of other intelligent beings ad infinitum For as you see he would not have so soon an answer seeing 't is no easie matter to find an ultimate in an infinite There must be then an intelligent being that learns in himself and by its self in what moment the thorn pricks us And this intelligent being can be no other than God that is to say a being whose power is infinite and whose will alone is the cause of things For after all there is none but him whose will is efficacious that can see in himself and by himself the existence and the motion of Bodies For it being impossible he should be ignorant of his own will he only can discover within himself the number figure and scituation of bodies and generally whatever happens to them It follows then that all other intelligent beings are enlightned by the Creator And as you see or as you will clearly see if you think on it seriously you should not know that you have a body and that there are others about you if you had not learnt it of him who knows it by himself Do you understand these things Erastus Erast I do plainly Theodorus This is your argument What causes pain is neither the Soul that feels nor the Thorn that pricks but a superior power This power ought at least to know the moment when the thorn pricks he cannot know it from the thorn seeing bodies cannot give any light to spirits they being neither visible nor intelligible by themselves and no relation being to be found between a body and a spirit He can know it then but by himself that is to say by the knowledge of his own will which creates and moves the thorn and whose power is infinite since it is able to create There is then a God and if there was no God I should not be pricked I should feel nothing see nothing and know nothing Theod. Very well But what think you of these reasons Aristarchus Arist Think I think that both you and your echo Erastus talk in the clouds The ground of your proof is that that there is no relation between bodies and spirits From whence you conclude that an Angel cannot see a body immediately and by himself To which I answer that that spirits may know bodies it is sufficient that they penetrate them Theod. What do you mean by penetrating them Certainly Erastus doth not understand you But without asking you explications that perhaps would puzzle and displease you doth your soul penetrate your body your heart or your brain the principal part where she resides Arist I believe it doth Theod. Pray tell me then how your brain is composed or that principal part wherein your soul resides Arist I do not understand Anatomy Theod. How You don't understand Anatomy Must you search in Books or in the head of other men which you do not penetrate to know how the brain which your soul penetrates is compos'd What signifies it then to a spirit to penetrate a body Arist I must confess I have nothing to answer Yet methinks if a spirit penetrates a body he ought to know that body But perhaps there is something that hinders it which I do not understand Theod. If it were so Aristarchus this something would be the God whom we seek I will lose no time to prove it to you For I will not prove the existence of God by imaginary effects You may think on it at your leisure But I rather advise you to make a serious reflection on the things I have told you now and then I hope you will visibly find that there is a God I mean a Being whose Will is Power and Power Infinite since it is able to create You will find that this God doth not walk about the Heavens as the Libertines will have it but that his providence extends it self to all things and that he acts incessantly in us That it is he that gives us the pleasing and painful sentiments we have of sensible objects and that consequently he may make us happy or miserable In short you will know God in the most useful manner for morality You will even confess that God hath made nothing but may serve to demonstrate his existence though 't is more conducing to morality to demonstrate it by something that passes within us One of the reasons why you are not easily brought to be of my mind is that you have perhaps never seriously thought on the things of which we have been speaking For I do not perceive that my proofs are remote or hard to be understood I will be judg'd of it by Erastus And I believe we ought to agree on that point that hereafter you may be prepared on the subjects on which we shall treat Arist It belongs to you Theodorus to set rules for every thing For you know that my resolution is to seek none but such truths as are essential and may make us wiser and more happy I need say no more to you Theod. To this effect Aristarchus I will tell you the course I intend to keep in our Conferences Observe it well that you may think on it at leisure and prepare your self to make me all the Objections you can I believe I have sufficiently demonstrated that there is a God who acts incessantly in us and who may make us happy or unhappy by pleasure and by pain of which he alone is the true cause and therefore I will bring no other proofs of it and will content my self with resolving your difficulties But I will prove to you that the design of God in creating man hath been that man might know and love him that God hath preserved man but to that end In short that that design is so unalterable that sinners and the damned themselves execute it in one sense and that they shall sooner cease to be than they shall wholly cease to know and to love God When I have establisht as a principle that since God acts always for himself we cannot be happy if we resist his will nor unhappy if we obey it I will demonstrate how God will be known and be loved how we can resist his orders and what is yet more â—trange how we are capable to offend him I will show that our nature is corrupted that sin dwells in us that the spirit is a slave to the flesh In short I will explain the cause and the effects of the corruption of nature how our disorders strange us from God and make us his enemies as also our want of a Mediator and Redeemer I will explain the qualities our Redeemer and Mediator ought to have to reconcile us to God and to satifie his justice that Jesus Christ possesses them all and none but him What may cure the blindness of the mind and the malice of our heart That those remedies are to be found in the precepts of the Gospel and the grace of Jesus Christ In fine I will show that none but a God
Mahomet are unworthy of Mankind for even the Heathen Philosophers themselves went thus far Christ would have us despise these Goods altho' the Law promises them and he declares those to be happy who are deprived of them and who are miserable and cursed according to the Law Thus I am satisfy'd that the promises of the Law were only figures for those amongst the Jews who had Charity could not desire the accomplishment of these promises as their true good but perhaps the Law in it self was good Theod. You perceive not that there must be a relation betwixt the good which the Law promises and the Law itself and that if the Law justifies really and by itself the recompences of the Law must be good in themselves and make a truly just Man happy But Men can't be just themselves and only desire these Rewards The just then could not trust in the Sacrifices and Ceremonies of the Law they were to expect the Messiah that could promise them such a happiness as they might lawfully wish it There were two sorts of Jews under the Law Jews after the Spirit and Jews after the Letter Those who had the Spirit of the Law were Christians for Christ is the end of the Law and those were circumcised with the circumcision of the heart and had put off the old man explaining the whole Law its Ceremonies and Promises by their relation to the Messiah and that eternal happiness which they expected from him They were not scandaliz'd when Isaiah spoke on the behalf of God to the Jews according to the flesh Isa 1.10,11 Hear the word of the Lord ye Princes of Sodom hearken to the Law of our God ye People of Gomorrah What have I to do with this multitude of Sacrifices chat ye offer to me saith the Lord All this is an abomination to me I love not the sacrifice of your Rams nor the fat of your Flocks nor the blood of Beeves Lambs and He-Goats They sung with joy in the same Spirit with Christians Psal 50. For thou desirest not Sacrifice else would I give it thou delightest not in burnt-offerings Lord do good in thy good pleasure unto Sion build thou the walls of Jerusalem then shalt thou be pleased with the sacrifices of righteousness with burnt-offerings and whole burnt-offerings then shall they offer bullocks upon thine Altar In fine they sighed incessantly towards Heaven to draw down the true Messiah who was to deliver them from their sins But the Jews according to the flesh gloried in the shameful signature of the circumcision of their bodies they were uncircumcised in heart they had a vail which hid the end of the Law from them They placed their confidence in their Sacrifices and Ceremonies in the Ark and in the Temple of the Lord in Moses Abraham and their other Patriarchs They were full of Zeal and Fury against the true Israelites and continually persecuted the Prophets which had the Spirit of the Law and which reproved their Vices The Jews after the Spirit were true Christians they were always ready to acknowledg and receive Jesus Christ whenever he should come for the Moral of the New Testament is wholly conformable to the disposition of their heart since they acknowledg that the goods of the senses were unworthy of their love And as they explain'd not holy Scripture according to the Letter but according to the mystical Sense and with relation to the Messiah whom they expected so the proofs which the Apostles took out of the Old Testament to justifie the quality of Christ were entirely conformable to their Spirit Thus Christ and his Apostles were heard by those amongst the Jews who were moved by Charity but the carnal Jews who had their heart vail'd could not nay even would not comprehend the proofs which the Apostles gave of the Truth they preacht Arist But must it not be confessed that the proofs which the Apostles drew from the Old Testament to confirm the New were very weak Theod. They were no proofs or at best extravagant ones to the carnal Jews and those who know not distinctly that the Old Testament is only for the use of the New that Abraham Joseph Joshua David Solomon are only in the Scripture because of CHRIST and that whatever hapned to the Jews were but figures of things to come Yes Aristarchus if the literal Sense of the Scripture is the chief end then St Paul and the Apostles prove nothing nay they are mad Men and fanatical But he must be the most stupid and rash of all Men who can imagin that St Paul had not common Sense that he would render himself so very ridiculous to wrest passages of Scripture to convince the Jews how unprofitable their Sacrifices and Ceremonies were For after all if we can't believe that the Letter of the Law rather administers death than life after what I have already said I see not but that we must believe at least that there were some Men amongst the Jews who search'd into the Law for another Sense besides the literal since St Paul does not make use of the literal Sense to convince them of the Messiah's coming Do not you know that even the Jewish Commentators who are the declared Enemies of CHRIST refer most of the passages to the Messiah which the Apostles do to CHRIST altho' these passages might often be understood of David Solomon or others for as the truth is we must consider these persons as figures of CHRIST The Letter of the Scripture does by Divine Providence contain so many things which appear unworthy of God and even contrary to Reason that those who are not entirely stupid find themselves obliged to abandon it I have proved this to you by the Rewards which Moses proposed to the Jews which as you your self have freely granted are not only unworthy of such who love God above all things but in general of all other Beings which are more noble than Bodies Thus we can't reasonably doubt but that the Jews who from the times of the Apostles expected the Messiah and who believed him near at hand were very much disposed to receive him in that capacity which the Apostles had described to them provided the love of sensible things hindred them not from following him God always disposes things after such a manner that those who love him do always find him he leaves such footsteps after him that those who feel the inward motions of Charity do highly acknowledg him And if false Prophets back their Lyes with Miracles 't is because God tempts Men to discern those who love him for those who love him are not deceived CHRIST is so concealed in the Scriptures that those who love him not do not find him there He is not only come to enlighten the blind but also to blind the wise He is come to reprove the glory of the world for this is an abomination before God In fine he is come to preach the Gospel to the poor the simple and ignorant