the Grace of the Creator XXXVI In the establish'd Order of Nature I can see but two Occasional Causes which shed Light on Minds and so determine the General Laws of the Grace of the Creator one which is in us and depends in some measure on us the other which is found in the Relation we have with surrounding Objects The former is nothing but the diverse Motions of our Will the second is the Occurrence of sensible Objects which act on our Mind in consequence of the Laws of Union of our Soul with our Body XXXVII We are taught by our own inward Consciousness That the Love of Light produces it and that Attention of Mind is a Natural Prayer by which we obtain Instruction of God for all the Enquirers of Truth who apply themselves to Truth discover it in proportion to their Application And if our Prayer were not interrupted nor our Attention disturb'd if we had any Idea of what we ask and should ask it with a competent Perseverance we should not fail to obtain whilst we were capable of receiving it But our Prayers are continually interrupted unless Self-interess'd our Senses and Imagination muddy and confound all our Ideas And â—hough the Truth we consult answers our Enquiries the confus'd Noise of our Passions deafens us to its Answers or makes us speedily forget them XXXVIII If it be consider'd that Man before the Fall was animated with Charity and possess'd with all that was requisite to his Perseverance in Innocence and that by his Perseverance and Application he ought to merit his Reward 't will easily be conceiv'd that the several Desires of his Will were establish'd the Occasional Causes of the Light receiv'd in his Understanding otherwise his Distraction had not been voluntary nor his Attention meritorious But Nature however corrupted is not destroy'd God has not desisted to will what he once will'd And the same Laws still subsist Therefore our manifold Volitions are still the Occasional or Natural Causes of the Presence of Ideas to our Mind But because the Union of the Soul with the Body is chang'd into a Dependence on it by a Natural Consequence of Sin and the immutable Will of God as I have explain'd elsewhere our Body at present disturbs our Ideas and speaks so loud in favour of its respective Goods that the Mind but seldom consults and distractedly listens to Internal Truth XXXIX Moreover Experience daily teaches us that our Conversation with Understanding Persons is capable of instructing us by raising our Attention that Preaching Reading Converse a thousand Occurrences of all sorts may raise some Ideas in us and likewise inspire us with good Thoughts The Death of a Friend is doubtless capable of putting us in Mind of Death unless some great Passion takes us up And when a Preacher of great Natural Endowments undertakes to demonstrate a most simple Truth and convince others of it it must be own'd that he may persuade his Hearers and even move their Conscience give them Fear and Hope and raise in them such other Passions as put them in a less State of Opposition to the Influence of the Grace of Jesus Christ. Men being made for a sociable Life 't was requisite they should mutually communicate their Thoughts and Motions 'T was fit they should be united in Mind as well as Body and that speaking by the Voice to their Ears and by Writing to their Eyes they should infuse Light and Understanding into one anothers Minds XL. But Light whatever way produc'd in us whether by particular Desires or fortuitous Instances as the Occasional Causes of it may be call'd Grace especially when it nearly relates to Salvation though it be but a Consequence of the Order of Nature because since Sin God owes us nothing and all the Good we have is merited for us by Jesus Christ in whom our very Being subsists But this kind of Grace though merited for us by Jesus Christ is not the Grace of our Lord but that of the Creator since Jesus Christ is not usually the Occasional Cause of it but the Cause of it is discoverable in the Order of Nature XLI There are still several other Natural Effects which we might reasonably look upon as Graces For Example Two Persons have at the same time two Desires of Curiosity The one to go see an Opera the other to hear a celebrated Preacher If they satisfie their Curiosity he that goes to the Opera shall find such Objects as according to his present Disposition of Mind shall raise in him Passions that will damn him whilst the other shall find in the Preacher so great Force and Light that the Grace of Conversion working in him at that moment shall be able to save him Which suppos'd Let but a shower of Rain or any other Accident happen that may stay them at home Though the Rain be a Natural Effect as depending on the Natural Laws of the Communication of Motions yet it may be said to be a Grace in respect of him whose Damnation it prevents and a Punishment to him whose Conversion it hinders XLII Grace being conjoin'd to Nature all the Motions of our Soul and Body have some relation to Salvation This Man is sav'd by having in a State of Grace made a false Step which happily broke his Neck and another is damn'd by having on some Occasion misfortunately avoided the Ruines of a falling House We know not what is for our Advantage but we well know there is nothing of it self so indifferent but has some reference to our Salvation because of the Mixture and Combination of Effects depending on the General Laws of Nature with others that depend on the General Laws of Grace XLIII As therefore Light points out to us the True Good the Means to obtain it our Duties to God in a word the Ways we are to follow it is sufficient to cause those who are animated with Charity to do good to merit new Graces and to conquer some Temptations as I shall explain in another Place so I think we may lawfully give it the Name of Grace though Jesus Christ be only the Meritorious Cause of it And whereas External Graces which have no immediate Influence on the Mind come nevertheless into the Order of Predestination of Saints I consider them also as True Graces In a word I see not why we may not give the Name of Grace to all Natural Effects when relating to Salvation subservient to the Grace of Jesus Christ and delivering us from some Hindrances to his Efficacy Yet if others will not agree with me I shall not contend with them about Words XLIV All these Graces if we may be allow'd to call them so being those of the Creator the General Laws of these Graces are the General Laws of Nature For we must still observe that Sin has not destroy'd Nature though it has corrupted it The General Laws of the Communications of Motions are always the same and those of the Union of the Soul
not the greatest that is possible Children in their Mother's Womb whose Bodies are not yet compleatly form'd and who are of themselves in a state of the greatest Weakness Impotency and Want that can possibly be conceiv'd ought to be united likewise to their Mothers in the strictest manner imaginable And though their Soul be separate from that of their Mothers yet since their Body is not loos'd and disengaged from her's it ought to be concluded they have the same Sentiments and the same Passions in a word all the same Thoughts as are excited in the Soul on occasion of the Motions which are produc'd in the Body Thus Infants see what their Mothers see they hear the same Cries they receive the same Impressions of Objects and are agitated with the same Passions For since the Air of the Face of a Man in a Passion pierces those which look upon him and Naturally impresses in them a Passion resembling that with which he is possess'd though the Union of that Man with those that consider him be not very great and binding one would think there were good Reason to believe the Mothers capable of imprinting on their Infants all the same Sentiments they are touch'd with and all the same Passions themselves are acted withal For in short the Body of an Infant in the Womb is all of a piece with the Body of the Mother the Blood and the Spirits are common to them both the Sensations and Passions are the Natural Result and Consequents of the Motions of the Blood and Spirits and these Motions are necessarily communicated from the Mother to the Child Therefore the Passions and Sensations and generally all the Thoughts occasion'd by the Body are common to the Mother and the Child These things seem to me beyond exception true for several Reasons which yet I advance not here but as a Supposition which I think will be sufficiently demonstrated by what follows For every Supposition that can stand the shock of all the Difficulties possible to be rais'd against it and repel them ought to pass for an indisputable Principle The invisible Bonds and Cements wherewith the Author of Nature has united all his Works are worthy of the Wisdom of GOD and the Admiration of Men there is nothing in the World at once more surprizing and instructing than this but we are too inconsiderate to regard it We leave our selves to be conducted without considering who conducts us or how he does it Nature is conceal'd from our Eyes as well as its Author and we feel the Motions that are produc'd in us without considering from what Springs they are And yet there are few things more necessary to be known by us since upon the Knowledge of them it is that the Explication of all things relating to Man depends There are certainly in our Brain some secret Springs and Movements which naturally incline us to Imitation for this is necessary to Civil Society It is not only necessary for Children to believe their Fathers for Disciples to believe their Masters and Inferiours their Superiours It is moreover necessary that all Men should be inclinable to take up the like Exteriour Manners and to do the same Actions as those with whom they mean to live For to the intent that Men should have a Connexion and Dependance on each other 't is necessary they come near to one another in the Characters hoth of Body and Mind This is the Fundamental Principle of Abundance of things we shall treat of in the following Discourse But as to what we have to say in this Chapter it is farther necessary to know that there are in the Brain some Natural Dispositions which incline us to Compassion as well as to Imitation It ought to be known then That the Animal Spirits do not only Naturally convey themselves into the Parts of our Body for the performing the same Actions and the same Motions which we see others do but farther for the Receiving after a manner their Hurts and Injuries and participating of their Miseries For Experience teaches us that when we very attentively consider a Man violently struck or dangerously wounded the Spirits impetuously hasten to the Parts of our Body correspondent to those we see wounded in another provided we turn not the current of them another way by a voluntary and forcible Titillation of a different Part from that which we see hurt or wounded Or that the Natural Course of the Spirits towards the Heart and Viscerous parts which is usual in sudden Commotions changes not the Determination of the Flux of the Spirits we are speaking of and hurries them along with them Or lastly unless some extraordinary Connection of the Traces of the Brain with the motions of the Spirits effects the same thing This Translation of the Spirits into the Parts of our Body which are Analogous to those we see injuriously treated in others makes a very sensible Impression on Persons of a fine and delicate Constitution who have a lively Imagination and very soft and tender Flesh. For they feel for instance a kind of shivering or trembling in their Legs by an attentive beholding any one that has a Sore there or actually receives a blow in them For a confirmation of this take what a Friend of mine wrote to me to the same purpose An Old Gentleman that liv'd with one of my Sisters being sick a Young Maid held the Candle whil'st he was Blooded in the Foot But as she saw the Surgeon strike in the Lancet she was seiz'd with such an Apprehension as to feel three or four days afterwards such a piercing Pain in the same part of her Foot as forc'd her to keep her Bed all that time The Reason whereof is this That the Spirits impetuously diffuse themselves into these parts of our Body that by keeping them more intense they may render them more Sensible to the Soul and may put her upon her guard and make her solicitous to avoid those Evils which we behold in others This Compassion in Bodies produces another Compassion in Minds It induces us to Condole and Comfort others in their Troubles because in so doing we Comfort and Solace our selves In fine it gives a check to our Malice and Cruelty For the horrour of Blood and the fear of Death in a word the sensible impression of Compassion often prevents those Persons from Butchering beasts who are the most convincingly perswaded they are meer Machines Because a great many Men are unable to Kill them without Wounding themselves by a Repercussive stroke of Compassion But that which here is most especially remarkable is That the Sensible View of a Wound receiv'd by another produces in those which behold it a so much greater Wound as their Constitution is more weak and delicate Because that sensible View impetuously throwing the Animal Spirits into the Parts of the Body which are correspondent to those they see hurt or wounded they must needs make a greater Impression in the Fibres
est quod sponsa in canticis canticorum sponsi vocem quasi per somnium audierat quae dicebat Ego dormio cor meum vigilat Ac si diceret dum exteriores sensus ab â—ujus vitae sollicitudinibus sopio vacante mente vivacius interna cognosco Foris dormio sed intus cor vigilat quia dum exteriora quasi non sentio interiora solerter apprehendo Bene ergo Eliu ait quod per somnium loquitur Deus St. Gregory's Morals upon the 33. Ch. of Job THE ILLUSTRATION UPON THE Seventh CHAPTER of the Second PART of the Third BOOK Where I prove That we have no clear Idea of the Nature or Modifications of our Soul I Have often said and think sufficiently prov'd in the third Book of the preceding Treatise that we have no clear Idea but only the Conscience or inward Sensation of our Soul and that therefore we have a much more imperfect knowledge thereof than we have of Extension Which to me seem'd so evident that I did not think it necessary to prove it more at large But the Authority of M. des Cartes who possitively says That the nature of the Mind is better known than that of any other thing has so prepossess'd some of his Disciples that what I have said upon that Subject serves only to make them think me a weak Person unable to reach to and hold fast abstracted Truths which have nothing in them to welcome and retain the attention of their Contemplators I confess I am extreamly Feeble Sensible and Heavy and my Mind depends on my Body more ways than I can express I know it I feel it and I continually labour to increase this knowledge I have of my self For though we cannot help our being miserable we ought at least to have the knowledge and the sense of it we ought at least to be humbled upon the sight of our inward Miseries and to acknowledge the need we have of being deliver'd from this Body of Death which throws trouble and confusion into all the faculties of our Soul But yet the Question before us is so well proportion'd to the Mind that I can see no need of any great Application to resolve it and for that reason I did not insist upon it For I think it may be affirm'd that most Mens ignorance about the Soul as of its distinction from the Body of its Spirituality Immortality of its other properties is sufficiently demonstrative that we have no clear and distinct Idea of it It may be said that we have a clear Idea of Body because we need but consult the Idea that represents it to discover what Modifications it is capable of We plainly see that it may be either round or square in Rest or Motion We easily conceive that a square may be divided into two Triangles two Parallelograms or two Trapezia We never are at a stand what to answer to the demand whether this or that be implied or denied in Extension because the Idea of Extension being clear we may easily and by a bare perception discover what it includes and what it excludes But it does not appear to me that we have any such Idea of our Mind as can discover when we consult it the Modifications it will admit Had we never felt either Pleasure or Pain we could not tell whether our Soul were susceptible of either If a Man had never eaten a Melon felt Smart or seen Red or Blue he might have consulted long enough this pretended Idea of his Soul before he could distinctly discover whether it was capable or not of such Sensations or Modifications I say farther that though a Man actually feel Pain or sees Colour he cannot discover by a simple view whether these Qualities belong to the Soul He 'll imagine that Pain is in the Body which occasions him to suffer it and that Colour is diffus'd upon the surface of Objects though it be clearly conceiv'd that these Objects are distinguish'd from the Soul To be satisfied whether or no sensible Qualities are Modes of the Mind's existence this pretended Idea of the Soul is never consulted On the contrary the Cartesians themselves consult the Idea of Extension and reason in this manner Heat Pain Colour cannot be Modifications of Extension For this is capable but of different figures and Motions Now there are but two kinds of Beings Bodies and Minds Therefore Heat Pain and Colour and all other sensible Qualities are the Furniture of the Mind Whilst they are oblig'd to consult their Idea of Extension to discover whether sensible Qualities are Modifications of their Soul is it not evident they have no clear Idea of it For otherwise would they ever bethink themselves of so indirect a Conduct When a Philosopher would know whether Rotundity belongs to Extension does he enquire into the Idea of the Soul or any other besides that of Extension Does he not see clearly in the same Idea of Extension that Rotundity is a Modification of it And would it not be extravagance in him to argue thus to be instructed There are only two sorts of Beings Minds and Bodies Roundness is not a Modification of a Mind therefore it is a Modification of a Body We discover then by a bare perception without Argumentation and by the meer Application of the Mind to the Idea of Extension that Roundness and every other Figure is a Modification belonging to Body and that Pleasure Pain Heat and all other sensible Qualities are not Modifications of it There can be no Question propos'd about what does or does not appertain to Extension but may be easily readily and boldly answer'd by the sole consideration of the Idea that represents it All Men are agreed in their notion and beliefe upon this Point For those who will have Matter capable of Thought do not imagine this Faculty is to be attributed to iâ— because of Extension being perswaded that Extension consider'd precisely as such cannot Think But Men are not so well agreed about what they are to think of the Soul and her Modifications for some there are who fancy that Pain and Heat or at least that Clour does not belong to her And a Man would be laught at among some Cartesians that should affirm the Soul grows actually Blue Red Yellow and that she is dyed with all the Colours of the Rain-Bow when she contemplates it There are many who doubt and more that don't believe that the Soul becomes formally stinking upon the smell of carrion and that the tast of Sugar Pepper and Salt are properties belonging to her Where then is the clear Idea of the Soul that the Cartesians may consult it and may all agree about the subject where Colours Savours Odours ought to enter But though the Cartesians were agreed upon these difficulties yet we were not to conclude from their agreement that we have a clear Idea of the Soul For if they agree at last that 't is she which is actually Green or Red when a
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
and Body are chang'd no otherwise than that the Union of the former is grown into a Dependence for the Reasons I have given elsewhere For at present we depend on that Body to which before Sin we were only united XLV Now the Laws of Nature are always most Simple and General For God acts not by particular Wills unless Order requires a Miracle Which Truth I have sufficiently prov'd in the First Discourse Thus when a Stone falls on the Head of a good Man and rids him of his Life it falls in consequence of the Laws of Motions and not because that Man is Just and God designs to recompense him When a like Accident destroys a Sinner 't is not because God will actually punish him For God on the contrary would have all Men sav'd But he is not to change the Simplicity of his Laws to suspend the Punishment of a Criminal So likewise when Light breaks into our Understanding 't is because our Desires are the Natural or Occasional Causes of it 't is because we hear some understanding Person and because our Brain is dispos'd to receive the Impressions of the Speaker And not that God has a particular Will on our behalf but that he follows the General Laws of Nature to which he has oblig'd himself I can see nothing Mysterious in the Distribution of these kinds of Graces and I stand not to draw Consequences deducible from these Truths XLVI 'T is to be observ'd that Jesus Christ who is the sole Meritorious Cause of the Goods we receive from God by the Order of Nature is sometimes the Occasional Cause of the Grace of Light as well as of that of Sensation yet I am of Opinion that this but rarely happens because indeed it is not necessary it should Jesus Christ as much as possible makes the Order of Nature subservient to that of Grace For besides that Reason evinces that Order will have it so because that Method is most simple it is sufficiently manifest by the Conduct he takes on Earth and the Order he has establish'd and still preserves in his Church Jesus Christ made use of Speech for the Instruction of the World and likewise sent his Disciples two by two to prepare the People to receive him He has settled Apostles Prophets Evangelists Doctors Bishops and Priests to labour in the Edification of the Church Is not this to make Nature Handmaid to Grace and to propagate the Light of Faith in Mens Minds by ways most Simple and Natural And indeed Jesus Christ on Earth was not to instruct Men by particular Wills since he might instruct them as Interiour Truth and Eternal Wisdom by the most simple and exuberant Laws of Nature XLVII That which lies most hidden and unreveal'd in the Order God has follow'd for the Establishment of his Church is doubtless the Time Place and other Circumstances of the Incarnation of his Son and the Preaching of the Gospel For why should Jesus Christ for whom the World was created become Man Four thousand Years after its Creation Why must he be born among the Jews he that was to reject that wretched Nation Why must he choose to be the Son of David when the Family of David was obscur'd and not rather to be born from Emperours who have commanded the whole World since he came to Convert and Enlighten all the Earth Why to elect his Apostles and Disciples out of the Ignorant and Illeterate to preach to the Inhabitants of Bethsaida and Corazin who remain in Incredulity and to leave Tyre and Sidon who would have been converted by the like Grace afforded them to hinder St. Paul from preaching the Word of God in Asia and to appoint him to pass into Macedonia A thousand other Circumstances which have accompanied the Preaching of the Gospel are no doubt such Mysteries as admit not clear and evident Reasons nor is it my Design to give them My Purpose is only to establish some Principles that may afford some Light to these and the like Difficulties or at least give us to understand that nothing can be thence concluded against what I have said of the Order of Nature and Grace XLVIII 'T is certain that Natural Effects are complicated and mix'd a thousand ways with the Effects of Grace and that the Order of Nature strengthens or weakens the Efficacy or Effects of the Orders of Grace according as these two Orders variously combine together Death which by the General Laws of Nature at a particular Juncture befals a good or ill Prince or Bishop occasions a great deal of Good or Evil in the Church because such kind of Accidents cause a great Diversity in the Sequel of Effects which depend on the Order of Grace But God would have all Men sav'd by the simplest ways Therefore we may and ought to say in general That He has chosen the Time the Place and Manners which in the process of Time and by the General Laws of Nature and Grace must all things consider'd introduce a greater Number of the Predestinate into the Church God does all things for his Glory Therefore among all the possible Combination of Nature and Grace he has from the infinite Extent of his Knowledge made choice of that which could form the perfectest Church and most suitable to his Majesty and Wisdom XLIX This one would think were sufficient to answer all the Difficulties that can arise about the Circumstances of our Mysteries For if it be said that Jesus Christ ought to be born to a Roman Emperour and to perform his Miracles in the Metropolis of the World that the Gospel might spread it self with greater Ease into the remotest Countries It may be boldly answer'd That though this seems so to Men yet that Combination of Nature and Grace had not been so worthy of the Wisdom of God as that which he has chosen I confess Religion had been propagated with greater ease but its Establishment had not been so Divine and Extraordinary nor consequently an invincible Proof of its Reality and Truth So â—hat according to that Combination Religion would at this Day have been destroy'd at least less disseminated abroad in the World Besides when we say that God acts by the simplest ways we ever suppose an Equality in the rest and especially in the Glory that ought to redound to God from his Work But the Church had not been so perfect nor so worthy of the Greatness and Holiness of God if it had been form'd with so much ease For the Beauty of the Heavenly Jerusalem consisting in the Variety of Rewards accruing upon the several Combats of Christians 't was requisite the Martyrs should lay down their Lives as well as Jesus Christ to enter into the Possession of their present Glory In a word this Principle That of all the infinite Combinations of Nature and Grace God has chosen that which ought to produce an Effect most worthy of his Greatness and Wisdom suffices for a General Answer to all the