argument And it will not in the least follow from hence that the Cause of a Man's Willing is not the Will it self but something else not in his own disposing Which yet he boldly asserts It is the Power of Willing or that Faculty which we find in our selves of being free in many Cases to Act or not Act or to Act after such a particular manner which is generally called the Will and this is commonly said to be free Tho' I think as one hath observed it is not so proper a way of Speaking as to say the Man is free For besides that 't is not usual nor indeed proper to predicate one Faculty of another 't is hardly good sense to say the Will is free in the manner now explain'd for that would be the same thing as to say that a free Power is free whereas it is not the Power but the Man that hath the Power that is free But however the Other way of Expression hath prevailed and doth do so and I don't think any one is misled by it into Error for that which every body understands and means by saying the Will of Man is free is that Man hath in his Nature such a free Power as is called his Will Now from hence it will not follow that a Man is free whether he will Will or not for he must Will someway either to Act or not to Act or to Act after such a particular manner But it will follow that when a Man hath made any particular Volition or hath determined the Point whether he shall Act or forbear to Act he is then no longer at Liberty as to this particular Case and Instant for the Determination is then actually made and the Man no longer free not to make it But this proves nothing at all against the Liberty or Freedom of the Mind of Man Again what doth Mr. Hobbs mean by the Will 's being the Necessary Cause of Voluntary Actions Doth he mean that the Will of Man must of Necessity act freely and produce Actions voluntarily if he doth we are agreed but if he means that the Will is previously necessitated in every Act of Volition to Will just as it doth and could not possibly have willed otherwise this is to beg the Question and to take for granted the great thing in Dispute 't is to call that out of Controversie which is the only thing in Controversie which indeed when a Man contradicts the Common Sense and Reason of Mankind without Proof is the best way of Proceeding But that which looks most like an Argument for the Necessity of all Humane Actions is this which he brings in the last place That Cause saith he is a sufficient Cause which wanteth nothing requisite to produce its Effect but such a Cause must also be a Necessary one for had it not necessarily produced its Effect it must have been because something was wanting in it for that Purpose and then it could not have been sufficient So that whatever is produced is produced necessarily for it could not have been at all without a sufficient or necessary Cause and therefore also all Voluntary Actions are necessitated Now all this proves to his Purpose I think just nothing at all He proceeds on in his former Error of confounding the Act of Willing with the Power of Willing and of making Hypothetical the same with absolute Necessity for not now to dispute what he saith of every sufficient Cause's being a Necessary one allowing that when ever any Volition or Determination is made or when ever any Voluntary Action is done that the Will of Man was a sufficient Cause to produce that Effect nay that it did at last necessarily produce it he can inferr nothing from hence more than this That when the Will hath determined or willed 't is no longer free to Will or Nill that particular thing at that particular Instant which I don't believe any Body will ever or ever did deny But this will not prove at all that the Will was necessitated to make that
Determination à Priori and that it could have made no other which yet is what he means and ought to have clearly made out For the same Power or Faculty of Liberty which enabled it to make that Determination would have been a sufficient Cause for it to have made another contrary to it or differing from it and then when that had been made it would have been as necessary as the former And therefore that Definition of a Free Agent 's being that which when all things are present which are needful to produce the Effect can nevertheless not produce it tho' I don't think it the best doth not when rightly understood imply any Contradiction nor is it Nonsense at all For the meaning of it is That he is properly Free who hath the Power of Determination in himself and when all Requisites are ready so that nothing shall extrinsecally either hinder him from or compel him to Act can yet choose whether he will Act or not Thus if a Man hath Pen Ink and Paper and a place to write upon his Hand well and at Liberty and understands how to write he hath all things present that are needful to produce the Effect of Writing yet he can nevertheless not produce that Effect because he can choose after all whether he will write or no. Mr. Hobbs defines a Free Agent to be him that can do if he will and forbear if he will and that Liberty is the absence of all external Impediments which if he intended any thing by it but to palliate a bad Cause and to amuse the Person he wrote to is as much Nonsense and Contradiction to what he himself advances about Necessity as is possible For how a Man can be said to Act necessarily that hath no external Impediments to hinder him or Causes to compel him but is free to Act if he will or forbear if he will is what I believe no Man can possibly conceive Thus we see plainly that this great Patron of Necessity hath very little to say for his Darling Notion and that he plainly contradicts and is Inconsistent with himself Had he indeed dared speak out and thought it time to declare his Opinion freely he would no doubt have proceeded on other Grounds in this Point and made use of Arguments more agreeable to his Set of Principles which being allowed him would have demonstrated an absolute Necessity of all things whatsoever For he was a thorough Corporealist and maintained that there was nothing more in Nature but Matter and Motion which if it were true it is most certain that all Things and Actions must be inevitably Fatal and Necessary for as Mr. Lock well observes nothing but Thought or Willing in a Spirit can begin Motion The Necessity therefore in such an Hypothesis would be the true Ancient Democritick Fate the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or as Epicurus calls it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a through Material necessity Mechanically producing all Things or the Fate of the Naturalists who held nothing besides Matter and Motion But this Notion for some Reasons best known to himself he did not think fit to insist on when he wrote this Tract against the Liberty of Human Nature Tho' his Successor Spinoza with a little Variation did whose Arguments we must next consider Spinoza as I have formerly shewed was an Absolute Corporealist as well as Mr. Hobbs but finding that Cogitation could never be accounted for from Matter and Motion only he supposes Cogitation Essential to Matter and as he makes but one only Substance in the World which is the Matter of All Things or God so he supposes Cogitation to be one of the Essential Attributes of this Deity as Extension is the other And from hence he concludes That all things according to the Infinite variety of their several Natures must necessarily flow from God or the whole and must be just what they are and cannot be nor could not possibly have been any otherwise He doth indeed Stile the Deity Causa Libera and say he is only so But the reason he assigns for it is only because nothing can compel him to or hinder him from doing any Thing but he expresly denies him to have either Understanding or Free Will And he declares oftentimes That all things flow from the Deity by as Absolute a Necessity as that the Three Angles of a Triangle are equal to Two right ones And then as to the Mind of Man he gives this Reason why it cannot have any free Will Quia mens ad hoc vel illud Volendum determinatur à Causâ quae etiam ab alia haec iterum ab aliâ sic in Infinitum The same thing also he asserts in another Place and from thence undertakes to prove also that God cannot have any Free Will and withal saith That Understanding and Will as they are called belong to the Nature of God just as Motion and Rest and other Natural Things do which are absolutely determined to Operate just as they do and cannot do otherwise This is the Argument of Spinoza to prove that there is no such thing as freedom in the Nature of Man but that he is determined in every thing by Absolute and Inevitable Necessity And this Necessity also 't is plain according to him is purely Physical and Mechanical As to the Refutation of which I think I have already effectually removed the foundation on which it is all built by proving that there are such Beings as Immaterial Substances and that God himself is such an One or a Spirit For all the Necessity Spinoza contends for depends purely on his Notion of the Deity as appears sufficiently from what I have produced of his words If therefore it be true that God be an Immaterial Substance a Being Distinct from Nature or the Universe and the Creator and Producer of all things as I think I have very clearly proved 't is most certain that the whole Chain of Spinoza's Argument for Necessity is broken to pieces For the Reason he assigns for the necessary Operations of the Deity are not the Perfections of his Nature determining him to Good and Just Lovely and Reasonable things but that the Deity being Universal Nature All things and Operations are Parts of him and their several Ways and Manners of Acting and existing according to the necessary Laws of Motion and Mechanism are his Understanding and Will which Ignorant People he saith may perhaps take in a literal Sense and think that God can properly Know or Will any thing but that in reality there is no such thing as Understanding or Free Will in God since all things flow from Him by Inevitable Necessity And if there be not any freedom in the Deity that is in the whole there can be none in Men or in any other Beings who are but Parts of him If this indeed be true that there is no other God but Nature then 't is easie to see that
thing We cannot indeed perfectly comprehend the Nature of God because we have shallow limited finite and imperfect Capacities and Faculties and the Deity contains in himself all possible Perfection Every one must grant that 't is impossible the lesser should contain and comprehend the greater especially too when the Extent and Fulness of one Infinitely exceeds the Capacity of the other From hence therefore to inferr that we can have no Idea nor Knowledge at all of God is very absurd and incongruous 'T is a strange Method of Arguing that I can know nothing at all of a thing because I can't know every particular that belongs to it and he would deservedly be esteemed a Madman that should deny that there is any such thing as the Sun because he cannot tell how many Miles he is in Diameter how far he is from us and which way he comes by a supply of Matter to continue his enlivening Fire and Heat When some great and advantageous Revolution is brought about in any Nation when the Publick Good is secured the Laws and Liberties preserved and Confusion Bloodshed and Misery of all Kinds prevented by the wise and deep Council and Conduct of Him or Those that are at the Helm of Affairs Would it not be gross Stupidity for a Man to assert That all this came about by Chance and that there was no Wisdom nor Conduct that so opportunely managed all things only because he cannot penetrate into all the secret Steps and Methods of it and see all the hidden Springs by which it was moved regularly on to its intended Perfection There are many things whose Existence 't would be ridiculous to doubt of whose Nature and Qualities we are very far from being able perfectly to Comprehend and Explain And amongst the rest there is nothing but our own Existence that we can be more assured of than that there is a God For as to all Objects of Sense we may as Monsieur Des Cartes shews have some reason to doubt of their actual Existence without us till we are first satisfied that our Senses do not deceive us Till we know this for any thing we can demonstratively prove to the contrary all sensible Objects may be meer Phantasms and Delusions and nothing but the internal Configurations of our own Brains and the result of Imagination and Fancy But when once we are assured that there is a God who is perfectly Knowing Wise and Good we shall discover that He can be no Deceiver we shall find that 't is not suitable to the Idea we have of Him that He should delude and cheat us with false Appearances and consequently we may well conclude that he hath appointed our Senses to be proper Judges of their own Objects and that those Things are actually existing without us whose Idea's we so plainly perceive in our selves and which we truly judge to be so And if we will impartially consult our own Thoughts and reason clearly from those Idea's that we have within us I think we may most demonstratively be assured of the Existence of a God and that He is such a most Perfect or Infinite Being as the Sacred Scriptures and Divines describe Him to be I will allow that the greatest Certainty that we can have of the Existence of any thing is of our own Being of which as I have already said no one can possibly doubt for whatsoever can Think reason doubt will and determine must needs be Something and have a true and real Being And because we find by this means that there is certainly something actually existing it will plainly follow that something or other must always have been so for if ever there was a time when there was Nothing there never could have been any thing at all for absolute Nothing could never have done or produced any thing Something therefore 't is plain must have been always or eternally existing and which never could have had any beginning For if it ever had any beginning tho' never so many Thousands of Millions of Ages ago it must have then began from meer Nothing which 't is impossible for any Man to conceive Now if we consider our selves or any things else that are round about us in the world we shall plainly find that neither we nor they can be this thing that always was existent and which we have discovered must have been without beginning for we know well enough that it was but a little while ago when we began to be and that 't is but a short space before we shall die and cease to be in this World any more Besides we find in our selves and discover in things without us such Defects Limitations and Imperfections as sufficiently must convince us that neither we nor they can be Independent Beings nor indeed the Cause of one another's Existence We must therefore in our Thoughts have recourse to some first Cause or Origin from whence all things do proceed And that there must be some first Cause or some Being which produced both our selves and the things that are round about us in the World we cannot but be assured of for we know nothing can cause or make it self to be and we see that we cannot make or produce each other and we perceive that none of our Forms or Modes of Existence are Indestructible and Eternal but that all things are continually slitting and changing some improving and increasing while others are decreasing and dying The common Matter indeed of all Bodies will remain and we do not find it to be perishable as their forms are But then this we may easily know cannot be the first Cause of all other Things since we have no Idea of its being an Active Intelligent Wise and Powerful Being as that must be but the Notion we have of it is that it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 purely Passive and obsequiously Capable of all variety of Forms and Motions as I shall hereafter more largely shew If we farther carefully consider of this Being that we have thus found must have eternally been or existed we shall find also that it must for ever continue to be for the time to come for we cannot imagine how a Being that hath Eternally existed for the time past should ever terminate or cease to be for the time to come since there is nothing in its self or in any thing without it that can possibly be the Cause of its Destruction Such a Being therefore will be properly Eternal and necessarily Self-existent without Beginning or End or any Possibility of Dying or Ceasing to be Such a Being also must on this Account be the Creator Author and Cause of all things because nothing can be the Cause of it self and therefore they must either be Eternal and Necessarily Self existent as we are assured they are not or else derived from and produced by this Eternal and Infinite Being And as the Beings themselves are derived from and produced by this Eternal and Self existent Being so
Divine and Almighty Being Universally impressed upon the Minds of Men as no doubt but there is this I say is a very convincing Argument that such a Belief hath a good Foundation in the Nature of the thing and consequently hath Truth at the bottom And therefore 't is plain that these Men did not Invent but find this Notion and Belief actually Existing by a kind of Anticipation in the Hearts of all Mankind And that they could not possibly invent it had there been no Ground nor Reason for such a Belief I shall plainly prove by and by But again That the Notion of a God did not arise only from Fear is plain from hence That Mankind hath gotten an Idea of Him that could never proceed only from that Passion If Fear only were to make a God it would compose him of nothing but black and terrible Idea's it would represent Him to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 all envious and spiteful a grim angry and vindicative Being one that delights in nothing but to exercise his Tyrannical Power and Cruelty upon Mankind we should then believe him to be such a Power as the Indians do their Evil God and we do the Devil a mischievous and bloody Deity that is the Author of nothing but Evil and Misery in the World for these must be the dreadful Attributes of a Being which Fear only would create and set up in our Hearts But now instead of this we find a quite different Notion of God in the World We justly believe Him to be a most Kind Loving and Gracious Being and whose mercies are over all his works We are taught by the Scriptures those Sacred Volumes of his Will to believe that He at first Created the World and all things that are therein to display his Goodness and Kindness to his Creatures That he wills not nor delights in the death of a sinner nor in the evil and misery of any thing but that He hath by most admirable methods of Divine Love provided for our Happiness both here and hereafter Now such an Account as this of the Deity could never take its Rise from Fear only And therefore since it cannot be denied but that we have such a Notion of God it must have some more Noble and Generous an Original We find indeed in our selves a just Fear and Dread of Offending so Good and Gracious a God and we believe it suitable to his Justice to punish those that will pertinaciously continue in a state of Rebellion against Him after having refused and slighted the repeated Overtures of his Mercy But then we know very well That the Notion we have of a Deity is not occasioned by and derived from this Fear but on the contrary this Fear from it 'T is the Natural Consequence and Effect of the Belief and Knowledge of a God but it cannot be the Cause and Original of it For Fear alone can never dispose the Mind of Man to imagine a Being that is infinitely Kind Merciful and Gracious The Atheist therefore must here taken in Hope too as well as Fear as a joint Cause of his pretended Origin of the Belief of a God and say That Mankind came to imagine that there was some Powerful and Invisible Being which they hoped would do them as much good as they were afraid it would do them hurt But these two contrary Idea's like Equal Quantities in an Equation with contrary Signs will destroy one another and consequently the Remainder will be nothing And therefore the Mind of Man must lay aside such an Idea of God as soon as he hath well considered it for it will signifie just nothing at all Another very good Argument That the Notion of a God did not take its first Original from Fear only may be drawn from hence That those that do believe and know most of God are the least Subject to that servile Passion If Fear only occasioned Mens Notion and Belief of a God the consequence must be that where the Notion of a Deity is most strong and vivid there Men must be most timorous and apprehensive of Danger there the greatest distrust suspicion and anxious sollicitousness about the Events of Futurity would be always found But this is so far from being true in Fact that no one is so free from those Melancholy and Dreadful Thoughts and Apprehensions as he that truly believes in and Fears God For he can find always in Him Almighty Defence and Protection he can cast all his care on God who he knows careth for him When all the treacherous Comforts of this World leave him and when nothing but a gloomy Scene of Affliction Distress and Misery presents its self here yea even when Heart it self and Strength begin to fail God will be he knows the Strength of his Heart and his Portion for ever and even in the vast Multitude of his Afflictions God's Comforts will refresh his Soul But 't is far otherwise with the miserable Wretch that hath no Belief of nor any Knowledge of God if he fall into Affliction Trouble or Misery he hath nothing to support him He is the most abject and dispirited of all Mankind his whole head is sick and his heart is faint and his Spirit cannot sustain his Infirmity for he hath not only no Power and Ability to bear the present load of Misery but he expects yet much worse to come and notwithstanding all his former Incredulity and Bravery he now as the Devil himself doth believes and trembles And therefore though as Plutarch observes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it be the chief Design of Atheism to give Men an Exemption from Fear yet 't is a very foolish one and falls very far short of answering its End for it deserts and fails its Votaries in their greatest Extremities and Necessities and by depriving them of all just Grounds for hope must needs expose them to the most dismal Invasions of Fear And thus I think it is very plain That the Notion of a God could not take its first Original from Fear As to the Ignorance of Second Causes which is sometimes alledged as another Occasion of the Notion of a Deity the Modern Atheists do not much insist upon it and therefore I need not do so in its Refutation I have shewed already whence they had it and I think it sufficient to observe here that there are no Men so Ignorant of Second Causes nor any that give so poor and trifling Accounts of the Phaenomena of Nature as these Atheistical Philosophers do And therefore Ignorance ought rather to be reckoned among the Causes of Atheism and Infidelity than of the Idea of God and Religion for I am very well assured that a through insight into the Works of Nature and a serious Contemplation of that admirable Wisdom excellent Order and that useful Aptitude and Relation that the several Parts of the World have to each other must needs convince any one that they are the Products of a Divine and Almighty
Plutarch describing the Deity hath these remarkable words God is Mind a separated Form perfectly unmixed with Matter and without any thing that is passible 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And in another place he asserts 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That 't is impossible Matter alone can be the sole Principle of all things Plato every where distinguisheth between corporeal and incorporeal Substances calling the former by the Names of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sensible and the latter always either 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 immaterial or intelligible and he saith That certain intelligible and incorporeal Forms are the true and first Substance and that incorporeal Things which are the greatest and most excellent of all others are discoverable by reason only and nothing else And in another place he saith That they were instructed by their forefathers that Mind and a certain wonderful Wisdom did at first frame and doth now govern all things His words are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In Phileb p. 28. Which sufficiently shews the Antiquity of the Notion of an Incorporeal Deity and the way also how they came by it Of the same Opinion also was Socrates as we are told by Plutarch and others Lib. de Placit Philos. 1. c. 3. Zeno and the Stoicks defined the Deity to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an Intellectual and Rational Nature or as Plutarch recites their Opinion 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an Intelligent Spirit devoid of all Bodily shape Ibid. And Sextus Empericus tells us of Aristotle that he constantly asserted God to be Incorporeal and the Utmost Bounds of the Universe And Aristotle concludes his Book of Physicks with affirming that 't is impossible the first Mover or God can have any Magnitude but he must needs be devoid of Parts and Indivisible And Plutarch gives us this as the received and common Opinion of the Stoicks that God was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Spirit that was extended or did penetrate throughout the whole World De Placitis Philosoph lib. 1. c. 3. p. 882. Now by these Passages and many others that might easily be produced it appears very plain that the most Ancient Writers had a good clear Notion of God and that they speak of him as of a Mind perfectly distinct from Matter or as an immaterial or incorporeal Being Many of them also deliver themselves very expresly as to the Soul of Man which as Plutarch tells us they generally asserted to be Incorporeal and that it was naturally a Self-moving and Intelligible Substance But of this more in another place And that the Ancients did believe God to be a Spirit or a most Powerful Intelligent and Perfect Immaterial Substance will yet farther appear if we consider what Notion they had of and how they defined Matter or Body Plato describes it by the words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that which thrusts against other Bodies and resists their Touch or Impulse Others call it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that which so fills up a place as at that time to exclude from it any other Body Sometimes they called it the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in contradistinction to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is they distinguished it to be of a pure passive Nature and which was acted and determined only by Impulse from without it or distinct from it they knew very well that there was also besides it some Active Thing something that was the Cause of Motion and Action in the Universe For as Plutarch well observes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 'T is impossible Matter alone can produce any thing unless there be besides it some Active Cause Sextus Empiricus also gives this Definition of Matter or Body That it is that which resists other things which are brought against it for Resistance saith he or Impenetrability is the true Property of Body By these Accounts that they have given us of Matter or Body 't is very easie to understand their Notion or Idea of it which indeed was the Just and True one They thought Matter or Body to be a purely Passive Thing incapable of moving or acting by it self but wholly determined either by some Internal and Self-moving Mind or by the Motions and Impulses of other Bodies without it That it was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is as we now adays speak Impenetrably extended and did so fill up space or place as to exclude any other Body from being in the same Place with it at the same Time If to this you add what Aristotle and some others said of it that it was also capable of all Forms Figures and Modifications you have then the whole that ever they thought Matter could do or be Now from hence 't is exceeding clear that they could not as indeed we find actually they did not think Matter or Body the only Substance in the World and that the Deity was Material or Corporeal For they always described the Divine Nature by Attributes and Properties that were the very Reverses of what they appropriated to Matter or Body God they have told us is an Intelligent Mind pervading and encompassing all things an Active Energetical Principle the Cause of all Motion and Operation whatever Intangible indivisible invisible and no ways the Object of our Bodily Senses But yet whose Essence is plainly discoverable by our reasoning and Understanding Faculty This was as we have seen the Notion or Idea that many of the Ancient Philosophers had of the Deity and this plainly shews us that they look'd upon him to be what St. John here defines him an Incorporeal Being or a Spirit There were indeed some even then as I have before shewed who being wholly immersed in Matter themselves did assert that there was nothing else but Body in the World Such were Leucippus and Democritus and afterwards Epicurus and his Sect who perverted the Ancient Atomical and true Philosophy to an Atheistical Sense and made use of it for the banishing the Notion and Belief of a God out of their own and others Minds as indeed some others long before them had attempted to do But in this 't is very plain as an Excellent Person of our Nation hath observed that these Men did not understand the Philosophy they pretended to For it doth most clearly follow from the Principles of the True Atomical or Corpuscular Philosophy that there must be some other Substance distinct from and more Noble than Matter and which is of an Immaterial Incorporeal or Spiritual Nature And this I hope it will not be judged impertinent briefly to prove at this Time because some who seem not so throughly to understand it have of late reckoned the Mechanical Philosophy among the Causes of the growth of Atheism and Infidelity It is very much to the Purpose that the Ancient Atomists before Democritus and Leucippus did plainly assert and maintain the Doctrine of
in the World And if these can fully be made to appear I hope the Doctrine involved with them will also appear false and precarious and that the contrary Opinion of the Real Existence of Incorporeal Beings will find an easie admittance into our Faith But here I must premise as taken for granted That we are all agreed on the Definition of or know what we mean by Matter or Body viz. That it is Substance Impenetrably extended whereby we distinguish it from Spirit which is a Thinking Substance without Corporeal Extension or without having Partes extra Partes For if this be not the Notion which our Adversaries have of it as well as we 'T is in vain to dispute about it at all If therefore they have any other Idea of it that is different from this let them produce it and make it as clear and Intelligible as this is for without doing so they do nothing to the purpose And if they have not a clear and distinct Idea of Matter or Body how come they so boldly to say that Matter and Substance are all one how can they distinguish the Idea's of Body and Spirit so plainly as to be sure there can be no such thing as an Incorporeal Substance but that it implies a Contradiction Unless they fully know what Matter or Body is there may be Millions of Varieties and Degrees of Immaterial Substances or there may be no such thing as Body at all for any thing they can prove to the contrary The Atheist must then do one of these two things he must either establish a new Notion of Matter that shall be so intelligible and plain that all Mankind shall as readily acquiesce in it as they do in the old and common one or else he must resolve to keep to That The former of these he hath not yet done nor I believe is very ready to do but when he doth it 't will be time enough to consider it In the mean while I will readily join Issue with him on the common and received Notion of Body And from thence undertake to maintain That nothing is more absurd and unaccountable than their Assertion That there is no other Substance but Matter or Body in the World For First Had there been nothing else but Matter in the World from Eternity and if there be nothing else now there never was any thing else I cannot possibly see how these Gentlemen can account for Motion or shew us how Matter came first to be moved And Matter without Motion sure could never be God never be the Cause of any thing nor could it ever produce act or do any thing whatever Before Motion began Matter could have been nothing but an heavy lifeless Lump of vast extended Bulk which must have lain also for ever in the same dead and unactive Position if nothing had been superinduced to put it into Motion and Action And no one sure can be so stupid as to call this a Deity This is as Mr. Blount rudely and irreverently expresseth himself worse than to suppose a Hum-Drum-Deity chewing of his own Nature a Droning God that sits hoarding up of his Providence from his Creatures And this even he can't but acknowledge is an Atheism no less Irrational than to deny the very Essence of a Divine Being I hope therefore they will grant that Matter without Motion cannot be suppos'd to be a Deity And if so then the Divine Nature whatever it be must be something distinct from and more Noble than Matter and more akin to Motion than to Matter or Body in general or to it quatenus Matter as the Schools speak And indeed Motion taken in this sense not for a translation of Body from one place to another but for the Active Cause of Motion may be very well said to be Incorporeal or the Deity it self But how came this Motion into Matter at first and which way did Matter attain this Divine Activity or God-like Energy Here they must assert one of these three things either 1. That Motion came into Matter from something without it and distinct from it Or 2. That Motion is Essential to Matter and Co-eternal with it Or 3. That it came into it afterwards by Chance or without any Cause at all The First of these they will not say I doubt because it 's Truth but however if they do our Controversie is at an end for we believe that 't was a Divine and powerful Mind perfectly distinct from and more Noble than Matter who first made it and moved it and doth still continue to modifie and dispose it according to his Infinite Wisdom and Providence And one would think no Man can be so senseless as to maintain the last viz. That Motion came into Matter without any Cause at all and that it was Chance only that first produced it for Chance here signifies nothing in reality And truly Men that will be so ridiculously absurd as to assert that a Body or Particle of Matter that is once at rest may move by Chance only or may Chance to move of it self though there be nothing to cause its Motion deserve no serious Refutation but ought to be treated only as we do Fools and Madmen with silent Pity and Compassion And yet so very fond are some Persons of any thing that opposes Truth that they will run into the greatest Absurdities to maintain it For a late Corporealist is pleas'd to say That Matter can move of it self and to shew his deep Skill in Philosophy he tells us that Wind Fire and very fine-sifted small Dust are Matter and yet Self movers And of Wind and Fire he profoundly asserts That they cannot lose their Motion or cease Moving so long as they continue to be Wind and Fire That is As long as Wind and Fire are in Motion they cannot cease to move This indeed is a very deep and important Discovery But yet 't is what hardly any Man would have publish'd in Print but one that concludes a Body must needs move of it self only because he can't see with his Eyes the Cause or Origin of its Motion And yet even this he may often see in the case of Fire if he will but vouchsafe to observe how 't is usually kindled A little Consideration would have satisfied him also that Winds may be produced in the Atmosphere by the Air 's being moved some way by Heat Compression or some other Accidental Cause as well as in an Eolipile or a Pair of Bellows And as for his fine Dust's rising up in a Cloud of it self had he understood that the Agitation of any Fluid will keep the small Particles of any heavier Matter mixed with it from descending to the bottom of it nay and raise them up from thence too and had he not forgotten that this was the case here the Air being so agitated by the Motion of Sifting he would not sure have been so silly as to have brought these as Instances of Spontaneous Motion
For a Deity without the Attributes of Understanding and Wisdom without Ends or Design none of which Mr. Hobbs asserts expresly can be in God is a Ridiculous stupid Being an Idol that every rational Agent must needs despise and which can never be the Object of any one's Adoration Love or Obedience To assert therefore that the Attributes of God are not discoverable by Reason nor agreeable to Philosophical Truth but may be declared to be any thing which the Soveraign Power pleases to make them this is designedly to expose the Belief and Notion of a Deity and to render it so Precarious that it can be the Object of no Rational Man's Faith And this last named Writer Treats the Deity after the same manner in most other Places of his Works He saith we must not say of Him that he is Finite that he hath figure Parts or Totality that he is here or there that he moveth or resteth or that we can conceive or know any thing of him for all this is to dishonour him And yet to say that he is an Immaterial Substance that he is an Infinite and Eternal Spirit is he saith Nonsense and what destroys and contradicts it self However he is willing to allow the word Immaterial or Spirit to be used towards God as a Mark of Honour and Respect That is we may attribute to God what we know to be Nonsense and Contradiction and this is the Way to Honour him and to speak of him any other way is to Dishonour Him Who doth not perceive that it was plainly the Design of this Writer to treat of the Deity after such a manner as should deprive Him of all Knowledge and Care of Humane Affairs and consequently effectually Banish out of Mens Minds a just Veneration for Him and Adoration of Him Such Men are the most Dangerous and Mischievous of all others Profess'd Atheists can do no great Harm for all Persons are aware of them and will justly abhor the Writings and Conversation of Men that say boldly there is no God But there are but few such they have found a way to pass undiscovered under a fairer Dress and a softer Name They pretend to be true Deists and sincere Cultivators of Natural Religion and to have a most Profound Respect for the Supream and Almighty Being But when this Profound Respect comes to be throughly examined and duly understood it will appear to be the most abominable Abuse that can be and a most wicked and Blasphemous Idea of the Deity For they make him either nothing but the Soul of the World Universal Matter or Natura Naturata a God that is an absolutely necessary Agent without any Rectitude in his Will without any Knowledge Wisdom Goodness Justice Mercy or Providence over his Works But let such Persons take what Names they please upon themselves a little consideration will soon discover what they are in reality and I hope give Men a just abhorrence of such Notions tho' never so speciously put forth But let us now proceed to examine what Ground there is from the Nature of the Thing for Men to advance such wicked Opinions and to shew the weakness and precariousness of them And here it must be premised and taken for granted that there is a God This is what the Persons I am now concerned with pretend to own and to acknowledge Which being supposed It appears very plain that we may have if we will and some Persons as I have shew'd have always had a very clear Notion or Idea of the Attributes and Perfections of such a Being as also that they are fixed and immutable Properties in the Divine Nature For by professing to believe a God they must mean if they mean any thing The first Cause and Author of all Things and the Governour and Disposer of them A Divine Being containing in himself all possible Perfections without being subject to any manner of Defect This I have already hinted at in another place and shall now more largely prove So far is it from being true that we cannot reason of the Nature of God from his Attributes nor Discourse of those Attributes from our Reason That this seems to be the only proper Way of enquiring into the wonderful Depth of the Divine Perfections I mean the only Way we have without Revelation for I am not now considering what God hath farther discovered of Himself to us by his Word For tho' the Deity doth abound with Infinite Excellencies and Perfections yet by the Light of Nature we can discover those only of which he hath given us some Impression on our own Natures and these are the Scales and Proportions by which our Reason must measure the Divine Attributes and Perfections For in order to gain good and true Notions of these we ought to take our Rise from those Perfections and Excellencies which we find in the Creatures and especially in our selves There can be but two Ways of coming to the Knowledge of any thing by its Cause and by its Effects 'T is impossible for us to make use of the former of these in Reference to the Deity For He being himself without Cause and the First Cause and Original of all Things cannot be known to us this Way But by the second Way he very properly may be the Object of our Knowledge and we ought to apply our selves to this Method in order to understand the Attributes of God For whatever Excellency or Perfection we can any way discover in the Effects of God in the World i. e. in the Works of the whole Creation the same we cannot but suppose must be in Him in the highest and most noble Proportion and Degree since they are all owing to and derived from Him And if we take a serious and considerate View of the Excellencies and Perfections that are to be found in the Creatures or the Works of God in the World we shall find that they may be reducible to these Four general Heads Being or Substance Life Sensibility and Reason All which we find to be in our selves and therefore they are at hand and ready to assist our Meditations and these will if duly considered lead us into a good Way of discovering the Attributes and Perfections of the Divine Nature And I doubt not but a great Reason why Men have had and advanced wrong Notions of God hath been because they have had such of themselves and of those Perfections that are in our own Natures Men that do not understand that the true Perfection of Humane Nature consists in Moral Goodness or in an Universal agreeableness of our Will to the Eternal Laws of Right Reason cannot conceive aright of the Attributes and Perfections of God For they will be for making him like themselves guided by vehement Self-love and inordinate Will or whatever predominant Passions possess them 'T were easie to Trace this in the Epicurean Notion of a God dissolved in Ease and Sloth and who neglects the Government of the