LECTURE VII.

Of the BEING of GOD.

THOUGH On most subjects, the opinions of men are various, and often quite opposite, insomuch that they seem to be more remarkable for the vast variety of their sentiments, than that of their faces and languages; there are, however, two things, wherein all nations are agreed, and in which there seems to be a perfect harmony throughout the whole human race, the desire of happiness and a sense of religion. The former, no man desires to shake off; and though some, possibly, would willingly part with the latter, it is not in their power to eradicate it entirely they cannot banish God altogether out of their thoughts, nor extinguish every spark of religion within them. It is certainly true, that for the most part, this desire of happiness wanders in darkness from one object to another without fixing upon any; and the sense of religion is either suffered to lie inactive, or deviates into superstition. Yet, the great Creator of the world employs these two, as the materials of a fallen building, to repair the ruins of the human race, and as handles whereby He draws his earthen vessel out of the deep gulf of misery into which it is fallen.

Of the former of these, that is, felicity, we have already spoken on another occasion: we shall therefore now, with Divine assistance, employ some part of our time in considering that sense of religion which is naturally impressed upon the mind of man.

Nor will our labour, I imagine, be unprofitably employed in collecting together those few general principles in which so many, and so very dissimilar forms of religion and sentiments, extremely different, harmoniously agree; for, as every science most properly begins with universal propositions and things more generally known, so, in the present case, besides the other advantages, it will be no small support to a weak and wavering

mind, that amidst all the disputes and contentions subsisting between the various sects and parties in religion, the great and necessary articles, at least, of our faith, are established in some particulars, by the general consent of mankind, and, in all the rest, by that of the whole Christian world.

I would therefore most earnesly wish, that your minds, rooted and established in the faith, were firmly united in this delightful bond of religion, which, like a golden chain, will be no burden, but an ornament; not a yoke of slavery, but a badge of true and generous liberty. I would by no means have you to be Christians upon the authority of mere tradition, or education, and the example and precepts of parents and masters, but purely from a full conviction of your own understandings, and a fervent disposition of the will and affections proceeding therefrom. For piety" is the sole and only good among mankind*," and you can expect none of the fruits of religion, unless the root of it be well laid, and firmly established by faith: "for all the virtues are the daughters of faith†," says Clemens Alexandrinus.

Lucretius, with very ill-advised praises, extols his favourite Grecian philosopher as one fallen down from heaven to be the deliverer of mankind, and dispel their distressing terrors and fears, because he fancied he had found out an effectual method to banish all religion entirely out of the minds of men. And to say the truth in no age has there been wanting brutish souls, too much enslaved to their corporeal senses, who would wish these opinions to be true; yet, after all, there are very few of them who are able to persuade themselves of the truth of those vicious principles which, with great impudence and importunity, they commonly inculcate upon others: they belch out with full mouth their foolish dreams, often in direct opposition to conscience and knowledge; and what they unhappily would wish to be true, they can scarcely, if at all, believe themselves. You

* Εν γὰρ καὶ μόνον ἐν ἀνθρώποις ἀγαθόν ἡ ἐυσέβεια. † Ηᾶσαι γὰρ ἀρεταί πίστεως θυγάτερες.

Trismegist.

are acquainted with Horace's recantation, wherein he tells us, "That he had been long bigoted to the mad tenets of the Epicurean philosophy, but found himself at last obliged to alter his sentiments, and deny all he had asserted before*."

Some souls lose the whole exercise of their reason, because they inform bodies which labour under the defect of temperament or of proper organs; yet, you continue to give the old definition of man, and call him a rational creature; and should any one think proper to call him a religious creature, he would, to be sure, have as much reason on his side, and needed not fear his opinion would be rejected, because of a few madmen who laugh at religion. Nor is it improbable, as some of the ancients have asserted, that those few among the Greeks who were called Atheists, had not that epithet because they absolutely denied the being of God, but only because they rejected, and justly laughed at the fictitious and ridiculous deities of the nations.

Of all the institutions and customs received among men, we meet with nothing more solemn and general than that of religion and sacred rites performed to the honour of some deity; which is a very strong argument, that that persuasion, in preference to any other, is written, nay, rather engraven, in strong and indelible characters upon the mind of man. This is, as it were, the name of the great Creator stamped upon the noblest of all His visible works, that thus man may acknowledge himself to be His, and, concluding from the inscription he finds impressed upon his mind, that what belongs to God ́ought, in strict justice, to be restored to Him †, be wholly reunited to his first principle, that immense Ocean of goodness whence he took his rise. The distemper that has invaded mankind, is, indeed, grievous and epidemical: it consists in a mean and degenerate love to the body and corporeal things, and,

* Parcus Deorum cultor et infrequens,

Insanientis dum sapientiæ

Consultus erro, &c.

* Τα τοῦ Θεοῦ τῷ Θεῷ.

Od. xxxiv. lib. 1.

in consequence of this, a stupid and brutish forgetfulness of God, though He can never be entirely blotted out of the mind. This forgetfulness, a few, and but very few, alarmed and awakened by the Divine rod, early shake off. And even in the most stupid, and such as are buried in the deepest sleep, the original impression sometimes discovers itself when they are under the pressure of some grievous calamity, or on the approach of danger, and especially upon a near prospect of death. Then, the thoughts of God, that had lain hid and been long suppressed, forced out by the weight of pain and the impressions of fear, come to be remembered; and the whole soul being, as it were, roused out of its long and deep sleep, men begin to look about them, inquire what the matter is, and seriously reflect whence they came, and whither they are going. Then, the truth comes naturally from their hearts. The stormy sea alarmed even profane sailors so much, that they awaked the sleeping prophet: Awake, say they, thou sleeper, and call upon thy God. Jonah i. 6.

But however weak or imperfect this original or innate knowledge of God may be, it discovers itself every where so far, at least, that you can meet with no man, or society of men, that, by some form of worship or ceremonies, do not acknowledge a Deity, and, according to their capacity, and the custom of their country, pay him homage. It is true, some late travellers have reported, that, in that part of the new world called Brazil, there are some tribes of the natives, among whom you can discover no symptoms that they have the least sense of a Deity: but, besides that the truth of this report is very far from being well ascertained, and that the observation might have been too precipitately made by new comers who had not made sufficient inquiry, even supposing it to be true, it is not of such consequence when opposed to all the rest of the world, and the universal agreement of all nations and ages upon this subject, that the least regard should be paid to it. Nor must we imagine that it at all lessens the weight of this great argument, which has been generally and most justly urged, both by ancients

and moderns, to establish the first and common foundation of

religion.

Now, whoever accurately considers this universal sense of religion of which we have been speaking, will find that it comprehends in it these particulars: 1. That there is a God. 2. That He is to be worshipped. 3. Which is a consequence of the former, that He regards the affairs of men. 4. That He has given them a law, enforced by rewards and punishments, and that the distribution of these, is, in a very great measure, reserved to a life different from that we live in this earth, is the firm belief, if not of all, at least, of the generality of mankind. And though our present purpose does not require that we should confirm the truth of all these points with those strong arguments that might be urged in their favour; but rather, that we should take them for granted, as being sufficiently established by the common consent of mankind; we shall, however, subjoin a few thoughts on each of them separately, with as great brevity and perspicuity as we can.

1. THAT THERE IS A GOD. And here I cannot help fearing, that when we endeavour to confirm this leading truth, with regard to the First and Uncreated Being, by a long and laboured series of arguments, we may seem, instead of a service, to do a kind of injury to God and man both. For why should we use the pitiful light of a candle to discover the sun, and eagerly go about to prove the being of Him who gave being to every thing else? Who alone exists necessarily, nay, we may boldly say, who alone exists; seeing all other things were by Him extracted out of nothing, and, when compared with Him, they are nothing, and even less than nothing, and vanity. And would not any man think himself insulted, should it be suspected, that he doubted of the being of Him, without whom he could neither doubt, nor think, nor be at all? This persuasion, without doubt, is innate, and strongly impressed upon the mind of man, if any thing at all can be said to be so*.

* Primum visibile lux, et primum intelligibile Deus.