lost their Eye-sight by the great improvement and use of their Glasses unless they have observ'd the contrary Presumers indeed that fancy 't is but giving the Earth a kick and the whole difficulty's solv'd I would also know from what causes this Convulsion should arise Nature is not given to starting her motions are equal orderly and gentle All things circulate by an insensible Transition There is no surer sign of Inconstancy and Irregularity than Abruptness The cap'ring of a Beau and the catchings of a dying Man though effects of opposite Principles agree in this that they are alike the Symptoms and Consequences of Distemperature The Celestial Bodies are all constant to the same degrees and lines of motion and the spiral progress of the Sun was never to be charg'd hitherto unless on the score of a Miracle with interruption or deviation Be pleas'd therefore to proceed to the second I shall reply'd I acknowledging you have more fully convinc'd me than I had my self of the absurdity of that opinion the next to which is in my judgment ne'er a jot a more rational being chiefly adapted to the extravagancies of the Cardanists men that value no other Solutions than those fetch'd from the Postures of the Stars or Conjunctions of Planets not that they have yet erected a Scheme or particularly examin'd the state of the Heavenly Bodies but they are sure the whole matter may be illustrated this way and care not a Straw how the Heavens are accommodated as long as they can accommodate their Notions to them as for example are Mars and Venus in Conjunction 'T is a sure signification of an extraordinary Wenching-Season at Venice and Naples because forsooth the familiarity of those two Planets is so very notorious in Hungary of success to the Turks denoted by Mars superiour to Venus or of the contrary Venus expressing the effeminacy of the Sultan and Mars the power and vigour of the Emperour In England a Peace a Plot or any thing that falls out But I ought not to forestall your Lordship considering you since your Manumission from Mortality may have taken a Voyage as by a late Author we understand of Monsieur des Cartes through the Regions of the Upper Worlds and learn'd what their Correspondence and mutual Impressions are Be that so as you suspect or otherwise said he 't is sufficient that by knowledge atchievable in this world you may learn the ridiculousness of their Pretensions who would make you believe they can interpret the Language of all Revolutions and Aspects over their heads as easily and certainly as the Pythagoreans undertake to prick down their Harmony a Crew that do no more than disgrace all humane Learning and Philosophy but infest and undermine the Common-wealth Thus Ephemerides and Almanacks are become a Political poison a man cannot look what day of the Month 't is but seditious Dogrel stares him in the face Nor will ever any Conjunction be more auspicious than of such miscreant Heads with Pillory or Halter Besides what order or disposition of the Heavenly Bodies will these men pitch upon as effective of such consequences or how will they prove such a disposition so effective Since they themselves have not done it much less will I Sir trouble your head with examining particularly what have been the motions and postures of the heavenly bodies for these dozen years past In general I know of no such extraordinary Conjunctions as such extraordinary Effects require Have Orion and the Pleiades been in Trine with Aquarius or has Virgo been troubled with a Diabetes so long Proceed I beseech you Sir Others answer'd I seem rather inclin'd to believe that the last Comet was the Parent of all our unseasonable Weather and this comes from very judicious persons who not unjustly suspect that the main Effects of a Comet are late and rarely to be perceiv'd till a considerable time after the appearance And for my own part I do not only think this Conjecture probable but further believe that instead of civil they always portend natural Changes Battles Rebellions and State-Revolutions seem to have very little affinity with their fiery Streamers unless in the destructiveness of the Element and the irregularity of the motion Your judgment of Comets reply'd his Honour is very apposite but I am sorry your men of such a singular sagacity should link an Effect to a Cause before they have discern'd the dependance of one upon the other 'T is venturing too far and laying a Brat to the next comer We ought to be cautious in pronouncing so near relations especially when they succeed one another at so long a distance of time from which circumstance we may pretty securely gather that if a Cause Comets are however a remote Cause of such Innovations and if Naturalists will solve Effects by remote Causes at that rate a man may be said to be the effect of Beef and Mutton Comets may indeed have miraculous Influences but who can be confident of their aptness to produce those Events much less of their begetting them immediately and without the intervention of other Causes Though least of all methinks they should be the cause of abundance of Rain as rather suited to dissipate all collections of moist Bodies and proving too often the fore-runners of excessive heats and those Epidemical Mischiefs which are thence deriv'd Once more I therefore return to your self and demand the next Hypothesis There remain yet said I some behind but I desire another may content you and that such as is by some contended for with no less vehemence than any of the rest However 't is but a partial Solution and reaches no further backward than last Christmas about which time you may remember the Czar made us a visit and brought along with him all the Winter and bad Weather in Muscovy Then could not cry'd Verulam Experiment convince this Sect for I dare say had any of them approach'd within breath shot of that mighty Prince they would soon have perceiv'd he had brought them over more Heat than Cold. However if he brought it yet since he has not carry'd it back again 't is fit we make a further enquiry into the reason of its continuance and because you say you are cloy'd with other people's Notions avoiding Preambles I shall now begin to you my own Lecture your kind attention first bespoken You have heard I make no question and read much about Central Fire and may have observ'd that notwithstanding Philosophers disagree among themselves as to the material Causes the means of Perpetuation and several other circumstances so far they all consent that there certainly is such a thing And indeed the existence of any part of nature is perhaps the ultimate object of natural Philosophy Essences and Forms are an intricate sort of concern and will never be effectually unriddled till Matter may be reduc'd to an indivisible yet discernible Minuteness This is the only sure method to come at them they lie more
by one sense would if in like manner apply'd to the Organs of our other Senses affect them also and that therefore when an Object has past the Test of one there is no further need to examine it by the rest because all are affected after one manner so that if any thing acts upon my Faculty of seeing it ought to be a sufficient evidence that it is in the power of the same to act as effectually upon my Faculty of hearing c. till at length we come to imagine that whatsoever our Eyes represent to us under the Figure of a Palpable Substance is in it self such Thus while some Philosophers have beheld the Azure of the Sky they have been mov'd to fansie it a solid Arch compacted as it were of Blew Stone or some such kind of matter whence arose that wild System of solid Orbs by which the Ancients made a mere Paper-mill of the Heavens although I confess we are not so often by this means deceiv'd in the general intrinsick properties of Substances as in their external modifications in the discerning of which we should not behave our selves so like Infants if we would not so often rely upon the Authority of one Sense for the certainty of that which can only be prov'd by another Sense How often have we known wise people scar'd with the lustre of Phosphorus rotten Wood and stinking Fish only because they suppos'd such an Affinity between the Senses that if one receiv'd such an Influence from its Object as is proper to that Sense the other would also upon trial receive those Influences from the same Object which are proper to them Now where these two Rules are observ'd that we look on the Senses as bare instruments and that we do not confound them one with another I think we may safely trust to and rely upon them for the first will prevent our assenting too soon and the latter will be a means of knowing when it is time But the most simple way of reasoning is certainly the best for although the Authority of the Senses is not to be utterly rejected nay although it is for the most part to be receiv'd yet if more simple evidence can be had the Understanding is doubly gratified and the Will by far more plyant for evidence is as precious to the one as it is prevalent upon the other the first is not capable of any clearer information nor the latter of a stronger impression Whence it comes to pass that it is impossible for a man to be a Sceptick He may indeed affect the name but cannot be the thing because when he would seem to deny an Axiom he must be understood to want evidence and to have it at the same time to want it because he says so and to have it because he can bring no other argument for his not having it than a bare denying of it which is none at all 'T is true indeed every man knows best how he feels himself affected at any time but if his Neighbour find it out of his own power to evade the force of such and such a proposition he may assure himself that the same proposition can be no more evaded by the Pretender to Scepticism than by himself unless he believes that Pretender's Understanding and Will to be of a quite different constitution from his own or else that such a Pretender is endow'd with neither or deny'd the use and liberty of them or last of all that the Pretender's faculties transcend his own and that by vertue of a more sublime apprehension he understands that to be false which to another appears necessarily true In one of these three conditions the Pretender must be if he can really within his own breast deny the truth of an Axiom that is properly such for if his Faculties be exactly of the same kind and extent with his Neighbours it is impossible but what affects those of the latter in such a certain degree must affect those of the former in the same degree seeing where the cause is one and the Patients on which an Effect is to be wrought by that Cause are the very same in kind the Effect must also be the same for else two different Effects could be produced caeteris paribus by the same Cause which in a Cause suppos'd to move at least one of the two Patients fatally and inevitably as soon as addressed to that Patient and such is the self-evidence of a proposition to the Faculties of the Pretenders Neighbour in our case cannot be because if address'd to one of the Patients it unavoidably begets in it such an Effect it must as unavoidably when address'd to another Patient perfectly the same beget in it the same Effect otherwise its Effect would be necessary and yet not necessary which the Pretender's Neighbour knows of himself cannot be true nor can the Pretender's faculties be of a different kind provided they be of the same extent as his Neighbour's for if they are larger or narrower we are to consider them as supposed to be such afterwards because there can be no Species of Rational Faculties distinct in Essence and Nature from his own for whoever has a power of Apprehending of Judging of Concluding Coequal with his must apprehend judge and conclude as he does for if he have distinct powers equivalent to these he must apprehend judge and conclude by the help of those powers in the same degree as his Neighbour and if he cannot his powers are not equivalent and are therefore to be consider'd when we shall speak of them as suppos'd less Do his Faculties therefore differ from ours only in order that is Does he judge before he apprehends or conclude before he judges in that respect again his Rational Powers will be inferiour to his Neighbour's and therefore they cannot be of a different kind from those of the latter and equivalent to them Neither may they be superiour since if they surpass the Believer's either in alacrity of Perception strength of Judgment or security of Ratiocination which is what I mean by Superiour instead of disbelieving what his Neighbour cannot but assent to his knowledge of it must be more clear and ample and his conviction much fuller than his Neighbour's who assisted with that poor capacity that he is endow'd with finds himself oblig'd to acknowledge the truth of manifest Axioms and plainly perceives that they cannot be false how much rather then must the Pretender be sensible of their evidence being assisted with Faculties so much larger and perfecter in as much as that which approves its own certainty to Faculties less capable of apprehending it must approve it no less for the reasons already alledg'd where we demonstrated it impossible that Faculties exactly of the same kind and extent should be alike affected by the same Impressions to Faculties more capable of apprehending it Nay must over and above approve it self so much the more effectually to them as they are degrees more
other Perfections have been first prov'd from the Existence of even the smallest Particle of matter which according to the method we shall now pursue may be clearly and directly prov'd Having therefore thus demonstrated the Existence and general Properties of all Beings immediately affecting either our sensitive or thinking Faculties as also the certainty of the Existence of those Faculties and difference of their Nature we come next to enquire how they obtain'd this Existence and these Properties whether they gave them to themselves or receiv'd them from some other Cause Most evident it is that they exist according to a certain Line Succession or Course of Moments and that as to order of Time as they now are so a little before they were which Line or Course being trac'd by the moments whereof it consists to the utmost Length that our or any Multiplication of such Moments can reach will at last terminate in some certain Point beyond which Moment the Existence of such Beings is not to be referr'd and in which they first began to be And this Beginning it is impossible they should have had from themselves because they could not affect till they were and if not affect not effect whence it follows that they had some primary distinct Cause subsisting from Eternity not extended because a successive Existence is inseparable from Extension for we can no sooner perceive an extended Being but we must conceive it as existing in time because every extended Being is apt for or capable of being mov'd along the parts of a Line the measure of Motion by which we thus demonstrate the Succession of its Existence Let a be the Being extended f l a a Line along which a may be mov'd while a exists upon the space of the Line f l between f h it cannot exist also upon the space between i b And yet seeing it is capable of being mov'd along the Line f l till arriv'd to the space between i b it is no less capable of existing upon the space between i b but not till it has left off to exist upon the space between f h and yet it could not be capable of existing upon the space between i b after it had existed upon the space between f h unless it had existed before between f h and so many moments of Existence after its Existence between f h as its Motion should last through the several spaces till it might arrive at that between i b which Succession of Existence being trac'd back to the utmost extent that any Multiplication can attain will at last terminate in some certain point and therefore beyond that require a Cause which might subsist from Eternity Beside without Motion this extended Being could effect or affect nothing and yet this first Mover if an extended Substance could not have self-motion by the Demonstrations already offer'd upon that Argument And this prime unextended Cause must be also Infinite not only possessing Perfections equal to those of its own Effect but all others whatsoever or all Perfection possible and that because its Existence is necessary and eternal for to all manner of Perfection there accrues at least a Possibility of Existence So that whatsoever Perfection is missing in the Effects of this prime Cause cannot but exist in the Cause it self seeing as we observ'd before all Perfection carries in it at least a Possibility of Existing which yet it could not unless it may exist in the Prime Cause in case it cannot in its Effects There is no absurdity at all in affirming that whatsoever is a Perfection may exist so far from that that it is impossible to feign any Perfection wanting such a Possibility but if it may neither exist in the Effects nor prime Cause supposing that to be single it is an absurdity to say that such a Possibility is essential to all Perfection And although in the Effects of the prime Cause whatsoever is possible may not be found and indeed cannot for they are all notoriously limited the Extended by their Superficies and the Unextended by the defect of their powers and whatsoever is limited either way must be capable of Univocal Additions and when those are obtain'd still of greater so that something of Perfection will ever be wanting to them yet in the prime Cause it self whose Existence is necessary all manner of Perfection must because of its Possibility of Existence truly and really exist for it could not be in its own nature apt to exist unless it had been so either from Eternity or from a certain Period of Time now although the Perfections of the Effects of the prime Cause are in their own Nature capable of existing only within a certain Period of time yet whatsoever Perfection may possibly exist in the prime Cause whose Existence is necessary cannot but truly and really exist in it Now all Perfection whatsoever carries with it such a Possibility as for instance the power of creating a new World out of nothing or a new order of Effects answerable to that already created is such a Perfection as may possibly be in the prime Cause of those Effects already extant But yet it could not possibly be in this prime Cause unless co-eternal with it seeing if it were temporary it must be only the Effect of this prime Cause and not of the Essence of it nor co-eternal with it unless it necessarily existed because all Eternals exist by necessity Neither is this to say that what is most perfect must therefore exist because Existence is one of the Perfections of that most Perfect whereas indeed it is inseparable from even the least Perfection No all that I contend for amounts to no more than That in a Being of necessary Existence and in such an one only all Perfection possible must as necessarily exist Not but from the consideration of the nature of the Effects already in Being the Infinity of the prime Cause is no less conspicuous supposing it no derogation as indeed it is not from the Majesty of the prime Cause to say that it cannot create more kinds of Beings than what are already created Kinds I say which are these a Spirit and a Body and in truth it implies a mere Contradiction to say there can be more Kinds of Beings than these for whatsoever is must either be extended or not extended if the former 't is a Body if the latter 't is either an Intelligent Spirit or a blind unintelligent Energy And by these I mean a Spirit in general Now more sorts of Beings than these there cannot be and a contradiction I say is the Effect of supposing there can because admitting a third Kind it must be of such Beings as are neither extended nor unextended which 't is evident cannot be any Beings at all But of these Kinds the Cause that first produc'd 'em can at pleasure produce new Qualities and Numbers since it is perfectly and in all respects the same that it was from Eternity it being impossible
but that whatsoever exists from Eternity must be immutable because its Existence is necessary Nay further all Quantities or Numbers of Substances anew created be they never so great a Cause of Eternal Subsistence can produce in one act because it does not operate according to the Succession of the parts of time although to us it may seem so to do whose comprehension is so narrow in comparison of it as not to collect any manner of Existence or Operation but what is successive either from the notice of our own Existence or Operation or those of other Beings falling under our observation So soon as such Substances are created they cannot 't is true exist but according to such a Succession but the act of Creation as it is the act of the Creator is no more concern'd with any order of time than the Agent So that if a thousand Worlds not yet created were to be created with respect to the Creator they must be created together with that World already created All which is no other than consonant to the Principles of those many Philosophers who define Eternity a Possession at once of all Past Present and to Come To be sufficient therefore to create all Substances that can be created without a Contradiction and this at once certainly appertains to no less than a power Infinite for although the Quantities and Numbers of the Substances created let them be never so great must be Finite yet the power of creating as many more remains in the Creator Nor seems it any diminution of the Creator's Perfection that the Quantities and Numbers of the Substances created must be Finite since if they might be Infinite they might not only rival their Cause but oblige him to confer that upon Beings not existing from Eternity which only accrues to Beings existing from Eternity for nothing can be Infinite as to continuance unless a necessary Existent and nothing Infinite on other accounts unless Infinite as to continuance because every thing else must be the Effect of a Being of Infinite continuance and that Effect must be less perfect than its Cause as partaking even of substantially and essentially the same as the Cause of but a portion of its Cause which yet a Temporary Being cannot of an Eternal because whatever is Eternal in such a Being is in its own nature incommunicable to a Temporary Being and yet no Effect of an Infinite Cause can be less perfect than its Cause without being Finite by which it appears that to suppose the Quantities and Numbers of the Substances created may be Infinite is to suppose the Cause of them may be guilty of a most gross Absurdity and Contradiction and not only so but that it may likewise be mutable though of necessary Existence What I have said of Substances holds equally of their Properties And this argument it self might suffice to demonstrate the Infinity of each Perfection in the Creator which may be found in a more imperfect degree in the things created The Eternity of the All perfection and particularly of the Omnipotence of this prime Cause being thus evinc'd we are yet to reflect a little upon the necessity of all those Possible and Eternal Perfections being united in that one prime Cause and here it must be remember'd that if they are not united in the same Infinite they must either as to one part or kind of them be Finite or Infinite not Infinite for what can be a bolder contradiction than that one share of such Perfections should be Infinite when there remains a great deal of Perfection not united to it Finite therefore If Finite in some measure defective if defective wanting that principle which where ever it is found constitutes that Being altogether perfect viz. a necessity of existing the want whereof must be therefore the foundation of Imperfection because Perfection is constituted of Reality being only a Plenitude of Existence so as that for instance the Perfection of a Body is no more than the real Existence of its Extension and of whatever else goes to the constituting of a Body and the Perfection of its Extension c. consists in its being real or positive for nothing is further perfect than it is positive nor whatever composes the Essences of things any otherwise consummate than as those Constituents are true and genuine Existents It cannot therefore exist necessarily and if not necessarily not from Eternity whence it is clear it must be essentially united to all other possible Perfection that is of Eternal Existence Essentially I say because there can be no Union of Composition between two Beings unless each is in its own nature able to subsist by it self So that all Perfection whose Existence is from Eternity must be collected and essentially united in one Eternal most Perfect Cause of all other Beings whatsoever I know not whether I need particularly insist upon any further Eviction of the Omniscience of this prime Cause that being inclusively prov'd by the general Argument so lately handled in proof of his All-perfection but yet because this Attribute is a proper foundation for the Demonstration of his Providence it may not be amiss to consider it in it self So slight is the acquaintance we have with Spiritual Beings of a limited nature and much more with that of an unlimited one that what we learn concerning them we acquire partly by general Rules of Entities partly from certain general Properties of the Spiritual Beings themselves That the prime Cause must in it self have Intelligent Faculties there needs no other Evidence than that certain Effects of it have That part of its Productions which is call'd and known to be the Rational and Thinking have receiv'd of it considerable Abilities in that kind We apprehend we know we think and are admitted not only to the Contemplation of our selves and Fellow-Creatures but even into the Sanctum Sanctorum to the Contemplation of the prime Cause it self yet not without great restrictions it being the Prudence of the prime Cause to bestow but a scanty Portion of that upon its Creatures which as it would be in them the similitude of it self so it would tempt them to presume upon their own dignity and consequently to be forgetfull of his Not to mention here the event of our first Parents Lapse However such a portion of Understanding we can boast of as serves to signifie the Donour an Intelligent Being also and as the Intelligent part of his Creation bespeaks him Intelligent so that with all the other parts of it bespeak him infinitely so because indeed they could not have been at all unless that which gave them their Being had thoroughly and most intimately known the Ends and Essences of them because a Being independent existing from Eternity and therefore necessary and immutable could not be mov'd to exert the act of Creation unless by more than a brute Principle of Motion which Motion must either have continu'd from Eternity and so the Effects of it have been
Eternal the Absurdity of which we have already refuted or have been an arbitrary or voluntary Motion arising from a Principle of Intelligence Nor can it be but that these two Principles should operate for ends seeing this voluntary Motion could not have proceeded from the Intelligent Principle unless the Intelligent Principle upon notice or conception if I may so speak of things found at least some end to urge that voluntary Motion so that as every the least Effect of that Motion must have been for an end so must it also have issued from an Intelligent Principle in the arbitrary Mover whence it is evident this arbitrary Mover or Cause must have a perfect and absolute knowledge of all its own Effects But here I would not be understood either to define the Intellectual Powers of the first Cause or the Manner of their Operations when all I attempt is to shew that the least Effect of the prime Cause must flow from a voluntary Motion to which although infinitely more perfect that imperfect one of our Wills is somewhat analogous arising from an Idea of that which is to be the Effect of that voluntary Motion and that Idea also infinitely more perfect than any of ours And as this arbitrary Cause cannot but have the most entire and absolute knowledge of all its own Effects so must it be no less acquainted with whatever is possible besides because it comprehends in it all such Possibilities and whatsoever it so comprehends it must it self be conscious of seeing those Principles of Intelligence and voluntary Motion already mention'd cannot be as perhaps in Inferiour and Finite Rationals distinct from the other Faculties and Attributes but on the same account that such Principle are asserted at large to be in the prime Cause they must also be annex'd to whatsoever of it is found to be of eternal Existence seeing whatsoever is found to be so is alike independent of any foreign Impulsor as the prime Cause understood at large alike necessary and immutable and accordingly a Being alike Intelligent and Arbitrary Again as this prime Cause is infinitely powerfull and Wise so it must be infinitely Just and Mercifull too and that because its Effects are the Objects of its Love as well as the Off-spring of its power for so long as they exist they are certainly precious in its esteem and not only when they were first created but even as long as they continue in being it cannot but repute them good In truth unless they were so their All-wise Cause would fall under the imputation of acting in vain and be oblig'd in its own Justification to annihilate the universal System or at least such portions of it as were of no value in its sight by which Rule as we may be assur'd of its general Concern for all so of that Concern's being proportionable to the particular value of each Member so that every such Member in its particular Station is consulted and provided for according to its Dignity the measure whereof is best to be learn'd by examining how large its capacity is of being benefited by the first Cause for there is nothing more certain than that the first All-wise Cause rather than act in vain and to no purpose will benefit it and bless it to the full measure of that Capacity Yet not without conditions too where and so far as the Effect is qualify'd for entring or has actually enter'd into them Wherefore in cases even of Degeneracy in such an Effect the small remains of that Perfection which it receiv'd at first from its Cause are still valu'd by its Cause nay even when it seems good to the Cause that its Effects should undergo any Severities it cannot but either compensate for them afterwards which for the reasons already given it is oblig'd to do when conditions are observ'd or if it consigns over the violators to a perpetual punishment not to insist upon any other defence of its Justice therein I know not why we may not believe that the Effects even by the Laws of their nature decline through degeneracy into such a state of Misery and acquire such a Disposition that upon being translated according to the ordinary course of things into a new Station and condition they necessarily become miserable partly thro' those Defects which they owe to themselves and partly from impressions from without which could not affect them if the nature of the Effect had undergone no change by its Degeneracy Lastly Nothing is a more easie Demonstration than of the Providence of the first Cause from the certainty of its Justice and Mercy Indeed it is most conspicuous in every part of its great Work wherein the whole contrivance appears so admirable the subserviency of this to that so regular and the distribution of properties so just that of all Miracles the order of Nature which we daily behold is certainly the greatest Nor does there seem to be any necessity of betaking our selves to the more simple methods of Demonstration when if we would never so fain we cannot extricate our selves from evidences of such a Providence And when Democritus had modell'd his Atoms and Epicurus had as he fansied put them in a right way to gather into a Body what did it avail them They neither could be Atoms till they were made so nor move a point on till the first Mover set them forward But then what if the Beauty Structure and Order which ensu'd could not arise from any such Principles as it is plain they could not For supposing never so great variety in the figures of the Atoms that one Species of Motion viz. Casus declivis could not by any means beget such a multiplicity of Forms but only generate a solid flinty Mass solid and flinty I say because no manner of concourse could so strongly compact the Atoms as that Indeed it must have fasten'd all of them so close together that nothing could have broken so many free distinct Bodies off the Rock but the Supervention of an Almighty Arm nor yet could each such Frustulum have been so modify'd and temper'd as we find unless by the same So that the Founders and Maintainers of these Principles instead of mending the matter only made more work for themselves and brought their Particles so fairly together at last that when they should have been got asunder again nothing but a superiour Agent being that which they made sure of escaping could separate them For alas Chance has not strength enough If she might bring them together she could do no more afterwards but leave them together Besides what is this Chance at last So far from being a Cause that it never can be any thing but a Coincident For granting these Atoms fell thus together did they chance I beseech you to fall together before they did fall together And still it 's all the same thing whether these Atoms encounter in one kind of Motion or in many for if in many so as that they gather
into many distinct Bodies each of those Bodies must be superlatively compact seeing that motion which is to bring them together will bring them as close together as they can be brought when there is nothing to interpose But what shall at last animate some of these lumps and temper all of them Let the Atomist therefore take his choice whether he will have one great Mass or many little ones But I digress too far it being my present design not so much to confute Error as demonstrate Truth although indeed the latter is much at one with the former especially in the dispute before us Yet the reigning sottishness of that opinion so star'd me in the face while I would discourse upon the Providence of the prime Cause that I could not handsomely forbear a rebuke the continuation of the Effects of the prime Cause being no better accounted for by this barren childish Hypothesis than their Original for as they could not give themselves a Being but must necessarily have receiv'd it from an All-perfect Cause so not to mention the necessity of perpetual Creation in order to the Subsistence of such Effects sufficiently evinc'd by others from the nature and Attributes of this prime Cause I think I have clearly demonstrated that it certainly governs and is concern'd for all even the smallest of its Effects and this All-perfect first Cause is GOD. But now where appears that little half Animal the Atheist No longer I hope setting up for a Philosopher when for ought I know the Brutes even of the slowest apprehension may claim Pre-eminence in the Schools before him The Brutes whose every motion betrays a consciousness of a Truth which nothing but the darkest blindness of Soul can escape The Brain must be clouded thick on all sides or so dazling a Lustre could not but strike it Is this then the penetrating Man the subtile inventive Verè adeptus a Prodigy in good earnest if he could raise Effects without Causes and begin to build his Houses from the Tiles But alas there is not one Phaenomenon in all nature to be so much as plausibly interpreted but upon the confidence of a first Cause Those Accounts of Meteors which we have receiv'd are perhaps the fairest and easiest on all hands of any other Physical Notices whether we consult Cartes Gassendus Aristotle or the Stoicks Comets only excepted and yet no Vapours could be so much as exhal'd or any condens'd or rarefy'd but by the interposition of the first Cause for if transmutations analogous to those in the Alembicks of our Vertuosi require such peculiar and most exquisite Instruments how much rather do they require an Omnipotent Author and Cause to give an Efficacy to these Instruments And indeed the first blunder of the Atheistical Philosopher has ever been his mistaking Instruments for Efficient Causes for not discerning the difference between that which acts only necessarily and that which acts arbitrarily the poor Beetles have all along excluded a Deity by confounding the first with the latter Yet there 's the mischief of it these People cannot but be lost to all sound Reason and Sense before they straggle into such unaccountable delirious Notions and how is it possible to correct Error when instead of any Candour and Judgment you have nothing to treat with but obstinate Conceitedness profound Ignorance and desperate Indocility DE Cartesianâ DEI Ideâ EPISTOLA Ad V. Cl. D. Antonium Le Grand Quâ respondetur ad Cap. XIV um Apologiae ejus pro Ren. Cartesio contra S. Parkerum Archidiaconum tunc temporis Cantuar. Ornatissime Domine PErlectâ haud ità pridem Apologiâ tuâ Sermonis nitore pariter ac moderatione conditâ imprimis studium quo incalueram Veritatis exigere visum est ut instituta tua maxime verò quae de Cartesianâ Dei Ideâ tradideras pro virili refellerem cum scilicet nihil praestet amicum aliquem male consultum Veritatis basin primitivam demoliri ut suam substerneret quà m apertè ipsos adversarios ariete sua conquassare Quinimò me tandem in certamen planè arsisse fateor cum causam Veritatis defendi non posse perspexerim quin desideratissimi Parentis memoriam manesque simul vindicarem quos non vindicasse Adolescentis ignavi degenerisque sit Itaque cum ad omnia tua respondere nondum vacet accipe benigno quaesumus animo quae de capite Apologiae tuae decimo quarto scribenda habuimus quo Cartesium tuum Divinae Substantiae Ideam obtinuisse contendis quae aliunde profiscisci quà m ab illo cujus sit Idea nequiret Priusquam vero ista discutiamus paucis investigemus oportet quid per vocem Ideam nos intelligere debemus Platonem in usum introduxisse constat de quo D. Augustinus in Octaginta Quaestionum libro Ideas primò appellâsse Plato perhibetur non tamen si hoc nomen antequam ipse institueret non erat ideò vel res ipsae non erant quas Ideas vocavit vel à nullo erant intellectae sed alio fortasse atque alio nomine ab aliis atque aliis nuncupatae sunt Quae quidem eminentissimi Viri conjectura verisimilior ab una parte videtur ab altera minús Nam Philosophorum antiquissimas familias de rebus id intellexisse quòd varias suas formas seu species habeant quarum unaquaeque genus certum aeternâ necessitate constituat nos neutiquà m dubitemus num verò eodem quo Platonici modo intellexerunt nimirum prout in Divinâ Intelligentiâ delitescunt haud immeritò controvertamus Neque tamen hinc ita inferendum puto quasi maxima pars veterum Philosophorum omnesque ferè quos Graecia Barbaros esse voluit Magi Gymnosophistae Druides Deum aliquem extare inficiarentur Atqui tanta erat de Deò apud hos opinionum varietas pugna siquidem M. Tullium amimadvertisse memini Lib. 1. de Nat. Deorum Cui vero esse Deos dixerunt tantà sunt in varietate ac dissensione constituti ut eorum molestum sit dinumerare sententias ut ejusmodi species tanquam in Divinâ Intelligentiâ conversantes apprehendisse cum notitia quam Attributorum Divinorum habuerunt adeò imperfecta ac dimidiata esset non ita facilè credendum sit Quomodocunque autem rem istam se habuisse existimemus Platonem Terminum ipsum adinvenisse liquet Mentem volebant Platonici rerum esse Judicem ait Cicero Academ Quaest. lib. 1. solam censebant idoneam cui crederetur quia sola cerneret id quod esset simplex uniusmodi tale quale esset Hanc illi Ideam appellabant jam à Platone ita nominatam nos rectè speciem possumus dicere Sensus autem omnes hebetes tardos esse arbitrabantur nec percipere ullo modo res eas quae subjectae sensibus viderentur quae essent aut ita parvae ut sub sensum cadere non possent aut ita mobiles concitatae ut nihil unquam unum
clear those difficulties which otherwise the Notion of an Universal Flood must necessarily carry with it Phil. As for that further Speculations may in time bring forth a satisfactory Hypothesis but if they should not thus much we know That the Flood was either the ordinary Effect of second Causes though the measures of their Operation be hidden from us or if it could not be such an Effect that it was the direct and immediate Atchievment of Omnipotence it self and let that hush all your Scruples Bur. That were self-resignation with a Vengeance What Shall I be oblig'd to acquiesce in a Miracle because I cannot fathom Nature's measures Phil. Mistake me not I say fathom 'em if you can if that 's deny'd enquire whether the Supposal implies any Contradiction or Absurdity in respect of Nature's usual proceedings If it does not take it for granted 't was no more than the result of ordinary Combinations if it does you may be confident 't was Miracle all and then trouble your head no further Bur. I submit be pleas'd to proceed to your Argument Phil. The Theorist you know presumes it infallibly certain that the Earth rose out of a Chaos at first and that such a Chaos as himself describes Theor. Book 1. Chap. 4. a fluid Mass or a Mass of all sorts of little Parts and Particles of Matter mix'd together and floating in confusion one with another And this Supposition he lays down as a Postulate whereas I must tell you it ought to have been offer'd with such restrictions as render it wholly unserviceable to his main design For why must this Chaos be a fluid Mass Why might it not be as well a drift or shower of Atoms yet unamass'd disorderly dancing one amongst another and at various distances Bur. But this is no better Man than out of the Frying-pan into the Fire You dread the pernicious Doctrines of the Theory and therefore take Sanctuary in those of Epicurus In good time I beseech you consider the Poet's Maxim Dum vitant you know who vitium in contraria currunt Phil. God forbid using of Epicurus's terms should make me his All that I would have amounts to thus much That the Chaos or material Elements of our Earth which were originally created by a Divine Power and afterwards by the same Divine Power so dispos'd and compounded as to form this Sublunary World might as well be a Company or Chorus of Atoms of divers kinds dispers'd and dancing in the great Inane without any just order or distribution as a fluid Mass of mixt Particles Bur. What becomes then of the Authority of the Ancients who not to cite'em particularly understood by their Chaos nothing but a mere Hotch-potch of matter a rude undigested Mixture or Collection of the several Seeds of things animate and inanimate Phil. 'T is e'en as good as ever 't was that is in my opinion none at all sacred Authority always excepted whereto my Hypothesis is not that I know of any way repugnant for if the Tradition of the Ancients avails any thing in the present case it therefore avails because they liv'd at a less distance of time from the Chaos but alas neither their earliness nor the credit of their Tradition qualifie 'em to be better Judges than we of what neither they nor their Fore-fathers could know more than the latest of their Posterity and 't is impossible they should be better acquainted with the Chaos than their Offspring unless they and the Chaos had been Cotemporary Not to mention how much they are indebted to Moses for their Notions as also that most of your Authorities are either properly Poetical or else pure Hypothesis and Theory like your own Bur. Do you not believe then that the Primitive Inhabitants of the Earth might at least give a better guess from the Contemplation of it in its Infancy and most simple condition supposing even its first form the same as its present than we who behold it at so great a disadvantage and almost in its ruins what might be the Constitution of the Chaos Phil. By no means 'till you can prove Harmony a good Comment upon Disorder for whether your Chaos or mine were the true the first People of our world could I suppose see no farther into a Mill-stone than their Successors No doubt they were equally Strangers to all beyond the Superficial parts of our Globe as our selves consequently as much in the dark about the distribution of the Chaos much more about the state of it before that distribution Neither did the righteous Man and his Family that we know of make any remarks at the time of the Deluge which might give us some light into the matter or granting they left a Tradition behind them relating thereto and lost many Ages ago which however there appears no manner of reason why we should grant still I say those remarks must be very imperfect and contribute little enough to our knowledge of the Distribution of the Chaos nothing at all to our knowledge of its Constitution before that Distribution But I entreat you oblige me not to any longer Digression upon this Topick which else will lead us very much out of our way Bur. I shall not but pardon me if I observe to you that unless your dancing Atoms will answer all the ends of our fluid mass I shall hold it reasonable to pay some deference to the Authority of the Ancients which at least confirms the original state of Nature to be such as is fairly solvable according to our Hypothesis of the Chaos Phil. With all my heart when you can alledge a just cause why my dancing Atoms as soon as they are gather'd into a body will not serve the true genuine purposes of a Chaos as well as the Theorist's fluid Mass. Bur. Admitting therefore your Conjecture I cannot conceive of what use it will be to you in the present Disquisition Phil. Of singular use believe me for the Atoms or Particles of my Chaos being free and separate and not sorted into distinct Orders and Species nor allotted their proper distances from each other 't is very probable many less Detachments of them would unite distinctly from any greater Combination and being united into such smaller Masses would in time encounter the larger Combination such an one as we may understand to consist of the grossest matter of all being the likeliest to reach the Center soonest and by their accession render the Superficies of it however Spherical and regular in it self which according to our Supposition it could scarce be to a Nicety very uneven and mountainous All this would be but a natural result and yet requires a more immediate Interposition of Providence to frame the great ball of our Earth so regular as it now appears to be as indeed all Events in the natural World do and ever did and the Deluge no less than the rest notwithstanding the large Province you would assign to second Causes Thus we see what a doughty
Postulate your Theory leans upon Bur. Still we stand both upon the same bottom and if I should assent to your Hypothesis you cannot I think deny but you have as much reason to assent to mine Only this advantage I retain above you that those Conclusions which the Theory infers afterwards from my Hypothesis are so just and apposite and otherwise so perfectly inexplicable as to turn the Scale on my side and strengthen not a little the probability of our Proposition Phil. As for the inexplicableness of those Conclusions I have spoke to it already and need only admonish you to beware of such circular Argumentations The Conclusion is good because the Premises are so and the Premises are good because the Conclusion is so Bur. To whom do you apply that Phil. To no worse a Friend than your self The Flood came to pass by the disruption of that Crust of Earth which inclos'd the Abyss How could that be unless there was such a Crust But there was such a Crust form'd when the Chaos was digested into Order Why do you believe so because the Floud which ensued upon the dis-ruption of this Crust is best accounted for upon such a supposal And yet bating this Argument I do not see but my Scheme deserves to be as fairly receiv'd as that of the Theorist consideratis considerandis But I am ready to quit my own Notion of the Chaos offer'd only to shew the precariousness of the Theorist's and supposing the state of the Tohu bohu to have been such as he describes it I hope in the next place to convince you that the ditribution of its parts could not be such as he would have it not that Incrustation upon which he builds so confidently be effected after such a manner as he imagines Bur. Heroically threatned make but your words good at last Et eris mihi magnus Apollo Phil. You may remember the Theorist having delineated his Chaos presently after takes notice that from such a Chaos 't is impossible should arise a mountainous uneven Earth for that no Concretion or consistent State which this Mass could flow into immediately or first settle in could be of such a form or figure as our present Earth neither without nor within not within because there the Earth is full of Cavities and empty Places of Dens and broken Holes whereof some are open to the Air and others cover'd and enclos'd wholly within the ground Bur. And pray are not both of these unimitable in any liquid Substance whose parts will necessarily flow together into one continued Mass and cannot be divided into Apartments and separate Rooms nor have Vaults or Caverns made within it Phil. Not at all unimitable if I may be a Judge for let us but conceive the agitation of the Parts of this liquid Chaos to be pretty quick and violent which why it should not I know of no better reasons you can give than I can why it should I say suppose their agitation somewhat of the quickest and your Theorist's Axiom will appear a plain mistake unless he will please to exempt some of the main constituent Principles of this sublunary World out of his Chaos Bur. I cannot apprehend what you would drive at no more than why you should doubt of the comprehensiveness of our Chaos I know no reason why we ought to exclude either Fire or Air or Earth or Water I mean the constituent parts of them and if you will consult the Theorist's own description of his Chaos Book 1. Chap. 5. you will see he is much of the same mind Phil. I am glad to hear it I was almost afraid the two former Elements would get no House-room at least that commodious Utensil Fire and the more because in that same Description of his which you cite he has forgot to reckon it amongst his principles of all Terrestrial I suppose by that word he means sublunary Bodies Bur. But do not you know the Theorist is so liberal of that Element as to furnish out of the Centre with it even to profuseness Phil. With just as good a pretence as Mr. Hobbs himself has sometimes acknowledged such a thing as a Law of Nature but yet by the constant Tenour of his Argumentations would abolish the very meaning of it Thus the Theorist tolerates a Central Fire and at the same time forgets how upon the secretion of his Chaos he tumbles down all the course miry rubbish directly thither But this only by the by so long as he is reconcil'd to any mixture of Igneous and Aethereal Particles I am content seeing the consequence runs thus That these Igneous and Aethereal Particles being driven and put into motion in common with the rest may not unlikely occasion rarefactions at least in concurrence with the sulphureous Particles This I presume may pass with you for a Result natural enough Bur. Not so very natural neither 'till you can make out the necessity of your quick and violent motion Did you never see Water and Ashes mixt in a Kettle before 't was hung over the Fire if you ever did I much question whether you could find a motion so brisk among the parts of that Liquid as to cause rarefactions Phil. Pardon me Sir if I think the case quite different in the Chaos not only because its parts are suppos'd to be ten Thousand degrees more minute and mobile with respect to each other than the gross ones of common Water and Ashes but also because in such a composition before 't is hung over the Fire there are no such ingredients as igneous Particles nor yet any sulphureous at least at liberty But upon the insinuations of the igneous Particles you may behold how the more subtle parts of the mixture are easily rarefy'd and the gross ones crowded one upon another In like manner I cannot but believe the grosser and earthy parts of the Chaos by the rarefaction of the Igneous and Aethereal would gather into Cakes and Masses around the Spheres of rarefaction which if practicable then might the interior parts of the Chaos be divided into Apartments and separate Rooms and have Vaults and Caverns made within it for the Masses so form'd being unequal irregular and disjointed either of themselves or by Explosions when the rarefaction is violent and restrain'd encounter and tumble upon one another by that means falling into greater Masses and those greater Masses being craggy and cliffy and settling among one another no less irregularly must necessarily leave within them those Vaults and Caverns so little expected by the Theorist Bur. Very good Then it seems you fancy the Chaos boyling up like a Mess of Frumenty Phil. Not so fast my Friend But this I imagine that what an overproportion'd degree of heat to use again your own Similitude prevents in a Mess of Frumenty viz. The clotting or coalition of the grosser parts that would a degree of heat proportionably less very naturally effect in the Chaos Nor do I think it can be doubted but