But to show you still more inconveniences, continued PHILO, in your
Anthropomorphism, please to take a new survey of your principles. Like
effects prove like causes. This is the experimental argument; and this,
you say too, is the sole theological argument. Now, it is certain, that
the liker the effects are which are seen, and the liker the causes which
are inferred, the stronger is the argument. Every departure on either
side diminishes the probability, and renders the experiment less
conclusive. You cannot doubt of the principle; neither ought you to
reject its consequences.
All the new discoveries in astronomy, which prove the immense grandeur
and magnificence of the works of Nature, are so many additional arguments
for a Deity, according to the true system of Theism; but, according to
your hypothesis of experimental Theism, they become so many objections,
by removing the effect still further from all resemblance to the effects
of human art and contrivance. For, if LUCRETIUS[Lib. II. 1094], even
following the old system of the world, could exclaim,
Quis regere immensi summam, quis habere profundi
Indu manu validas potis est moderanter habenas?
Quis pariter coelos omnes convertere? et omnes
Ignibus aetheriis terras suffire feraces?
Omnibus inque locis esse omni tempore praesto?
If TULLY [De. nat. Deor. Lib. I] esteemed this reasoning so natural,
as to put it into the mouth of his EPICUREAN:
"Quibus enim oculis animi intueri potuit vester Plato fabricam illam
tanti operis, qua construi a Deo atque aedificari mundum facit? quae
molitio? quae ferramenta? qui vectes? quae machinae? qui ministri tanti
muneris fuerunt? quemadmodum autem obedire et parere voluntati architecti
aer, ignis, aqua, terra potuerunt?"
If this argument, I say, had any force in former ages, how much greater
must it have at present, when the bounds of Nature are so infinitely
enlarged, and such a magnificent scene is opened to us? It is still more
unreasonable to form our idea of so unlimited a cause from our experience
of the narrow productions of human design and invention.
The discoveries by microscopes, as they open a new universe in miniature,
are still objections, according to you, arguments, according to me. The
further we push our researches of this kind, we are still led to infer
the universal cause of all to be vastly different from mankind, or from
any object of human experience and observation.
And what say you to the discoveries in anatomy, chemistry, botany?...
These surely are no objections, replied CLEANTHES; they only discover new
instances of art and contrivance. It is still the image of mind reflected
on us from innumerable objects. Add, a mind like the human, said PHILO. I
know of no other, replied CLEANTHES. And the liker the better, insisted
PHILO. To be sure, said CLEANTHES.
Now, CLEANTHES, said PHILO, with an air of alacrity and triumph, mark the
consequences. First, By this method of reasoning, you renounce all claim
to infinity in any of the attributes of the Deity. For, as the cause
ought only to be proportioned to the effect, and the effect, so far as it
falls under our cognisance, is not infinite; what pretensions have we,
upon your suppositions, to ascribe that attribute to the Divine Being?
You will still insist, that, by removing him so much from all similarity
to human creatures, we give in to the most arbitrary hypothesis, and at
the same time weaken all proofs of his existence.
Secondly, You have no reason, on your theory, for ascribing perfection to
the Deity, even in his finite capacity, or for supposing him free from
every error, mistake, or incoherence, in his undertakings. There are many
inexplicable difficulties in the works of Nature, which, if we allow a
perfect author to be proved a priori, are easily solved, and become only
seeming difficulties, from the narrow capacity of man, who cannot trace
infinite relations. But according to your method of reasoning, these
difficulties become all real; and perhaps will be insisted on, as new
instances of likeness to human art and contrivance. At least, you must
acknowledge, that it is impossible for us to tell, from our limited
views, whether this system contains any great faults, or deserves any
considerable praise, if compared to other possible, and even real
systems. Could a peasant, if the Aeneid were read to him, pronounce that
poem to be absolutely faultless, or even assign to it its proper rank
among the productions of human wit, he, who had never seen any other
production?
But were this world ever so perfect a production, it must still remain
uncertain, whether all the excellences of the work can justly be ascribed
to the workman. If we survey a ship, what an exalted idea must we form of
the ingenuity of the carpenter who framed so complicated, useful, and
beautiful a machine? And what surprise must we feel, when we find him a
stupid mechanic, who imitated others, and copied an art, which, through a
long succession of ages, after multiplied trials, mistakes, corrections,
deliberations, and controversies, had been gradually improving? Many
worlds might have been botched and bungled, throughout an eternity, ere
this system was struck out; much labour lost, many fruitless trials made;
and a slow, but continued improvement carried on during infinite ages in
the art of world-making. In such subjects, who can determine, where the
truth; nay, who can conjecture where the probability lies, amidst a great
number of hypotheses which may be proposed, and a still greater which may
be imagined?
And what shadow of an argument, continued PHILO, can you produce, from
your hypothesis, to prove the unity of the Deity? A great number of men
join in building a house or ship, in rearing a city, in framing a
commonwealth; why may not several deities combine in contriving and
framing a world? This is only so much greater similarity to human
affairs. By sharing the work among several, we may so much further limit
the attributes of each, and get rid of that extensive power and
knowledge, which must be supposed in one deity, and which, according to
you, can only serve to weaken the proof of his existence. And if such
foolish, such vicious creatures as man, can yet often unite in framing
and executing one plan, how much more those deities or demons, whom we
may suppose several degrees more perfect!
To multiply causes without necessity, is indeed contrary to true
philosophy: but this principle applies not to the present case. Were one
deity antecedently proved by your theory, who were possessed of every
attribute requisite to the production of the universe; it would be
needless, I own, (though not absurd,) to suppose any other deity
existent. But while it is still a question, Whether all these attributes
are united in one subject, or dispersed among several independent beings,
by what phenomena in nature can we pretend to decide the controversy?
Where we see a body raised in a scale, we are sure that there is in the
opposite scale, however concealed from sight, some counterpoising weight
equal to it; but it is still allowed to doubt, whether that weight be an
aggregate of several distinct bodies, or one uniform united mass. And if
the weight requisite very much exceeds any thing which we have ever seen
conjoined in any single body, the former supposition becomes still more
probable and natural. An intelligent being of such vast power and
capacity as is necessary to produce the universe, or, to speak in the
language of ancient philosophy, so prodigious an animal exceeds all
analogy, and even comprehension.
But further, CLEANTHES: men are mortal, and renew their species by
generation; and this is common to all living creatures. The two great
sexes of male and female, says MILTON, animate the world. Why must this
circumstance, so universal, so essential, be excluded from those numerous
and limited deities? Behold, then, the theogony of ancient times brought
back upon us.
And why not become a perfect Anthropomorphite? Why not assert the deity
or deities to be corporeal, and to have eyes, a nose, mouth, ears, &c.?
EPICURUS maintained, that no man had ever seen reason but in a human
figure; therefore the gods must have a human figure. And this argument,
which is deservedly so much ridiculed by CICERO, becomes, according to
you, solid and philosophical.
In a word, CLEANTHES, a man who follows your hypothesis is able perhaps
to assert, or conjecture, that the universe, sometime, arose from
something like design: but beyond that position he cannot ascertain one
single circumstance; and is left afterwards to fix every point of his
theology by the utmost license of fancy and hypothesis. This world, for
aught he knows, is very faulty and imperfect, compared to a superior
standard; and was only the first rude essay of some infant deity, who
afterwards abandoned it, ashamed of his lame performance: it is the work
only of some dependent, inferior deity; and is the object of derision to
his superiors: it is the production of old age and dotage in some
superannuated deity; and ever since his death, has run on at adventures,
from the first impulse and active force which it received from him. You
justly give signs of horror, DEMEA, at these strange suppositions; but
these, and a thousand more of the same kind, are CLEANTHES's
suppositions, not mine. From the moment the attributes of the Deity are
supposed finite, all these have place. And I cannot, for my part, think
that so wild and unsettled a system of theology is, in any respect,
preferable to none at all.
These suppositions I absolutely disown, cried CLEANTHES: they strike me,
however, with no horror, especially when proposed in that rambling way in
which they drop from you. On the contrary, they give me pleasure, when I
see, that, by the utmost indulgence of your imagination, you never get
rid of the hypothesis of design in the universe, but are obliged at every
turn to have recourse to it. To this concession I adhere steadily; and
this I regard as a sufficient foundation for religion.