all true Religion and put the most contemptible Brute in competition with him we destroy the very Nature of Rewards and Punishments founded upon his Actions and take every thing from him commendable or praise-worthy But saith the Atheist we would have had him placed in such a Condition that he should only have had a power or freedom to do everything he ought but never to have had the liberty of forfeiting his Future Happiness The Absurdity of this Desire or Expectation is so palpably conspicuous that there is no Man can consider it without perceiving it For if Mankind had been compell'd to the Duties of Religion whether they wou'd or no or had there been a perfect Impossibility that any Man shou'd fall into Infidelity in what I pray had layn the Advantage of a Religious Faith if Men tho' never so desirous could not be vicious where had been the Benefit or the just Reward of Vertue if they had never the power of degrading their Natures and falling into Luxury Epicurism and Sensuality who had ever heard of Temperance and Sobriety Where wou'd be our Christian Fortitude and Magnanimity if there were no Difficulties to be encountred or Dangers to be overcome or in a word what reason have we to value our selves for our Honesty Justice Charity Patience Resignation if all these stood but for so many Cyphers or empty insignificant Sounds as they must be did we suppose our selves in such a state as this where we are hurried on by some unseen Impulse or Coaction independent on the Powers or Faculties of our own Minds I must confess there are some Places or Texts in the Sacred Writings which seem at first sight to countenance this Opinion That Man is not a free Agent or invested with this Power which we contend for But whoever will take the trouble of collecting the several Expositions not only of Divines but Philosophers will find them all satisfactorily explain'd their Scruples fairly remov'd and the more natural and genuine Sense of them demonstratively asserted There is no Person that I know of hath made so much Noise in the World about Liberty and Necessity or about our acting necessarily as Mr. Hobbs That Man saith he is free to do a thing that may do it if he have the will to do it and may forbear if he have the will to forbear and yet if there be a necessity that he shall have the will to do it the Action is necessarily to follow and if there be a necessity that he shall have the will to forbear the forbearing also will be necessary The Question therefore is not Whether a Man be not a free Agent that is to say whether he can write or forbear speak or be silent according to his will But whether the will to write or the will to forbear come upon him according to his will or according to any thing else in his own power I acknowledge this Liberty that I can do if I will but to say I can will if I will I take to be an absurd Speech Again saith Mr. Hobbs Every Effect must have a Cause to produce it that Cause must be sufficient to produce it otherwise it had never been produced if that Cause be sufficient it must likewise be necessary to produce it for if any thing were wanting that was necessary to the Production of the Effect it could not be effected and thus the Effect comes to be produced necessarily or of pure necessity The Comparison stands thus The Will of Man must have some Cause that Cause must be sufficient if sufficient likewise necessary Ergo Man's Will is necessitated Whoever will trouble himself with a little Reflection may easily unriddle this Mystery and prove the Argument to be a meer Sophism however strenuous it appear at the first view The judicious Mr. E d hath done it already to my Hand and therefore I shall refer you to his Dialogues for a Solution In the interim I shall be plain with you in this particular That whatever Applause this Author may have gain'd in the World and how much soever extoll'd for a Man of profound Thought or a deep Judgment I see nothing in him more taking than his manner of Expression in which he was indeed so peculiar and singularly fortunate that many Men have been hereby so sooth'd and tickled into an Opinion of his Judgment as to take all he says for granted and to believe every thing new till a farther Consideration discovers to them that there is nothing more so than his stile and the order of his Thoughts I have some reason to believe you tainted with this Man's Principles on which account as an Antidote against the Rest of his Heretical Opinions I wou'd recommend you to the Writings of Bishop Lucy my Lord C n Mr. W and particularly to the lately mention'd E d. When Men have degraded themselves into Beasts by practice they wou'd have it thought by any means that 't is unavoidable for them to act otherwise than they do From hence they take the Measures of their Opinions and will allow of no Difference betwixt themselves and the pittifulâ—st Brute but that Matter in them is fall'n into a more lucky Texture and Modification And indeed the Brutish Soul will very well serve all the ends of some Men who to justifie their Sensuality earnestly contend that they have nothing more to indulge or gratifie besides their Animal Inclinations But notwithstanding whatever these Men think this is a most undoubted Verity That next to the Belief of the Being of God the Perswasion of the Soul 's being Immortal is the great Basis of all true Happiness the Hinge upon which all Religion turns 'T is this that leads us both to contemn the Gratifications of the Flesh and to be solicitous about a Happiness hereafter tho' it be with undergoing some present Inconveniences nor is there any Truth whatever that hath a more powerful Influence upon the whole Course of our present Lives Men may study to palliate and ease the Disquiet of their troubled Souls after what manner they please yet still there will be some lucid Intervals which will discover to them the possibility of a Life to come and put them upon questioning the Certainty of their Souls perpetual Sleep which shou'd it happen to be a mistake will prove one of the most dangerous and pernicious Consequence Sic mihi saith the Eloquent Cicero persuasi sic sentio Cum tanta celeritas sit Animorum tanta memoria praeteritorum futurorumque prudentia tot Artes tot Scientiae tot Inventa non posse eam Naturam quae eas res contineat esse Mortalem cumque Animus semper Agitetur nec principium motus habeat quia ipse se moveat nec finem quidem habiturum esse motus quia nunquam se ipse sit relicturus cum simplex Animi sit Natura neque habeat in se quidquam admistum dispar sui atque dissimile non posse
more reputable Name of Deist has been taken up by our Modern Vitioso's the initial Letter of your Character must be now expanged and unless you acknowledge Theism the Men of Letters however debaucht will laugh at and contemn you I have often wondred what those Men think of the Divine Being or what God is who are so very familiar with his Name that they scarce repeat a Sentence without it altho ' it be by way of imprecating his Judgments or wishing him to damn them That the Name is more than a useless Sound most of them will acknowledge and those who boldly plead for the Custom of Swearing do grant that tho' God is yet doth He not take notice of what they say neither are they capable if not punisht here of suffering hereafter It must certainly be this Conceit that embolden'd a lewd Fellow when he was askt whether he was in earnest when he cry'd G d D â— Him to reply That for his part Jest or Earnest he thought were equal since tho' he wisht Damnation he believ'd there was nothing in his Composition which was capable of it and therefore there was no danger Custom had rendred the practise of it familiar and he used it instead of other words to imbellish his Discourse If profane Sweating be at all allowable it must be to such as these but for any Man to pray that G d wou'd D m his Soul and at the same time to believe its Immortality or at least to fear any such thing is a Matter unaccountable and no ways to be resolved but by the Degeneracy of our Reason the Abolition of our Sense and a total Depravation of our Understandings and yet this is the Practise I do not say of your self of many who tell us they are perswaded of the Being of a God and that they are far from any Certainty that their Souls may not survive their Bodies There are many Men saith a Modern Philosopher and Physician â—â—tho take a wonderful delight in Swearing each word must have a S'w ds by G d or a G d D m them for its attendance otherwise the Language would seem to be imperfect or at least to want its natural Eloquence This Interjection of Speech is so much practis'd that some Masters of Languages in France make it the third Lesson to their Scholars A German continues he newly arriv'd at Paris and applying his Mind to the study of that Language shew'd me his third Lesson which his Master had recommended to him to get by heart This Pius of Doctrine did contain no less than Thirty or Five and Thirty Oaths some of which he said were of the last years Invention which his Master had particularly marked I asked the Gentleman how he would come to know their proper Places and Insertions He answered me that that was the first Question he asked his Master who resolv'd him that a little Converse with the French wou'd soon make him perfect in that Business Well might this Ingenious Man cry out upon these Reflections O Tempora O Mores and surely it must strike every more than ordinary thoughtful Man with the most profound Admiration to consider the Practises of those Men who are continually acting that which they themselves have all imaginable assurance they shall sooner or later repent of and be concern'd for 'T is very common as I have before taken notice of for Men to live as if there were no God and we may meet with some so extravagantly audacious as to tell us they are both certain of the truth of their Opinions and certain that come what will they shall never alter them But yet I very much question whether one Instance can be given of a clearly reasoning Atheist unconcern'd in his last Minutes I had a very slight Acquaintance with a Gentleman of some acquired Parts who had frequently beasted amongst his intimate Friends that he question'd not but he shou'd show at his Death the same disregard to the Belief of a Divine Being and the Immortality as he had done all along and this he spoke with a more than usual Seriousness Some few years after as I was told by one of his Friends this Gentleman being on the Thâ—â—es the Boat was overset by some Accident and turn'd the bottom upwards The Spark had been just before Swearing and Damming himself in his wonted â—â—ife and yet nevertheless upon his first sinking he was heard very dolefully to cast out â—â— God be mercif By the endeavour of the Watermen and some other Assistance they were all saved some of them almost expiring their last Breath 'T was several days before this Person was able to go abroad and upon his first visit to one of his Fellows he was upbraided with Cowardise for betraying the Cause of Irreligion and falsifying his Promise to dye an Infidel The Sense of his late Disorder had made too great an Impression to be so soon obliterated and calling to Mind his Deportment when he thought himself a dead Man he fairly confest that he cou'd not help what he did tho' at the same time if his Soul prov'd independent he thought himself plunging into Eternal Misery At this time saith he my fears are pretty well worn off I find my self as much a Libertine as ever though I must tell you that you shall never catch me making Resolutions what to do when I am dying Thus do these miserable Wretches at one time or other in spight of their most firm Resolves to the contrary betray the Weakness of their Cause and by their apparent fears that they are in the wrong together with their many private and publick Recantations they by some means or other satisfie us that there is no secure Dependance upon the strongest of their Arguments or weightiest of their Notions I might illustrate this Subject by a Transcript of those clear Thoughts and Apprehensions of the Deity which are conspicuous in the Writings even of the Heathen Philosophers but having already transgrest the Bounds of an Epistle I shall shut up all in the words of an unknown Author to this purpose It would be too tedious to consider all the little Cavils and Objections of Atheists against a Deity The most material are reducible to those that have been proposed and may be refuted by the Answers we now have given for they proceed either from wrong Apprehensions of the Nature and Attributes of God or from Ignorance of the Nature and Relation of other things or from an obstinate Resistance of what is de facto evident and all of them demonstrate their Unreasonableness and Absurdity which doth further appear by the unreasonable Consequences of not acknowledging a Deity which is a second way of proving it For if there be no God then it necessarily follos that either every Thing made it self or that all things came from nothing and that there are Effects which have no Cause for there is Life Sense and Reason without any Being capable to produce
starve with Meat before them if it be not put into their Mouths whereas those whose Kind breed on the Ground can never be taught to gape for their Food but so soon as batch't betake themselves to seek out and pick up their food These I say with a thousand Instances of the like nature are evident Marks of a Providential Wisdom because they are Rational Actions many of them at least perform'd not accidentally but constantly by Irrational Agents Understanding being got by a Series of Experiments Observations or Information therefore it is some old Arts are improv'd some quite lost some new ones found out but all meer Animals act the same yesterday and to day thus far they always went and no farther which fully proves they were originally compell d and limitted to act according to their Kind and had nothing to do with Will or Reason It may be objected That several sorts of Animals are very dâ—cible Creatures and learn several things by the Discipline of Mankind which wou'd make one ready to think that those Creatures have some degrees of Reason To which I say thus far is prov'd that those Creatures do act artificially and for ends without Deliberation and Knowledge and those being the chief ends for which they were made we cannot reasonably suppose that they shou'd blindly act that part and yet have the use of Reason in things of lesser moment It must therefore be concluded that the utmost extent of their Ability is to do and not to know and therefore tho' by the Impressions made upon the Senses they may be forced to do what their Nature is capable of doing yet this is all from the Senses and Reason but begins where the Senses end To do and to know why we do proceed from different Principles 't is true the most docible Creatures may mimick several things they see Men do yet can they give us no Indication that they know why or to what end they do them for that their Souls being Corporeal it follows necessarily that all their Motions must be made either by an External or Internal Force or Impulse whereas Will and Reason can be no other than the Powers of a self-moving Principle which is a spiritual immaterial Essence Sense and Imagination can conceive nothing but what is Corporeal and the highest Conceptions which depend on Sense amount no higher than Imagination which likewise is unable to receive any other than Corporeal Idea's Nor can it reflect or make any Conclusions about what it perceives So that Brutes may very well be thus far endow'd without any such thing as a Rational Exertion For a farther Explanation hereof I shall give you the Descriptton of a Learned Man of the Mechanic Process by which Brute Animals come by all their Habits and that acquir'd seeming Knowledge which tho' in some degrees it surpasses their Natural Instincts is however most strictly ty'd to Sense and Imagination When the Brain saith he in the more perfect Brutes grows clear and the Constitution of the Animal Spirits becomes sufficiently lucid and defaecated the Exteror Objects being brought to the Organs of the Senses make Impressions which being from thence transmitted for the continuing the Series or Order of the Animal Spirits inwards towards the streaked Bodies affect the common Sensory and when as a sensible impulse of the same like a waving of waters is conveyed farther into the callous Body and thence into the Cortex or shelly substance of the Brain a Perception is brought in concerning the Species of the thing admitted by the Sense to which presently succeeds the Imagination and Marks or Prints of its Type being left constitute the Memory but in the mean time whilst the sensible Imprâ—ssion being brought to the common Sensory â—ffects there the Perception of the thing felt as some direct Species of it tending farther creates the Imagination and Memory so other reflected Species of the same Object as they appear either Congruous or Incongruous produce the Appetite and local Motions its Executors that is the Animal Spirits looking inwards for the Act of Sension being struck back leap towards the streaked Bodies and when as these Spirits presently possessing the beginnings of the Nerves irritate others they make a Desire of flying from the thing felt and a Motion of this or that Member or Part to be stirred up then because this or that kind of Motion succeeds once or twice to this or that Sension afterwards for the most part this Motion follows that Sension as the Effect follows the Cause and according to this manner by the admitting the Idea's of sensible things both the knowledge of several things and the habits of things to be done or of local Motions are by little and little produced For indeed from the beginning almost every Motion of the animated Body is stirred up by the Contact of the outward Object viz. the Animal Spirits residing within the Organ are driven inward being stricken by the Object and so as we have said constitute Sension or Feeling then like as a stood sliding along the banks of the shoar is at last beaten back so because this waving or inward turning down of the Animal Spirits being partly reflected from the common Sensory is at last directed outwards and is partly stretched forth even into the inmost part of the Brain presently local Motion succeeds the Sension and at the same time a Character being affixed on the Brain by the sense of the thing perceiv'd it impresses there Marks or Vestigia of the same for the Phantasie and the Memory then affected and afterwards to be affected but when as the Prints or Marks of very many Acts of this kind of Sensation and Imagination as so many Tracts or Ways are ingraven in the Brain the Animal Spirits oftentimes of their own accord without any other forewarning and without the presence of an Exterior Object being stirr'd up into Motion forasmuch as the fall into the footsteps before made represent the Image of the former thing with which when the Appetite is affected it desiring the thing objected to the Imagination causes spontaneous Actions and as it were drawn forth from an inward Principle As for Example sake The Stomack of an Horse feeding in a barren Ground or Fallow-land being incited by Hunger stirs up and variously Agitates the Animal Spirits flowing within the Brain the Spirits being thus moved by accident because they run into the footsteps formerly made they call to mind the former more plentiful Pasture fed on by the Horse and the Meadows at a great distance then the imagination of this desirable thing which at that time is cast before it by no outward Sense but only by the Memory stops at the Appetite that is the Spirits implanted in the streaked Bodies are affected by that Motion of the Spirits flowing within the middle part or marrow of the Brain who from thence presently after their formerly accustom'd manner enter the Origines of the Nerves and
voluntary Motions which are produced in us only by the free Thoughts of our own Minds and are not nor can be the Effects of the impulse or determination of the Motion of blind Matter in or upon our Bodies for then it could not be in our power or choice to alter it For example My right hand writes whilst my left hand is still what causes Rest in one and Motion in the other nothing but my Will a Thought of my Mind my Thought only changing the right hand rests and the left hand moves this is matter of fact which cannot be deny'd Explain this and make it intelligible and then the next step will be to understand Creation For the giving a new determination to the Motion of the Animal Spirits which some make use of to explain voluntary Motion clears not the difficulty one jotâ— to alter the determination of Motion being in this Case no easier nor less than to give Motion it self since the new determination given to the Animal Spirits must be either immediately by Thought or by some other Body put in their way by Thought which was not in their way before and so must own its Motion to Thought either of which leaves voluntary Motion as unintelligible as it was before In the mean time it is an over-valuing our selves to reduce all to the narrow measure of our Capacities and to conclude all things impossible to be done whose manner of doing exceeds our Comprehension this is to make our Comprehension infinite or God finite when what He can do is limited to what we conceive of it If you do not understand the operations of your own finite Mind that thinking Thing within you do not deem it strange that you cannot comprehend the operations of that Eternal infinite Mind who made and governs all things and whom the Heaven of Heavens cannot contain I hope my Friend you will more readily excuse the foregoing Prolixity on the account that first Principles especially those of so great moment as these before us ought to be as clearly and satisfactorily prov'd as it is possible which if upon your most serious Reflection you find establisht beyond opposition I expect that from this moment you date the downfal of your Atheism and that you presently commence Deist in order to turn Christian. I know of no better way of arguing with the meer natural Man or with such who value themselves so highly upon the strength of their own Judgment or Humane Reason than to endeavour their Conviction by the most rational Deductions from as rational Propositions whether or no these are such which I have transferr'd hither from the Writings of these two famous Men I must leave you to consider I confess there is little hopes of reclaiming such fool-hardy Libertines who argue for their Infidelity by the same powers in their Souls which to the more considerate are convincing proofs That the Soul which is invested with such mighty Power must undoubtedly be a Substance independant of Corporiety and consequently incapable of suffering an extinction with the Lamp of Life but of the Nature of the Rational Soul of Man and its different Existence from the Soul of Brutes I shall discourse elsewhere having here confin'd my self more particularly to enquire after the Author of our own Being and all others which surround us There have been many Methods used in handling of this Subject and indeed were our Opponents so full of Reason as they pretend one might wonder that any of them should prove insufficient I shall not here stay to examine the Certainty of that Cartesian Notion That 't is impossible we could have had any Idea of that infinite Eternal all-wise Being we call God if such a Being did not really exist or were not in rerum Natura But of this we may be satisfy'd that unless we do believe there is such an immense Being has created us with a design not to deceive us we must be pure Scepticks for it is impossible without this Belief we should be fully assur'd of any Truth whatsoever and therefore I think 't is not without Cause that the Philosopher lays this down as a necessary Introduction to Science Nihil intelligitur nisi Deus prius intelligatur Having proved the Necessity of some Eternal cogitative Being by a train of Arguments which are founded upon right Reason neither supported by Tradition or Authority either Sacred or Profane I shall next inquire how it comes to pass that this first and if I may so say greatest Truth the Foundation of all true Happiness is so wonderfully obscur'd effac'd and even obliterated out of the Hearts of a great part of Mankind Whosoever will take the trouble to inform himself after what manner most People account for the Productions they see daily brought to pass may easily understand that where one Man speaks either reasonably or becomingly of the great Author of the Universe and acknowledges any such Being as superintends the agency of second Causes there are abundantly more who look no farther than the empty Sounds of Fate Fortune Chance Destiny and in their Enquiries into the Structure of Humane Bodies or the Discords of the Animal Oeconomy you rarely find any thing more particularly taken notice of than the Archaeus by some by others the Plastick Power and indeed by all most commonly a certain Nature which tho' continually in their Expressions they know not what to make of Excuse me Sir if I think it worth my while to examine which of these can supply the place of an Almighty or of any real efficient Cause or with what reason we can ascribe unto either of these nominal Agents the Operations imputed to them Fate or Destiny saith SENECA is an immutable and invincible Law imposed upon Things and Actions You will say perhaps that this thing shall happen or not happen if it must come to pass altho ' you vow and make your request yet shall it take effect If it shall not come to pass vow and pray as much as you list yet it shall not fall out Now the Consequence saith he of this Argument is false because you have forgot the Exception that I have put between them both that is to say This shall happen provided a Man makes Vows and Prayers it must necessarily happen that to vow or not to vow are comprehended in and are parts of the same Destiny Again It is destinated or it is such a Man's fate to be an eloquent Man but under this Condition it is likewise destinated that he be instructed in good Letters It is destinated for another Man to he rich but here 't is included in the same Destiny that be make use of the means for their procurement So likewise may it be said it was such a Man's destiny to be hang'd but here that he render himself guilty of some capital Offence for which he is convicted by the Law is part of the same Destiny In the sence wherein these words are
used by this Philosopher I see no mighty prejudice there is indeed this mistake very oft attending That whereas by Fate or Destiny are understood the unalterable Laws of God which are founded upon his Prescience Men are apt to overlook the Lawgiver himself and to represent this Law by him establisht as a certain powerful Agent or irresistible Deity which they say does blindly and accountably govern the World Give me leave to take notice That I look upon this Fate and Destiny of the Heathens in its vulgarly received Phrase very nearly to correspond with the Predestination of some Modern Christians they do both of them partake of the same tyrannical despotic power and both tend to the same end viz. the robbing Man of his Freedom and exposing him Brute-like to act by an irresistible Impulse The Eternal Decrees of the Divine Being which are made as it were conditional and founded on a fore-knowledge of the Good and Evil that Man shall act carry nothing along with them contradictory to his Truth and Justice but the Absolute Predestination which is suppos'd exclusive of Mâ—ns Actions as a free Agent is a Doctrine so very harsh and so pregnant with ill Consequences as is not to be countenanced Thus much for Fate and Destiny Chance and Fortune are words so insignificant that had not a foolish Custom rendred them familiar one might justly admire that ever they should be mention'd by considering Men. The true Notion of Fortune in the words of a Learned Man denoteth nothing more than the ignorance of an Event in some knowing Agent concern'd about it so that it owes its very Being to Humane Understanding and without relation to that would be a Non Ens or really Nothing 'T was Man that first made Fortune and not Fortune Man so likewise the adequate meaning of Chance as it is discinguisht from Fortune in that the latter is understood to befal only Rational Agents but Chance to be amongst inanimate Bodies is really a bare Negation that signifies no more than this That any Effect amongst such Bodies ascribed to Chance is verily produced by Physical Agents according to the establisht Laws of Motion but without their consciousness of concurring to the Production and without their Intention of such an Effect So that in this genuine acceptation of Chance here is nothing supposed that can supersede the known Laws of natural Motion and thus to attribute the formation of Mankind to Chance is equally as absurd as to ascribe the same to Nature or Mechanism Having given you these few hints touching the unreasonableness of our ascribing any Effect to that which is in truth no more than a Chimaera or Fiction of the Brain and our looking on them as Agents which are meer Non-Entities I shall take notice of those other Expressions which are so frequently made use of not only by the Ignorant but even by Physicians themselves and other Learned Men such I mean as the Archaeus the Plastic Power the formative Faculty and that petty kind of Deity called Nature For the better comprehending the significancy of these several Terms let us put our selves upon reflecting and a very little attention will discover the fallacy Suppose then for instance that any Man should tell me that such or such a Thing will exhilirate the Archaeus or enliven decay'd Nature that such a Monster owes its rise to a Defect or Error committed by the Plastic Power or formative Faculty is it not very reasonable that we desire to know what either of these are whether or no they are real Agents or intellectual Beings imploying themselves in the care of our Conservation or in a word what they do truly import in their genuine and proper meaning If we make I say this Enquity we may satisfie our selves that every one of these words with many of the like signification particularly such as go by the name of Faculties and Qualities were first of all taken up either as an Umbrage for Mens Ignorance of real Causes or invented in order to a more compendious way of speaking whereby the several Means made use of towards a particular Production are comprised under some single Appellation And thus it happens as Mr. Boyle speaks that a fit and actuating Power of the Teeth Tongue Spittle Fibres and Membranes of the Gullet and Stomach together with the Natural Heat the Ferment and Menstruum and some other Agents which co-operate to the Transmutation of our Aliment into Chile are all included in that frequent Expression of Concoctive Faculty a word as commonly made use of by those who know not what they mean when they speak it as by those that do But amongst all the pretended Causes of those Effects we see daily produc'd there is none more frequently made use of than the word Nature upon which consideration the most Judicious Boyle foreseeing the abuse of that unhappy word was as he expresses himself so paradoxical as to make a very serious doubt whether this same Nature so much discourst of was a Thing or a Name or whether it was any real existent Being or a Being purely notional For when any Man tells me saith he that Nature does this or that that 't is natural for one thing to do this and another that he does in no wise help me to understand or to explicate the manner of these Productions for 't is manifest enough that whatsoever is done in this World where the Rational Soul intervenes not is really effected by corporeal Agents acting in a World so fram'd as ours is according to the Laws of Motion settled by its omniscient Author 'T is true that many acknowledge this Nature to be a Thing established by the Almighty and subordinate to Him but tho' many confess it when they are askt whether they do or not yet besides that they seldom or never lift up their Eyes to any higher Cause he that takes notice of their way of ascribing Things to Nature may easily discern that whatever their words sometimes be the Agency of the God of Nature is very little taken notice of in their Thoughts Indeed if I thought my Opinion might sway with you so far as to put you upon reflecting in good earnest I should give you to understand that 't is my real belief That the improper use of this very word has been vastly injurious to the Glory of our Maker and in the words of the foresaid Author I doubt not but the looking upon meerly Corporeal and oftentimes Inanimate Things as if they were endow'd with Life Sence and Understanding and the ascribing to Nature and some other Beings whether Real or Imaginary Things that belong only to God have been some if not the chief of the grand Causes of Atheism amongst Nominal Christians and of Polytheism and Idolatry amongst the Gentiles The wretched Subterfuges of Atheism being thus manifestly discover'd insufficient Causes of any manner of Production the greatest part of them being purely Imaginary and like
I hope it will be excus'd by those who consider the Person unto whom I write You have given me I must acknowledge a liberty to open the Pandects of Nature and to furnish my self from thence with any thing that seems useful but will have nothing to be thought valid which is transferr'd from the more Sacred Records of Revelation A God ergo a Providence has been by almost all but especially Christian Philosophers thought a necessary Conclusion but since we are to concede nothing by way of an implicite Faith or as founded upon the bare Testimony of other Men I shall not spend my time in considering the Analogy or reflecting whether or no these terms are Synonimous but will endeavour impartially to take notice not only of some few particulars which may countenance but of some others which seem to thwart and to be repugnant to this Notion as it seems generally establisht In order to my proceeding I expect you should take notice that with some others who have written upon this Subject I distinguish Providence as bipartite or under a double signification viz. General and Particular the former which by Philosophers is term'd the general Concourse or Co-operating Influence I conceive to be so reasonable and intelligible a Notion that I presume when once you have consented to the acknowledgment of a first Cause of all Things you will find your self as it were necessitated to own that the same Power who created the Universal Matter out of Nothing and disposed its several Parts into so many curious and elaborate Engines must unavoidably be concern'd at least in the preservation of the same from Annihilation or extend a Power of Conservation to its continuance and support for however possible it may be to conceive that God Almighty in directing the Particles of Matter into their several Shapes Forms or Configurations did establish certain Catholick Laws of Motion yet surely if hereupon we suppose the Deity to retire within himself no farther to be concern'd with his Divine Workmanship nor so much as ever after to think of or regard it it is utterly unconceivable that Matter and Motion and the several Textures arising from their Combination can be kept on foot or secured from their Primitive Non-existence In this Doctrine of God's ordinary Concurrence I must confess I can find nothing but what is easie and as it were self-evident but when we survey some very unaccountable Phâ—nomena and those various Anomali's which run retrograde to our Sense and Opinions of the Divine Attributes when we reflect upon what some call the Prosperity of wicked Men and the Adversity of the good when we see Justice and Innocence trampled under foot and all that 's good and vertuous degraded and contemned whilst Vice in the mean while reigns as it were triumphant when we see that neither the Profession nor Practise of the Sacred Rites of Religion can secure us from Rapine Cruelty and Oppression lastly when we consider as the Atheist says That Time and Chance hapneth to all these I say notwithstanding they may be fairly solv'd by those Primitive Laws of Motion bestow'd on Matter and still maintain'd by the Divine Being yet when we view them as under his immediate Concern and Government or resulting from his especial Providence they then appear with a somewhat differing Aspect and leave our Reason in a thick Darkness and Obscurity To this purpose you may object that however great and wise that Power may be who made the World you can discover not much of either in its Government You can own indeed that all Effects must have sufficient Causes but then of which you make so mighty an advantage you daily find these Causes take place in the production of all Effects promiscuously and that they are seldom or never prevented by a Divine Suspension even when they seem to impeach the Power and Wisdom of an especial Providence That I may give an Instance suitable to your own Thoughts You see that Mankind from whatsoever Cause they had their Origine are now continued by the mutual Embrace or Carnal Knowledge of the Two Sexes and therefore you don't admire that when they come together in the state of Wedlock or under the Nuptial Institution with the Generative Organs rightly dispos'd that they should propagate their Species but when on the other hand you consider many incestuous Embraces and that a Conception is the Result of a Venereal Act in Fornication or Adultery provided the faeminine Ova are prolific or capable of Impregnation by the Seminal Aura of the Male Here you see abundant Reason to cry out of Providence and expect the Supreme Power should either immediately pursue the Transgressors with Divine Vengeance or suspend his Laws of Motion in the Act in order to prevent a spurious Illegitimate Issue Again by the same Catholic Law of Motion or rather by a Specific Gravity or Principle of Gravitation which is the Property of every Particle of Matter you come to understand that if a ponderous Body be suspended by too slender a Line or a weighty Structure raised upon an infirm Basis insufficient for its Support or Fulcrum Here I say by a very little knowledge in Mechanicks you easily foresee that if the suspended Body preponderate the force intended to hold it up the Line must necessarily break and the weight as necessarily fall so likewise the Building in time grown ruinous or decay'd by other Accidents the Foundation failing most certainly tumbles but if a sober or reputed pious Man passing by should chance to make a Perpendicular to the suspended Body at the time of the Lines breaking and by the fall of the said weight receive some extraordinary hurt or if by the sinking of an infirm Building a supposedly righteous Family should be crusht to Death here the Atheist thinks he has a strong and powerful Reason to inveigh against or triumph over the Providence of God and will hardly be perswaded but that if the Divine Being did inspect or concern himself with the Affairs of Mankind he would upon all such Emergencies miraculously interpose and either by a Revelation or some other Supernatural Illumination discover to us the impending danger or for our Security stop the Laws of Motion which he at first establisht or deprive those Bodies of their Specific Gravitation which would otherwise injure us Farther According to this general and prime establisht Law 't is easie to conceive that the minute Particles of Matter each of them having their own proper size shape or texture as it happens that they are posited in reference to the Horizon as erected inclining or level when they come to convene into one Body from their primary Affections Disposition and Contrivance as to Posture and Order there must necessarily result that which by one comprehensive Name we call the Figure Shape or Texture of that Body and what we call a Monster after this manner produced is so far from being an Error or Trespass upon
and Conceptions to which the Body gave no occasion so the Body is the Spring and Fountain of several Functions over which the Soul hath no Dominion nor any direct influence they remain as much distinct nothwithstanding the Union which intercedes between them as they would have done shou'd we suppose them to have had an Existence previous to their Confederations or as they shall be after the dissolution of the Lâ—â—gue between them From all which it may be Scientifically concluded That they are distinct and different Principles in Man's Constitutâ—on but whether thereupon he ought to be called a Compositum or they to be stiled Parts will be resolv'd into a meer Longomachy or Chat about Words tho' to speak my own Mind I see no Cause why Man may not properly enough obtain the Appellation of Compositum and the Soul and Body be allow'd for Constituent Parts Nor thirdly doth the Cartesian Hypothesis tho' the most ingenious and best contrived of any hitherto thought upon fully satisfie an inquisitive Mind in the Matter before us their Hypothesis is briefly this That God in his infinite Wisdom chose to create three distinct and different kinds of Beings 1. Some purely Material which through difference of the Figure Size Number Texture and Modification of their Parts come to multiply into many different Species 2. Some purely Immaterial among whom whether there be any Specifical Difference is Pro and Con disputed 3. Man a Compositum of both having an Immaterial Intellectual Soul joyned to an Organical Body Now say they God having in his Soveraign Pleasure thought good to form Man such a Creature he hath not only by an uncontroulable Law confined the Soul to an intimate Presence with and constant Residence in the Body while it remains a fit Receptacle or till he give it a discharge but withal hath made them dependent upon one another in many of their Operations and in this mutual dependence of one upon the other with respect to many of their Operations they state the Union betwixt the Soul and Body to consist for through the Impressions that are made upon the Organs of Sence there result in the Soul certain Perceptions and on the other hand through the Cogitations that arise in the Soul there ensue certain Emotions in the Animal Spirits and thus say they by the Action of each upon the other and their Passion from one another they are formally united But all this instead of loosing the Knot serves only to tye it faster For 1. this Mutual Dependancy as to Operation of one upon the other cannot be apprehended but in Posteriority of Nature to Union and consequently the formal Reason of Union cannot consist in it 2. There are Cases wherein neither the Impressions of outward Objects upon the Sensory Nerves beget or excite any Perceptions in the Soul which whether it proceed from obstinacy of Mind or intense Contemplation alike answers my drift and also Cases wherein Cogitations of the Mind make not any sensible Impressions upon the Body as in Extasies and yet the Union of the Soul and Body remains undissolved which argues that it imports more than either an intimous Presence or a Dependance between them in point of Operation 3. 'T is altogether unintelligible how either a Body can act upon a Spirit or a Spirit upon a Body I grant it may be demonstrated that they do so but the manner of doing it or indeed how it can be done is not intelligible That a Tremour begot in the Nerves by the jogging of Particles of Matter upon the Sensory Organs shou'd excite Cogitations in the Soul or that the Soul by a meer Thought should both beget a Motion in the Animal Spirits and determine through what Meatus's they are to steer their Course is a Phaenomenon in the Theory of which we are perfectly non-plust How that which penetrates a Body without giving a jogg to or receiving a shove from it shou'd either impress a Motion upon or receive an impression from it is unconceivable so that to state the Union of the Soul and Body in a reciprocal Action upon and Passion by and from one another is to fix it in that which supposeth the Sagacity of our Faculties to conceive how it can be Now if common Unions of whose Reality and Existence we are so well assur'd be nevertheless with respect to their Nature not only so unknown but unconceivable we may lawfully presume if their lye nothing else against the immediate Union of Believers with Christ save that it cannot be comprehended that this is no Argument why we should immediately renounce the Belief of it If we can but once justifie that there is such an Union betwixt the blessed Jesus and sincere Christians the incomprehensibleness of the manner of it ought not to discourage our Faith if we can take up with the Evidence of Sense and Reason as to the reality of other Unions whose Modes are as little understood I see no cause why the Veracity of God provided we can produce the Authority of Divine Testimony shou'd not satisfie us as to the Reality of the Union tho' the manner how it is were a question we cou'd not answer and indeed if Men will not be huff't and talk'd out of the perswasion of those things of whose Existence their Senses and Reason ascertain them tho' they cannot answer all the Difficulties they are accosted with in their Enquiries about them much less ought Christians to be hector'd out of the Belief of the Doctrines of Faith because of the Entanglements which attend the Conception of them 't is the Nature of Faith to embrace things upon the alone Testimony of God tho' it understand nothing of the Mode and Manner how they are the highest Assurance of the Reality of any thing is God's affirming it and what he asserts we are with all reverence to assent unto its Truth tho' we can frame no adaequate Idea of it nor fathom it in our own Conceptions Our Saviour himself hath adjourned the perfect knowledge of this Mystery till the glorified state in these words At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father and you in me and I in you Thus far you have had the Thoughts of the before-mention'd Author which I shall leave you to consider seriously at your leisure the Subject is indeed noble how despicably soever it may be treated by the Libertine whose Belief is stagger'd because he himself is not possest of what he has slighted and contemned and for that he finds himself at liberty to live as he listeth I must own indeed that it is scarce possible for one Man to infuse such Idea's into another as may be able to perswade that other that he himself is a Partaker of such a Spiritual Refreshment and Divine Consolation as nothing less than the Divine Gaace can communicate to his Soul and on this account I have the less admir'd that both Paelagius Socinus and their Adherents have gain'd so