deavour to make men doubtful in regard to this great and glorious truth, THE BEING OF GOD, do every thing in their power to overturn government, to unhinge fociety, to eradicate virtue, to destroy happiness, and to promote confufion, madness, and mifery.

409. On what human reafon difcovers of the Divine nature is partly founded the evidence even of revelation itself. For no pretended revelation can be true, which contradicts what by human reafon is demonftrable of the divine perfections. We do not prove from Scripture, that God exists; because they who deny God deny the authority of Scripture too. But when, by rational proof, we have evinced his being and attributes, we may then ascertain the truth of divine revelation, or detect the falfehood of a pretended one. When we have, from the purity of its doctrine, and the external evidence of miracles, prophecy, and human testimony, fatisfied ourselves of the truth of the Chriftian revelation, it becomes us to believe even fuch parts of it as

could

could never have been found out by human reafon. And thus it is, that our natural notions of God and his providence are wonderfully refined and improved by what is revealed in holy writ: fo that the meaneft of our people, who has had a Chriftian education, knows a great deal more on these subjects, than could ever be dif covered by the wisest of the antient philofophers. That many things in the divine. government, and many particulars relating to the divine nature, as declared in Scripture, fhould furpafs our comprehenfion, is not to be wondered at; for we are daily puzzled with things more within our sphere: we know that our own foul and body are united, but of the manner of that union we know nothing. A paft eternity we cannot comprehend; and a future eternity is an object by which our reafon is aftonifhed and confounded: yet nothing can be more certain, than that one eternity is past and another to come.

410. In evincing the being of God, two forts of proof have been employed; which are called the proofs a priori and a pofterio

ri. In the former, the being of God is proved from this confideration, that his existence is neceffary, and that it is abfurd and impoffible to fuppofe that he does not exist. This argument is fully difcuffed by Dr Clarke, in the first part of his excellent book on the evidence of natural and revealed religion. The proof a pofteriori fhows, from the prefent conftitution of things, that there is and must be a Supreme Being, of infinite goodness, power, and wisdom, who created and fupports them. This laft is the most obvious proof, and the most eafily comprehended; and withal so fatiffying, that the man must be mad who refuses to be convinced by it. I shall therefore give a brief account of this argument; referring to Dr Clarke for the other. Natural Theology confifts of two parts. In the first, we demonftrate the existence of God; in the fecond, his attributes. These parts however are strictly connected; for the fame arguments that prove the first prove alfo the fecond.

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411.

CHAPTER I.

OF THE DIVINE EXISTENCE.

TH

HAT we ourselves and innumerable other things exift, may be taken for granted, a a first principle, as evident as any axiom in Euclid. Hence we infer, that something must always have existed. For if ever there was a time when nothing existed, there must have been a time when fomething began to be; and that fomething must have come into being without a caufe; fince, by the fuppofition, there was nothing before it. But that a thing fhould begin to exift, and yet proceed from no cause, is both abfurd and inconceivable ; all men, by the law of their nature, being neceffarily determined to believe, that whatever begins to exift proceeds from fome caufe. Therefore fome being muft have exifted from eternity.-This being must have been either dependent on fomething elfe, or not dependent on any thing elfe. Now an eternal fucceffion of depend3 B 2

ent

ent beings, or a being which is dependent and yet exists from eternity, is impoffible. For if every part of fuch a fucceffion be dependent, then the whole must be fo; and, if the whole be dependent, there must be fomething on which it depends; and that fomething must be prior in time to that which depends on it; which is impoffible, if that which is dependent be from eternity. It follows, that there must be an eternal and independent being, on whom all other beings depend.

412. Some atheists seem to acknowledge a first cause, when they afcribe the origin of the univerfe to chance. But it is not eafy to guess what they mean by this word. We call thofe things accidental, cafual, or the effects of chance, whofe immediate caufes we are unacquainted with; as the changes of the weather, for example; which however every body believes to be owing to fome adequate caufe, though we cannot find it out. Sometimes, when an intelligent being does a thing without defign, as when a man throwing a ftone out of his field happens to strike a man whom he did not fee; it is called accidental. In affirm