Epicurean Opinion concerning the Immortality of the Humane Soul and the Supream Good and what may redound from it The second Part. CHAP. I. Of the Universal Consentment of all Nations in this Point That there ought to be one Certain Religion And that it is Necessary that God himself prescribe the model of the same p. 137 CHAP. II. How greatly it imports true Piety That every man be throughly assured that his Religion is Good And that this cannot be unlesse it be of Divine Revelation p. 158 CHAP. III. Of the Immortality of the Soul and of the Creation of the world How greatly it imports true Piety to be fully assured of both And that a man cannot be so without a particular Revelation p. 183. CHAP. IV. How much true Godliness is concern'd in the certaine knowledge That the whole world is governed by a special Providence and That the same is no otherwise attainable but by Revelation p. 207 CHAP. V. Of what great moment it is to know whether Death be a natural accident or not And that such knowledge cannot be attained without Special Revelation p. 220 CHAP. VI. Of the corruption of mankind How much it imports true piety to know the Originall of it which we cannot do without a particular Revelation p. 223 CHAP. VII Of the Remission of sins what knowledge men naturally have thereof And how much it is the interest of true piety to be assured of the same Also of the Resurrection of the Body p. 246 CHAP. VIII What understanding can be had of true virtue without a particular Revelation p. 264 CHAP. IX What the principal tokens and evidences are by which this particular Revelation may be known and distinguished p. 278 The third Part. CHAP. I. THat such as acknowledge a particular Revelation cannot allow indifference improfession of Religion p. 295 CHAP. II. Which have been the principal Religions That profession of any sort is indifferent even by the verdict of the Pagan In which the Divine Revelation is not found p. 313 CHAP. III. Whether the Profession of all Religions be Indifferent according to the Religion of Mahomet And that this Religion is not of Divine Institution p. 340 CHAP. IV. Of the Religion of the Jews whether it allows Indifference And how it ought to be held of Divine Revelation p. 367 CHAP. V. That the time of the duration of Moses's Law is expired and consequently that some other must be come in it's place p. 389 CHAP. VI. That the Christian Religion being more excellent hath succeeded the Jewish p. 404 CHAP. VII That according to right Reason and the Old Testament the means of obtaining Salvation ought to be such as the Christian Religion holds forth p. 437 CHAP. VIII That the promised Messias ought to be both God and man whence it followes that there are several persons in one simple Divine Essence Also of the Divinity of the Old Testament p. 459 CHAP. IX That Jesus is the Messias promised by the Old Testament Also of the Divinity of the New p. 492 CHAP. X. That those who affirm Christ took upon him the appellation of God though he was not so onely that he might thereby render his Doctrine more authentique are apparently destitute of all reason p. 511 CHAP. XI That Indifference in the professing of all Religions is not justifiable according to the Christian Religion which darty soever be embraced And for Conclusion the Refutation of the pretext propounded in the Preface p. 525 A TREATISE Concerning RELIGIONS Against those who esteem all Indifferent The first Part. CHAP. I. That according to the Doctrine of the Epicureans there can be no assurance of the Existence of a Deity ALthough the name of Epicurus was detestable to Antiquity in regard that placing the supreme attainment of human felicity in Delight he seemed to deprave and adulterate whatsoever is sublime and Generous in Philosophy and moreover though succeeding Ages have had it in as much or gâ—â—â—ter abhorrence 〈◊〉 reason Time confirmed them in this opinion that 〈◊〉 End he aimâ—d at was to exâ—â—â—â—uish by his Maximes all the seeds of Honor Pâ—â—â—y and Vertue yet it is not my design in terming those Epicureans against whom this Dissertation is enterprized to fasten that appellation upon them as a piece of infaâ—y but onely â—o â—â—note and specificate them by the Conformity â—â—y have with that Person in his most capital Opinions My purpose is not to represent them in any other odious dress then that of the enormous and ill-beseeming appearance of their Perswasions in matter of Religion and the sequel of this discourse shall manifestly enough discover whether or no it hath been with Reason and Justice that this Sect hath in all times been regarded with a sort of execration not by popular judgement only but also amongst the other Philosophers Now whereas there is no Nation so projectedly Savage as to be aliens to the belief of existence of some Deity which mankind ought to adore no people who do not essay by some kind of performances to express the sentiments of Devotion and Honor they bear towards him it is difficult to imagine there should be any persons found of minds so immensely distant from the common conceptions of reason as to be able resolvedly to deny it And the reason of the difficulty is this That Notices which are so Universal having a necessary foundation and firm root in Nature it must needs be that such as stifle the same in themselves have in the first place violated and defaced That Hence it is that I would not formally accuse them who maintain that the Deity does not intermeddle in the affairs of this lower World and conceive we ought to venerate the same only upon the account of its excellence although there is not to be attended from it either Punishment for Wickedness or Compensation for Virtue to have absolutely banisht the knowledge of it from amongst them and to make profession of believing there is a God onely to escape the infamous title of Atheist Cicero indeed reproaches Epicurus with this artifice and raises the suspicion upon his Followers which nevertheless shall not ingage me to believe that the corruption of our Age could possibly afford birth to such monsters But howsoever that particular be certain it is beyond contradiction that the Opinions of this Philosopher lead directly to Impiety and that if they who have embraced them believe the existence of God t is Nature which prevails in them and which is never conquerable by all the attempts and outrages they imploy to conquer and suppress her Three things alone inform us there is a God his Word the World and Man and they teach us in truth so evidently and represent him so livety that such eyes must be lostly obtenebrated which do not perceive him therein In his Word we meet with wonderful Revelations and Predictions ratified by Events after divers Ages and with such Histories as no man knew or could know which
judge of his own actions But where we are condemned in our own censure of any fault it would be great folly to expect our absolution from that of others And nothing is more absolutely conformable to the Principles of Nature and Light of Reason then Saint Paul's justifying the righteousness of the judgement which God will pronounce upon the Gentiles at the last day by the condemnation which their own thoughts pronounce against them in their breasts I am not ignorant that Passion is sometimes so vehement and obscures the Understanding so far that after the commission of an evil action attempts are made to defend it and reasons sought out to colour it with the dress appearance of Good and Fit But this proceeds from the affection which we bear toward our selves and from the obstinacy of our passions which yet are of no moment to justifie the deed Otherwise the more wicked any one were the more excusable would his wickedness be for they are the most wicked who have most given themselves up to the precipitous swing of their unreasonable appetites Besides it often falls out that an action is notwithstanding condemned in the heart though it be in shew defended and excused but men are unwilling to appear to others what they know themselves to be If Passion troubles the judgement of reason in any one so as to take from him the knowledge of the vitiousness of his action there needs onely to give him leasure till the same be somewhat appeased and to bring him if possible to consult his thoughts with composedness and serenity of mind For when once the Passion hath remited its violence and gives room for reason there is scarce any man in whom conscience do's not perform the office of a judge which cannot be corrupted If this be not effectual but particular interests keep reason absolutely in subjection it is requisite to separate the man and his fact and represent to him the same action which he hath committed under the name of strange persons disguising the story a little with some slight circumstances which do not at all concern the ground-work Thus the Prophet Nathan made use of an Apologue to David after his adultery with Barsheba and the murder of her Husband to the end he might draw the King wholly from his own interests and prejudices which he might have in favor of himself The consequence of which was that he brought him to pronounce without hesitation a most equitable judgement which immediately after he observed was applicable to his own crime In effect if a man does not in such case pronounce his own condemnation it must be confidently affirmed that Vice is so much rooted and incorporated into his mind that it hath extinguish'd all the seeds of Honesty which Nature had sown in it and triumphs completely over his conscience and his reason The second sort is of those things in which we fail by some error of judgement without being transported by our Passions and consequently without any repugnance of conscience In faults of this nature we are sometimes excusable and sometimes not As for instance If a man thinking to ridde himself of his enemy kills his Father in the darkness of the night the fact considered strictly is Parricide but the ignorance of him that committed the same renders it a degree less and excusable Yea it may so fall out that his intention may make it commendable as in case he understood himself to be with an enemy of his Prince or Country in an alarm and that he could not possibly distinguish by any token or suspect by any occasion or conjecture that it were his Father The true character which can manifest his purpose in the action is as Aristotle saith if upon beholding his Father dead he is displeased with his misfortune and affected with a sensible regret and sorrow and plead nothing in his own favour beside his total ignorance of the thing and the false appearances which tempted him to the mistake So it may be judged that Oedipus was extremely unfortunate but neither a parricide nor incestuous and that Thyestes eat the flesh and dranke the blood of his children and yet it ought not to be concluded that he was therefore any thing the more unnatural or barbarous The pitious lamentations wherewith they both deplor'd their unhappiness sufficiently bespeak their innocence of those crimes and that the same were befallen them by a pardonable ignorance One of them cryes out to Jupiter in Seneca Me pete trisulco flammeam telo facom Per pectus hoc transmitte And the other as soon as he came to know whence he was brake forth into these words in Sophocles 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And thereupon in a furious despair tore his eyes out of his Head But all ignorances are not alike For there are some things we are ignorant of because though we do know them yet we take pleasure to delude our selves by vain reasons on purpose to obliterate their knowledge out of our minds like bad servants who construe their Masters orders to a contrary sense because they are not according to their humor and indevor to perswade their misinterpretation to others till at length they are drawn to believe for true what they so strongly desire should be so Thus some man that in the commencement of a Law-suit understood at first that he had the wrong side is by the eagerness slights and subtleness of Barretry so perverted from the knowledge of justice that at last he takes up an assurance that his cause is Good Now is the injustice which he commits afterwards in pursuit of such a perswasion any wise excusable by his ignorance If it be there is no command but may be securely infringed when it is free for servants to gloss upon the words of their Masters no sort of in justice which does not become right and equitable nor fraud but may be converted into sincere and commendable proceeding if it be lawful for a man to blind himself with his passion and to perplex the knowledg he hath of Truth in affected difficulties Where there is an absolute commandment and which proceeds from a soveraign authority such as God's is we ought to be so humble and obedient as though we should not comprehend all the reason of such command yet the authority of the person that gives it supplies what is defective in the understanding of the same And Verity and Justice ought to be of such esteem as where they appear clearly to us though it be not easie to unty all the difficulties which may arise we ought to hold them always notwithstanding for sacred and venerable As on the contrary that perversion of Reason which is effected by the subtilty of cavillations and Sophistry invented to abuse men ought to be esteemed an intoxication of the Understanding But do we hold him excusable who being disturbed with excess
of wine commits a wrong or an indignity No certainly for since he is the cause of his own error his ignorance ought to be imputed to him together with the rest of the mischiefs consequent to it what intention soever he had during the perturbation of his debauchery Lastly There are some things which we are ignorant of because we have been too supine in searching to know them But if through such ignorance a man commit something against Nature and Reason is there any just cause to acquit him of the fact No more surely then in the other For the documents of Nature and Reason are sufficiently clear if diligence be imployed to comprehend them and in such cases the negligence it self is a crime every man being oblig'd to be attentive and circumspect in that which is duty Now it is not at all reasonable to excuse one fault with another or to judge the duty not incumbent on a man because he is ignorant of it at such times as he might have known it So the Pagans were ignorant that the Statues which they erected to the Deity were a disparagement to his glory and thought they well discharged the duties of Piety when they burnt incense to him before those Images It is not doubted but they had a good zeal therein that is to say a desire of performing somewhat well-pleasing to the Deity But yet their Worship was no other then detestable Idolatry seeing it was possible for them to have learn't by contemplation of the Universe and the Providence which governs it that God is of an infinite and spiritual nature and which hath no resemblance with ours For to speak plainly they did him as little honor as they would have done to Augustus if after they had heard wonders related of his Wisdom Valor and other rare qualities they should have represented that great Emperor under the figure of a Beast For if their good intent justified them the Egyptians might have as much to plead for themselves when they adored God under the likeness of irrational yea even of dead and insensible creatures Because the duty of the Conscience toward the Deity is like that of a Wife towards her Husband namely as precise and incommunicable to any other and to defend the Idolatry of the Pagans with the pretext of a good meaning is as if a man should go about to excuse a Wife who had amorously entertain'd some other person in her Husbands absence under colour that she fancied some resemblance between them and should not dissallow that being she could not injoy her Husband she was for his sake much affected towards his image In a word in the ignorances of which we are not our selves the cause the Action takes it's tincture from the good intention and is judged accordingly but in ignorances proceeding either from a manifest affectation or apparent negligence to obtain the truths which offer themselves to the Understanding the intention how good soever it he follows the nature of the Action so that if the Action be bad the intention cannot possibly be good But to return to our purpose Certainly God is not onely the principal but the onely object of Religion so that the knowledge of Him is the foundation of all Piety which if it be solid the structure built upon it will be firm if bad and faulty all that is raised upon it will fall to ruin He that pleases may read in Cicero the relation which Velleius there makes of the opinions of the Philosophers concerning this matter I have recited some of them already but there are more remaining for we may find there about four or five and twenty ready counted besides several which he forgot Diogenes Laertius also affords better store but they all agree in this particular that they are in a manner equally false extravagant and unworthy the name of their Authors who were generally commendable persons and of great reputation Otherwise they are strangly discordant in all circumstances Yet every one of them conceived he had reason on his side and that his fancy was dress'd up with rational and handsome probabilities and appearances In which horrible jarring what means is there to distinguish the voice of truth if it were amongst them Who is he of mankind whose intellectuals are subtle and vers'd enough in this matter to be able to discern her in the midst of such confusion and to assure himself that he hath observ'd her by her peculiar characters But surely there is none that bethinks himself to find truth in that medly of sentiments and opinions although his Understanding were quicker-sighted in these matters then naturally it is for most certainly it is not to be found there and I dare readily give those against whom I dispute their choice to maintain without blushing the most tolerable of them all Except perhaps that of Anaxagoras who according to the relation of Cicero affirms that the order and excellent disposition of all things owes its original to an infinite Understanding but Diogenes Laertius do's not express that he determin'd whether that Understanding were of a finite or infinite essence And Anaximenes whose disciple he had been contented himself with saying that the Principle and Element of all things is infinite leaving it to be conjectur'd whether he meant the Matter thereby as the Air or Water which was the opinion of Thales or some other like thing or rather that which indued the same with Form and Order which Anaxagoras termed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But if the opinions of these two be put together it may be Anaximenes attributed infinity to the Matter and Anaxagoras added to the saâ—e an infinite Understanding not onely to frame and dispose it but also to serve for its Form From whence it results that the World is an infinite God and yet composed too such as Pliny fancyes it in the beginning of his Natural History and Virgil describes in the verses which I here subjoyn Principio coelum ac terram camposque liquentes Lucentemque globum Lunae Titaniaque astra Spiritus intus agit totamque infusa per artus Mens agitat molem magno se corpore miscet Now this conceit is implicated with a thousaud absurdities impertinences And yet Philosophers of the present Age have no cause to boast that they are naturally more knowing in this particular then their predecessors were All that the strength of the mind of man is able to reach to in reference to the knowledge of the Deity was attempted in that interval of time which interceded between that wherein Philosophy began to flourish in Greece and the declination of the Roman Empire It was in that period that we experienc'd all our power and found at the upshot of our knowledge that we understood nothing at all of it How then will some say Are there not instances enough in Heaven and Earth the Government of the world from whence to extract at least some good and solid knowledge
of God If there be not why then are arguments drawn from thence against the Epicureans to prove providence to them and to refute their opinions concerning the nature of God If there be why cannot a man make use of them to guide him at least in some measure to the knowledge of those secrets God forbid that we should so much forget our selves as to forget how clearly God ha's revealed himself in the World The manifestation which he hath made therein of his Perfections is one thing and the faculty which we naturally have to understand them an other Reason indeed but that which is right and in its integrity not such as we now possess might have thence collected the means of serving God in a due manner But as it is deprav'd blind and maim'd in its powers and apprehensions it is utterly incapable of discerning the truth therein or forming certain rules of piety from thence There is light enough in the Sun to make it be seen but it is by those who have eyes to these who never had any or have lost them it is as dark as the Earth on which they tread In like manner an infinite number of bright and excellent truths are held forth in the World and its Government to him that ha's the eye of his Understanding sufficiently clear and serene But the Eye of the Understanding which we call Reason in the conditition we injoy it at present is so distemper'd clouded and perturb'd that it beholds the truths which are there notwithstanding all their clearness but very obscurely and though they are most certain and stedfast in themselves yet when it contemplates them it perceives them onely as if they were inconstant and wavering Nor are men in this Age more free from these natural impediments then they were two thousand years ago and consequently can be no better assured of their knowledge For to say that 't is a Science which may aswell have been improved as others they which liv'd since having taken from the Opinions of the Ancients what was pure and rejected the unsound and bad is a thing of no moment to our discourse because it is untrue Perhaps Aristotle built his Philosophy up with the opinions of Elder Philosophers by refining them from that which he found faulty and serving himself with the truths before discover'd by them aswell to employ the same as materials to his structure as to find out others which were yet abstruse aad unknown And indeed it hath been observed that Hippocrates furnish'd him with the grounds of his Physiology so that he had no more to do but to build upon them and some have moreover believ'd that in divers places of his Writings and particularly in his Epistles he supplyed him with many singular advantages to the composing of his Ethicks And although he refutes Plato in several of his Opinions yet it is certain that he took many excellent instructions both from the discourses which he heard him make in his Academy and from the reading of his Works But I pray observe how this came to pass Aristotle was indued with an understanding capable to discern distinctly enough in matters of Philosophy the truths which his predecessors had brought to light and distinguish the same from falsities he was able to cull out and to place some apart from others and so to compose out of his own inventions and those of others a Body of Science better contriv'd then any had been before and whose parts were more correspondent amongst themselves But here the Question is concerning truths which the mind of man in its present estate is not capable to perceive clearly so that if he were put to make his choice of those different Opinions it would betide him that instead of hapning right he would rather choose the worst and thus it hath fallen out to all them which took imperfect humane reason for their guide therein If this reason be not satisfactory to my Adversaries let them pay themselves with experience Why did not Cicero garble all those different Opinions of Philosophers touching the Nature of the Gods to frame a good one if possible and leave posterity a rational doctrine in so important a matter But in stead of doing so the consciousness of his weakness makes him content himself with reciting them and after all his stories he knows as little of it as he did at first as if they had been nothing but clouds and darkness cast before his eyes Or why do not they show us the writings of some Philosopher either ancient or modern who being no otherwise assisted then by the meer light Reason ha's had more sound and sober opinions concerning it then his predecessors On the other side it will be found that some Philosophers who heretofore impugned Christian Religion and the Books of the Old and New Testament and who ought to have purifi'd that doctrine from the old absurdities it abounds with to the end their adversaries might have less advantage against it have been guilty of as many impertinences as they of preceding times and afforded as much cause to be insulted over in regard of the stupidity and ridiculousness of their conceits The unhappiness is that being naturally blind in these things we nevertheless conceive we see clearly and are so possess'd with a good opinion of our selves that we will not admit any one to teach us or if we have been taught by some bodyelse we are so ungrateful that we will not acknowledge it but reproach and execrate those persons from whom we have received all the purest of our knowledge For 't is the same case with these people and the Epicureans who having been enlightned by Christian Religion in many truths in the ignorance or incertitude of which they had otherwise eternally stagger'd or fluctuated they arrogate the glory of having of themselves drawn them out of the bottom of Democritus's Well or establish'd the belief of the same amongst men by the strength of their reason For why are they not say they as capable to invent them as they are to apprehend and receive them since they are revealed A wonderful Question truly and worthy of such subtle persons As if there were not a capacity in children of a dozen years old to apprehend the most difficult Geometrical Demonstrations when they are taught the same by some skillful Master who notwithstanding could never of themselves have invented the least Theorem in that Science Or as if we did not see them every day learn the Arabick Tongue readily by help of a knowing Instructor although they were as well able to pull the Stars out of Heaven as we say as to have disentangled the confusion of that Language and reduc'd it into Grammatical Rules It is indeed by the same faculty of Understanding that discover'd truths are comprehended and those found out which are unknown but there is required a far greater strength and vivacity of Intellect to make new discoveries then to comprehend
magnanimity and denounce eternal perdition in â—ase they be deficient of courage herein I will not at present determine on which side the right is May the Father of Mercy please to reconcile their minds and close up this great wound of his Church But in the mean time it is beyond all doubt that according to their contrary doctrines they ought to condemn one the other and hold that whoso embraces the faith of the One cannot secure his salvation in the external profession of the Other For example for I wil will not engage far in this matter The Reformed charge the Roman Church with three accusations Of heresie in its doctrine in many particulars of Idolatry in its religious service and of Tyranny in relation to government in sundry instances So as to call the head of it Anti-Christ and apply to him as the person intended by Prophecies whatsoever is found concerning Anti-christ in the Epistles of Saint Paul and the Revelation If these accusations be grounded on truth how can they comply with that Church unless they will violate this Commandment A man that is an heretick after the first and second admonition reject Knowing that he that is such is subverted and sinneth being condemned of himself c. And how can they but hold the teachers of it for accursed according to this other commandment Little Children Keepe your selves from Idolatry And I cannot imagine that Saint Paul would permit external communion in the same Religion which those whom in regard of their Religion he excludes from hope of the Kingdom of Heaven Be not deceived saith he Idolaters shall not inherit the Kingdome of God And if he forbids to eat with them that is to converse familiarly with them in the way of civil and ordinary life much more would he prohibit to entertain society with them in the same Religion But those words are most highly remarkable If any man worship the beast and his image and receive his mark in his forehead or in his hand The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy Angels and in the presence of the Lambe For if the Beast mention'd there be Anti-Christ as 't is manifest and the Bishop of Rome be this Anti-christ as the Reformed pretend and that to receive the mark of the Beast in ones forehead or hand be as is evident to adhere to it in external profession what does he but pronounce sentence of condemnation against himself who believes the Pope to be Anti-christ and nevertheless esteems the outward profession of adhering to him indifferent For 't is all one as if he should affirm it lawful for a good and loyal Subject to follow the standard of the enemy of his King some unjust and violent usurper of his Kingdom And indeed it cannot be thought but that the Pope himself and his Cardinals if they believed themselves such as the adversary party publishes them would condemn themselves and all those which follow them On the other side the Catholicks accuse their Adversaries of a temerarious separation from the true Church and of having added Heresie to Schism amassing their Religion up of all those heresies which have been condemned by the ancient Councils and moreover of having to heresie added Rebellion against the Pastors whose vocation is onely true and legitimate Also of having abolisht the most sacred Mysteries which our Saviour instituted subverted all order of Discipline from top to bottom in a word of having revolted from the faith and obedience of the Supreme Monarch of the Church the Vicarius of our Lord Jesus the sole and infallible dispenser of his mysteries Now if this accusation contain as much truth as upon seeing it explicated and maintain'd in the writings of those great and even incomparable personages which have undertaken the quarrel in favour of the Roman Church in our times it seems to have verisimilitude what man so perswaded can with a good conscience associate himself to people culpable of so many heinous crimes as of Schisme heresie rebellion temerity and sacriledge against God impudence towards men and above all of disobedience to him that represents Jesus Christ and God his Father upon earth Surely he that should in the least connive at or bear with the reproaches cast upon him might be thought even capable of attempting on the person of the Redeemer of the World From all this it is easily colligible That this opinion of Indifference of all Religions in outward profession is false and pernicious renders all the exhortations of God himself in his Gospel to suffer for the truth insignificant disparages the sober judgement of the Apostles who were the first that propos'd themselves examples of inflexible resolution and consequently leads to the contempt of God and of all Religion in the World For like as one that should profess it indifferent to him what man he ownes for his Father or what Prince's badge he wears instead of his King 's would tacitely intimate himself to be of some spurious or degenerate off-spring and that he ha's a venal and unnatural soul So he that cares not of what God he bears the cognisance here below declares sufficiently that he acknowledges none for his own part and that his following of any Religion is onely out of interest and complacency and those Pretexts we mentioned in the beginning how specious soever are onely a coverture to this profane humor Truth say they is hard to be disentangled from the confusion of the many Religions which have the vogue in the world And God is of his own Nature so merciful that he is not strictly inquisitive concerning it but is better pleas'd with the love of peace and society then with the adherence to certain particular opinions which occasions such disturbances and miseries Strange people who complain of the difficulty of a thing they never enquir'd after who limit the prerogatives of God and his affections without understanding them and who under colour of tenderness for peace with men make no conscience to wage war against God who for the preservation of Civil Society which onely regulates and contains the duties of men among themselves subvert and confound the Laws of Religion in which are contained our duties towards him who created the World and Men. Certainly had these Opinionists imploy'd in the search of God's truth half the time they bestow on unprofitable occupations of this life they would not judge Religion a thing full of spinous questions and irresolvable difficulties The sole reading of the Old and New Testaments which would not take up so much of their time as a quarter of Amadis or the Romance of Astrea would clear up all those perplexities and cause them to pronounce resolutely provided they come to it with attentive minds and free from evil prejudices for the preeminence of the
notwithstanding after they came to be discovered the World it self hath consented to the mind of man acquiesces in them and the shadows which have remained of them in the Fables of the Pagans do serve for even indubitable evidence and testimony unto them On the other side it contains a doctrine of that excellency that no men of howsoever transcendent accomplishments could ever have invented the same which is so conformable to our Reason that although it be admirably sublime there is nothing in it which subverts or incounters the soberness of our judgements in a word all the parts of it have such excellent proportion amongst themselves that so many different spirits which have left it us in writing in several Ages could not have carried on so unitedly and with such uniformity a design of like grandeur without a guidance other then humane Above all there is remarkable in it a marveilous efficacy to comfort a man in his misery after it hath first given him to understand it and unvailed his mind from the ignorance of himself and his own calamity which without doubt are effects whereof our conscience instructs us we â—annot be the cause Lastly this Divinity whâ—â— men have sought after as it were gropingâ—y in all Ages is manifested to us therein with such clearness that after so long experience which we have made of our natural blindness it can be nothing but enormous stupidity not to see that God reveals himself therein and that no other could have spoken so suitably of his nature and of his perfections In the mean while the Epicureans do not receive this Revelation as proceeded from God nor attribute so much to it by far as to the Writings of Plato Cicero and Aristotle If they may be believed all the Prophets were men of alienated understandings and the Apostles vagabond circulators who went about abusing the greatest part of the World So that it is not from these men that they have learnt this truth That there is a God for if they gave credit to them in this particular and avouched to hold it from them why should they disbelieve them in the rest Or how is it credible that so great frontless Imposters as they imagine the Prophets and Apostles were should be the first discoverers of so excellent a truth Or if they did not first discover it so as to merit the title of its Inventors and that notwithstanding we hold it from them whence can it be conjectured they should have drawn it It remains of necessity that if they had it not from Divine Revelation they attained it by study and contemplation either of the World or of themselves As to the World it is easie that it could not be made by it self and consequently must have an Author The construction of so vast a fabrick speaks the power of its Architect and its â—dmirable motions which have remained so reâ—â—lar and constant after so many Ages offer to our wonder his incomprehensible Wisdom In the Harmony of such variety of things and contrary qualities linked one with another and in the convenient disposure of all the creatures to a subserviency in mutual offices without which the World could not subsist his Goodness is presented visible as it were to our eye and palpable by our hand In the shaping of every thing and the apt Symmetry of its parts appears an Art not only inimitable by us but even such as we are not capable perfectly to comprehend The conservation of the Universe and administration of all it containes clearly evidences a Providence conducting natural causes to their effects and animating them with powers to produce them which disposes of all evenements of things agreeably to his will wisely ordering the most casual and contingent And although there are not wanting some to complain of his regiment and to reproach to him oftentimes the prosperity of the Bad and calamitous estate of the Good yet it does visibly enough defend and recompence Virtue and on the contrary avenges Wickedness frequently sometimes even to the displaying of dreadful judgements upon eminent impieties Insomuch that there is not a Star in the Heavens nor a Flower upon the Earth whether considered in the gross or in parcel but declares aloud that there is a God Creaâ—â—â— Consâ—rvator and Governor of all things Nevertheless the Epicureans do not acknowledge that the World ever had a Beginning or if it had according to their opinion yet they will not confess that it was framed otherwise then by the fortuitous concourse of infinite peteâ—t Atomes And for what concerns the regiment and conservation of it they will not have the Deity imployed in the Government of Nature and things here below and do not behold as they profess in all the Universe any footstep of his Providence For t is their general Apophthegm that God hath no affairs of his own and takes no part in those of another least he should interrupt his repose and the serene tranquillity of his eternal beatitude So that if we believe them all things come to pass in the World by a fatal necessity or as it pleases Fortune who being blind and wonderfully temerarious hath neither counsel nor aim in her actions There remains the consideration of Man In our selves we may in the first place observe the structure of our Bodies which are composed after so fair a Symmetrie that the most excellent entendments are ravished and confounded in the speculation and even the illterate and they which regard it more superficially cannot but express their astonishment at the same In effect were there in them onely the Masterpiece of our Eyes and that Activity of our Hands which renders us so expedite to all sorts of services there would be enough to raise amazement in us and direct us to the knowledge of that infinite Wisdom whereunto we ow our Originals Moreover besides this Life which is the Energy of our Soul and that imperceptible dispensation of spirits which she manages with so much diligence for the motions of our Members and the functions of our Senses The light of our Intellect its agitations so vivid regular conduct and great capacity to comprehend all things The faculty which inables us to reason concerning the Deity and dispute of it one against another sufficiently evidences that there is some Principle of Understanding without us from which this ray we posses is derived into our Nature For it must needs be that we have drawn it from without us since by it we so far surpass our selves that our Fathers confes themselves unable to have communicated it to their chrâ—â—ten as also for their own particular that they did not receive it from their fathers or Ancesters More signally the Fear which men naturally have when they apprehend the Deity will revenge their misdoings and the Hope to find support from it with which they comfort themselves as often as straits and necessity afflicts them two Passions which are almost the sole motives that