and rational Creature We should have as much feeling upon clipping a Hair of the Head as upon pricking a Nerve Or rather as Men that is as a complex Being compounded of many vital parts we should have no feeling nor perception at all For every single Atom of our Bodies would be a distinct Animal endued with self-consciousness and personal Sensation of its own And a great number of such living and thinking Particles could not possibly by their mutual contract and pressing and striking compose one greater individual Animal with one Mind and Understanding and a vital Consension of the whole Body any more than a swarm of Bees or a crowd of Men and Women can be conceived to make up one particular Living Creature compounded and constituted of the aggregate of them all 2. It remains therefore secondly that seeing Matter in general as Matter has not any Sensation or Thought if it have them at all they must be the result of some Modification of it it must acquire them by some Organical Disposition by such and such determinate Motions by the action and passion of one Particle upon another And this is the Opinion of every Atheist and counterfeit Deist of these times that believes there is no Substance but Matter and excludes all incorporeal Nature out of the number of Beings Now to give a clear and full confutation of this Atheistical Assertion I will proceed in this method 1. First I will give a true Notion and Idea of Matter whereby it will again appear that it has no inherent Faculty of Sense and Perception 2. I will prove that no particular sort of Matter as the Brain and Animal Spirits hath any power of Sense and Perception 3. I will shew that Motion in general superadded to Matter cannot produce any Sense and Perception 4. I will demonstrate that no particular sort of Motion as of the Animal Spirits through Muscles and Nerves can beget Sense and Perception 5. I will evince that no Action and Passion of the Animal Spirits one Particle upon another can create any Sense and Perception 6. I will answer the Atheist's Argument of matter of Fact and Experience in brute Beasts which say they are allowed to be meer Matter and yet have some degree of Sense and Perception And first I will give a true Notion and Idea of Matter whereby it will appear that it has no inherent Faculty of Sense and Perception And I will offer no other but what all competent Judges and even Atheists themselves do allow of and which being part of the Epicurean and Democritean Philosophy is providentially one of the best Antidotes against their other impious Opinions as the Oil of Scorpions is said to be against the poison of their Stings When we frame in our minds any notion of Matter we conceive nothing else but Extension and Bulk which is impenetrable and divisible and passive by which three properties is understood that any particular quantity of Matter doth hinder all other from intruding into its place till it self be removed out of it that it may be divided and broken into numerous parts of different sizes and figures which by various ranging and disposing may produce an immense diversity of Surfaces and Textures that if it once be bereaved of Motion it cannot of it self acquire it again but it either must be impell'd by some other Body from without or say we though not the Atheist be intrinsecally moved by an immaterial self-active Substance that can penetrate and pervade it Wherefore in the whole Nature and Idea of Matter we have nothing but Substance with Magnitude and Figure and Situation and a capacity of being moved and divided So that no parts of Matter consider'd by themselves are either hot or cold either white or black either bitter or sweet or betwixt those extremes All the various Mixtures and Conjugations of Atoms do beget nothing but new inward Texture and alteration of Surface No sensible Qualities as Light and Colour and Heat and Sound can be subsistent in the Bodies themselves absolutely consider'd without a relation to our Eyes and Ears and other Organs of Sense These Qualities are only the effects of our Sensation which arise from the different motions upon our Nerves from objects without according to their various modification and position For example when pellucid colourless Glass or Water by being beaten into powder or froth do acquire a very intense whiteness what can we imagine to be produced in the Glass or Water but a new disposition of parts Nay an object under the self-same disposition and modification when 't is viewed by us under differing proportions doth represent very differing colours without any change at all in it self For that same opake and white Powder of Glass when 't is seen thro' a good Microscope doth exhibit all its little fragments pellucid and colourless as the whole appear'd to the naked eye before it was pounded So that Whiteness and Redness and Coldness and the like are only Idea's and Vital Passions in Us that see and feel but can no more be conceived to be real and distinct Qualities in the Bodies themselves than Roses or Honey can be thought to smell or taste their own Sweetness or an Organ be conscious of its Musick or Gun-powder of its Flashing and Noise Thus far then we have proved and 't is agreed on all hands that in our conception of any quantity of Body there is nothing but Figure and Site and a Capacity of Motion Which Motion if it be actually excited in it doth only cause a new Order and Contexture of parts so that all the Idea's of sensible Qualities are not inherent in the inanimate Bodies but are the effects of their Motion upon our Nerves and sympathetical and vital Passions produced within our selves 2. Our second enquiry must be what it is in the constitution and composition of a Man that hath the Faculty of receiving such Idea's and Passions Let us carry in our minds this true notion of Body in general and apply it to our own Substance and observe what prerogatives this Rational Machin as the Atheists would make us to be can challenge above other parcels of Matter We observe then in this understanding piece of Clock-work that his Body as well as other senseless Matter has colour and warmth and softness and the like But we have proved it before and 't is acknowledged that these Qualities are not subsistent in those Bodies but are Idea's and Sensations begotten in something else So that 't is not Blood and Bones that can be conscious of their own hardness or redness and we are still to seek for something else in our Frame and Make that must receive these impressions Will they say that these Idea's are performed by the Brain But the difficulty returns upon them again for we perceive that the like qualities of softness whiteness and warmth do belong to the Brain it self and since the Brain is but Body those Qualities
as we have shewn cannot be inherent in It but are the Sensations of some other Substance without it It cannot be the Brain then which imagins those qualities to be in it self But they may say 't is not the Gross Substance of the Brain that causes Perception but the Animal Spirits that have their residence there which are void of sensible qualities because they never fall under our Senses by reason of their minuteness But we conceive by our Reason though we cannot see them with our Eyes that every one of these also hath a determinate figure they are Spheres or Cubes or Pyramids or Cones or of some shape or other that is irregular and nameless and all these are but Modes and Affections of Magnitude and the Idea's of such Modes can no more be subsistent in the Atoms so modified than the Idea of Redness was just now found to be inherent in the Blood or that of Whiteness in the Brain And what relation or affinity is there between a minute Body and Cogitation any more than the greatest Is a small drop of Rain any wiser than the Ocean or do we grind inanimate Corn into living and rational Meal my very Nails or my Hair or the Horns and Hoofs of a Beast may bid as fair for Understanding and Sense as the finest Animal Spirits of the Brain 3. But Thirdly they will say 't is not the Bulk and Substance of the Animal Spirits but their Motion and Agility that produces Cogitation and Sense If then Motion in general or any degree of its velocity can beget Cogitation surely a Ship under sail must be a most intelligent Creature though while she lies at Anchor those Faculties be asleep some cold Water or Ice may be phlegmatick and senseless but when it boils in a Kettle it has wonderfull Heats of Thinking and Ebullitions of Fancy Nay the whole corporeal Mass all the brute and stupid Matter of the Universe must upon these terms be allowed to have Life and Understanding since there is nothing that we know of in a state of absolute Rest. Those things that seem to be at rest upon the surface of the Earth are daily wheel'd about its Axis and yearly about the Sun with a prodigious swiftness 4. But Fourthly they will say 't is not Motion in general that can do these feats of Sensation and Perception but a particular sort of it in an Organized Body through the determinate Roads and Channels of Muscles and Nerves But I pray among all the kinds of Motion whether straight or circular or parabolical or in what curve they please what pretence can one make to Thinking and Liberty of Will more than another Why do not these persons make a Diagram of these cogitative Lines and Angles and demonstrate their Properties of Perception and Appetite as plainly as we know the other properties of Triangles and Circles But how little can any Motion either circular or other contribute to the production of Thought No such circular Motion of an Atom can be all of it existent at once it must needs be made gradually and successively both as to place and time for Body cannot at the same instant be in more places than one So that at any instant of time the moving Atom is but in one single point of the Line Therefore all its Motion but in that one point is either future or past and no other parts are coexistent or contemporary with it Now what is not present is nothing at all and can be the efficient of nothing If Motion then be the cause of Thought Thought must be produced by one single Point of Motion a Point with relation to time as well as to place And such a Point to our Conceptions is almost equivalent to Permanency and Rest or at least to any other Point of any Motion whatsoever What then is become of the privilege of that organical Motion of the Animal Spirits above any other Again we have shewn that this circular and other Motion is but the successive Flux of an Atom and is never existent together and indeed is a pure Ens Rationis an operation of the Soul which considering past motion and future and recollecting the whole by the Memory and Fancy calls this by one denomination and that by another How then can that Motion be the efficient of Thought which is evidently the Effect and the Product of it 5. But Fifthly they will say farther which is their last refuge that 't is not Motion alone or under this or that Denomination that produceth Cogitation but when it falls out that numerous Particles of Matter aptly disposed and directed do interfere in their Motions and strike and knock one another this is it which begets our Sensation All the active power and vigour of the Mind our Faculties of Reason Imagination and Will are the wonderfull result of this mutual Occurse this Pulsion and Repercussion of Atoms Just as we experience it in the Flint and the Steel you may move them apart as long as you please to very little purpose but 't is the Hitting and Collision of them that must make them strike Fire You may remember I have proved before that Light and Heat and the rest of those Qualities are not such Idea's in the Bodies as we perceive in our Selves So that this smiting of the Steel with the Flint doth only make a Comminution and a very rapid Whirling and Melting of some Particles but that Idea of Flame is wholly in Us. But what a strange and miraculous thing should we count it if the Flint and the Steel instead of a few Sparks should chance to strike out Definitions and Syllogisms And yet it 's altogether as reasonable as this sottish opinion of the Atheists That dead senseless Atoms can ever justle and knock one another into Life and Understanding All that can be effected by such encounters of Atoms is either the imparting or receiving of Motion or a new determination and direction of its Course Matter when it acts upon Matter can communicate nothing but Motion and that we have shew'd before to be utterly unable to produce those Sensations And again how can that Concussion of Atoms be capable of begetting those internal and vital Affections that Self-consciousness and other Powers and Energies that we feel in our Minds seeing they only strike upon the outward Surfaces they cannot inwardly pervade one another they cannot have any penetration of Dimensions and Conjunction of Substance But it may be these Atoms of theirs may have Sense and Perception in them but they are refractary and sullen and therefore like Men of the same Tempers must be bang'd and buffeted into Reason And indeed that way of Argumentation would be most proper and effectual upon these Atheistical Atomists themselves 'T is a vigorous Execution of good Laws and not rational Discourses only either neglected or not understood that must reclaim the profaneness of those perverse and unreasonable Men. For what can be said
more to such persons that are either so disingenuous or so stupid as to profess to believe That all the natural Powers and acquired Habits of the Mind that penetrating Understanding and accurate Judgment that strength of Memory and readiness of Wit that Liberality and Justice and Prudence and Magnanimity that Charity and Beneficence to Mankind that ingenuous fear and awfull Love of God that comprehensive Knowledge of the Histories and Languages of so many Nations that experienced Insight into the works and wonders of Nature that rich Vein of Poetry and inexhausted Fountain of Eloquence those lofty flights of Thought and almost intuitive Perception of abstruse Notions those exalted Discoveries of Mathematical Theorems and Divine Contemplations all these admirable Endowments and Capacities of humane Nature which we sometimes see actually existent in one and the same Person can proceed from the blind shuffling and casual clashing of Atoms I could as easily take up with that senseless assertion of the Stoicks That Vertues and Vices and Sciences and Arts and Fancies and Passions and Appetites are all of them real Bodies and distinct Animals as with this of the Atheist That they can all be derived from the Power of meer Bodies 'T is utterly incredible and impossible and we cannot without indignation go about to refute such an absurd imagination such a gross contradiction to unprejudiced Reason And yet if the Atheists had not been driven from all their posts and their subterfuges if we had not pursued their Atoms through all their turnings and windings their cells and recesses their interferings and justlings they would boast that they could not be answer'd and make a mighty flutter and triumph Nay though they are so miserably confounded and baffled and can offer no further explication of the Cause and the Manner yet they will Sixthly urge matter of Fact and Experience that meer Body may produce Cogitation and Sense For say they do but observe the actions of some Brutes how nearly they approach to humane Reason and visibly discover some glimpses of Understanding and if that be performed by the pure Mechanism of their Bodies as many do allow who yet believe the Being of God and an immaterial Spirit in Man then 't is but raising our Conceptions and supposing Mankind to be Engines of a finer Make and Contexture and the business is done I must confess that the Cartesians and some others men that have given no occasion to be suspected of Irreligion have asserted that Brutes are meer Machins and Automata I cannot now engage in the Controversie neither is there any necessity to do so for Religion is not endanger'd by either opinion If Brutes be said to have Sense and Immaterial Souls what need we be concern'd whether those Souls shall be immortal or annihilated at the time of Death This objection supposes the Being of God and He will do all things for the wisest and best ends Or if Brutes be supposed to be bare Engins and Machins I admire and adore the divine Artifice and Skill in such a wonderfull contrivance But I shall deny then that they have any Reason or Sense if they be nothing but Matter Omnipotence it self cannot create cogitative Body And 't is not any imperfection in the power of God but an incapacity in the Subject The Idea's of Matter and Thought are absolutely incompatible And this the Cartesians themselves do allow Do but convince Them that Brutes have the least participation of Thought or Will or Appetite or Sensation or Fancy and they 'll readily retract their Opinion For none but besotted Atheists do joyn the two Notions together and believe Brutes to be rational or sensitive Machins They are either the one or the other either endued with Sense and some glimmering Rays of Reason from a higher Principle than Matter or as the Cartesians say they are purely Body void of all Sensation and Life and like the Idols of the Gentiles they have eyes and see not ears and hear not noses and smell not they eat without hunger and drink without thirst and howl without pain They perform the outward material actions but they have no inward Self-consciousness nor any more Perception of what they do or suffer than a Looking Glass has of the Objects it reflects or the Index of a Watch of the Hour it points to And as one of those Watches when it was first presented to the Emperour of China was taken there for an Animal so on the contrary our Cartesians take brute Animals for a sort of Watches For considering the infinite distance betwixt the poor mortal Artist and the Almighty Opificer the few Wheels and Motions of a Watch and the innumerable Springs and Organs in the Bodies of Brutes they may affirm as they think without either absurdity or impiety that they are nothing but moving Automata as the fabulous Statues of Daedalus bereaved of all true life and vital Sensation which never act spontaneously and freely but as Watches must be wound up to set them a going so their Motions also are excited and inhibited are moderated and managed by the Objects without them 2. And now that I have gone through the six parts that I proposed and sufficiently shewn that Sense and Perception can never be the product of any kind of Matter and Motion it remains therefore that it must necessarily proceed from some Incorporeal Substance within us And though we cannot conceive the manner of the Soul's Action and Passion nor what hold it can lay on the Body when it voluntarily moves it yet we are as certain that it doth so as of any Mathematical Truth whatsoever or at least of such as are proved from the Impossibility or Absurdity of the Contrary a way of Proof that is allowed for infallible Demonstration Why one motion of the Body begets an Idea of Pleasure in the Mind another an Idea of Pain why such a disposition of the Body induces Sleep another disturbs all the operations of the Soul and occasions a Lethargy or Frenzy this Knowledge exceeds our narrow Faculties and is out of the reach of our discovery I discern some excellent Final causes of such a vital Conjunction of Body and Soul but the instrumental I know not nor what invisible Bands and Fetters unite them together I resolve all that into the sole Pleasure and Fiat of our Omnipotent Creator whose Existence which is my last Point is so plainly and nearly deducible from the established proof of an Immaterial Soul that no wonder the resolved Atheists do so labour and bestir themselves to fetch Sense and Perception out of the Power of Matter I will dispatch it in three words For since we have shewn that there is an Incorporeal Substance within us whence did that proceed and how came it into Being It did not exist from all Eternity that 's too absurd to be supposed nor could it come out of nothing into Being without an Efficient Cause Something therefore must have created our
well adapted and accommodated to their particular Functions The Eye is very proper and meet for seeing the Tongue for tasting and speaking the Hand for holding and lifting and ten thousand Operations beside and so for the inward Parts the Lungs are suitable for Respiration the Stomach for Concoction the Lacteous Vessels for the Reception of the Chyle the Heart for the Distribution of the Blood to all the parts of the Body This is matter of Fact and beyond all dispute and in effect is no more than to say that Animals are Animals for if they were deprived of these Qualifications they could not be so This therefore is not the matter in Question between us and the Atheists But the Controversie is here We when we consider so many constituent parts in the Bodies of Men all admirably compacted into so noble an Engine in each of the very Fingers for example there are Bones and Gristles and Ligaments and Membranes and Muscles and Tendons and Nerves and Arteries and Veins and Skin and Cuticle and Nail together with Marrow and Fat and Blood and other Nutricious Juices and all those solid Parts of a determinate Size and Figure and Texture and Situation and each of them made up of Myriads of little Fibres and Filaments not discoverable by the naked Eye I say when we consider how innumerable parts must constitute so small a member as the Finger we cannot look upon It or the whole Body wherein appears so much Fitness and Use and Subserviency to infinite Functions any otherwise than as the effect of Contrivance and Skill and consequently the Workmanship of a most Intelligent and Beneficent Being And though now the Propagation of Mankind be in a settled method of Nature which is the instrument of God yet we affirm that the first Production of Mankind was by the immediate Power of the Almighty Author of Nature and that all succeeding Generations of Men are the Progeny of one primitive Couple This is a Religious Man's account of the Frame and Origination of himself Now the Atheists agree with us as to the Fitness of Man's Body and its several Parts to their various Operations and Functions for that is visible and past all contradiction but they vehemently oppose and horribly dread the Thought That this Usefulness of the Parts and the Whole should first arise from Wisdom and Design So that here will be the point in debate and the subject of our present Undertaking Whether this acknowledged Fitness of Humane Bodies must be attributed as we say to a wise and good God or as the Atheist averr to dead senseless Matter They have contrived several tricks and methods of Deceit one repugnant to another to evade if possible this most cogent Proof of a Deity All which I will propose and refute and I hope to make it appear that here as indeed every where but here certainly in the great Dramatick Poem of Nature is dignus Deo vindice Nodus a necessity of introducing a God And first I will answer what Exceptions they can have against Our account and secondly I will confute all the Reasons and Explications they can give of their Own 1. First I will answer what Exceptions they can have against Our account of the Production of Mankind And they may object That the Body it self though pretty good in its kind and upon their Hypothesis nevertheless doth not look like the Workmanship of so great a Master as is pretended by Us that infinite Wisdom and Goodness and Power would have bestowed upon us more Senses than five or at least these five in a much higher Perfection that we could never have come out of the Hands of the Almighty so subject to numerous Diseases so obnoxious to violent Deaths and at best of such a short and transitory Life They can no more ascribe so sorry an Effect to an Omniscient Cause than some ordinary piece of Clock-work with a very few motions and uses and those continually out of order and quickly at an end to the best Artist of the Age. But to this we reply First as to the five Senses it would be rash indeed to affirm That God if he had pleased could not have endued us with more But thus much we may averr That though the Power of God be infinite and perfect yet the Capacities of Matter are within limits and bounds Why then doth the Atheist suspect that there may possibly be any more ways of Sensation than what we have already Hath he an Idea or Notion or Discovery of any more So far from that that he cannot make any addition or progress in those very Senses he hath further than they themselves have informed him He cannot imagine one new Colour or Tast or Smell beside those that have actually fallen under his Senses Much less can he that is destitute of an entire Sense have any Idea or Representation of it as one that is born Deaf hath no Notion of Sounds or Blind of Colours and Light If then the Atheist can have no Imagination of more Senses than five why doth he suppose that a Body is capable of more If we had double or triple as many there might still be the same suspicion for a greater number without end and the Objection therefore in both cases is equally unreasonable and groundless Secondly we affirm that our Senses have that degree of Perfection which is most fit and suitable to our Estate and Condition For though the Eye were so piercing as to descry even opake and little Objects some hundreds of Leagues off even that improvement of our sight would do us little service it would be terminated by neighbouring Hills and Woods or in the largest and evenest plain by the very convexity of the Earth unless we could always inhabit the tops of Mountains and Cliffs or had Wings too to fly aloft when we had a mind to take a Prospect And if Mankind had had Wings as perhaps some extravagant Atheist may think us deficient in that all the World must have consented to clip them or else Humane Race had been extinct before this time nothing upon that supposition being safe from Murder and Rapine Or if the Eye were so acute as to rival the finest Microscopes and to discern the smallest Hair upon the leg of a Gnat it would be a curse and not a blessing to us it would make all things appear rugged and deformed the most finely polish'd Chrystal would be uneven and rough The sight of our own selves would affright us The smoothest Skin would be beset all over with ragged Scales and bristly Hairs And beside we could not see at one view above what is now the space of an Inch and it would take a considerable time to survey the then mountainous bulk of our own Bodies Such a Faculty of sight so disproportion'd to our other Senses and to the Objects about us would be very little better than Blindness it self And again God hath furnished us with
prove that Humane Race was neither 1 from Everlasting without beginning nor 2 owes its beginning to the Influence of Heavenly Bodies nor 3 to what they call Nature that is the necessary and mechanical motions of dead senseless Matter I proceed now to examin the fourth and last Plea of the Enemies to Religion and their own Souls That Mankind came accidentally into the World and hath its Life and Motion and Being by mere Chance and Fortune We need not much wonder that this last Opinion should obtain almost universally among the Atheists of these times For whereas the Other require some small stock of Philosophy to understand or maintain them This Account is so easie and compendious that it needs none at all and consequently is the more proper and agreeable to the great Industry and Capacity of the most numerous Party of them For what more easie to say than that all the Bodies of the first Animals and Plants were shuffled into their several Forms and Structures fortuitously that is these Atheists know not how nor will trouble themselves to endeavour to know For that is the meaning of Chance and yet this is all that they say or can say to the great Matter in question And indeed this little is enough in all reason and could they impose on the rest of Mankind as easily as delude themselves with a notion That Chance can effect a thing it would be the most expedite and effectual means to make their Cause victorious over Vertue and Religion For if you once allow them such an acceptation of Chance you have precluded your self they think from any more reasoning and objecting against them The Mechanical Atheist though you grant him his Laws of Mechanism is nevertheless inextricably puzzled and baffled with the first Formation of Animals for he must undertake to determine all the various Motions and Figures and Positions and Combinations of his Atoms and to demonstrate that such a quantity of Motion impressed upon Particles so shaped and situated will necessarily range and dispose them into the Form and Frame of an Organical Body an attempt as difficult and unpromising of success as if he himself should make the Essay to produce some new Kinds of Animals out of such senseless Materials or to rebuild the moving and living Fabrick out of its dust in the grave But the Atheist that we are now to deal with if you do but concede to him that Fortune may be an Agent presumes himself safe and invulnerable secure above the reach of any further disputes For if you proceed to ask questions and bid him assign the proper Causes and determinate Manner of that fortuitous Formation you thereby deny him what you granted before and take away the very Hypothesis and the Nature of Chance which supposeth that no certain Cause or Manner of it can possibly be assigned And as the stupidity of some Libertines that demand a sight of a Spirit or Humane Soul to convince them of its existence hath been frequently and deservedly exposed because whatsoever may be the object of our Sight must not be a Soul or Spirit but an opake Body so this Atheist would tax us of the like Nonsense and Contradiction if after he hath named to us Fortune or Chance we should expect from him any particular and distinct account of the Origin of Mankind Because it is the very essence and notion of his Chance to be wholly unaccountable and if an account could be given of it it would then no longer be Chance but Mechanism or a necessary production of certain Effects from certain Causes according to the Universal Laws of Motion Thus we are to know that if once we admit of Fortune in the Formation of Mankind there is no further enquiry to be made no more Difficulties to be solved and no Account to be demanded And who then can admire if the inviting easiness and compendiousness of this Assertion should so dazle the Eyes of our Atheist that he overlooks those gross Absurdities that are so conspicuous in it 1 For first if this Atheist would have his Chance or Fortune to be a real and substantial Agent as the Vulgar seem to have commonly apprehended some making it a Divinity others they do not conceive what he is doubly more stupid and more supinely ignorant than those Vulgar in that he assumes such a notion of Fortune as besides its being erroneous is inconsistent with his Atheism For since according to the Atheists the whole Universe is Corpus mane Body and nothing else this Chance if it do really and physically effect any thing must it self be Body also And what a numerous train of Absurdities do attend such an assertion too visible and obvious to deserve to be here insisted on For indeed it is no less than flat contradiction to it self For if this Chance be supposed to be a Body it must then be a part of the common Mass of Matter and consequently be subject to the universal and necessary Laws of Motion and therefore it cannot be Chance but true Mechanism and Nature 2 But secondly if he forbear to call Chance a real Agent and is content to have it only a Result or Event since all Matter or some portion of it may be naturally exempt from these supposed Mechanical Laws and be endowed with a power of spontaneous or fortuitous Motion which power when it is exerted must produce an Effect properly Casual and therefore might constitute the first Animate Bodies accidentally against the supposed natural tendency of the Particles of those Bodies even this second Assertion is contrary to common Sense as well as common Observation For how can he conceive that any parcel of dead Matter can spontaneonsly divert and decline it self from the line of its motion without a new impulse from external Bodies If it can intrinsically stir it self and either commence its Motion or alter its course it must have a principle of self-activity which is Life and Sense But Sense I have proved formerly to be incompatible with mere Bodies even those of the most compound and elaborate textures much more with single Atoms or solid Particles of Matter that having no intestine motion of Parts are destitute of the first foundation and capacity of Life And moreover though these Particles should be supposed to have this internal principle of Sense it would still be repugnant to the notion of Chance because their Motions would not then be Casual but Voluntary not by Chance but Choice and Design And Again we appeal to Observation whether any Bodies have such a power of Fortuitous Motion we should surely have experiment of it in the effects of Nature and Art No Body would retain the same constant and uniform Weight according to its Bulk and Substance but would vary perpetually as that spontaneous power of Motion should determin its present tendency All the various Machins and Utensils would now and then play odd Pranks and Capricio's quite contrary to
their proper Structures and Designs of the Artificers Whereas on the contrary all Bodies are observed to have always a certain and determinate Motion according to the degrees of their External Impulse and their inward Principle of Gravitation and the Resistance of the Bodies they occurr with which therefore is without Error exactly foreseen and computed by sagacious Artists And if ever Dead Matter should deviate from this Motion it could not proceed from it self but a supernatural Agent and ought not to be called a Chance but a Miracle For Chance is but a mere name and really Nothing in it self a Conception of our own Minds and only a Compendious way of speaking whereby we would express That such Effects as are commonly attributed to Chance were verily produced by their true and proper Causes but without their designing to produce them And in any Event called Casual if you take away the real and physical Causes there remains nothing but a simple Negation of the Agents intending such an Event which Negation being no real Entity but a Conception only of Man's Intellect wholly extrinsecal to the Action can have no title to a share in the production As in that famous Example which Plutarch says is the only one where Fortune is related to have done a thing artificially when a Painter having finish'd the Picture of a Horse excepting the loose Froth about his Mouth and his Bridle and after many unsuccessfull essays despairing to do that to his satisfaction in a great rage threw his Spunge at it all besmear'd as it was with the Colours which fortunately hitting upon the right place by one bold stroke of Chance most exactly supplied the want of Skill in the Artist even here it is manifest that considering the Quantity and Determination of the Motion that was impressed by the Painter's hand upon the Spunge com pounded with the specifick Gravity of the Spunge and resistance of the Air the Spunge did mechanically and unavoidably move in that particular line of Motion and so necessarily hit upon that part of the Picture and all the paint that it left there was as certainly placed by true natural Causes as any one stroke of the Pencil in the whole Piece So that this strange effect of the Spunge was fortuitous only with respect to the Painter because he did not design nor forsee such an effect but in it self and as to its real Causes it was necessary and natural In a word the true notion of Fortune 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 denoteth no more than the Ignorance of such an event in some Knowing Agent concerned about it So that it owes its very Being to Humane Understanding and without relation to that is really Nothing How absurd then and ridiculous is the Atheist that would make this Fortune the cause of the Formation of Mankind whereas manifestly there could be no such Thing or Notion in the World as Fortune till Humane Nature was actually formed It was Man that first made Fortune and not Fortune that produced Man For since Fortune in its proper acceptation supposeth the Ignorance of something in a subject capable of Knowledge if you take away Mankind such a Notion hath no Existence neither with relation to Inanimate Bodies that can be conscious of nothing nor to an Omniscient God that can be ignorant of nothing And so likewise the adequate Meaning of Chance 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as it is distinguished from Fortune in that the latter is understood to befall only Rational Agents but Chance to be among Inanimate Bodies is a bare Negation that signifies no more than this That any Effect among such Bodies ascribed to Chance is really produced by Physical Agents according to the established Laws of Motion but without their Consciousness of concurring to the Production and without their Intention of such an Effect So that Chance in its true sense is all one with Nature and both words are used promiscuously by some ancient Writers to express the same thing And we must be wary lest we ascribe any real Subsistence or Personality to this Nature or Chance for it is merely a notional and imaginary thing an abstract Universal which is properly Nothing a Conception of our own making occasion'd by our reflecting upon the settled Course of things denoting only thus much That all those Bodies move and act according to their essential properties and qualities without any consciousness or intention of so doing So that in this genuine acceptation of Chance here is nothing supposed that can supersede the known Laws of Natural Motion and thus to attribute the Formation of Mankind to Chance is all one with the former Atheistical Assertion that ascribes it to Nature or Mechanism and consequently it hath received a prolix and sufficient Refutation in my preceding Discourse 3 But thirdly 't is likely that our Atheist may willingly renounce the Doctrine of Chance as a thing differing from Nature and may allow it to be the same thing and that too no real and substantial Agent but only an abstract intellectual Notion but still he hath another Expedient in reserve which is a middle and safe way between the former rigorous Mechanism and the extravagancies of Fortuitous Motion viz. That at the Beginning all things 't is true proceded necessarily and fatally according to the Mechanical powers and affections of Matter but nevertheless the several Kinds of Animals were not formed at the first trial and effort without one error or miscarriage as strict Mechanism would suppose but there was an immense Variety of Ferments and Tumors and Excrescences of the Soil pregnant and big with Foetus's of all imaginable shapes and structures of Body Millions of which were utterly uncapable of Life and Motion being the Molae as it were and the Abortions of Mother Earth and many of those that had Life and Powers to preserve their own Individuals yet wanted the due means of Propagation and therefore could not transmit their Species to the following Ages and that those few only that we now find in Being did happen for he cannot express it but by the Characters of a Chance to have all the parts necessary not only for their own Lives but for the Continuation of their Kinds This is the favourite Opinion among the Atheists and the most plausible of all by which they think they may elude that most formidable Argument for the Being of God from the admirable contrivance of Organical Bodies and the exquisite fitness of their several Parts for those Ends and Uses they are put to and seem to have been designed for For say they since those innumerable Instances of Blunder and Deformity were quickly removed out of Knowledge and Being it is plain that no Animals ought now to be found but such as have due Organs necessary for their own nourishment and increase of their Kinds so that this Boasted Usefulness of Parts which makes Men attribute their Origination to an intelligent and wise Agent is really
to convince us that in natural corruptions and dissolutions Atoms are not reduc'd to Nothing which surely would be needless if the very Idea of Atoms imported Self existence And yet if one Atom do not include so much in its Notion and Essence all Atoms put together that is all the Matter of the Universe can not include it So that upon the whole matter since Creation is no contradiction since God hath certainly created nobler Substances than Matter and since Matter is not necessarily eternal it is most reasonable to believe that the eternal and Self-existent God created the material World and produced it out of Nothing And then as to the last Proposition that Motion as an Attribute or Property of Matter cannot have been from Eternity That we may wave some Metaphysical Arguments which demonstrate that Local Motion cannot be positively eternal we shall only observe in two Words That if Matter be not essentially eternal as we have shewed before much less can Motion be that is but the adjunct and accident of it Nay though we should concede an Eternity to Matter yet why must Motion be coaeval with it which is not only not inherent and essential to Matter but may be produced and destroyed at the pleasure of free Agents both which are flatly repugnant to an eternal and necessary Duration I am aware how some have asserted that the same quantity of Motion is always kept up in the World which may seem to favour the Opinion of its infinite Duration but that Assertion doth solely depend upon an absolute Plenum which being refuted in my next Discourse it will then appear how absurd and false that conceit is about the same quantity of Motion how easily disproved from that Power in Humane Souls to excite Motion when they please and from the gradual increase of Men and other Animals and many Arguments besides Therefore let this also be concluded That Motion has not been eternal in an infinite past Duration Which was the last thing to be proved A CONFUTATION OF ATHEISM FROM THE Origin and Frame of the World PART II. The Seventh SERMON preached Novemb. 7. 1692. Acts XIV 15 c. That ye should turn from these vanities unto the living God who made Heaven and Earth and the Sea and all things that are therein Who in times past suffer'd all Nations to walk in their own ways Nevertheless he left not himself without witness in that he did good and gave us Rain from Heaven and fruitfull Seasons filling our hearts with Food and Gladness WHen we first enter'd upon this Topic the demonstration of God's Existence from the Origin and Frame of the World we offer'd to prove four Propositions 1. That this present System of Heaven and Earth cannot possibly have subsisted from all Eternity 2. That Matter consider'd generally and abstractly from any particular Form and Concretion cannot possibly have been eternal Or if Matter could be so yet Motion cannot have coexisted with it eternally as an inherent property and essential attribute of Matter These two we have already established in the preceding Discourse we shall now shew in the third place 3. That though we should allow the Atheists that Matter and Motion may have been from everlasting yet if as they now suppose there were once no Sun nor Stars nor Earth nor Planets but the Particles that now constitute them were diffused in the mundane Space in manner of a Chaos without any concretion or coalition those dispersed Particles could never of themselves by any kind of Natural motion whether call'd Fortuitous or Mechanical have conven'd into this present or any other like Frame of Heaven and Earth I. And first as to that ordinary Cant of illiterate and puny Atheists the fortuitous or casual Concurse of Atoms that compendious and easie Dispatch of the most important and difficult affair the Formation of a World besides that in our next undertaking it will be refuted all along I shall now briefly dispatch it from what hath been formerly said concerning the true notions of Fortune and Chance Whereby it is evident that in the Atheistical Hypothesis of the World's production Fortuitous and Mechanical must be the self-same thing Because Fortune is no real entity nor physical essence but a mere relative signification denoting only this That such a thing said to fall out by Fortune was really effected by material and necessary Causes but the Person with regard to whom it is called Fortuitous was ignorant of those Causes or their tendencies and did not design or foresee such an effect This is the only allowable and genuine notion of the word Fortune But thus to affirm that the World was made fortuitously is as much as to say That before the World was made there was some Intelligent Agent or Spectator who designing to do something else or expecting that something else would be done with the Materials of the World there were some occult and unknown motions and tendencies in Matter which mechanically formed the World beside his design or expectation Now the Atheists we may presume will be loth to assert a fortuitous Formation in this proper sense and meaning whereby they will make Understanding to be older than Heaven and Earth Or if they should so assert it yet unless they will affirm that the Intelligent Agent did dispose and direct the inanimate Matter which is what we would bring them to they must still leave their Atoms to their mechanical Affections not able to make one step toward the production of a World beyond the necessary Laws of Motion It is plain then that Fortune as to the matter before us is but a synonymous word with Nature and Necessity It remains that we examine the adequate meaning of Chance which properly signifies That all events called Casual among inanimate Bodies are mechanically and naturally produced according to the determinate figures and textures and motions of those Bodies with this negation only That those inanimate Bodies are not conscious of their own operations nor contrive and cast about how to bring such events to pass So that thus to say that the World was made casually by the concourse of Atoms is no more than to affirm that the Atoms composed the World mechanically and fatally only they were not sensible of it nor studied and consider'd about so noble an undertaking For if Atoms formed the World according to the essential properties of Bulk Figure and Motion they formed it mechanically and if they formed it mechanically without perception and design they formed it casually So that this negation of Consciousness being all that the notion of Chance can add to that of Mechanism We that do not dispute this matter with the Atheists nor believe that Atoms ever acted by Counsel and Thought may have leave to consider the several names of Fortune and Chance and Nature and Mechanism as one and the same Hypothesis Wherefore once for all to overthrow all possible Explications which Atheists have