least Motion to Matter This Philosophy I say perfectly Accommodates with Religion whose end is to Unite us to God in the strictest Bonds 'T is Customary with us to Love only those things which are capable of doing us some Good This Philosophy therefore Authorises only the Love of God and Condemns the Love of every thing else We ought to fear nothing but what is able to do us some Evil. Therefore this Philosophy approves the fear of God and absolutely Condemns all other Thus it justifies all the just and Reasonable Motions of our Soul and Condemns all those that are contrary to Reason and Religion For we can never justifie the Love of Riches the desire of Greatness the Extravagance of Debauchery by this Philosophy by the Principles whereof the Love for Bodies is absurd and ridiculous 'T is an indisputable Truth 't is a Natural Opinion 't is even a Common Notion that we ought to Love the cause of our Pleasure and to Love it proportionably to the Felicity it either Actually does or is able to possess us with 'T is not only just but as it were necessary that the cause of our happiness should be the Object of our Love Therefore this Philosophy will teach us to Love God only as being the only Cause of our Felicity That surrounding Bodies cannot Act upon that we Animate and consequently much less upon our Mind That 't is not the Sun which enlightens us and gives us Life and Motion Nor that fills the Earth with Fruits and Beautifies it with Flowers and supplies us with Food and Nourishment This Philosophy seconding the Scripture teaches that 't is God alone who gives us Rain and Regulates the Seasons that fills our Bodies with Food and our hearts with Joy that he alone is able to do us good and thereby has given a perpetual Testimony of what he is though in the ages passed he suffer'd all Nations to walk in their own ways According to the Language of this Philosophy we must not say that 't is Nature that fills us with good nor that it is God and Nature together But that it is God alone speaking thus without Ambiguity for fear of deceiving the Ignorant For we must distinctly acknowledge one cause of our happiness if we we make it the only Object of our Love 'T is likewise an undeniable Truth That we ought to fear things that are able to harm us and to fear them in Proportion to the Evil they can do us But this Philosophy teaches us that God only can do us evil that 't is he as says Isaiah who forms the Light and creates Darkness who makes Peace and creates Evil and there is no Evil but what he does as says the Prophet Amos. Therefore it is he only that is to be fear'd We must not fear either Plague or War or Famine or our Enemies or even Devils themselves But God alone We ought to shun the Sword when we see a Blow a coming we are to fly the Fire and avoid a ruinous House that 's ready to crush us but we must not fear these things We may fly from those Bodies which are the Occasional or Natural Causes of Evil but we must fear God as the true Cause of all the misfortunes of Sinners and hate only Sin which necessarily provokes the cause of our Happiness to become the Cause of our Misery In a Word all the Motions of our Mind must center upon God since he alone 's above it and the Motions of our Body may relate to the Bodies round it This is what we learn from that Philosophy that admits not the Efficacy of Second Causes But this Efficacy being suppos'd I cannot see but we have reason to fear and Love Bodies and that to regulate our Love by Reason we need but prefer God before all things the First and Vniversal to every Second and Particular Cause We can see no need of Loving him with all our Strength Ex totâ mente ex toto corde ex totâ animâ ex totis viribus as says the Scripture Yet when a Man contents himself in preferring God to all things and adoring him with a Worship and a Love of Preference without making a continual Effort to Love and Honour him in all things It often fortunes that he deceives himself that his Charity vanishes and is lost And that he is more taken up with sensible than the supream Good For should it be demanded of the greatest Sinners and even Idolaters whether they preferr'd the universal to particular Causes they would make no scruple to answer amidst their Debauches Errours and Extravagance that they are not wanting to their essential Duty and that they are very sensible of what they owe to God 'T is acknowledg'd that they are deceiv'd But take away the Efficacy of Second Causes and they have no probable Pretext left to justifie their Conduct and Behaviour whilst if it be granted them they will think and Discourse with themselves in the following manner when blinded by their Passions and attentive to the Testimony of their Senses I am made for Happiness Neitheir can I nor indeed ought I to supersede my Love and Respect for whatever can be the Cause of my Felicity Why then must not I Love and respect sensible Objects if they be the true Causes of the Happiness I find in their Enjoyment I acknowledge the Sovereign Being as only worthy of Sovereign Worship and I prefer Him before all the World But since I see not that He requires any thing from me I enjoy the Goods he affords by Means of Second Causes to which he has subjected me And I pay not my Gratitude to him which perhaps would be to his Dishonour As he gives me no Blessing immediately and by himself or at least without the Assistance of his Creatures 't is a Sign he requires not the immediate Application of my Mind and Heart at least that he desires the Creatures should partake with him in the Acknowledgments and Resentments of my Heart and Mind Seeing he has communicated Part of his Power and Glory to the Sun has environ'd him with Splendour and Majesty and has given him the Supremacy in all his Works and seeing from the Influence of this great Luminary we receive all the necessary Blessings of Life Why should we not employ a part of this indebted Life in rejoicing in his Light and testifying the Sense we have of his Greatness and his Benefits Wou'd it not be the most shameful Ingratitude to receive from that excellent Creature abundance of all things and yet to shew no Sense of Gratitude to him for them And should we not be unspeakably blind and stupid to be unmov'd with Fear and Veneration in Respect of him whose Absence freezes us to Death and whose too near Approach can burn and destroy us I say it again that God is preferable to all things and infinitely more estimable than his Creatures But we are to fear and Love
proceed from their feeling an Uneasiness and Regret to retire into themselves there to discover their Weaknesses and Infirmities and their being pleas'd with Curious Enquiries and gayer sort of Sciences Being always Abroad they are insensible of the Disorders that happen at Home within themselves They think all 's right because there 's a Stupor on their Soul and find fault with those who knowing their Distemper betake to Remedies saying they make themselves sick because they try for Cure But these Great Genius's who pierce into the most Mysterious Secrets of Nature who lift themselves in Opinion as high as Heaven and descend to the bottom of the Abyss ought to remember what they are These great Objects it may be do but dazle them The Mind must needs depart out of it self to compass so many things and this it can't do without scattering its Force Men came not into the World to be Astronomers or Chymists to spend their whole Life at the end of a Telescope or labouring at a Furnace to deduce trifling Consequences from their painful Observations Grant that an Astronomer made the first Discoveries of Continent and Sea and Mountains in the Moon that he first observ'd the Spots that circuit upon the Sun and that he had exactly calculated their Motions Suppose that a Chymist had found out at length the Secret of fixing Mercury or of making the Alkaest wherewith Van-helmont boasted to dissolve all Bodies What are they the wiser or happier for all this It perhaps has set them up in Reputation with the World but if they would reflect upon it they would find that Reputation did but increase their Bondage Astronomy Chymistry and most of the other Sciences may be look'd on as proper Divertisements for a Gentleman But Men should never be enamour'd with their Gayety not prefer them before the Science of Humane Nature For though the Imagination fixes a certain Idea of Greatness to Astronomy by reason of its considering Great and Glorious Objects and seated infinitely above all other things the Mind is not blindly to prostrate it self to that Idea but sit its Master and its Judge and strip it of that Sensible Pomp which amazes Reason The Mind must pronounce of all things according to its Internal Light without hearkening to the false and confus'd Verdict of its Senses and Imagination and whilst it examines all Humane Sciences by the Pure Light of Truth which enlightens it we doubt not to affirm it will disesteem most of them and set a greater Price on that which teaches us to know our selves than on all the other put together Therefore we choose rather to advise such as wish well to Truth to judge of the Subject of this Treatise by the Responses they shall receive from the Sovereign Instructor of all Men after having interrogated him by some Serious Reflexions than to forestall them with a long anticipating Discourse which perhaps they might look on as Common-place Matter or the Vain Ornaments of a Preface If they are persuaded this is a Subject worthy their Study and Application we desire them once more not to judge of the Things contain'd in it by the good or ill Manner they are express'd in but still to retire into themselves and there to hear the Decisions they are to follow and to judge by Being thus fully persuaded that Men cannot teach one another and that those who hear us learn not the Truths we speak to their Ears unless at the same time He who taught them us manifest them likewise to their Mind We think our selves farther oblig'd to advertise the Readers that would profit by this not to credit us on our Word out of any Inclination and Good-liking nor withstand our Sentiments out of Prejudice or Aversion For though we think nothing be therein advanc'd but what we learn'd at the Expence of Meditation we should however be very sorry that others should be contented with the Remembrance and Belief without the Knowledge of our Notions and fall into Errour for want of Understanding us or because we have Err'd before them That presumptuous Pride of some of the Learned who demand our Belief upon their Word seems intolerable They are angry with us for Interrogating GOD when once they have spoke to us because they Interrogate Him not themselves They grow warm upon every Opposition to their Opinions requiring an absolute Preference should be given to the Mists and Darkness of their Imagination before the Pure Light of Truth which illuminates the Mind We are Thanks to GOD very remote from this way of proceeding though it be often charg'd upon us We demand indeed a Resignation to Matters of Fact and the Experiments we produce because there are things not learn'd by the Applying the Mind to Sovereign and Universal Reason But as to Truths discoverable in the True Ideas of things which the Eternal Wisdom suggests to us in our most inward and secret Reason herein we expresly caution against resting upon what we have thought of them as judging it no small Crime thus to equalize our selves with GOD by usurping a Power over the Minds of Men. The chief Reason why we are so earnestly desirous that those who read this Work bring all possible Application along with them is that we are willing to be reprehended for the Faults we have been guilty of For we pretend not to be Infallible We have so strict an Union with and so strong a Dependence on our Body that we are justly apprehensive lest we have sometimes mistaken the confus'd Noise wherewith it fills the Imagination for the Pure Voice of Truth which speaks to the Understanding Were it GOD only who spoke and did we judge only according to what we heard we might perhaps say in the words of our LORD As I hear I judge and my Judgment is just But we have a Body that speaks lowder than GOD Himself but never speaks the Truth We have Self-love which corrupts the Words of GOD which are all Truth and we have Pride which emboldens us to judge without staying for the Words of Truth which ought to be the Rule of all our Judgments For the principal Cause of our Errours is that our Judgments reach farther than our Pure Intellectual Perceptions Wherefore I intreat those to whom GOD shall discover my Wandrings to put me in the Right Way that so this Treatise which I offer as an Essay whose Subject is well worthy the Application of Men may by degrees arrive to its Perfection This Undertaking was at first ettempted only with design of instructing my self But some Persons being of Opinion it might be of use if publish'd I the willinger submitted to their Reasons because one of the principal so well suited with the desire I had of advantaging my self The best means said they of being inform'd in any Matter is to communicate our Opinions about it to the Learned This quickens our own Attention as well as provokes theirs Sometimes they have
entire Tulip We see in the Cicatricle of a new-laid Egg and which had never been brooded a Chicken which is possibly compleatly form'd We see Frogs in the Eggs of Frogs and we shall see other Animals still in their Cicatricles when we have Art and Experience enough to discover them But 't is not for the Mind to stand still when the Eyes can go no farther For the view of the Soul is of a greater compass than the sight of the Body Besides this therefore we ought to think That all the Bodies of Men and of Beasts which should be born or produc'd till the End of the World were possibly created from the Beginning of it I would say That the Females of the Original Creatures were for ought we know created together with all those of the same Species which have been or shall be begotten or procreated whilst the World stands We might push this Thought much farther yet and it may be with a great deal of Reason and Truth But we have just cause to fear lest we should be too desirous of penetrating too far into the Works of GOD We see nothing but Infinities round about us And not only our Senses and our Imagination are too limited to comprehend them but the Mind it self however pure and disengag'd from Matter is too gross as well as too feeble to pierce into the least of the Works of the Almighty 'T is lost 't is dissipated 't is dazled and amazed at the view of that which according to the Language of the Senses is call'd an Atom Notwithstanding the Pure Intellect has this advantage above the Imagination of the Senses that it acknowledges its own Weakness and the Almightiness of GOD Whereas our Imagination and our Senses bring down the works of GOD and audaciously set themselves above them and so throw us headlong and blind-fold into Error For our Eyes furnish us not with the Idea's of any of those things we discover by Microscopes and our Reason We perceive not by our Sight any less Body than an Hand-worm or a Mite The half of a Hand-worm is nothing if we rely on the Report of our Eyes A Mite is a Mathematical point in their account which you can't divide but you must annihilate Our Sight then does not represent Extension to us as it is in it self but as it is in Relation to our Body And because the half of a Mite has no considerable relation to our Body and has no influence either towards the Preservation or Destruction of it therefore our Eyes entirely conceal it from Us. But if we had Eyes made after the manner of Microscopes or rather if we were as little as Hand-worms and Mites we should judge of the Magnitude of Bodies in a far different manner For without doubt these little Animals have their Eyes so dispos'd as to see the Bodies that surround them and their own Bodies far greater than we see them for otherwise they could not receive such impressions as were necessary to the Preservation of Life and so the Eyes they have would be altogether useless But that we may throughly explain these things we must consider that our Eyes are in effect only Natural Spectacles that their humours have the same way of Operating as the Glasses in the Spectacles and that according to the figure of the Crystalline and its distance from the Retina we see Objects very differently insomuch that we cannot be assur'd there are two Men in the World that see Bodies of the self-same bigness since we cannot be assur'd there are two Men's Eyes altogether made alike 'T is a Proposition that ought to be imbrac'd by all those who concern themselves with Opticks That Objects which appear equally distant are seen so much bigger as the figure which is delineated in the fund of the Eye is bigger Now it is certain that in the Eyes of those Persons whose Crystalline is more convex the Images are painted lesser in proportion to the convexity Those then who are short-sighted having their Crystalline more convex see the Objects lesser than those whose Crystalline is of the common standard or than old People who want Spectacles to read with but see perfectly well at a distance since those whose Sight is short must necessarily have the Crystalline more convex on supposition their Eyes as to the other parts are equal 'T were the easiest thing in Nature to demonstrate all these things Geometrically and were they not of the number of those which are very well known I would insist longer upon them to make them evident But because several have already handled this Subject I desire such as are willing to be instructed therein to turn to them and consult them Since it is not manifest that there are two Men in the World who see Objects in the same bulk and magnitude and generally the same Man sees them bigger with his left Eye than his right according to the Observations which have been made and are related in the Journal of the Learned from Rome in January 1669 it is plain we ought not to build upon the Testimony of our Eyes so as to pass our judgment from it It is much better to attend to Reason which proves to us That we are unable to determine what is the absolute Magnitude of Bodies which encompass us or what Idea we ought to have of the Extension of a Foot-square or of that of our own Body so as that Idea may represent it to us as it is For we learn from Reason that the least of all Bodies would be no longer little if it were alone since it is compounded of an infinite number of parts out of each of which GOD could frame an Earth which yet would be but a single Point in comparison of the rest in conjunction Thus the Mind of Man is incapable of forming an Idea great enough to comprehend and embrace the least Extension in the World since the Mind has bounds but that Idea should be infinite It is true The Mind may come very near the Knowledge of the Relations these infinites have to one another which constitute the World it may know for instance one of them to be double to another and that a Fathom is the measure of six Foot Yet for all this it cannot form an Idea to it self that can represent these things as they are in their own Nature Well but let it be suppos'd that the Mind is capable of Idea's which equal or which measure the Extension of Bodies which we see for it would be a difficult undertaking to convince Men of the contrary Let us see what may be concluded from the Supposition Doubtless this will be the Conclusion That GOD does not deceive us That he has not given us Eyes like Glasses to magnifie or diminish the Object and therefore we ought to believe that our Eyes represent things as really they are 'T is true GOD never deceives us but we often deceive our selves by
will about them They have no Relish of Tasts unless some change happens in the disposition of the Fibres of their Tongue and Brain In short the Sensations have no manner of Dependence upon the Will of Men And 't is only he that created Men that still preserves them in that mutual correspondence of the Modifications of their Soul to those of their Body So that if a Man would have me represent to him Heat or Colour I cannot make use of words to do it But I must impress in the Organs of his Senses such Motions as Nature has affixt these Sensations to I must bring him to the Fire and shew him a piece of Painting And this is the reason why 't is impossible to give Men that are born Blind the least Knowledge of that which we understand by Red Green Yellow or the like For since 't is impossible for a Man to make another understand him when he that hears has not the same Idea's as he that speaks it is manifest that since Colours are neither conjoyn'd to the sound of words nor to the Motion of the Auditory but to that of the Optick Nerve we can never represent them to Men that are Blind since their Optick Nerve cannot be Vibrated by colour'd Objects We have therefore some sort of Knowledge of our Sensations Let us now see how it comes to pass that we are still casting about to know them and that we believe our selves destitute of any Knowledge of them The reason of it undoubtedly is this The Soul since the Original Sin is now as it were Corporeal in her Inclination the Love she has for sensible Objects is perpetually lessening the Union or the Relation she has with those that are intellectual She is disgusted and uneasy in conceiving things that will not enter by the Senses and is presently for leaving the Consideration of them She imploys her utmost endeavour to produce the Images that represent them in her Brain and she is so throughly inur'd to this kind of Conception from our Infancy that she thinks that she can have no Knowledge of what she can have no Imagination Notwithstanding there are a great many things which being not Corporeal cannot be represented to the Mind by Corporeal Images as to instance our Soul with all her Modifications At what time therefore our Soul would represent to her self her own Nature and her own Sensations she endeavours to form a Corporeal Image thereof She is in search of her self amongst all Corporeal Beings One while she takes her self for one Thing and another while for Another sometimes for Air sometimes for Fire or for the Harmony of the parts of her own Body And being thus desirous of finding her self among the mass of Bodies and of imagining her own Modifications which are her Sensations as the Modifications of Bodies we need not wonder if she 's bewildred in her wandrings and is misguided out of the Knowledge of her self That which induces the Soul to be still more fond of Imagining her Sensations is her judging them to be in the Objects And moreover that they are the Modifications of them and consequently that they are something Corporeal and fit to be Imagin'd She judges then that the Nature of her Sensations consists only in the motion which produces them or in some other Modification of a Body which is manifestly different from what she feels this being nothing Corporeal nor possible to be represented by Corporeal Images This is what confounds her and makes her believe she is altogether ignorant of her own Sensations As for those who make none of these fruitless Attempts to represent the Soul and its Modifications by Corporeal Images and yet are desirous of having their Sensations explain'd to them they must understand that neither the Soul nor its Modifications can be known by Idea's taking the word Idea in its most proper signification as I have determin'd and explain'd it in the third Book but only by Conscience or Internal Sensation So that when they ask us to explain the Soul and her Modifications by any Idea's they demand what is impossible for all the Men in the World put together to give them Because Men cannot instruct us by giving us Idea's of things but only by making us attentive to those we have already The second Error whereinto we fall about our Sensations is the attributing them to Objects which has been explain'd in the XI and XII Chapters The third is our judging that all Mankind have the same Sensations of the same Objects We believe for example that all the World sees the Sky Azure the Meadows Green and all visible Objects in the same manner as we see them and so likewise all the other sensible Qualities of the other Senses There are many who will wonder even that we call in question those things which they believe indubitable However I can certify them they have not any Reason to judge of these things as they do And though I cannot Mathematically demonstrate they are in an Error I can nevertheless demonstrate 't is the greatest chance in the World if they are not And I have Arguments strong enough to convince them they are certainly deceiv'd That the Truth of what I here advance may be here acknowledg'd we must call to mind what has been already prov'd namely That there is a vast difference betwixt our Sensations and the causes of our Sensations We may conclude from thence that absolutely speaking it is possible for similar Motions of the Internal Fibres of the Optick Nerves to produce in different Persons different Sensations that is to cause them to see different Colours And it may so fall out that a Motion which shall produce in one Person the Sensation of Blew shall cause the Sensation of Green or Gray in another or perhaps a new Sensation which never any man had besides It is certain I say that this is possible and there is no reason in the World that can prove the contrary However we will grant that it is not probable it should be so It is much more reasonable to believe that GOD acts always uniformly in the Union he has establish'd betwixt our Souls and our Bodies and that he has affixt the same Idea's and the same Sensation to similar Motions of the Internal Fibres of the Brain of different Persons Let it be granted then that the same Motions of the Fibres which terminate in the middle of the Brain are accompany'd with the same Sensations in all Men if it fortunes that the same Objects produce not the same Motions in their Brain they will not by consequence excite the same Sensations in their Soul Now to me it seems indisputable that the Organs of the Senses of all Men being not dispos'd in the same manner cannot receive the same Impressions from the same Objects The blows for instance that Porters give one another by way of Complement would cripple some sort of People The
same blow produces very different motions and consequently excites very different Sensations in a Man of a Robust Constitution and in a Child or a Woman of a tender make Thus since we cannot be ascertain'd that there are two Persons in the World who have the Organs of their Senses exactly match'd we cannot be assur'd there are two Persons in the World who have altogether the same Sensations of the same Objects This is the Original cause of the strange Variety which is found in the Inclinations of Men. Some there are who are extremely pleas'd with Musick others find nothing agreeable in it And even between these who delight in it some one sort of Musick some another according to that almost Infinite Diversity which is found in the Fibres of the Auditory Nerve in the Blood and the Animal Spirits How great for instance is the difference between the Musick of Italy of France of the Chinese and other People and consequently between the Relish these different People have of these different sorts of Musick It is usual likewise for the same Men at several times to receive different Impressions from the same Consorts For if the Imagination be well warm'd by a great plenty of brisk and active Spirits a Man is much more pleas'd with a bolder Hand or a Voluntarie wherein there are many Discords than with a softer Musick that is compos'd with exacter Rules and a Mathematical Niceness Experience proves this and 't is easie to give a Reason for it 'T is just the same with Smells He that loves an Orange-flower possibly cannot endure a Rose and so on the contrary As for Tasts there is no less a Diversity in them than in the other Sensations Sawces must be made wholly different equally to please different Men or equally to please the same Person at different times One loves Sweet another Sowre One loves the Taste of Wine another abhors it the same Person who thinks it pleasant when he 's in Health finds it bitter in a Fever and so 't is with the other Senses And yet all Men are fond of Pleasure they all delight in agreeable Sensations And in this have all the same Inclinations They receive not therefore the same Sensations from the same Objects since they do not love them equally alike Thus that which makes one Man say he likes sweet things is the agreeable Sensation he has of them and that which makes another say he does not love sweet things is indeed because he has a different Sensation from him that loves them And so in saying he loves not sweet things it is not imply'd that he would not have the same Sensation as the other but only that he has it not Wherefore 't is an Impropriety of Speech for a Man to say he loves not what is Sweet he should say he loves not Sugar or Honey or the like which to others seem sweet and agreeable and that he has not the same Taste as others because the Fibres of his Tongue are differently dispos'd But to give a sensible Instance Let us suppose that among twenty Men there were some one of them whose Hands were Cold and that he was unacquainted with the words they make use of in England to explain the Sensation of Heat and Cold by and on the contrary that the Hands of all the rest were extreamly Hot. If in Winter some Water somewhat frigid should be brought them all to wash in those whose Hands were very Hot washing after each other might very well say This Water is very Cold I can't endure it But when the other whose Hands were extreamly Cold came to wash at last he might say on the contrary I can't imagine Gentlemen why ye like not the Cold Water for my part I take pleasure in feeling it Cold and washing in it It is manifest in this particular instance That the last in saying he lov'd the Cold could mean nothing else but that he lov'd the Heat and that he felt the Water Hot whilst others felt the contrary Thus when a Man says I love what is bitter and can't endure sweets no more is meant thereby than that he has not the same Sensations as those who say they love sweets and have an aversion to what is bitter It is certain therefore that a Sensation which is agreeable to one Man is so to all others who have the same but the same Objects does not cause the same Sensation in all Men because of the different disposition of the Organs of the Senses which is a thing of greatest consequence to be observ'd both as to Natural and Moral Philosophy To this only one Objection can be made and that very easie to be answer'd which is this It sometimes happens that those very Persons who love extreamly some sorts of Meat at length shall hate them in as great a degree either because in eating they met with some uncleanliness in the Dish which surpriz'd and disgusted them or because they surfeited on them by eating to excess or for several other reasons These Men 't is objected love not the same Sensations as they lov'd before For still though they eat the same Meats yet they find them no longer pleasant and palatable In answering this Objection it must be observ'd that these Men upon eating those Meats to which they have so great an abhorrence and loathing have two very different Sensations at the same time They have that of the Meat which they eat as 't is suppos'd in the Objection And they have yet another Sensation of Distaste or Loathing which proceeds for instance from a strong imagination of some uncleanliness they have formerly seen mingled with what they eat The reason of this is that when two Motions are occasion'd in the Brain at the same time one of them is never excited without the other unless it be some considerable time after Thus because the Agreeable is always accompany'd with the Loathsome Sensation and we usually confound things which happen at the same time we imagine with our selves that this Sensation which was formerly pleasant and agreeable is no longer so And yet if it were always the same it must necessarily be always agreeable Wherefore supposing it to be disagreeable and unpleasant 't is because it is joyn'd and confounded with another Sensation which is more distastful than it is it self agreeable There is much more difficulty to prove that Colours and such other Sensations which I term'd the Faint and Languid are not the same in all Mankind Because all these Sensations affect the Soul so weakly that a Man cannot distinguish as he may in Tasts or other more powerful and lively Sensations whether one is more agreeable than another nor discover the diversity of Mens Sensations by the variety of Pleasure or Distast which might be found in different Persons Yet Reason which shews that the other Sensations are not all alike in different Persons does likewise shew there must necessarily be variety in
It daily happens that an unexpected Event that has any thing terrible in its circumstances deprives of their Senses Men of a Mature Age whose Brain is not so susceptible of new Impressions who are experienc'd in the World who can make a Defence or at least are capable of taking up some Resolution Children at their first Arrival in the World suffer something from every Object that strikes upon their Senses wherewith they are not yet acquainted All the Animals they see are Creatures of a new Species on their Regard since nothing of what they see at present was ever seen by them before They are destitute of Strength and void of Experience the Fibres of their Brain are of a most fine and flexible temper How then is it possible their Imagination should continue whole when expos'd to the Impressions of so many different Objects 'T is true the Mothers have somewhat pre-accustomed their Children to the Impressions of Objects by having already imprinted them in the Fibres of their Brain before they left the Womb and this is the reason they receive much less damage when they behold with their own Eyes what they in some manner have perceived already with their Mother's 'T is farther true that these adulterate Traces and wounds their Imagination receives upon the sight of so many Objects to them frightful and terrible close up and heal again in time for as much as being unnatural the whole Body is against them and all the parts conspire to their Destruction as has been seen in the preceding Chapter And this is the cause that all Men in general are not Fools from their Cradles But this hinders not but that there may be ever some Traces so strong and deep impress'd as can never be effac'd but will remain as long as Life it self If Men would make serious Reflections upon what happens in their own Breast and contemplate their own Thoughts they would not want an Experimental Proof of what I have said They would generally discover in themselves some secret Inclinations and Aversions which are not in others whereof there seems no other Reason to be given than these Traces of our Infancy For since the causes of these Inclinations and Aversions are peculiar to us they have no foundation in the Nature of Men and since they are unknown to us they must needs have acted on us at a time when our Memory was not yet capable of registring the circumstances of things which might have assisted us in calling them again to Mind and that time could be only that of our tenderest Age. Monsieur Des-Cartes has acquainted us in one of his Epistles that he had always a particular fancy for all Squint-ey'd People and having diligently search'd into the Cause of it at length understood this Defect was incident to a young Maid he lov'd when he was a Child the Affection he retained for her diffusing it self to all others that any way resembled her But 't is not these little irregularities of our Inclinations which subject us most to Error 'T is our having universally or almost universally our Mind adulterate in something or other and our being generally subject to some kind of Folly though perhaps we are not aware of it Let a Man but examine carefully the Temper of those People he converses with and he will easily be perswaded into this Opinion and though himself be an Original for others to Copy after and be look'd upon as such yet he will find all others to be Originals too and all the difference to consist in the Degree of more or less Now one of the Causes of the different Characters of Mens Minds is doubtless the difference of Impressions received by them in their Mother's Womb as has been manifested touching peculiar and unusual Inclinations because these being Species of Folly that are settled and permanent for the most part they cannot have their Dependence on the Constitution of the Animal Spirits which is of a flux and alterable Nature And consequently they must needs proceed from the Base and Spurious Impressions made in the Fibres of the Brain at such time as our Memory was incapable of preserving the Remembrance of them that is in the beginning of our Lives Here then is one of the commonest Causes of the Errors of Mankind I mean that Subversion of their Brain caused by the Impression of External Objects in making their Entrance into the World and this Cause does not so suddenly cease as may be possibly imagined The ordinary Commerce Children are oblig'd to have with their Nurses or even with their Mothers that frequently have had no Education puts the last hand and gives the finishing stroke to the corruption of their Mind These silly Women entertain them with nothing but Fooleries with ridiculous Tales and frightful Stories Their whole Discourse to them is about things sensible and they deliver it in a way most proper to confirm them in the false Judgments of their Senses In a word they sow in their Minds the Seeds of all the Follies and Weaknesses themselves are subject to as of their extravagant Fears and Apprehensions their ridiculous Superstitions and other the like Feeblesses of Mind Which is the Reason that not being accustomed to search for Truth nor to taste and relish it they at last become incapable of discerning it and of making any use of their Reason Hence they become timerous and low-spirited which Temper for a long time sticks by them For there are many to be seen who when fifteen or twenty Years old retain the Character and Spirit of their Nurse 'T is true Children seem not to be greatly qualified for the Contemplation of Truth and for abstract and sublime Sciences because the Fibres of their Brain being extreamly fine are most easily agitated by Objects even the most weak and least sensible that can be and their Soul necessarily admitting Sensations proportioned to the Agitation of these Fibres leaves Metaphysical Nations and pure Intellection to apply her self wholly to her Sensations And thus Children seem improper for and incapable of an attentive Application to the pure Idea's of Truth being so frequently and so easily drawn off by the confus'd Idea's of their Senses Yet in Answer to this it may be said First that 't is easier for a Child of seven Years old to be freed from the Errors his Senses lead him to than for a Man at sixty who all his Life long has been mis-guided by the prejudices of Childhood Secondly that a Child though incapable of the clear and distinct Idea's of Truth is at least capable of being admonish'd that his Senses deceive him upon all occasions and if he cannot be taught the Truth he should not however be encouraged and fortified in his Errors Lastly the youngest Children though never so taken up with Pleasant and Painful Sensations yet learn in little time what Persons more advanc'd in Years cannot in much longer as the Knowledge of the Order and Relations
great Precipice which a Man sees under him and from which there is danger of falling or the Traces of some bulky Body imminent over his Head and ready to fall and crush him is naturally Connected with that which represents Death and with a Commotion of the Spirits which disposes him to flight or the desire of flying it This Connection admits no alteration because 't is necessary it should always be the same and it consists in a disposition of the Fibres of the Brain which we bring with us into the World All the Connections which are not Natural may and ought to break because the different Circumstances of times and places ought to change to the end they may be useful to the Preservation of Life 'T is convenient the Partridge for instance should fly the Sports-man with his Gun at the season and the places of his pursuing the Game But there 's no necessity it should fly him in other places or at other times Thus 't is necessary all Animals for their Preservation should have certain Connections of Traces easily made and easily broken and that they should have others very difficult to be sever'd and lastly others incapable of Dissolution 'T is of very great use to make diligent enquiry into the different Effects these different Connections are able to produce For there are Effects which as they are very numerous so they are no less important to the Knowledge of Man and all things relating to him We shall see hereafter that these things are the principal Causes of our Errors But 't is time to return to the Subject we have promis'd to Discourse on and to explain the different Changes which happen to the Imagination of Men by reason of their different ways and purposes of Life CHAP. IV. I. That Men of Learning are the most subject to Error II. The Causes why Men had rather be guided by Authority than make use of their own Reason THE Differences observable in Men as to their Ways and Purposes of Life are almost infinite Their different Conditions different Employments different Posts and Offices and different Communities are innumerable These Differences are the Reason of Men's acting upon quite different Designs and Reasoning upon different Principles Even in the same Community wherein there should be but one Character of Mind and all the same Designs you shall rarely meet with several Persons whose Aims and Views are not different Their various Employments and their many Adhesions necessarily diversifie the Method and Manner they would take to accomplish those various things wherein they agree Whereby 't is manifest that it would be an impossible Undertaking to go about to explain in particular the Moral Causes of Error nor would it turn to any great Account should we do it in this place I design therefore only to speak of those Ways of Living that lead us into great multitudes of Errors and Errors of most dangerous Importance When these shall be explain'd we shall have open'd the way for the Mind to proceed farther and every one may discover at a single View and with the greatest ease imaginable the most hidden Causes of many particular Errors the Explication whereof would cost a world of Pains and Trouble When once the Mind sees clearly it delights to run to Truth and it runs to it with an inexpressible swiftness The Imployment that seems most necessary to be treated of at present by Reason of its producing most considerable Changes in the Imagination of Men and its conducting them into Errors most is that of Men of Books and Learning who make greater use of their Memory than Thought For Experience has ever manifested that those who have applied themselves the most fervently to the Reading of Books and to the Search of Truth are the Men that have led us into a very great part of our Errors 'T is much the same with those that Study as with those that Travel When a Traveller has unfortunately mistaken his way the farther he goes at the greater distance he is from his Journey 's end and he stâ—ll deviates so much more as he is industrious and in haste to arrive at the place design'd So the vehement pursuits Men make after Truth cause them to betake themselves to the Reading of Books wherein they think to find it or put them upon framing some Phantastical System of the things they desire to know wherewith when their Heads are full and heated they try by some fruitless Sallies and Attempts of Thought to recommend them to the taste of others with hopes to receive the Honours that are usually pay'd to the first Founders of Systems These two Imperfections are now to be consider'd 'T is not easie to be understood how it comes to pass that Men of Wit and Parts choose rather to trust to the Conduct of other Men's Understanding in the Search of Truth than to their own which GOD has given them There is doubtless infinitely more Pleasure as well as Honour to be conducted by a Man 's own Eyes than those of others And a Man who has good Eyes in his Head will never think of shutting them or plucking them out under the hopes of having a Guide And yet the use of the Understanding is to the use of the Eyes as the Understanding is to the Eyes and as the Understanding is infinitely superiour to the Eyes so the use of the Understanding is accompany'd with more solid Satisfactions and gives another sort of Content than Light and Colours give the Sight Notwithstanding Men employ their Eyes in Guiding and Conducting themselves but rarely make use of their Reason in Discovery of Truth But there are many Causes which contribute to this overthrow of Reason First Men's Natural Carelessness and Oscitation that will not let them be at the Pains of Thinking Secondly Their Incapacity to Meditate which they have contracted for want of applying themselves to it from their Youth as has been explain'd in the Ninth Chapter Thirdly The inconcernedness and little Love they have for Abstract Truths which are the Foundation of all that can be known in this World The Fourth Reason is the Satisfaction which accrues from the knowledge of Probabilities which are very agreeable and extreamly moving as being founded upon sensible Notions The Fifth Cause is that ridiculous Vanity which makes us affect the seeming Learned For those go by the Name of Learned who have read most Books The Knowledge of Opinions is of greater use in Conversation and serves better to catch the Admiration of the Vulgar than the Knowledge of True Philosophy which is learned by Meditation In the sixth place we may reckon that unreasonable Fancy which supposes the Ancients were more enlightned than we can be and that there is nothing left for us but what they have succeeded in The Seventh is a Disingenuous Respect mix'd with an absurd Curiosity which makes Men admire things that are most Remote and Ancient such as are far fetch'd or
dispositio cùm in uno homine reperitur dignus est esse Divinus magìs quam humanus And in other places he still bestows more pompous and magnificent praises on him As Lib. 1. de Generatione Animalium Laudemus Deum qui separavit hunc virum ab aliis in perfectione appropriavitque ei ultimam dignitatem humanam quam non omnis homo potest in quacunque aetate attingere The same he says of him Lib. 1. Dest Disp. 3. Aristotelis doctrina est SVMMA VERITAS quoniam ejus intellectus fuit finis humani intellectûs quare bené dicitur de illo quód ipse fuit creatus datus nobis Divinâ providentiâ ut non ignoremus possâ—bilia sciri Must not a Man be mad in good earnest that will talk at this rate And must not his Bigottry for this Author be degenerated into Extravagance and Folly Aristotle 's Doctrine is the SOVEREIGN TRUTH 'T is impossible for any man to equal him or come near him in Science This is the Man that was sent us from Heaven to teach us all that is possible to be known This is he upon whom all the wise Men are form'd and they are so much more learn'd as they better understand him As he says in another place Aristoteles fuit Princeps per quem perficiuntur omnes Sapientes qui fuerunt post eum licèt differant inter se in intelligendo verba ejus in eo quod sequitur ex eis And yet the Works of this Commentator have been dispersed over all Europe and into Countries farther remote They have been translated out of Arabick into Hebrew out of Hebrew into Latin and it may be into many other Languages Which Manifestly shews what Esteem the Learned have had for them So that a more sensible instance than this cannot be given of the Prepossession of Men of Study For it evidently shews that they are not only Opinionated with an Author themselves but also communicate their Bigottry to others proportionably to the Esteem the World conceives of them And thus these false Praises Commentators load him with are often the cause that Men of no very brightned Parts who betake themselves to the Reading of them are prepossessed and thereby led into infinite Error See here another instance A Man renowned among the Learned who Founded the Geometry and Astronomy Lectures in the Vniversity of Oxford begins a Book which he wrote upon the Eight first Propositions of Euclid with these Words Consilium meum est Auditores si vires valetudo suffecerint explicare Definitiones Petitiones communes Sententias octo priores Propositiones primi libri Elementorum caetera post me venientibus relinquere And he concludes with these words Exolvi per Dei gratiam Domini Auditores promissum liberavi fidem meam explicavi pro modulo meo Definitiones Petitiones communes Sententias octo priores Propositiones Elementorum Euclidis Hîc annis fessus cyclos artemque repono Succedent in hoc munus alii fortasse magis vegeto corpore vivido ingenio c. A Man of a competent Sense would not require more than an hour's time to learn of himself or with the help of the meanest Geometrician the Definitions Postulates Axioms and the Eight first Propositions of Euclid they have very little need of any Explication and yet here is an Author that talks of his Enterprize as of some very difficult and mighty Undertaking He is apprehensive least his strenth should fail him Si vires valetudo suffecerint He leaves the Prosecution of them to his Successors Caetera post me venientibus relinquere He thanks GOD for having through his particular Mercy accomplish'd and made good what he promis'd Exolvi per Dei gratiam promissum liberavi fidem meam Explicavi pro modulo meo What the Quadrature of the Circle the Duplication of the Cube This Great Man has explain'd pro modulo suo the Definitions Postulates Axioms and the Eight first Propositions of the first Book of Euclid ' s Elementâ— Possibly amongst those who shall succeed him there may some be found of a stronger and healthier Constitution than himself to carry on so great a Work Succedent in hoc munus alii FORTASSE magis vegeto corpore vivido ingenio But as for his part he has done enough to sit down and rest Hêc annis fessus cyclos artémque reponit Euclid never thought of being so obscure or of saying such extraordinary things when he compos'd his Elements as should necessarily demand a Book of near three hundred pages to explain his Definitions Axioms Postulates and Eight first Propositions But this Learned Englishman knew how to enhance the Science of Euclid and if Age would have permitted him and he had but continued in the same Vigour we should at present have had a dozen or fifteen mighty Volumes upon Euclid's Elements only which doubtless would have been very beneficial to Novice Pretenders to Geometry and had made much for the Honour of Euclid See what whimsical designs a falsly term'd Learning can put Men upon This Gentleman was vers'd in the Greek Tongue for we are oblig'd to him for a Greek Edition of St. Chrysostom's Works He possibly had read the Ancient Geometricians He could give an Historical Account of their Propositions no less than their Descent and Genealogy He had all the respect for Antiquity that ought to be had for Truth and what is it such a Disposition of Mind produces A Commentary upon the Definitions of Terms the Demands Axioms and the Eight first Propositions of Euclid much harder to be understood and remembred I do not say than the Propositions he commented on but than all that ever Euclid wrote on Geometry There are many Men that out of Vanity talk in Greek and even sometimes in a strange Language they don't themselves understand For Dictionaries no less than Indices and Common Places are very great helps to some sorts of Authors But there are very few of Prudence enough to keep in their Greek upon a Subject where it is needless and impertinent to make use of it And this makes me believe it was Prepossession and an inordinate Esteem for Euclid that form'd in our Author's Imagination the first Design of his Book If this Gentleman had made as much use of his Reason as his Memory in a Matter where Reason should have only been imploy'd or if he had had as great a Respect and Love for Truth as Veneration for the Author he went to expound there is great Probability that having mispent so much time upon so frivolous a Subject he would have acknowledg'd Euclid's Definitions of a Plane Angle and Parallel Lines to be Vicious and Defective and inexpressive of the Nature of them and that the Second Proposition is impertinent since the Proof of it depends upon the Third Postulate which is harder to be granted than that Second Proposition since in granting that Third Postulate which
Imagination which are the Ingredients of the Fine Wit 'T is the glittering and not the solid Mind that pleases the generality because they love what touches the Senses above that which instructs their Reason And thus taking the Fineness of Imagination for the Fineness of the Mind we may say that Montagne had a Mind Fine and indeed extraordinary His Idea's are false but handsom His Expressions irregular and bold but taking His discourses ill-season'd but well imagin'd There appears throughout his Book the Character of an Original that is infinitely pleasing As great a Copyer as he is the Copyer is not discern'd his strong and bold Imagination giving always the turn of an Original even to what was the most stol'n To conclude he has every thing necessary either for pleasing us or imposing on us And I think I have sufficiently shewn that 't is not by convincing their Reason he gets into the Favour and Admiration of Men but by turning their Mind by an ever-victorious Vivacity of his imperious Imagination CHAP. VI. I. Of Witches in Imagination and of Wolf-men II. The Conclusion of the two first Books THE strangest effect of the force of Imagination is the immoderate Fear of the Apparition of Spirits Witchcraft Spells and Charms Lycanthropes or Wolf-men and generally of whatever is suppos'd to depend on the Power of the Devil There is nothing more terrible or that frightens the Mind more and makes deeper impressions in the Brain than the Idea of an invisible Power intent upon doing us mischief and to which we can make no resistance Whatever Discourses raise that Idea are attended to with dread and curiosity Now Men affecting all that 's extraordinary take a whimsical delight in relating surprizing and prodigious Stories of the Power and Malice of Witches both to the scaring others and themselves And so we need not wonder that Sorcerers and Witches are so common in some Countries where the belief of the Witches-Sabbath is deeply rooted in the Mind Where all the most extravagant Relations of Witchcrafts are listen'd to as Authentic Histories and where Mad-men and Visionists whose Imagination has been distemper'd through the recital of these Stories and the corruption of their Hearts are burnt for real Sorcerers and Witches I know well enough I shall incur the blame of a great many for attributing the most part of Witchcrafts to the power of Imagination as knowing Men love to be scar'd and frightned that they are angry with such as would disabuse them and are like those imaginary sick People who respectfully harken to and punctually execute the orders of Physicians who prognosticate direful accidents to them For Superstitions are not easily either destroy'd or oppos'd without finding a great number of Patrons and Defenders And that Inclination to a blind-fold Belief of all the Dreams and Illusions of Demonographers is produc'd and upheld by the same Cause which makes the Superstitious stiff and untractable as it were easie to demonstrate However this ought not to discourage me from shewing in a few words how I believe such Opinions as these take footing A Shepherd in his Cottage after Supper gives his Wife and Children a Narrative of the adventures of the Witches-Sabbath And having his Imagination moderately warm'd by the Vapours of strong Liquors and fancying he has been often an Assistant at that imaginary Rendezvous fails not to deliver himself in a manner strong and lively His natural Eloquence together with the Disposition his whole Family is in to hearken to a Subject so new and terrible must doubtless produce prodigious Impressions in weak Imaginations nor is it naturally possible but his Wife and Children must be dismay'd must be affected and convinc'd with what they hear him say 'T is an Husband 't is a Father that speaks of what himself has been an Eye-witness and Agent He is belov'd and respected and why should he not be believ'd The Shepherd repeats the same thing one day after another his Wifâ—'s and Children's Imagination receive deeper and deeper Impressions of it by degrees till at last it grows familiar their Fears vanish but Conviction stays behind and at length Curiosity invites them to go to it themselves They anoint themselves and lay them down to sleep This Disposition of Heart gives an additional heat to their Imagination and the Traces the Shepherd had imprinted on their Brain open so as to make them fancy in their sleep all the Motions of the Ceremony he had describ'd to them present and real They wake and ask each other and give a mutual Relation of what they say And thus they strengthen the Traces of their Vision and he who has the strongest Imagination having the best knack at perswading the rest fails not in a few Nights time to Methodize the Imaginary History of the Sabbath Here now are your finish'd Witches of the Shepherd's making and these in their turn will make many others if having a strong and lively Imagination they be not deterr'd by Fear from telling the like Stories There have been known such hearty down-right Witches as made no scruple to confess to every body their going to the Sabbath and who were so throughly convinc'd of it that though several Persons watch'd them and assur'd them they never stirr'd out of their Bed yet have withstood their Testimony and persisted in their own perswasion We all know that when Children hear Tales of Spirits what frights they are put into and that they have not courage to stay without Light and Company Because at that time their Brain receiving not the Impressions of any present Object opens in those Traces that are form'd in it by the Story and that with so much force as frequently to set before their Eyes the Objects represented to them And yet these Stories are not told them as if they were true nor spoken in a manner denoting the Belief of them in the Speaker and sometimes coldly and without the least concern Which may make it less to be admir'd that a Man who believes he has been present at the Witches-Sabbath and consequently affirms it in a serious tone and with a look of assurance should easily convince his respectful Auditory of all the circumstances he describes to them and thereby transmit into their Imagination Impressions like those he was himself abus'd with Men in speaking engrave in our Brain such Impressions as they have themselves When they are deep they speak in a way that makes a deep Impression upon others For they never speak but they make them like themselves in some thing or other Children in their Mother's Womb have only the Perceptions of their Mothers and when brought into the World imagine little more than what their Parents are the cause of even the wisest Men take their Measures rather from the Imagination of others that is from Opinion and Custom than from the Rules of Reason Thus in the places where Witches are burnt we find great numbers of them it being taken for
of Nothing because to the producing an Angel out of a Stone so far as that is possible to be done the Stone must be first Annihilated and afterwards the Angel Created but simply to Create an Angel there needs no Annihilation at all If then the Mind produces its Idea's from the Material Impressions the Brain receives from Objects it does still the same thing or a thing as difficult or even difficulter than if it Created them Since Idea's being Spiritual cannot be produc'd out of Material Images that are in the Brain to which they have no Proportion or Analogy But some will say That an Idea is not a Substance Be it so but still it is a Being and a Being of a Spiritual kind And as it is impossible to make a Square of a Spirit though a Square be not a Substance so 't is impossible to frame a Spiritual Idea out of a Material Substance tho' an Idea were not a Substance But suppose we should allow the Mind of Man to have an absolute Power of Creating and Annihilating the Idea's of things yet after all he would never imploy it to the producing them For as a Painter though never so excellent at his Art could not represent an Animal he had never seen or had no Idea of so that the Picture he was oblig'd to make of it would not be like that unknown Animal so a Man could not form the Idea of an Object unless he knew it before that is unless he had already the Idea of it which has no dependance on his Will But if he has the Idea of it already he knows the Object and 't is needless to form a new one of it 'T is therefore needless to attribute to the Mind of Man the power of producing its Idea's It may perhaps be said that the Mind has general and confus'd Idea's which it does not produce and that those which it produceth are particular more clever and distinct but it all comes to the same thing For as a Painter could not draw the Picture of a particular Man so as to be certify'd he had hit it right unless he had a distinct Idea of him and even unless the Person himself should sit so the Mind that had only the Idea for instance of Being or of an Animal in general could not represent to it self an Horse nor form any very distinct Idea thereof nor be assur'd this Idea perfectly resembled an Horse unless it had a former Idea thereof wherewith to collate this second Now if it had a former it is in vain to form a second And the Question proceeds upon that former Therefore c It is true that whilst we conceive a Square by pure Intellection we may besides imagine it that is perceive it by drawing the Image of it in the Brain But 't is to be observ'd in the first place that we are not the real and principal Cause of that Image but it would take up too much time to explain it And again that the second Idea which accompanies that Image is so far from being more distinct and accurate than the others that on the contrary it owes all its Exactness to its Resemblance with the first which serves to regulate the second For in brief it is not to be believ'd that the Imagination or even the Senses make us a more distinct Representation of Objects than the Pure Intellect but only that they make the Mind more concern'd and applicative For the Idea's of Sense and Imagination are not distinct any farther than they are conformable with those of Pure Intellection The Image of a Square for instance that the Imagination delineates in the Brain is no otherwise just and regular than as it conforms with the Idea of a Square which we have by Pure Intellection 'T is that Idea which regulates the Image 'T is the Mind that conducts the Imagination and obliges it as I may say to look time after time whether the Image painted by it be a Figure of four right and equal Lines whose Angles are exactly right In a word if that which is imagin'd be like that which is conceiv'd After what has been said I suppose no body can doubt but it is an Error in those that affirm the Mind can form the Idea's of Objects since they attribute to the Mind a Power of Creating and even of Creating with Wisdom and Order though it has no Knowledge of what it does a thing utterly inconceivable But the Cause of this their Error is that customary Judgment Men make of one thing 's being the Cause of another when they are found conjoin'd together supposing that the true Cause of this Effect be unknown to them 'T is for this Reason that every one concludes that a Bowl in motion meeting with another is the true and principal Cause of the motion it communicates to it that the Will of the Soul is the true and principal Cause of the motion of the Arm and such like Prejudices as these because it always happens that a Bowl is mov'd when it lies in the way of another that knocks against it and we move our Arms almost as often as we will it and we do not sensibly perceive what else could be the Cause of these Motions But when an Effect is not so constant an attendant on any thing that 's not the Cause of it there are ever very many who believe this thing to be the Cause of the Effect that happens though all Men fall not into this Error A Comet for instance appears and presently after a Prince goes off c. Stones are expos'd to the Moon and are eaten with Worms The Sun is in Conjunction with Mars at the Nativity of a Child and that Child has some Fortune extraordinary This is Argument sufficient to perswade a great many that the Comet the Moon the Conjunction of the Sun with Mars are the Causes of the Effects I have mention'd and of others that are like them And the Reason why all the World is not of the same Opinion is their Observation that the like Effects do not at all times attend these Causes But all Men having commonly Idea's of Objects present to their Mind when they desire it and this happening many times a day very few of them but conclude that the Will which accompanies the Production or rather Presence of Idea's is the true Cause of them because they see nothing at the same time to which they can attribute them And they imagine that Idea's cease to exist when out of the view of the Mind and that they begin to exist again when re-presented to it 'T is upon the same account too that some judge that External Objects send forth Images that resemble them so as has been said in the preceding Chapter For it being impossible to see Objects by themselves or any otherwise than by their Idea's they judge that the Object produces the Idea because when 't is present they see it
as little as possibly it can 'T is upon this account it is easily perswaded that the Essences of things are in Indivisibili and that they are like Numbers as we have said before for that then it requires only one Idea to represent all the Bodies that go under the name of the same Species If you put for example a Glass of Water into an Hogshead of Wine the Philosophers will tell you the Essence of Wine still remains the same and the Water is converted into Wine That as no number can intervene between three and four since a true Unity is indivisible so 't is necessary the Water should be converted into the Essence or Nature of the Wine or that the Wine should lose its own That as all Numbers of Four are perfectly alike so the Essence of Water is exactly the same in all Waters That as the Number Three Essentially differs from the Number Two and cannot have the same Properties so two Bodies differing in Specie differ Essentially and in such wise as they can never have the same Properties which flow from the Essence and such like things as these Whereas if Men consider'd the true Idea's of things any thing attentively they would not be long a discovering that all Bodies being extended their Nature or Essence has nothing in 't like Numbers and that 't is impossible for it to consist in Indivisibili But Men not only suppose Identity Similitude or Proportion in the Nature the Number and essential Differences of Substances but in every thing that comes under their Perception Most Men conclude that all the fix'd Stars are fastned as so many Nails in the mighty Vault of Heaven in an equal distance and convexity from the Earth The Astronomers have for a long time given out that the Planets rowl in exact Circles whereof they have invented a plentiful number as Concentric Excentric Epicycles Deferent and Equant to explain the Phenomena that contradict their Prejudice 'T is true in the last Ages the more Ingenious have corrected the Errors of the Ancients and believe that the Planets describe Ellipses by their Motion But if they would have us believe that these Ellipses are regular as we are easily inclin'd to do because the Mind supposes Regularity where it perceives no Irregularity they fall into an Error so much harder to be corrected as the Observations that can be made upon the Course of the Planets want Exactness and Justness to shew the Irregularity of their Motions which Error nothing but Physicks can remedy as being infinitely less observable than that which occurs in the Systeme of exact Circles But there is one thing of more particular occurrence relating to the Distance and Motion of the Planets which is that the Astronomers not being able to discover an Arithmetical or Geometrical Proportion that being manifestly repugnant to their Observations some of them have imagin'd they observ'd a kind of Proportion which they term Harmonical in their Distances and Motions Hence it was that an Astronomer of this Age in his New Almagistus begins a Section intitul'd De Systemate Mundi Harmonico with these words There is no Man that 's never so little vers'd in Astronomy but must acknowledge a kind of Harmony in the motion and intervals of the Planets if he attentively considers the Order of the Heavens Not that he was of that Opinion for the Observations that have been made gave him sufficiently to understand the extravagance of that imaginary Harmony which has yet been the Admiration of many Authors Ancient and Modern whose Opinions are related and refuted by Father Riccioli It is attributed likewise to Pythagoras and his Followers to have believ'd That the Heavens by their Regular Motions made a wonderful Melody which Men could not hear by reason of their being us'd to it As those says he that dwell near the Cataracts of the Waters of Nile hear not the noise of them But I only bring this particular Opinion of the Harmonical Proportion between the Distances and Motions of the Planets to shew that the Mind is fond of Proportions and that it often imagines them where they are not The Mind also supposes Uniformity in the Duration of things and imagines they are not liable to Change and Instability when it is not as it were forc'd by the Testimonies and report of Sence to judge otherwise All Material things being extended are capable of Division and consequently of Corruption And every one that makes never so little reflection on the Nature of Bodies must sensibly perceive their Corruptibility And yet there have been a multitude of Philosophers who believ'd the Heavens though Material were Incorruptible The Heavens are too remote from our Eyes to discover the Changes which happen in them and there seldom any great enough fall out to be seen upon Earth which has been sufficient warrant to a great many Persons to believe they were really incorruptible What has been a farther confirmation of their Opinion is their attributing to the Contrariety of Qualities the Corruption incident to Sublunary Bodies For having never been in the Heavens to see how things were carried on there they have had no Experience of that contrariety of Qualities being to be found therein which has induc'd them to believe there were actually no such thing And hence have concluded the Heavens were exempt from Corruption upon this Reason That what according to their Notion corrupts Sublunary Bodies is not to be found in the higher Regions of the World 'T is plain that this Arguing has nothing of solidity for we see no Reason why there may not be found some other Cause of Corruption besides that contrariety of Qualities which they imagine nor upon what grounds they can affirm There is neither Heat nor Cold neither Drought nor Moisture in the Heavens that the Sun is not hot nor Saturn cold There is some probability of Reason to say That very hard Stones and Glass and other Bodies of like Nature are not corrupted since we see they subsist a long time in the same Capacity and we are near enough to observe the Changes that should happen to them But while we are at such a Distance from the Heavens as we are it 's absolutely against all Reason to conclude they don't corrupt because we perceive no contrary Qualities in them nor can see them corrupting and yet they don 't only say they don't corrupt but that they are unchangeable and incorruptible And a little more the Peripateticks would maintain That Celestial Bodies were so many Divinities as their Master Aristotle did believe them The Beauty of the Universe consists not in the Incorruptibility of its parts but in the Variety that is found in them and this great Work of the World would have something wanting to its Admirable Perfection without that Vicissitude of things that is observ'd in it A Matter infinitely extended without Motion and consequently rude and without Form and without Corruption might perhaps manifest
Sin found Fruits pleasant to the sight and grateful to the Taste if we rightly consider the words of the Holy Scripture nor shall we come to think that the Oeconomy of the Senses and Passions which is so wonderfully contrived and adapted to the preservation of the Body is a Corruption of Nature instead of its Original Institution Doubtless Nature is at this present corrupted the Body acts too violently upon the Mind and whereas it ought only to make an humble Representation of its wants to the Soul it domineers over her takes her off from God to whom she ought to be inseparably united and continually applies her to the search of such sensible things as tend to its preservation She is grown as it were material and terestrial ever since her Fall the Essential Relation and Union that she had with God being broken that is to say God being withdrawn from her as much as he could be without her destruction and annihilation A thousand disorders have attended the absence or departure of him that preserv'd her in Order and without making a longer Enumeration of our Miseries I freely confess that Man since his Fall is corrupted in all his parts That Fall however has not quite destroyed the Work of God for we can still discover in Man what God at first put in him and his immutable Will that constitutes the Nature of every thing was not changed by the Inconstancy and Fickleness of the Will of Adam Whatever God has once will'd he still wills and because his Will is efficatious brings it to pass The Sin of Man was indeed the Occasion of that Divine Will that makes the Dispensation of Grace but Grace is not contrary to Nature neither do they destroy each other since God is not opposed to himself that he never repents and that his Wisdom being without Limits his Works will be without End And therefore the Will of God that constitutes the Dispensation of Grace is superadded to that which makes the Oeconomy of Nature in order to repair and not to change it There are then in God but these two general Wills and the Laws by which he governs the World depend on one or other of them It will plainly appear by what follows that the Passions are very well order'd if considered only in reference to the Preservation of the Body though they deceive us in some very rare and particular Occasions which the universal Cause did not think fit to remedy Thence I conclude That the Passions belong to the Order of Nature since they cannot be ranked under the Order of Grace 'T is true that seeing the Sin of the first man has deprived us of the Help of an always-present God and always ready to defend us It may be said That Sin is the Cause of our excessive adhesion to sensible things because Sin has estranged us from God by whom alone we can be rid of our Slavery But without insisting longer upon the Enquiry after the first Cause of the Passions let us examine their Extent their particular Nature their End their Use their Defects and whatever they comprehend CHAP. II. Of the Vnion of the Mind with sensible things or of the Force and Extent of the Passions in general IF all those who read this Work would be at the pains to reflect upon what they feel within themselves it would not be necessary to insist upon our Dependency upon all sensible Objects I can say upon this Head but what every one knows as well as I do if he will but think on it and was therefore very much inclined to pass it over But Experience having taught me That Men often forget themselves so far as not to think or be aware of what they feel nor to enquire into the Reason of what passes in their own Mind I thought it fit to propose some Considerations that may help them to reflect upon it And even I hope That those who know such things will not think their Reading ill bestowed for though we do not care to hear simply rehearsed what we very well know yet we use to be affected with Pleasure at the hearing of what we know and feel together The most honourable Sect of Philosophers of whose Opinions many Pretenders boast still now a-days will persuade us That it is in our power to be happy The Stoicks continually say We ought only to depend upon our selves we ought not to be vexed for the Loss of Dignities Estates Friends Relations we ought to be always calm and without the least Disturbance whatever happens Banishment Injuries Affronts Diseases and even Death are no Evils and ought not to be feared and a thousand Paradoxes of that Nature which we are apt enough to believe both because of our Pride that makes us affect Independency as that because Reason teaches us that most part of the Evils which really afflict us would not be able to disturb us if all things remained in good Order But God has given us a Body and by that Body united us to all sensible things Sin has subjected us to our Body and by our Body made us dependent upon all sensible things It is the Order of Nature it is the Will of the Creatour that all the Beings that he has made should hang together And therefore being united to all things and the Sin of the first Man having made us dependent on all Beings to which God had only united us there is now none but he is at once united and subjected to his Body and by his Body to his Relations Friends City Prince Country Cloaths House Estate Horse Dog to all the Earth to the Sun the Stars and the Heavens It 's then ridiculous to tell Men that it is in their power to be happy wise and free It is to jeer them seriously to advise them they ought not to be afflicted for the Loss of their Friends or Estates For as it were absurd to exhort Men not to feel Pain when they are beaten or not to be sensible of Pleasure when they eat with an Appetite so the Stoicks are either unreasonable or not in good earnest when they cry That we ought not to be sorry for the Death of our Father the Loss of our Goods our Banishment Imprisonment and the like nor to be glad of the happy Success of our Affairs since we are united to our Country Goods Friends c. by a Natural Union which at present has no dependence on our Will I grant that Reason teaches us we are to undergo Banishment without Sorrow but the same Reason likewise teaches us we ought to endure the cutting off our Arm without Pain because the Soul is superiour to the Body and that according to the light of Reason her happiness or misery ought not to depend upon it but 't is ridiculous to argue against Experience which in this occasion will convince us that things are not so as our Reason intimates they ought to be The Philosophy of
false Supposition of the Philosophers which we are here endeavouring to destroy that the surrounding Bodies are the true Causes of our Pain and Pleasure Reason seems to justifie a Religion like the Pagan Idolatry and approve the universal Depravation of Morals Reason I grant teaches not to adore Onions and Leeks for instance as the Sovereign Divinity because they can never make us altogether happy when we have them or unhappy when we want them neither did the Heathens worship them with an equal Homage as their great Jupiter whom they fansied to be the God of Gods or as the Sun whom our Senses represent as the universal Cause that gives Life and Motion to all things and which we can hardly forbear to look on as the Sovereign Divinity if we suppose as the Pagan Philosophers that he Comprehends in his Being the true Causes of what he seems to produce as well upon our Soul and Body as upon all the Beings that surround us But if we must not pay a Sovereign Worship to Leeks and Onions they deserve at least some particular Adoration I mean they may be thought upon and loved in some manner if it be true that they can in some sort make us happy and may be honour'd proportionably to the good they doe us Surely Men that listen to the Reports of Sense think Pulse capable of doing them good otherwise the Israelites would not have bewailed the loss of them in the Wilderness or look'd on themselves as unhappy for being deprived thereof had they not fansied to themselves some great Happiness in the Enjoyment of them See what an Abyss of Corruption Reason plunges us into when it goes hand in hand with the Principles of Pagan Philosophy and follows the footsteps of the Senses But that the Falshood of that wretched Phylosophy and the Certainty of our Principles and Distinctness of our Ideas may not be longer doubted it will be necessary plainly to establish the Truths that contradict the Errours of the Ancient Philosophers or to prove in few words that there is but one true Cause since there is but one true God that the Nature and Force of every thing is nothing but the Will of God that all Natural things are not real but only occasional Causes and some other Truths depending on them It is evident that all Bodies great and little have no force to move themselves a Mountain a House a Stone a Grain of Sand the minutest and bulkiest Bodies imaginable are alike as to that We have but two sorts of Ideas viz. of Spirits and Bodies and as we ought not to speak what we conceive not so we must only argue from those two Ideas Since therefore our Idea of Bodies convinces us that they cannot move themselves we must conclude that they are moved by Spirits But considering our Idea of finite Spirits we see no necessary Connexion betwixt their Will and the Motion of any Body whatsoever on the contrary we perceive that there is not nor can be any Whence we must infer if we will follow Light and Reason That as no Body can move it self so no Created Spirit can be the true and principal Cause of its Motion But when we think on the Idea of God or of a Being infinitely perfect and consequently Almighty we are aware that there is such a Connexion betwixt his Will and the Motion of all Bodies that it is impossible to conceive he should will that a Body be moved and it should not be moved And therefore if we would speak according to our Conceptions and not according to our Sensations we must say that nothing but his Will can move Bodies The moving force of Bodies is not then in themselves this force being nothing but the Will of God Bodies then have no proper Action and when a moving Ball meets with another and moves it the former communicates nothing of its own to the latter as not having in it self the Impression it communicates though the former be the Natural Cause of the latter's Motion and therefore a natural Cause is not a true and real Cause but only an occasional which in such or such a Case determines the Author of Nature to act in such or such a manner 'T is certain that all things are produced by the Motion of visible or invisible Bodies for Experience teaches us that those Bodies whose parts are in greater Motion are always the most active and those that Cause the greatest Alterations in the World so that all the Forces of Nature are but the Will of God who Created the World because he will'd it who spake and it was done who moves all things and produces all the Effects we see because he has established some Laws by which Bodies Communicate their Motion to each other when they meet together and because those Laws are efficacious they and not the Bodies act There is then no Force Power nor true Cause in all the Material and sensible World Nor need we admit any Forms Faculties or real Qualities to produce Effects which the Bodies bring not forth or to divide with God his own Essential Force and Power As Bodies cannot be the true Causes of any thing so likewise the most Noble Spirits are subject to the same impotency on that respect They cannot know any thing unless God enlightens them nor have the Sensation of any thing unless he modifies them nor will unless he moves them towards himself They may indeed determine the Impression God has given them to himself towards other Objects but I doubt whether it can be call'd a Power For if to be able to sin is a Power it is such a one as the Almighty wants saith St. Austin somewhere If Men had of themselves the Power of loving Good it might be said that they have some Power but they cannot so much as love but because God Wills it and that his Will is Efficacious They love because God continually drives them towards Good in general that is towards himself for whom alone they are Created and preserved God moves them and not themselves towards Good in general and they only follow that Impression by a free Choice according to the Law of God or determine it towards false and seeming Goods according to the Law of the Flesh But they cannot determine it but by the sight of Good For being able to doe nothing without an Impression from above they are incapable of loving any thing but Good But though it should be supposed which is true in one sense that Spirits have in themselves the Power of knowing Truths and loving Good should their Thoughts and Will produce nothing outwardly it might still be said that they were impotent and unoperative Now it seems undeniable that the Will of Spirits is not able to move the smallest Body in the World it being evident there is no necessary Connexion betwixt the Will we may have of moving our Arm for instance and the Motion of the same Arm. It moves
to furnisâ— an Animal with parts quite useless and to congeal the Fruits after they are perfectly formed Is not this rather because God does what he pleases and that his power supersedes all Order and Rule For to mention things of greater Importance than the Fruits of the Earth wherewith he may do as he sees good the Clay whereof God makes Vessels of wrath is the same with that which he fashions Vessels of Mercy ANSWER These are the difficulties which serve only to obscure the Truth as proceeding from the darkness of the Mind We know that God is just we see that the wicked are Happy ought we to deny what wee see ought we to doubt of what we know because we may possibly be so stupid as not to know and so Libertine as not to believe what Religion teaches us of future Torments So we know that God is Wise and all that he does is Good mean while we see Monsters or defective Works What are we to believe that God is out of his aim or that these Monsters are not his handiwork Certainly if we have sence and constancy of Mind we shall believe neither the one nor the other For 't is manifest that God does all and that whatever he does is as perfect as possible with relation to the simplicity and fewness of the means he imploys in the Formation of his Work We must hold fast to what we see and not quit our ground for any difficulties impossible to be resolv'd when our Ignorance is the cause of that Impossibility If Ignorance must raise Difficulties and such like Difficulties overthrow the best establisht Opinions what will remain certain among Men who know not all things What Shall not the brightest Lights be able to disperse the least Darkness and shall any little shadow Eclipse the clearest and the liveliest Light But though the answering such sort of Difficulties might be dispenc'd with without Prejudice to the fore-establisâ—t Principle yet it is not amiss to show they are not unanswerable For the Mind of Man is so unjust in its Judgments that it may possibly prefer the Opinions which seem to result from these imaginary Difficulties before certain Truths which no Man can doubt of but because he will and with that design ceases to examine them I say then that God wills order though there are Monsters and 't is moreover because God wills order that there are Monsters and this is my reason Order requires that the Laws of nature whereby God produces that infinite Variety so conspicuous in the World should be very simple and very few in number Now 't is the simplicity of these general Laws which in some particular Junctures and because of the Disposition of the subject produces irregular Motions or rather Monstrous Combinations and consequently God's willing order is the cause of these Monsters Thus God does not positively or directly will the Existence of Monsters but he positively wills certain Laws of the Communication of Motions whereof Monsters are the necessary consequences because these Laws though of a most simple kind are nevertheless capable of producing that variety of forms which can't be sufficiently admired For Example In consequence of the general Laws of the Communication of Motions there are some Bodies which are driven near the Centre of the Earth The Body of a Man or an Animal is one of these that which upholds him in the Air breaks under his Feet is it just or according to Order that God should change his general Will for that particular Case Surely it seems not probable That Animal therefore must necessarily break or maim its Body And thus we ought to argue about the generation of Monsters ORDER requires that all Beings should have what 's necessary to their Preservation and the Propagation of the Species provided this may be done by most simple Means and worthy the Wisdom of God And so we see that Animals as also Plants have general Means to preserve themselves and to continue their Species and if some Animals fail thereof in some particular Occasions 't is because these general Laws whereby they were form'd reach not these private Emergencies because they respect not Animals separately but generally extend to all Beings and that the Good of the Publick must be preferr'd before Particular Advantages 'T is evident That if God made but one Animal it would not be Monstrous But Order would require That he should not make that Animal by the same Laws that he at present forms all others for the Action of God must be proportion'd to his Design By the Laws of Nature he designs not the making one Animal but a whole World and he must make it by the simpliest Means as Order requires 'T is enough then that the World be not monstrous or that the general Effects be suitable to the general Laws to vindicate the Work of God from Censure and Reproach If for all particular Changes God had instituted so many particular Laws or if He had constituted in every Being a particular Nature or Principle of all the Motions that arrive in it I confess it would be hard to juâ—tifie his Wisdom against so visible Disorders We should perhaps be forc'd to confess either that God wills not Order or that he knows not how or is not able to rectifie Disorder For in short it seems to me impossible to ascribe an almost infinite Number of second Causes of natural Forces Vertues Qualities and Faculties to what we call the Sports and Disorders of Nature with a Salvo to the infinite Power and Wisdom of the Author of all things OBJECTION against the Second Article GOD can never act for Himself A wise Being will do nothing useless but whatever God should do for himself would be useless because he wants nothing God wills nothing for himself if by the Necessity of his Essence he has all the Perfection he can desire And if God desires nothing for himself he works nothing for himself since he works only by the Efficacy of his Will The Nature of Good is to be communicative and diffusive 't is to be useful to others and not to it self 't is to seek out 't is if it be possible to create Persons whom it may make happy Therefore it is a Contradiction for God who is essentially and supremely good to act for himself ANSWER GOD may be said to act for himself two ways either with intent to derive some Advantage from what he does or to the end his Creature may find its Happiness and Perfection in him I enquire not at present whether God acts for himself in the first sense and whether to receive an Honour worthy of himself he has made and restor'd all things by his SON in whom according to the Scripture all things subsist I only assert that God cannot create and preserve Spirits in order to know and love created Beings 'T is an Immutable Eternal and necessary Law That they should know and love God as I
these Terms ought to be explain'd If you 'll say that the Union of my Mind and Body consists in God's willing That upon my Desire to move my Arm the Animal Spirits should betake themselves to the Muscles it is compos'd of to move it in the manner desir'd I clearly understand this Explication and receive it But this is exactly my own Assertion For if my Will determine that of God 't is evident that my Arm is mov'd not by my Will which is impotent of it self but by the Will of God which never fails of its Effect But if it be said The Union of my Mind and Body consists in God's giving me a Force to move my Arm as he has given my Body likewise a Force of making me feel Pleasure and Pain to the end I may be sollicitous for this Body and be concern'd for its Preservation certainly this is to suppose the thing in dispute and to make a Circle No Man has a clear Idea of that Force which the Soul has over the Body or the Body over the Soul nor knows very well what he says when he positively asserts it That Opinion has been embrac'd through Prejudice has been learn'd in Infancy and in the Age of Sense But Understanding Reason and Reflexion have no part in it which is manifest enough from what I have said in the foregoing Treatise But you 'll say I know by my inward Conscience of my Action that I really have this Force and therefore am not mistaken in believing it I answer That when I move my Arm I am conscious to my self of the Actual Volition by which I move it and I err not in believing I have that Volition I have moreover an inward Sense of a certain Effort or Endeavour which accompanies this Volition and it is to believ'd that I make this Endeavour Last of all I grant that I have an inward feeling of the Motion of my Arm at the instant of this Effort which suppos'd I agree to what is said That the Motion of the Arm is perform'd at the instant a Man feels this Effort or has a practical Volition of moving his Arm. But I deny that this Effort which is no more than a Modification or Sensation of the Soul which is given us to make us understand our Weakness and to afford us a confus'd and obscure Sensation of our Strength can be capable of moving and determining the Spirits I deny there is any Analogy or Proportion between our Thoughts and the Motions of Matter I deny that the Soul has the least Knowledge of the Animal Spirits which she imploys to move the Body Animated by her Last of all Though the Soul exactly knew the Animal Spirits and were capable of moving them or determining their Motions yet I deny that with all this she could make choice of these Ductus of the Nerves of which she has no Knowledge so as to drive the Spirits into them and thereby move the Body with that Readiness Exactness and Force as is observable even in those who are the least acquainted with the Structure of their Body For supposing that our Volitions are truly the moving Force of Bodies howbeit that seems inconceivable how can we conceive the Soul moves her Body The Arm for Example is mov'd by means of an inflation or contraction caus'd by the Spirits in some of the Muscles that compose it But to the end the Motion imprinted by the Soul on the Spirits in the Brain may be Communicated to those in the Nerves and from thence to others in the Muscles of the Arm the Volitions of the Soul must needs multiply or change in proportion to those almost infinite shocks or Collisions that are made by the little Bodies that constitute the Spirits But this is inconceivable without admitting in the Soul an infinite number of Volitions upon the least Motion of the Body since the moving it would necessarily demand an innumerable multitude of Communications of Motions For in short the Soul being but a particular Cause and not able to know exactly the degrees of agitation and the dimensions of infinite little Corpuscles which encounter upon the dispersion of the Spirits into the Muscles she could not settle a General Law for the Communication of these Spirits Motion nor follow it exactly if she had establish't it Thus it is evident the Soul could not move her Arm although she had the Power of determining the Motion of the Animal Spirits These things are too clear to be longer insisted on The case is the same with our Thinking Faculty We are inwardly conscious that we Will the Thinking on something that we make an effort to that purpose and that in the Moment of our desire and effort the Idea of the thing presents it self to our Mind but our inward Sensation does not tell us that our Will or Effort produces our Idea Reason does not assure us that it 's possible and only prejudice makes us believe that our desires are the causes of our Ideas whilst we experiment an hundred times a Day that the latter accompany or pursue the former As God and his Operations have nothing sensible in them and as we are not conscious of any thing but our desires that precede the presence of our Ideas so we do not think our Ideas can have any other cause than these desires But view the thing closely and we shall see no force in us to produce them neither Reason nor Conscience giving us any information thereupon I don't think my self oblig'd to transcribe all the other proofs employ'd by the patrons for the Efficacy of Second Causes Because they seem so trifling that I might be thoughts to design to render them Ridiculous And I should make my self so if I gave them a Serious Answer An Author for Example very gravely asserts in behalf of his Opinion Created Beings are true Material Formal Final Causes why must not they likewise be Efficient or Efficacious I fancy I should give the World little satisfaction if to answer this Gentlemans Question I should stand to explain so gross an Ambiguity and show the difference between an Efficacious cause and that which the Philosophers are pleas'd to call material Therefore I leave such arguments as these to come to those which are drawn from Holy-Writ ARGUMENT VII The Defenders of the Efficacay of Second Causes commonly alledge the following Passages to support their Opinion Let the Earth bring forth Grass Let the Waters bring forth the moving Creature that hath Life and Fowl that may fly c. Therefore the Earth and Water by the Word of God receiv'd the Power of producing Plants and Animals Afterwards God Commanded the Fowls and Fishes to multiply Be fruitful and multiply and fill the Waters in the Seas and let Fowl multiply in the Earth Therefore he gave them a Power of begetting their like Our Saviour in the fourth Chapter of St. Mark says the Seed which falls on good Ground brings forth
their Operation So likewise in point of free Causes I believe that God incessantly gives the Mind an Impression towards Good in General and that he moreover determines this Impression towards particular Goods by the Idea's or Sensations that he gives us as I have explain'd in the first Illustration which is the same with what the Divines intend by affirming That God moves and prevents our Wills Thus the Force which puts our Minds in Motion is the Will of God which Animates us and inclines us towards Good For God Creates not Beings to constitute the moving force of Minds for the same Reason that he Creates none to be the moving force of Bodies The Wills of God being of themselves Efficacious He need but Will to do And we ought not to multiply Beings without necessity Besides whatever is real in the determinations of our Motions proceeds likewise from the Action of God in us as appears from the first Illustration But all we Act or produce is by our Wills that is by the Impression of the Will of God which is our moving force For our Wills are Efficacious no farther than they are of God as mov'd Bodies impel not others but in as much as they have a moving force that translates them which is no other than the Will of God which Creates or preserves them successively in different places Therefore we Act no otherwise than by the Concourse of God and our Action consider'd as Efficacious and capable of producing any Effect differs not from his but is as say most Divines the self same Action eadem numero actio Now all the Changes which arrive in the World have no other Natural Cause than the Motions of Bodies and Volitions of Minds For First by the General Laws of the Communications of Motions the invisible Bodies which surround the visible produce by their various Motions all these divers Changes whose Cause is not apparent And Secondly by the Laws of Union of our Soul and Body when circumambient Bodies Act upon our own they produce in our Soul a multiplicity of Sensations Idea's and Passions Thirdly Our Mind by its Volitions produces in it self infinite different Idea's for they are our Volitions which as Natural Causes intend and Modifie our Mind Their Efficacy nevertheless proceeds from the Laws which God has establish'd And Lastly when our Soul acts upon our Body she produces several Changes in it by vertue of the Laws of her Union with it and by means of our Body she effects in those about it abundance of Changes by vertue of the Laws of Communication of Motions So that the Motions of Bodies and the Volitions of Minds are the only Natural or Occasional Causes of Natural Effects which no Man will deny who uses any Attention supposing only he be not prepossest by those who understand not what they say who fancy perpetually to themselves such Beings as they have no clear Idea's of and who offer to explain things which they do not understand by others absolutely incomprehensible Thus having shown that God by his Concourse or rather by his Efficacious Will performs whatever is done by the Motions of Bodies and the Wills of Minds as Natural or Occasional Causes it appears that God does every thing by the same Action of the Creature Not that the Creatures have of themselves any Efficacious Action but that the Power of God is in a manner Communicated to them by the Natural Laws which God has establish'd on their account This then is all that I can do to reconcile my Thoughts to the Opinion of those Divines who defend the necessity of immediate Concourse and hold that God does All in all things by an Action no ways differing from the Creatures For as to the rest of the Divines I think their Opinions utterly indefensible and especially that of Durandus together with the Sentiments of some of the Ancients refuted by St. Austin who absolutely deniâ—d the necessity of God's Concurrence pretending that Second Causes did all things by the Power which God in their Creation gave them For though this Opinion be less intricate and perplex'd than that of other Divines yet to me it seems so repugnant to Scripture and so suitable to Prejudices to say no worse of it that I think it altogether unwarrantable I confess that the School-Men who make God's immediate concourse to be the same Action with that of the Creatures do not perfectly agree with my Explication and all those that I have read except Biel and Cardinal d' Ailly are of Opinion That the Efficacy which produces Effects proceeds from the Second Cause as well as the First But as I make it indispensable for me to speak nothing but what I clearly conceive and always to take the side that best comports with Religion I think I am not liable to blame for deserting an Opinion which to many Men seems still more inconceiveable as they strive more to comprehend it and for establishing another which agrees perfectly not only with Reason but also with the Sacredness of our Religion and Christian Morality which is a Truth already prov'd in the Chapter that 's the Subject of these Reflexions However 't is not inconvenient to say something to it that I may fully verifie what I have said upon the present Question Both Reason and Religion evince That God will be Lov'd and rever'd by his Creatures Lov'd as Good and Rever'd as Power Which is such a Truth as it would be Impiety and Madness to doubt of To love God as he requires and deserves we must according to the First Commandment both of the Law and Gospel and by Reason it self as I have somewhere shown Love Him with all our Strength or with the whole extent of our Loving Capacity 'T is not sufficient to prefer Him before all things unless we moreover Love Him in all things For otherwise our Love is not so perfect as it ought to be and we return not to God all the Love that he gives us and gives us only for Himself in whom every one of His Actions Center So to render to God all the Reverence that is due to Him 't is not enough to adore Him as the Supreme Power and fear Him more than His Creatures we must likewise fear and adore Him in all His Creatures all our respects must perpetually tend towards Him to whom alone Honour and Glory are to be ascrib'd Which is what God Commands us in these Words Thou shalt Love the Lord thy God with all thy Heart and with all thy Soul and with all thy Strength And in these Thou shalt fear the Lord thy God and Him only shalt thou serve Thus the Philosophy that convinces us that the Efficacy of Second Causes is a Fiction of the Mind that the Nature of Aristotle and some other Philosophers is a Chimera that none but God is Strong and Powerful enough not only to Act on our Soul but even to give the
them which by the Efficacy of the same Law giving the Elasticity to visible Bodies oblige them to rebound and hinder them from observing it But this I ought not to explain more at length XVII Now these two Laws are so Simple so Natural and at the same time so Fruitful that though we had no other Reason to conclude they are observ'd in Nature we should be induc'd to believe them establish'd by Him who works always by the simplest Ways in whose Action there is nothing but what 's so justly uniform and wisely proportion'd to his Work that He does infinite Wonders by a very small Number of Wills XVIII It fares not so with the General Cause as with the Particular with infinite Wisdom as with limited Understandings GOD foreseeing before the Establishment of Natural Laws all that could follow from them ought not to have constituted them if He was to disannul them The Laws of Nature are constant and immutable and general for all Times and Places Two Bodies of such degrees of Magnitude and Swiftness meeting rebound so now as they did heretofore If the Rain falls upon some Grounds and the Sun scorches others if a seasonable Time for Harvest is follow'd by a destructive Hail if an Infant comes into the World with a monstrous and useless Head growing from his Breast that makes him wretched this proceeds not from the particular Wills of GOD but from the Settlement of the Laws of Communication of Motions whereof these Effects are necessary Consequences Laws at once so simple and so fruitful that they serve to produce all we see Noble in the World and even to repair in a little time the most general Barrenness and Mortality XIX He that having built an House throws one Wing of it down that he may rebuild it betrays his Ignorance and he who having planted a Vine plucks it up as soon as it has taken root manifests his Levity because he that wills and unwills wants either Knowledge or Resolution of Mind But it cannot be said that GOD acts either by this Freakishness or Ignorance when a Child comes into the World with superfluous Members that make him leave it again or that an Hail-stone breaks off a Fruit half ripe If he causes this 't is not because he wills and unwills for GOD acts not like particular Causes by particular Wills nor has he establish'd the Laws of the Communications of Motions with design to produce Monsters or to make Fruit fall before Maturity it not being their Sterility but Fecundity for which He will'd these Laws Therefore what He once will'd He still wills and the World in general for which these Laws were constituted will eternally subsist XX. 'T is here to be observ'd That the Essential Rule of the Will of GOD is Order and that if Man for example had not sinn'd a Supposition which had quite chang'd the Designs then Order not suffering him to be punish'd the Natural Laws of the Communications of Motions would never have been capable to incommodate his Felicity For the Law of Order which requires that a righteous Person should suffer nothing against his Will being Essential to GOD the Arbitrary Law of the Communication of Motions must have been necessarily subservient to it XXI There are still some uncommon Instances where these General Laws of Motions ought to cease to produce their Effect not that GOD changes or corrects His Laws but that some Miracles must happen on particular Occasions by the Order of Grace which ought to supersede the Order of Nature Besides 't is fit Men should know that GOD is so Master of Nature that if He submits it to His Laws establish'd 't is rather because He wills it so than by an absolute Necessity XXII If then it be true that the General Cause ought not to produce His Work by particular Wills and that GOD ought to settle certain constant and invariable Laws of the Communication of Motions by the Efficacy whereof He foresaw the World might subsist in the State we find it in one Sense it may be most truly said that GOD desires all his Creatures should be perfect that He wills not the Abortion of Children nor loves monstrous Productions nor has made the Laws of Nature with design of causing them and that if it were possible by ways so simple to make and preserve a perfecter World He would never have establish'd those Laws whereof so great a Number of Monsters are the necessary Results But that it would have been unworthy His Wisdom to multiply His Wills to prevent some particular Disorders which by their Diversity make a kind of Beauty in the Universe XXIII GOD has given to every Seed a Cicatricle which contains in Miniature the Plant and Fruit another Cicatricle adjoining to the former which contains the Root of the Plant which Root contains another Root still whose imperceptible Branches expand themselves into the two Lobes or Meal of the Seed Does not this manifest that in one most real Sense He designs all Seeds should produce their like For why should He have given to those Grains of Corn He design'd should be barren all the Parts requisite to render them Fecund Nevertheless Rain being necessary to make them thrive and this falling on the Earth by General Laws which distribute it not precisely on well manur'd Grounds and in the fittest Seasons all these Grains come not to good or if they do the Hail or some other mischievous Accident which is a Necessary Consequence of these same Natural Laws prevents their earing Now GOD having constituted these Laws might be said to will the Fecundity of some Seeds rather than others if we did not otherwise know that it not becoming a General Cause to work by Particular Wills nor an infinitely wise Being by Complicated Ways GOD ought not to take other Measures than He has done for the Regulating the Rains according to Time and Place or by the Desire of the Husbandman Thus much is suffiâ—ient for the Order of Nature Let us explain that of Grace a little more at large and especially remember that 't is the same Wisdom and the same Will in a word the same GOD who has establish'd them both PART II. Of the Necessity of the General Laws of GRACE XXIV GOD loving Himself by the Necessity of His Being and willing to procure an Infinite Glory and Honour on all Hands worthy of himself consults His Wisdom for the accomplishing His Desires This Divine Wisdom fill'd with Love for Him from whom He receives His Being by an Eternal and Ineffable Generation seeing nothing in all possible Creatures worthy of the Majesty of His Father offers Himself to establish to His Honour an Eternal Worship and to present Him as High Priest a Sacrifice which through the Dignity of His Person should be capable of contenting Him He represents to Him infinite Models for the Temple to be rais'd to His Glory and at the same time all possible Ways to execute His Designs
Glory Sin which introduc'd into the World the Miseries of Life and Death which follows it were necessary that Men after their Trial upon Earth might be legitimately crown'd with that Glory the Variety and Order whereof shall make the Beauty of the future World XXXIII 'T is true that Concupiscence which we feel in us is not necessary to our Meriting For Jesus Christ whose Merits are infinite was not subject to it But though He absolutely controll'd it He was willing to admit in Himself the most vexatious Motions and Sensations that He might merit all the Glory that was prepar'd for Him Of all Sensations that which is most repugnant to a Soul willing and deserving to be happy is Pain wbich yet He was willing to suffer in the most excessive degree Pleasure makes actually Happy the Person that actually enjoys it which yet he willingly deny'd Himself Thus he has offer'd like us innumerable Sacrifices through a Body which he took like ours But these Sacrifices were of a different kind from those of the greatest Saints because he voluntarily rais'd in Himself all those painful Sensations which in the rest of Men are the necessary Consequences of Sin which being thus perfectly voluntary were therefore more pure and meritorious XXXIV If I had a clear Idea of the Blessed Spirits who are not embody'd I perhaps could clearly resolve a Difficulty that arises from their Consideration For it may be objected either that there is very little Variety in the Merits or Rewards of Angels or that it was to ill purpose for God to unite Bodies to Spirits which are whilst united so dependant on them I confess I do not see any great Diversity in the Rewards answering the Merits of purely intelligible Substances especially if they have merited their Recompence by one sole Act of Love For being not united to a Body which might be an Occasion to God's giving them by most Simple and General Laws a Train of different Thoughts and Sensations I see no Variety in their Combats or Victories But possibly another Order has been establish'd which is unknown to me and therefore I ought not to speak of it And 't is sufficient that I have establish'd a Principle from whence may be concluded that God ought to create Bodies and unite Minds to them that by the most simple Laws of Union of these two Substances He might give us in a general constant and uniform manner that great Variety of Sensations and Motions which is the Principle of the Diversity of our Merits and Rewards XXXV Lastly 't was requisite that God alone should have all the Glory of the Beauty and Perfection of the future World This Work which infinitely excels all others ought to be a Work of pure Mercy It was not for Creatures to glory in having any other part in it than that the Grace of Jesus Christ had given them In a word 't was fit that God should suffer all Men to be involv'd in Sin that He might shew them Mercy in Jesus Christ. XXXVI Thus the first Man being impower'd by the Strength of His Charity to persevere in Original Righteousness God ought not to have fix'd him to his Duty by preventing Pleasures for having no Concupiscence to conquer God ought not to prevent his Free Will by the Delectation of His Grace In short having all in general that was necessary to his meriting his Reward God who works nothing in vain ought to leave him to himself though He foresaw His Fall since He design'd to raise him up in Jesus Christ put Free Will to confusion and manifest the Greatness of His Mercy Let us now endeavour to discover the Ways whereby God executes His Eternal Purpose of the Sanctification of His Church XXXVII Though God in the Establishment of the future World acts in Ways very different from those by which He preserves the present yet it ought not to be imagin'd that difference is so great as to take from the Laws of Grace the Character of the Cause that made them As it is the same God who is the Author both of the Order of Grace and Nature these two Orders must agree in all those included Symptoms which discover the Wisdom and Power of their â—ounder Therefore since God is a General Cause whose Wisdom has no Bounds He must needs for the Reasons before given act as such in the Order of Grace as well as in that of Nature and His own Glory being His End in the Construction of His Church He must establish most Simple and General Laws and which have the greatest Proportion of Wisdom and Fertility with their design'd Effect XXXVIII The more wise an Agent is the more comprehensive are his Wills A very limited Understanding is constantly taking fresh Designs and in the Execution of any one of them employs more Means than are useful In a word a straitned Capacity does not sufficiently compare the Means with the End the Force and the Action with the Effect to be produc'd by them On the contrary a Mind of great Reach and Penetration collates and weighs all things forms not Designs except upon the Knowledge of the Means to dispatch them and when it has observ'd in these Means a certain Proportion of Wisdom with their Effects he puts them in practice The more simple are the Machines and more different their Effects the more Marks they bear of an intelligent Workman and more worthy they are to be esteem'd The great Number of Laws in a State are commonly a Proof of the want of Insight and Extent of Thought in their â—ounders it being rather the Experience of their Exigency than a wise Fore-sight that establish'd them God therefore whose Wisdom is infinite ought to employ the simplest and most comprehensive Means in the Formation of a future World as well as in the Preservation of the present He ought not to multiply His Wills which are the executive Laws of His Designs save when Necessity obliges Him to it but must act by General Wills and so settle a Constant and Regular Order by which He foresees through the infinite Comprehension of His Wisdom that a Work so admirable as His must needs be form'd Let us see the Consequences of this Principle and the Application we may make of it in the Explication of those Difficulties which seem very puzzling and perplex'd XXXIX Holy Writ on one hand teaches us that God wills all Men should be sav'd and come to the Knowledge of the Truth and on the other that He does whatever He wills and yet Faith is not given to all Men and the Number of those that perish is greater than that of the Predestinate How can this be reconcil'd with His Power XL. God foresaw from all Eternity Original Sin and the Infinite Number of those whom Sin should cast into Hell and nevertheless created the First Man in a State from whence He knew He must fall and likewise has appointed such Relations betwixt this Man and his
Difficulties that can be started about the Circumstances of our Mysteries like as to vindicate the Orders of Nature and Grace in themselves we need but know That God being infinitely wiâ—e frames no Design but upon the admirable Proportion of Wisdom and Fecundity discover'd in the ways capable to bring it to pass as I have explain'd in the First Discourse L. Most Men judging of God by measure of themselves imagines that he first forms a Design and afterwards consults his Wisdom about Ways to execute it For our Volitions generally prevent our Reason and our Designs are hardly ever perfectly Rational But God's Ways are not like those of Men who acts in the following manner if I have well consulted the Idea of a Being infinitely perfect God by the infinite Light of his Wisdom knows all possible Works and at once all the respective Ways of producing them He sees all the Proportions between Means and their End He compares all things by one Eternal Immutable and Necessary View and by the Comparison he makes of the Proportions of Wisdom and Fecundity which he discovers between the Designs and Ways of executing them he freely forms a Design But the Design being form'd he necessarily chooses the general Ways most worthy of his Wisdom Greatness and Goodness For since he forms no Design but through the Knowledge of the Means of executing it the Choice of the Design includes the Choice of Means LI. When I say That God forms his Design freely I would not be thought to mean that he may make choice of another less worthy and reject that which is more worthy of his Wisdom For supposing that God wills the Production of an external Work worthy of him he is not indifferent in the Choice but must produce the perfectest possible with reference to the Simplicity of the Ways he acts by This God owes to himself from following the Rules of his Wisdom and he must always act in the wisest and perfectest manner But I say that God forms his Design freely because he does not invincibly and necessarily love any thing besides his own Substance Neither the Incarnation of the Word nor for a much stronger Reason the Creation of the World are necessary Emanations of his Nature God is fully Self-sufficient For the Being infinitely perfect may be conceiv'd alone and without necessary Relation to any of his Creatures LII As God necessarily loves himself he necessarily follows the Rules of his Wisdom But whereas his Creatures constitute no part of his Being he is so full and sufficient in himself that nothing obliges him to produce them and he is absolutely indifferent or free on their Account And therefore it is that he has made the World in Time For that Circumstance sufficiently shews that the Creatures are not necessary Emanations of the Divinity but essentially depending on the Free Will of the Creator LIII Lo however an Objection that offers it self immediately to the Mind If it were true that God necessarily follow'd the Rules of his Wisdom the World would not have been created in Time For either the World is worthy or unworthy of God If it were better that the World should not be produc'd from Nothing it ought to be Eternal if on the contrary that it should remain in Nothingness it ought not to be created Therefore God is not oblig'd to stick to Rules which his Wisdom prescribes since the World was created in Time But this Objection is easily answer'd 'T is better for the World to be than not to be but it had better not be at all than be Eternal The Creature ought to carry the Essential Character of Dependency If Spirits were Eternal they might have some reason to consider themselves as Gods or necessary Beings or at least as capable of contributing to the Greatness or Felicity of God whilst imagining he could not forego producing them They might in a manner compare themselves with the Persons in the Deity while believing themselves produc'd like them by a necessary Emanation Thus God ought by the Rules of his Wisdom to leave Creatures the Mark of their Dependence and yet give them Assurance that he made them not to annihilate them and that being constant in his Purposes by reason of his unlimited Wisdom they shall eternally subsist LIV. This Difficulty may still be driven farther in this manner God necessarily follows the Rules of his Wisdom and necessarily does what is best But it was at least better for the World to be created in Time than not to be at all And certainly it was fit by the Rules of the Wisdom of God that the World should be produc'd in the Circumstances in which he produc'd it Therefore the Creation of the World in Time is absolutely necessary God was not at Liberty on its account nor capable of hindring its temporary Production For the Resolution of this Difficulty it must be observ'd That though God follows the Rules prescrib'd by his Wisdom yet he does not necessarily what is best because being Master of his Action he may choose to do any thing To act and not to follow the Rules of his Wisdom is a Fault Therefore on supposition that God acts he necessarily acts in the wisest manner conceivable But his Liberty in the Production of the World is a Sign of his Abundance Fulness and Self-sufficiency 'T is better for the World to be than not to be the Incarnation of Jesus Christ renders the Work of God worthy of its Author I acknowledge But whereas God is essentially happy and perfect and as nothing is good on his Consideration but himself or the Cause of his Perfection and his Happiness he loves nothing invincibly besides his own Substance and whatever is exteriour to him ought to be produc'd by an Action really eternal and immutable but that derives its Necessity from Supposition of the Divine Decrees LV. I offer another Principle which I have already mention'd which may afford some Light to the Difficulties that may arise about the Incarnation of Jesus Christ and the Creation of the World Reason and Authority of Holy Writ teach us that the First and Principal of the Designs of God is the Constitution of his Church in Jesus Christ. The present World is not created to remain as it is The Falshood and Errour the Injustice and Disorder that are seen in it give us sufficiently to understand it ought to have an end The future World which Truth and Justice shall inhabit is the Earth which God has settled on inviolable Foundations and which being the Object of Divine Love shall eternally subsist God has not created this Visible World with other Design than to raise by degrees that invisible City whereof St. John speaks so many Wonders and as Jesus Christ shall be the principal Beauty of it he was always had in View by God in the Production of his Work He has made all for Man and with reference to him as the Scripture teaches But he for
and absolute Lord of all things by right of Generation These Truths are evident as we are assur'd by Jesus Christ himself who says that his Father has given him power to judge Men because he is the Son of Man So we ought not to think that Scripture Expressions which make Jesus Christ the Author of Grace must be understood of him consider'd in his Divine Person For if so I confess I should not have prov'd him the Occasional Cause since he would be the True Cause of it But whereas it is certain that the Three Persons of the Trinity are equally the True Cause of Grace because all the External Operations of God are common to them all my Proofs are undeniable since Holy Scripture says of the Son and not of the Father or the Holy Spirit that he is the Head of the Church and that in this Capacity he communicates Life to the constituent Members of it Second OBJECTION XIV 'T is God who gives the Soul of Jesus Christ all the Thoughts and Motions relating to the Formation of his Mystical Body So that if on one hand the Wills of Jesus Christ as Occasional or Natural Causes determine the Efficacy of the General Wills of God on the other 't is God himself who determines the several Wills of Jesus Christ. And thus it comes to the same thing For in brief the Volitions of Jesus Christ are always conformable to those of his Father I grant that the particular Volitions of the Soul of Jesus Christ are always conformable to the Wills of his Father not as if there were any particular Wills in the Father which answer to those in the Son and determine them but only that the Volitions of the Son are always conform'd to Order in general which is the necessary Rule of the Will of God and of all those who love him For to love Order is to love God 't is to will what he wills 't is to be Just Wise Regular in our Love The Soul of Jesus desires to form to the Glory of his Father the largest most sumptuous and accomplish'd Temple possible Order demands this since nothing can be made too great for God All the several Thoughts of this Soul perpetually intent on the Execution of its Design proceed likewise from God or the Word to which it is united But its various Desires are certainly the Occasional Cause of these various Thoughts for it thinks on what it wills Now these diverse Desires are sometimes entirely free and probably the Thoughts which excite them do not invincibly determine the Soul of Jesus Christ to apply her self to the Means of executing them For in brief 't is equally advantageous to the Design of Jesus Christ whether it be Peter or John that causes the Effect which the Regularity of his Work requires 'T is true the Soul of Jesus is not indifferent in any thing that relates to his Father's Glory or that Order necessarily demands but is entirely free in all the rest there is nothing extraneous to God which invincibly determines his Love Thus we ought not to wonder if Jesus have particular Wills though there be not the like Wills in God to determine them But let it be granted that the Volitions of Jesus Christ are not free and that his Light invincibly carries him to will and to will always in a determinate manner in the Construction of his Church But it is Eternal Wisdom to which his Soul is united that must determine his Volitions We must not for that Effect suppose Particular Wills in God But all the Wills of Jesus Christ are Particular or have no Occasional Cause to determine their Efficacy as have those of God For the Soul of Jesus Christ having not an infinite Capacity of Thinking his Notices and consequently his Volitions are limited Therefore his Wills must needs be Particular since they change according to his diverse Thoughts and Applications For probably the Soul of Jesus Christ otherwise imploy'd in Contemplating and tasting the infinite Satisfactions of the True Good methinks ought not according to Order desire at once to think on all the Ornaments and Beauties he would bestow upon his Church nor on the different Ways of executing each of his Designs For Jesus Christ desiring to render the Church worthy of the infinite Majesty of his Father would gladly perfect it with infinite Beauties by Ways most conformable to Order He must then constantly change his Desires there being but one infinite Wisdom who can fore-see all and prescribe himself General Laws for the executing his Designs But the future World being to subsist eternally and to be infinitely more perfect than the present it was requisite that God should establish an Occasional Cause Intelligent and Enlightned by Eternal Wisdom to remedy the Defects which should unavoidably happen in the Works that were form'd by General Laws The Collision of Bodies which determines the Efficacy of the General Laws of Nature is an Occasional Cause without Understanding and Liberty and therefore 't is impossible but there must be Imperfections in the World and Monsters produc'd which are not of such account as that the Wisdom of God should descend to remedy them by Particular Wills But Jesus Christ being an Intelligent Occasional Cause illuminate with the Wisdom of the Word and susceptible of Particular Wills according to the particular Exigencies of the Work he forms 't is plain that the future World will be infinitely more perfect than the present that the Church will be without Spot or Wrinkle as we are taught by Scripture and that it will be a Work most worthy of the Complacency of God himself 'T is in this manner that Eternal Wisdom renders as I may say to his Father what he had taken from him For not permitting him to act by Particular Wills he seem'd to disable his Almighty Arm But becoming incarnate he so brings it to pass that God acting in a manner worthy of him by most Simple and General Laws produces a Work wherein the most Illuminate Intelligences cannot observe the least Imperfection PROOFS founded on REASON XV. Having demonstrated by the Authority of Scripture that the diverse Motions of the Soul of Jesus Christ are the Occasional Causes which determine the Efficacy of the General Law of Grace by which God would have all Men sav'd in his Son 't is necessary to shew in general by Reason that we are not to believe God acts in the Order of Grace by Particular Wills For though by Reason separate from Faith it cannot be demonstrated that God has constituted the Wills of Man-God the Occasional Causes of his Gifts yet it may without Faith be shewn that he distributes them not to Men by Particular Wills and that in two manners a priori and a posteriori that is by the Idea we have of God and by the Effects of Grace For there is nothing but serves to prove this Truth First then for the Proof of a priori A wise Being
them and recommend them to the Reception of all Men. I might vindicate this Opinion by the Conduct of the Fathers and by the Authority of St. Austin who frequently exhorts to the clear Discovery and Understanding of those Truths which we already believe in the Obscurity of Faith But I don't suppose there are any so irrational as to find fault with my Conduct however prejudiced against my Opinions Wherefore I intreat those who will be at the Pains of reading what I have written not to suppose me in an Errour but to suspend their Judgment till they have well understood my Opinion and not to condemn me in General Terms nor draw too hastily from my Principles unwarrantable Conclusions In Matters so obscure as those of Grace the Advantage is always on the side of the Aggressor and 't is not just to make use of it to the Defendant's Prejudice He should judge equitably and without Prepossession compare all the Consequences deducible from the several Opinions that he may embrace that which seems most agreeable to the Goodness and Wisdom of God For 't is unreasonable to condemn an Opinion unexamin'd for some unhappy Consequences which Men never fail to infer from it when the Imagination is scar'd and the Mind possess'd with contrary Notions XIX I know for Example that some Persons have said I make all Prayers useless and rob Men of the Confidence they ought to have in God since in their Notions God acting by General Wills we must not expect particular Supplies from Heaven I confess if this sole Consequence were included in my Principles they would be false heretical and impious For we overturn Religion if we take from Men their due Hope and Confidence in God and 't is partly on that very account I cannot admit of those Mens Opinions which are most opposite to my manner of Reconciling Grace with Liberty But so far are my Principles from leading to Despair that on the contrary they give the Righteous and even Sinners Consolation in shewing them the Means of obtaining of God the things they stand in need of For if we are Righteous our Prayers are meritorious and if meritorious Order requires that they should be heard and Order being with God a Law infinitely more inviolable than any other establish'd for the Construction of his Work he never fails to do what Order prescribes him Therefore the Prayers of the Righteous are never ineffectual which is what I have establish'd in the XIX Section of the Second Discourse But if we are Sinners 't is certain our Prayers are of themselves in vain for God hears not Sinners Order will have it so Nevertheless we must not despair We have an Advocate with the Father Jesus Christ the Righteous He came into the World to save Sinners His Prayers are constantly and most readily heard Let us pray in his Name or address our selves to him Our Prayers will sollicite him to form some Desires relating to us and his Desires are the Occasional Causes which infallibly determine the General Law of Grace by which God wills the Salvation of all Men in his Son This is what I have maintain'd at large in the Second Discourse Thus I am so far from depriving Men of the Confidence they ought to have in God that on the contrary I precisely shew by the Authority of Scripture the way we ought to take for the obtaining of God the Graces that we want Therefore I pray my Readers to do me the Justice of Examining my Opinions without Prevention and I am willing they should afterward judge of them according to their Light and Knowledge For I submit all my Thoughts not only to the Censure of the Church which has Right to make me quit them by an Authority which I shall be ever ready to defer to but also to the Judgments of all Particular Persons by whose Admonitions I shall endavour to profit The END * Nihil est potentius illa creâ—tura quae mâ—â—s diciâ—ur rationalis nihil est 〈◊〉 Quicquid 〈◊〉 illam est jam creator est Tr. 23. in Joan. Quod rationali anima melius est omnibus conscentientibus Deus est Aug. †Ad ipsam similitudinem non omnia facta sunt sed sola substantia rationalis quare omnia per ipsam sed ad ipsam non nisi anima rationalis Itaque substantia rationalis per ipsam facta est ad ipsam non est enim ulla natura interposita Lib. Imp. de Gen. ad Litt. Rectissime dicitur factus ad Imaginem Similitudinem Dei non enim aliter incommutabilem veritatem posset mente conspicere De ver Rel. Mens quod non sentit nisi cum purissima beatissima est nulli cohaeret nisi ipsi veritati quae similitudo imago patris sapientia dicitur August lib. imp de Gen. ad 〈◊〉 Non exigua hominis portio sed totius humanae universitatis substantia est Ambr. 6. Hexam 7. †Ubique veritas praesides omnibus consulentibus te simulque respondes omnibus etiam diversa consulentibus Liquide tu respondes sed non liquide omnes audiunt Omnes unde volunt consulunâ— sed non semper quod volunt audiunt Conf. S. Aug. lib. 10. cap. 26. * V. Quint. Curt. lib. 7. cap. 8. Intâ—s in domicilio cogitationis nec Hebraea nec Graca nec Latina nec Barbara veritas sine oris linguae organis sine strepiâ—â— syllabarum Confess S. Aug. l. 11. c. 3. * Videtur quasi ipse a te occidere cum tu ab ipso occidas Aug. in Psal. 25. Nam etiam sol iste videntis faciem illustrat caeci ambobus sol praesens est sed praesente sole unus absens est Sic Sapientia Dei Dominus J. C. ubique praesens est quia ubique est veritas ubique sapientia Aug. in Joan. Tract 35. What I here say of the Vnions of the Mind with GOD and with the Body ought to be understood according to our ordinary way of Conception For indeed our Mind can be immediately united to GOD only that is can truly depend on none but GOD. And if it be united to or depend on the Body 't is because the Will of GOD makes that Vnion or Dependence efficacious Which will easily be conceiv'd in the Sequel of this Work Quis enim bene se inspiciens non expertus est tanto se aliquid intellexisse sincerius quanto removere atque subducere intentionem mentis a corporis sensibus potuit Aug. de Immort Anim. c. 10. Principium creaturae intellectualis est aeterna sapientia quod principium manens in se incommutabiliter nullo modo cessat occulta inspiratione vocationis loqui ei creaturae cui principium est ut convertatur ad id ex quo est quod aliter formata ac perfecta esse non possit Lib. 1. de Gen. ad Litter Ch. 50. Scimus quoniam cum apparuerit similes ei erimus quoniam
videbimus eum sicuti est Joh. Ep. 1. ch 3. v. 2. * Corpus quod corrumpitur aggravat animam Sap. 9.10 Terrena inhabitatio deprimit sensum multa cogitantem difficile aestimamus quae in terra sunt quae in prospectu sunt invenimus cum labore Sap. 9.15 †Deus intelligibilis lux in quo a quo per quem intelligibiliter lucent omnia 1. Sol. Insinuavit nobis Christus animam humanam non vegetari non illuminari non beatificari nisi ab ipsa substantia Dei August in Joh. Illa autoritas divina dicenda est quae non solum in sensibilibus signis transcendit omnem humanam facultatem sed ipsum hominem agens ostendit ei quousque se propter ipsum depresserit non teneri sensibus quibus videntur illa miranda sed ad intellectum jubet evolare simul demonstrans quanta hic possit cur haec faciat quam parvi pendat Aug. 2. de Ord. 9. * Tract in Joan. 27. Et si cognovimus secundum carnem Christum jam non secundum carnem novimus 2 ad Cor. Nolite putare quenquam hominem aliquid discere ab homine Admonere possumus per strepitum vocis nostrae si non sit intus qui doceat inanis fit strepitus noster Aug. in Joan. Auditus per me factus intellectus per quem Dixit aliquis ad cor vestrum sed non eum videtis Si intellexistis fratres dictum est cordi vestro Munus Dei est intelligentia August Johan Tract 40. Noli putare te ipsam esse lucem Aug. in Psal. Sicut audio sic judico judicium meum justum est quia non quaero voluntatem meam Johan cap. 5.30 Qui hoc videre non potest oret agat ut posse mereatur nec ad hominem disputatorem pulset ut quod not legit legat sed ad Deum Salvatorem ut quod non valet valeat Epist. 112. cap. 12. Supplexque illi qui lumen mentis accendit attendat ut intelligat Conf. Ep. Fund cap. 33. Nullo modo resistitur Corporis sensibus quae nobis sacratissima disciplina est si per eos inflictis plagis vulneribusque blandimur Ep. 72. * See the 6 th Book Of the Nature Properties of the Vnderstanding II. Of the Nature and Properties of the Will and of its Liberty * See the Illustrations * See the Illustrations I. Of our Judgments and Reasonings II. That Judgments and Reasonings depend upon the Will Geometricians love not Truth but only the Knowledg of Truth tho' it be otherwise said III. What use should be made of our Liberty that we never may be deceiv'd IV. General Rules for the avoiding Error and Sin A necessary Reflexion on the two Rules I. The Answer to some Objections II. Observations on what has been said concerning the necessity of Evidence See the Illustrations I. Of the Occasional Causes of our Errors and that there are five principal II. The General Design of the whole Work III. The particular Design of the first Book I. Two ways of explaining how our Senses were corrupted by Sin S. Gregor Homil. 39. upon the Gospels * Fr. Son â—â—ur †Fr. Son Esprit See the Illustrations Deus ab initio constituit hominem reliquit illum in manu Consilii sui adjecit mandata praecepta sua c. Ec. 15.14 A Remedy for the Disorder which Original Sin has caus'd in the World and the Foundation of Christian Morality * See the Illustrations II. That our Liberty not our Senses is the true cause of our Errors III. A Rule for avoiding Error in the use of our Senses I. Of the Errors of sight in respect of Extension absolutely consider'd * See the Journal of the Learned Nov. 12. 1668. Fr. Le germe * The Cicatricle or the Sperm of the Egg is a little white spot upon the Yolk See Malpigh de Formatione Pulli in Ova †See Swammerdam 's Miraculum naturae II. A Continuation of these Errors about Invisible Objects III. Of the Errors of sight touching Extension relatively consider'd I. Of the Errors of sight about Figures II. We have no knowledge of the least of them III. The knowledge we have of the greater is not exact IV. An Explication of some Natural judgments which prevent our deception V. That these very judgments deceive us in some particular junctures See the 9. Chapter towards the end See the 3 d. Ch. of the 2 d. Part of the 6 Book I. That our Eyes are incapable of informing us of the Quantity or Swiftness of Motion consider'd in it self II. That Duration which is necessary to our knowledge of the Quantity of Motion is unknown to us III. An Instance of the Errors of Sight in respect of Motion and Rest. I. A general Demonstration of the Errors of our Sight concerning Motion II. That the Distance of Objects is necessary to be known in order to judge of the Quantity of their Motion III. The Mediums whereby we know the Distances of Objects are examined The Soul does not make all those judgments I aâ—tribute to her these Natural judgments are nothing but Sensations and I only speak thus the better to explain things The second Medium whereby to judge of the Distance of Objctes The third Medium whereby to judge of the Distance of Objects The fourtâ— and fifth Mediums The sixth Medium whereby to judge of the Distance of Objects * Seethe Illustrations * I call by the Name of Idea here whatever is the Immediate Object of the Mind I. The Distinction of the Soul and Body II. An Explication of the Organs of the Senses III. The Soul is immediately united to that part of the Brain where the Fibres of the Organs of the Senses centre IV. An Instance to explain the effect which Objects have upon our Bodies V. What it is that Objects produce in the Soul and the Reasons why the Soul perceives not the Motions of the Fiâ—res of the Body This confus'd Reasoning or this Natural Judgement is only a Compound Sensation See what I have said before of Natural Judgements and the first Ch. of the 3 d. Book VI. Four things which are generally confounded in every Sensation I. Of the Error we fall into concerning the Action of Objects against the External Fibres of our Senses III. The Cause of this Error III. An Objection and Answer I. Of our Errors concerning the Motions or Vibrations of the Fibres of our Senses II. That we confound them with the Sensations of our Soul and sometimes have no Perception of them III. An Experiment that proves it IV. An Explication of three sorts of Sensations of the Soul V. The Errors that accompany the Sensations I. The Definition of the Sensations II. That a Man knows his own Sensations better than he thinks he does III. An Objection and Answer IV. From whence it proceeds that a Man imagines he has no knowledge of
indeed whenever we will it and we may be call'd in that sense the natural cause of the Motion of our Arm yet natural Causes are not true but only occasional as acting by the mere force and efficacy of the Will of God as we have already explain'd For how is it possible for us to move our Arm To perform this 't is requir'd we should have Animal Spirits and send them through certain Nerves towards certain Muscles to swell up and contract them for so that Motion is perform'd as some pretend though others deny it and assert that the Mystery is not yet discover'd However it be most Men know not so much as that they have Spirits Nerves and Muscles and yet move their Arms with as much and more dexterity than the most skilful Anatomists Men therefore will the moving their Arm but 't is God that is able and knows how to doe it If a Man cannot overthrow a Tower yet he knows what must be done to effect it but not one amongst them knows what the Animal Spirits must doe to move one of his Fingers How should they then move the whole Arm of themselves These things appear very evident to me and I suppose to all thinking Persons though they may be incomprehensible to others such as are only used to the confused voice of the Senses But Men are so far from being the true Causes of the Motions produc'd in their Body that it seems to imply a Contradiction they should be so For a true Cause is that betwixt which and its Effect the Mind percieves a necessary connexion for so I understand it But there is none besides the infinitely perfect Being betwixt whose Will and the Effects the Mind can perceive a necessary Connexion and therefore none but God is the true Cause or has a real Power of moving Bodies Nay it seems unconceivable that God should communicate this Power either to Angels or Men And those that pretend that the Power we have of moving our Arm is a true Power must by Consequence grant that God can give Spirits the Power of creating annihilating and doing all possible things in short that he can make them Almighty as I am going to pove God needs not Instruments to act 't is enough he should Will the Existence of a thing in order to its Existing because it is contradictory that he should will a thing and his Will should not be fulfilled And therefore his Power is his Will and to communicate his Power is to communicate his Will so that to communicate his Will to a Man or an Angel can signifie nothing else but to will that whenever that Man or Angel shall desire that such or such a Body be moved it may actually be moved In which Case I see two Wills concurring together that of God and that of the Angel and to know which of them is the true Cause of the Motion of that Body I enquire which is the Efficacious I see a necessary Connexion betwixt the Will of God and the thing willed in this Case God wills that whenever the Angel shall desire that such a Body be moved it be really so There is then a necessary Connexion betwixt the Will of God and the Motion of that Body and consequently God is the true Cause of that Motion and the Will of the Angel is only occasional Again to make it more evidently manifest let us suppose God wills it should happen quite contrary to the Desire of some Spirits as may be thought of the Devils or some other wicked Spirits in Punishment of their Sins In that Case it cannot be said God communicates his Power to them since nothing happens of what they wish However the Will of those Spirits shall be the natural Cause of the produced Effects as such a Body shall be removed to the Right because they wish it were moved to the Left and the Desires of those Spirits shall determine the Will of God to act as the Will of moving the Parts of our Body determine the first Cause to move them and therefore the Desires of all finite Spirits are but occasional Causes If after all these Reasons it be still asserted that the Will of an Angel moving a Body is a true and not a bare occasional Cause 't is evident that the self-same Angel might be the true Cause of the Creation and Annihilation of all things since God might as well communicate to him his Power of Creating and annihilating Bodies as that of moving them if He should will that they should be created and annihilated in a word if he will'd that all things should be performed according to the Angel's Desires as he wills that Bodies be moved as the Angel pleases if therefore it may be said that an Angel or Man are true Movers because God moves Bodies as they desire that Man or Angel might likewise be call'd true Creatours since God might create Beings on occasion of their Will Nay perhaps it might be said that the vilest of Animals or even mere Matter is the real Cause of the Creation of some Substance if it be supposed with some Philosophers that God produces substantial Forms whenever the Disposition of Matter requires it And lastly since God has resolved from all Eternity to create some certain things at some certain times those Times might also be called the Causes of the Creation of such Beings with as much right as 't is pretended that a Ball meeting with another is the true Cause of the Motion that is communicated to it because God by his general Will that constitutes the Order of Nature has decreed that such or such Communication of Motions should follow upon the Concourse of two Bodies There is then but one true Cause as there is one true God Neither must we imagine that what precedes an Effect does really produce it God himself cannot communicate his Power to Creatures according to the Light of Reason He cannot make them true Causes and change them into Gods But though he might doe it we conceive not why he should will it Bodies Spirits pure Intelligences all can doe nothing 'T is he who has made Spirits that enlightens and moves them 't is he who has created Heaven and Earth that regulates all their Motions In fine 't is the Authour of our Being that performs our Desires Semel jussit semper paret He moves even our Arms when we use them against his Orders for he complains by his Prophets That we make him subservient to our unjust and criminal Desires All those little Divinities of the Heathens all those particular Causes of Philosophers are Chimeras which the wicked Spirit endeavours to set up that he may destroy the Worship of the true God The Philosophy we have received from Adam teaches us no such things but that which has been propagated by the Serpent for ever since the Fall the Mind of Man is turned Heathen That Philosophy join'd to the Errours of the Senses has made
special a regard as to give it all things necessary to its preservation and likewise a Seed for perpetuating it's kind This proves second causes no more than the Plurality of Causes of contrary Principles of Good and Evil which the Manichees imagin'd to account for these effects But 't is a certain Sign of the Grandeur Wisdom and Magnificence of God For God does no works unbecoming an infinite Wisdom and he does them with that profusion as is a manifest proof of his Power and Greatness Whatever is destroy'd is repair'd again by the same Law that destroy'd it So great is the Wisdom Power and Fecundity of that Law God prevents not the destruction of Beings by any new Will not only because the first suffices to restore them but especially because his Wills are of much greater value than the Reparation of these Beings They are far more valuable than all that they produce And God had never made this World since not worthy of the Action by which it was produc'd unless he had other prospects than are known by the Philosophers and knew how to honour himself in JESUS CHRIST with an honour which the Creatures are not capable of giving him When a House falls and crushes an Honest Man to death a greater Evil happens than when one Beast devours another or when a Body is forc'd to rebound by the shock it receives from the Encounter of another But God does not multiply his Wills to redress either the true or apparent Disorders which are the necessary Consequences of natural Laws God ought not to correct nor change these Laws though they sometimes produce Monsters He is not to confound the Order and simplicity of his Ways He must neglect mean and little things I would say he must not have particular Wills to produce effects which are not equivalent to or worthy of the Action of the Producer God works not Miracles save when Order which he constantly follows requires it which Order requires that he should act by the most simple ways and make no exceptions to his general Wills but when 't is absolutely necessary to his designs or on particular occasions which we are absolutely ignorant of Though we are all united to Order or the Wisdom of God yet we know not all the Rules of it We see in it what we ought to do but we cannot discover in it what God ought to Will nor is it our business to be very sollicitous to know it A great instance of what I have said we have in the Damnation of an infinite number of Persons whom God suffer'd to perish in times of Ignorance and Error God is infinitely Good He loves all his Works He wills that all Men should be sav'd and come to the Knowledge of the Truth for he has made them to injoy him And yet the greatest number are Damn'd They live and die in blindness and will remain in it to all Eternity Comes not this from his acting by the simplest means and his following Order We have shown that according to Order God ought not to prevent by Indeliberate Pleasures the will of the first Man whose Fall has disorder'd Nature It was requisite that all Men should descend from one not only because that is the most simple way but for several too Theological and abstract Reasons to be here explain'd In fine we ought to believe this conformable to the Order which God follows and to the Wisdom he always consults in the intention and execution of his designs The first Man's Sin has produc'd infinite Evils I confess but certainly Order requir'd that God should permit it and that he should instate Man in a peccable condition God minded to repair his laps'd Work seldom gives Victorious Graces that prevail over the malice of the greatest Sinners Sometimes he gives Graces useless to the conversion of the Receiver though he foresees their inutility and sometimes sheds them in great Plenty yet with little effect Commonly he acts as it were by degrees giving Men secret inspirations of Self-denial and Repentance as formerly he gave them Counsels in his Gospel Thus he prepares them for the grace of Conversion and last of all bestows it Why all these round-about Methods and ways indirect Would it not have been enough for him to have positively Will'd the Conversion of a Sinner to have effected it in an efficacious and irresistible manner But is not it visible that this proceeds from his acting by the simplest Methods and Orders willing it though we do not always see it For God must necessarily follow Order and Wisdom in his actings though these are Unfathomable Abysses to the Mind of Man There are certain most simple Laws in the Order of Grace by which God for the most part acts For this Order has its Rules as well as that of Nature though we know them not as we see those of the Communications of Motions Only let us follow the Counsels which are given us in the Gospel by him who perfectly knows the Laws of Grace This I say to pacify the unjust Complaints of Sinners who despise the Counsels of JESUS CHRIST and charge their Malignity and disorders upon God They would have God show Miracles in their behalf and dispense with the general Laws of Grace They lead their Life in Pleasures they seek out for Honours and daily renew those wounds which sensible Objects have given their Brain and add more to them and after this expect God should cure them by a Miracle Not unlike wounded Men who in the excess of their Pain tear their Cloaths renovate their Wounds and when in the sight of approaching Death complain of the cruelty of their Surgeons They would have God to save them because say they God is Good Wise Powerful and needs but determine it to make us happy Why did he make us to damn and destroy us They ought to know that God Wills they should be sav'd and to that intent has done all that could be done by Order and Wisdom which he consults We cannot believe that he deserts us whilst he gives us his own Son to be our Mediator and Sacrifice Yes God is willing that all Mankind should be sav'd but by ways that we ought to study with care and follow with caution and weariness God is not to consult our Passions in the Execution of his designs He can have no regard but to his Eternal Wisdom nor follow any other rule than the Divine Order which Order will have us imitate JESUS CHRIST and obey his Counsels for our Sanctification and Salvation But if God has not predestin'd all Men to be conformable to the Image of his Son who is the Model and Exemplar of the Elect 'T is because herein God acts by the most simple means with reference to his designs which all make for his Glory 'T is because God is an universal Cause which ought not to act like particular Causes which have particular Volitions for all they do 'T
is because his Wisdom which in this respect is an Abyss to our apprehensions Wills it so Lastly 't is because this Conduct is more worthy of God than could be any other more favourable for the Reprobate For even they are condemn'd hy an Order as worthy our Adorations as that whereby the Elect are sanctified and sav'd And nothing but our Ignorance of Order and our Self-love make us blame a Conduct which the Angels and Saints eternally admire But let us return to the proofs of the efficacy of second Causes ARGUMENT V. If Bodies had not a certain Nature or Force to act with and if God did all things there would be nothing but what was Supernatural in the most ordinary effects The distinction of Natural and Supernatural which has been so well receiv'd in the World and establisht by the universal approbation of the Learn'd would be Chimerical and Extravagant ANSWER I answer that distinction is absurd in the Mouth of Aristotle since the Nature he has establisht is a meer Chimera I say that distinction is not clear in the mouth of the Vulgar part of Men who judge of things by the Impression they make upon their Senses For they know not precisely what they mean when they say the Fire burns by it's Nature I say that this distinction may pass in the mouth of a Divine if he means by natural Effects the consequences of the General Laws which God has settled for the production and preservation of all things And by supernatural Effects those which are independent on these Laws In this sense the Distinction is true But the Philosophy of Aristotle together with the Impression of the senses makes it as I think dangerous because it may divert from God the too respectful admirers of the Opinions of that wretched Philosopher or such as consult their senses instead of retiring into themselves to consult the Truth And therefore that distinction is not to be made use of without an Explication St. Austin having us'd the word fortune retracted it though there are few that could be deceiv'd by it St. Paul speaking of meats offer'd to Idols advertises that an Idol is nothing If the Nature of the Heathen Philosophy be a fiction if that nature be nothing it should be precaution'd for that there are many who are abus'd by it And more than we suppose who inconsiderately attribute to it the Works of God who are taken up with this Idol or fiction of the Humane mind and pay it those Honours which are only due to the Divinity They are willing to let God be Author of Miracles and some Extraordinary effects which in one sense are little worthy of his Greatness and Wisdom and they refer to the Power of their Imaginary nature those constant and regular Effects which none but the Wise know how to admire They suppose too that this so wonderful disposition which all living Bodies have to preserve themselves and beget their like is a production of their Nature For according to these Philosophers the Sun and Man beget a Man We may still distinguish between supernatural and natural Order several ways For we may say that the supernatural relates to future Goods that it is establish't upon consideration of the merits of CHRIST that it is the first and principal in the designs of God and other things enough to preserve a distinction which they are vainly apprehensive should fall to the ground ARGUMENT VI. The main proof which is brought by the Philosophers for the Efficacy of second Causes is drawn from the will and liberty of Man Man wills and determines of himself But to Will and Determine is to Act. 'T is certainly Man who commits Sin God not being the Author of it any more than of Concupiscence and Error Therefore Man acts ANSWER I have sufficiently explain'd in several Places of the Treatise about the Search of Truth what is the Will and Liberty of Man and especially in the first Chapter of the first Book and in the first Illustration upon it so that it is needless to repeat it again I acknowledge Man Wills and Determines himself in as much as God causes him to Will incessantly carries him towards good and gives him all the Idea's and Sensations by which he determines his Impression I know likewise that Man alone commits Sin But I deny that therein he does any thing For Sin Errour and even Concupiscence are nothing I have explain'd my self upon this Point in the first Illustration Man wills but his Volitions are impotent in themselves they produce nothing and God works all notwithstanding them For 't is even God that makes our Will by the Impression he gives us towards Good All that Man has from himself are Errour and Sin which are nothing There is a great difference between our Minds and Bodies that are about us I grant Our Mind in one sense Wills Acts and Determines it self Our own inward Consciousness is an evident Conviction If we were destitute of Liberty there could be no future Recompence and Punishment for 't is our Liberty that makes our Actions good or bad and without it Religion would be but a Phantasm and a Dream But that which we cannot see clearly is That Bodies have a force of Acting This it is we cannot comprehend and this we deny when we deny the Efficacy of Second Causes Even the Mind acts not in that measure which is imagin'd I know that I will and that I Will freely I have no Reason to doubt of it which is stronger than that inward feeling I have of my self Nor do I deny it but I deny that my Will is the true Cause of the Motion of my Arm of the Idea's of my Mind and of other things which accompany my Volitions For I see no Relation between so different things Nay I most clearly see there can be no Analogy between my Will to move my Arm and the Agitation of some little Bodies whose Motion and Figure I do not know which make choice of certain Nervous Canals amongst a Million of others unknown to me in Order to cause in me the Motion I desire by a World of Motions which I desire not I deny that my Will produces in me my Idea's I cannot see how 't is possible it should for since it cannot Act or Will without Knowledge it supposes my Idea's but does not make them Nay I do not so much as know precisely what an Idea is I cannot tell whether we produce them out of nothing and send them back to the same nothing when we cease to perceive them I speak after the Notion of some Persons I produce you 'll say my Idea's by the Faculty which God gives me of Thinking I move my Arm because of the Union which God has establish'd between my Mind and Body Faculty Vnion are Logical Terms of loose and indeterminate Signification There is no particular Being nor Mode of Being which is either Faculty or Vnion Therefore