CHAP. IV.

_Examination of the Proofs of the Existence of the Divinity, as given by

CLARKE._

The unanimity of man in acknowledging the Divinity, is commonly looked

upon as the strongest proof of his existence. There is not, it is said,

any people on the earth who have not some ideas, whether true or false,

of an all-powerful agent who governs the world. The rudest savages

as well as the most polished nations, are equally obliged to recur

by thought to the first cause of every thing that exists; thus it

is affirmed, the cry of Nature herself ought to convince us of the

existence of the Godhead, of which she has taken pains to engrave the

notion in the minds of men: they therefore conclude, that the idea of

God is innate.

Perhaps there is nothing of which man should be more sedulously careful

than permitting a promiscuous assemblage of right with wrong--of

suffering false conclusions to be drawn from true propositions;

this will not improbably be found to be pretty much the case in this

instance; the existence of the great _Cause of causes_, the _Parent of

parents_, does not, I think, admit of any doubt in the mind of any

one who has reasoned: but, if this existence did not rest upon better

foundations than the unanimity of man on this subject, I am fearful

it would not be placed upon so solid a rock as those who make this

asseveration may imagine: the fact is, man is not generally agreed upon

this point; if he was, superstition could have no existence; the idea

of God cannot be _innate_, because, independent of the proofs offered on

every side of the almost impossibility of innate ideas, one simple fact

will set such an opinion for ever at rest, except with those who are

obstinately determined not to be convinced by even their own arguments:

if this idea was innate, it must be every where the same; seeing that

that which is antecedent to man's being, cannot have experienced the

modifications of his existence, which are posterior. Even if it were

waived, that the same idea should be expected from all mankind, but

that only every nation should have their ideas alike on this subject,

experience will not warrant the assertion, since nothing can be better

established than that the idea is not uniform even in the same town;

now this would be an insuperable quality in an innate idea. It not

unfrequently happens, that in the endeavour to prove too much, that

which stood firm before the attempt, is weakened; thus a bad advocate

frequently injures a good cause, although he may not be able to overturn

the rights on which it is rested. It would, therefore, perhaps, come

nearer to the point if it was said, "that the natural curiosity of

mankind have in all ages, and in all nations, led him to seek after the

primary cause of the phenomena he beholds; that owing to the variations

of his climate, to the difference of his organization, the greater

or less calamity he has experienced, the variety of his intellectual

faculties, and the circumstances under which he has been placed, man

has had the most opposite, contradictory, extravagant notions of the

Divinity, but that he has uniformly been in accord in acknowledging both

the existence, and the wisdom of his work--NATURE."

If disengaged from prejudice, we analyze this proof, we shall see that

the universal consent of man, so diffused over the earth, actually

proves little more than that he has been in all countries exposed to

frightful revolutions, experienced disasters, been sensible to sorrows

of which he has mistaken the physical causes; that those events to which

he has been either the victim or the witness, have called forth his

admiration or excited his fear; that for want of being acquainted with

the powers of nature, for want of understanding her laws, for want of

comprehending her infinite resources, for want of knowing the effects

she must necessarily produce under given circumstances, he has believed

these phenomena were due to some secret agent of which he has had vague

ideas--to beings whom he has supposed conducted themselves after his own

manner; who were operated upon by similar motives with himself.

The consent then of man in acknowledging a variety of gods, proves

nothing, except that in the bosom of ignorance he has either admired

the phenomena of nature, or trembled under their influence; that his

imagination was disturbed by what he beheld or suffered; that he has

sought in vain to relieve his perplexity, upon the unknown cause of

the phenomena he witnessed, which frequently obliged him to quake with

terror: the imagination of the human race has laboured variously upon

these causes, which have almost always been incomprehensible to him;

although every thing confessed his ignorance, his inability to define

these causes, yet he maintained that he was assured of their existence;

when pressed, he spoke of a spirit, (a word to which it was impossible

to attach any determinate idea) which taught nothing but the sloth,

which evidenced nothing but the stupidity of those who pronounced it.

It ought, however, not to excite any surprise that man is incapable of

forming any substantive ideas, save of those things which act, or which

have heretofore acted upon his senses; it is very evident that the

only objects competent to move his organs are material,--that none but

physical beings can furnish him with ideas,--a truth which has been

rendered sufficiently clear in the commencement of this work, not to

need any further proof. It will suffice therefore to say that the idea

of God is not an innate, but an acquired notion; that it is the very

nature of this notion to vary from age to age; to differ in one country

from another; to be viewed variously by individuals. What do I say?

It is, in fact, an idea hardly ever constant in the same mortal. This

diversity, this fluctuation, this change, stamps it with the true

character of an acquired opinion. On the other hand, the strongest proof

that can be adduced that these ideas are founded in error, is, that man

by degrees has arrived at perfectioning all the sciences which have any

known objects for their basis, whilst the science of theology has not

advanced; it is almost every where at the same point; men seem equally

undecided on this subject; those who have most occupied themselves with

it, have effected but little; they seem, indeed, rather to have rendered

the primitive ideas man formed to himself on this head more obscure,--to

have involved in greater mystery all his original opinions.

As soon as it is asked of man, what are the gods before whom he

prostrates himself, forthwith his sentiments are divided. In order that

his opinions should be in accord, it would be requisite that uniform

ideas, analogous sensations, unvaried perceptions, should every where

have given birth to his notions upon this subject: but this would

suppose organs perfectly similar, modified by sensations which have

a perfect affinity: this is what could not happen: because man,

essentially different by his temperament, who is found under

circumstances completely dissimilar, must necessarily have a great

diversity of ideas upon objects which each individual contemplates so

variously. Agreed in some general points, each made himself a god after

his own manner; he feared him, he served him, after his own mode. Thus

the god of one man, or of one nation, was hardly ever that of another

man, or of another nation. The god of a savage, unpolished people, is

commonly some material object, upon which the mind has exercised itself

but little; this god appears very ridiculous in the eyes of a more

polished community, whose minds have laboured more intensely upon the

subject. A spiritual god, whose adorers despise the worship paid by the

savage to a coarse, material object, is the subtle production of the

brain of thinkers, who, lolling in the lap of polished society quite at

their leisure, have deeply meditated, have long occupied themselves

with the subject. The theological god, although for the most part

incomprehensible, is the last effort of the human imagination; it is to

the god of the savage, what an inhabitant of the city of Sybaris, where

effiminacy and luxury reigned, where pomp and pageantry had reached

their climax, clothed with a curiously embroidered purple habit of silk,

was to a man either quite naked, or simply covered with the skin of

a beast perhaps newly slain. It is only in civilized societies, that

leisure affords the opportunity of dreaming--that ease procures the

facility of reasoning; in these associations, idle speculators meditate,

dispute, form metaphysics: the faculty of thought is almost void in the

savage, who is occupied either with hunting, with fishing, or with

the means of procuring a very precarious subsistence by dint of almost

incessant labour. The generality of men, however, have not more elevated

notions of the divinity, have not analyzed him more than the savage. A

spiritual, immaterial God, is formed only to occupy the leisure of some

subtle men, who have no occasion to labour for a subsistence. Theology,

although a science so much vaunted, considered so important to the

interests of man, is only useful to those who live at the expense of

others; or of those who arrogate to themselves the privilege of thinking

for all those who labour. This science becomes, in some polished

societies, who are not on that account more enlightened, a branch of

commerce extremely advantageous to its professors; equally unprofitable

to the citizens; above all when these have the folly to take a very

decided interest in their unintelligible system--in their discordant

opinions.

What an infinite distance between an unformed stone, an animal, a star,

a statue, and the abstracted Deity, which theology hath clothed with

attributes under which it loses sight of him itself! The savage without

doubt deceives himself in the object to which he addresses his vows;

like a child he is smitten with the first object that strikes his

sight--that operates upon him in a lively manner; like the infant, his

fears are alarmed by that from which he conceives he has either

received an injury or suffered disgrace; still his ideas are fixed by a

substantive being, by an object which he can examine by his senses. The

Laplander who adores a rock,--the negro who prostrates himself before

a monstrous serpent, at least see the objects they adore. The idolater

falls upon his knees before a statue, in which he believes there resides

some concealed virtue, some powerful quality, which he judges may be

either useful or prejudicial to himself; but that subtle reasoner,

called a metaphysician, who in consequence of his unintelligible

science, believes he has a right to laugh at the savage, to deride the

Laplander, to scoff at the negro, to ridicule the idolater, doth

not perceive that he is himself prostrate before a being of his own

imagination, of which it is impossible he should form to himself any

correct idea, unless, like the savage, he re-enters into visible nature,

to clothe him with qualities capable of being brought within the range

of his comprehension.

For the most part the notions on the Divinity, which obtain credit even

at the present day, are nothing more than a general terror diversely

acquired, variously modified in the mind of nations, which do not

tend to prove any thing, save that they have received them from their

trembling, ignorant ancestors. These gods have been successively

altered, decorated, subtilized, by those thinkers, those legislators,

those priests, who have meditated deeply upon them; who have prescribed

systems of worship to the uninformed; who have availed themselves

of their existing prejudices, to submit them to their yoke; who have

obtained a dominion over their mind, by seizing on their credulity,--by

making them participate in their errors,--by working on their fears;

these dispositions will always be a necessary consequence of man's

ignorance, when steeped in the sorrows of his heart.

If it be true, as asserted, that the earth has never witnessed any

nation so unsociable, so savage, to be without some form of religious

worship--who did not adore some god--but little will result from it

respecting the Divinity. The word GOD, will rarely be found to designate

more than the unknown cause of those effects which man has either

admired or dreaded. Thus, this notion so generally diffused, upon which

so much stress is laid; will prove little more than that man in all

generations has been ignorant of natural causes,--that he has been

incompetent, from some cause or other, to account for those phenomena

which either excited his surprise or roused his fears. If at the present

day a people cannot be found destitute of some kind of worship, entirely

without superstition, who do not acknowledge a God, who have not adopted

a theology more or less subtle, it is because the uninformed ancestors

of these people have all endured misfortunes--have been alarmed by

terrifying effects, which they have attributed to unknown causes--have

beheld strange sights, which they have ascribed to powerful agents,

whose existence they could not fathom; the details of which, together

with their own bewildered notions, they have handed down to their

posterity who have not given them any kind of examination.

It will readily be allowed, that the universality of an opinion by

no means proves its truth. Do we not see a great number of ignorant

prejudices, a multitude of barbarous errors, even at the present day,

receive the almost universal sanction of the human race? Are not nearly

all the inhabitants of the earth imbued with the idea of magic--in the

habit of acknowledging occult powers--given to divination--believers in

enchantment--the slaves to omens--supporters of witchcraft--thoroughly

persuaded of the existence of ghosts? If some of the most enlightened

persons are cured of these follies, they still find very zealous

partizans in the greater number of mankind, who accredit them with the

firmest confidence. It would not, however, be concluded by men of sound

sense, in many instances not by the theologian himself, that therefore

these chimeras actually have existence, although sanctioned with the

credence of the multitude. Before Copernicus, there was no one who did

not believe that the earth was stationary, that the sun described his

annual revolution round it. Was, however, this universal consent of

man upon a principle of astronomical science, which endured for so many

thousand years, less an error on that account? Yet to have doubted the

truth of such a generally-diffused opinion, one that had received

the sanction of so many learned men--that was clothed with the sacred

vestments of so many ages of credulity--that had been adopted by Moses,

acknowledged by Solomon, accredited by the Persian magi--that Elijah

himself had not refuted--that had obtained the fiat of the most

respectable universities, the most enlightened legislators, the wisest

kings, the most eloquent ministers; in short, a principle that embraced

all the stability that could be derived from the universal consent of

all ranks: to have doubted, I say, of this, would at one period have

been held as the highest degree of profanation, as the most presumptuous

scepticism, as an impious blasphemy, that would have threatened the very

existence of that unhappy country from whose unfortunate bosom such a

venomous, sacrilegious mortal could have arisen. It is well known what

opinion was entertained of Gallileo for maintaining the existence of the

antipodes. Pope Gregory excommunicated as atheists all those who gave it

credit. Thus each man has his God: But do all these gods exist? In reply

it will be said, somewhat triumphantly, each man hath his ideas of the

sun, do all these suns exist? However narrow may be the pass by which

superstition imagines it has thus guarded its favourite hypothesis,

nothing will perhaps be more easy than the answer: the existence of the

sun is a fact verified by the daily use of the senses; all the world see

the sun; no one bath ever said there is no sun; nearly all mankind have

acknowledged it to be both luminous and hot: however various may be the

opinions of man, upon this luminary, no one has ever yet pretended there

was more than one attached to our planetary system. But we may

perhaps be told, there is a wide difference between that which can be

contemplated by the visual organs, which can be understood by the sense

of feeling, and that which does not come under the cognizance of any

part of the organic structure of man. We must confess theology here

has the advantage; that we are unable to follow it through its devious

sinuosities; amidst its meandering labyrinths: but then it is the

advantage of those who see sounds, over those who only hear them; of

those who hear colours, over those who only see them; of the professors

of a science, where every thing is built upon laws inverted from those

common to the globe we inhabit; over those common understandings, who

cannot be sensible to any thing that does not give an impulse to some of

their organs.

If man, therefore, had the courage to throw aside his prejudices, which

every thing conspires to render as durable as himself--if divested

of fear he would examine coolly--if guided by reason he would

dispassionately view the nature of things, the evidence adduced

in support of any given doctrine; he would, at least, be under

the necessity to acknowledge, that the idea of the Divinity is not

innate--that it is not anterior to his existence--that it is

the production of time, acquired by communication with his own

species--that, consequently, there was a period when it did not actually

exist in him: he would see clearly, that he holds it by tradition from

those who reared him: that these themselves received it from their

ancestors: that thus tracing it up, it will be found to have been

derived in the last resort, from ignorant savages, who were our first

fathers. The history of the world will shew that crafty legislators,

ambitious tyrants, blood-stained conquerors, have availed themselves of

the ignorance, the fears, the credulity of his progenitors, to turn

to their own profit an idea to which they rarely attached any other

substantive meaning than that of submitting them to the yoke of their

own domination.

Without doubt there have been mortals who have dreamed they have seen

the Divinity. Mahomet, I believe, boasted he had a long conversation

with the Deity, who promulgated to him the system of the Mussulmans. But

are there not thousands, even of the theologians, who will exhaust their

breath, and fatigue their lungs with vociferating this man was a liar;

whose object was to take advantage of the simplicity, to profit by the

enthusiasm, to impose on the credulity of the Arabs; who promulgated

for truths, the crazy reveries of his own distempered imagination?

Nevertheless, is it not a truth, that this doctrine of the crafty Arab,

is at this day the creed of millions, transmitted to them by their

ancestors, rendered sacred by time, read to them in their mosques,

adorned with all the ceremonies of superstitious worship; of which the

inhabitants of a vast portion of the earth do not permit themselves for

an instant to doubt the veracity; who, on the contrary, hold those who

do not accredit it as dogs, as infidels, as beings of an inferior rank,

of meaner capacities than themselves? Indeed that man, even if he were

a theologian, would not experience the most gentle treatment from the

infuriated Mahometan, who should to his face venture to dispute the

divine mission of his prophet. Thus the ancestors of the Turk have

transmitted to their posterity, those ideas of the Divinity which they

manifestly received from those who deceived them; whose impositions,

modified from age to age, subtilized by the priests, clothed with

the reverential awe inspired by fear, have by degrees acquired that

solidity, received that corroboration, attained that veteran stability,

which is the natural result of public sanction, backed by theological

parade.

The word God is, perhaps, among the first that vibrate on the ear of

man; it is reiterated to him incessantly; he is taught to lisp it

with respect; to listen to it with fear; to bend the knee when it is

reverberated: by dint of repetition, by listening to the fables of

antiquity, by hearing it pronounced by all ranks and persuasions, he

seriously believes all men bring the idea with them into the world; he

thus confounds a mechanical habit with instinct; whilst it is for want

of being able to recal to himself the first circumstances under which

his imagination was awakened by this name; for want of recollecting all

the recitals made to him during the course of his infancy; for want of

accurately defining what was instilled into him by his education; in

short, because his memory does not furnish him with the succession of

causes that have engraven it on his brain, that he believes this idea

is really inherent to his being; innate in all his species. Iamblicus,

indeed, who was a Pythagorean philosopher not in the highest repute

with the learned world, although one of those visionary priests in some

estimation with theologians, (at least if we may venture to judge by the

unlimited draughts they have made on the bank of his doctrines) who

was unquestionably a favourite with the emperor Julian, says, "that

anteriorly to all use of reason, the notion of the gods is inspired

by nature, and that we have even a sort of feeling of the Divinity,

preferable to the knowledge of him." It is, however, uniformly by habit,

that man admires, that he fears a being, whose name he has attended to

from his earliest infancy. As soon as he hears it uttered, he without

reflection mechanically associates it with those ideas with which

his imagination has been filled by the recitals of others; with those

sensations which he has been instructed to accompany it. Thus, if for a

season man would be ingenuous with himself, he would concede that in

the greater number of his race, the ideas of the gods, and of those

attributes with which they are clothed, have their foundation,

take their rise in, are the fruit of the opinions of his fathers,

traditionally infused into him by education--confirmed by

habit--corroborated by example--enforced by authority. That it very

rarely happens he examines these ideas; that they are for the most part

adopted by inexperience, propagated by tuition, rendered sacred by time,

inviolable from respect to his progenitors, reverenced as forming part

of those institutions he has most learned to value. He thinks he has

always had them, because he has had them from his infancy; he

considers them indubitable, because he is never permitted to question

them--because he never has the intrepidity to examine their basis.

If it had been the destiny of a Brachman, or a Mussulman, to have drawn

his first breath on the shores of Africa, he would adore, with as much

simplicity, with as much fervour, the serpent reverenced by the Negroes,

as he does the God his own metaphysicians have offered to his reverence.

He would be equally indignant if any one should presumptuously dispute

the divinity of this reptile, which he would have learned to venerate

from the moment he quitted the womb of his mother, as the most zealous,

enthusiastic fakir, when the marvellous wonders of his prophet should

be brought into question; or as the most subtile theologian when

the inquiry turned upon the incongruous qualities with which he has

decorated his gods. Nevertheless, if this serpent god of the Negro

should be contested, they could not at least dispute his existence.

Simple as may be the mind of this dark son of nature, uncommon as may

be the qualities with which he has clothed his reptile, he still may be

evidenced by all who choose to exercise their organs of sight; not so

with the theologian; he absolutely questions the existence of every

other god but that which he himself has formed; which is questioned in

its turn by his brother metaphysician. They are by no means disposed to

admit the proofs offered by each other. Descartes, Paschal, and Doctor

Samuel Clarke himself, have been accused of atheism by the theologians

of their time. Subsequent reasoners have made use of their proofs, and

even given them as extremely valid. Doctor Bowman published a work, in

which he pretends all the proofs hitherto brought forward are crazy and

fragile: he of course substitutes his own; which in their turn have been

the subject of animadversion. Thus it would appear these theologians are

not more in accord with themselves than they are with Turks or Pagans.

They cannot even agree as to their proofs of existence: from age to

age new champions arise, new evidence is adduced, the old discarded, or

treated with contempt; profound philosophers, subtle metaphysicians, are

continually attacking each other for their ignorance on a point of the

very first importance. Amidst this variety of discussion, it is very

difficult for simple winds, for those who steadily search after truth,

who only wish to understand what they believe, to find a point upon

which they can fix with reliance--a standard round which they may rally

without fear of danger--a common measure that way serve them for a

beacon to avoid the quicksands of delusion--the sophistry of polemics.

Men of very great genius have successively miscarried in their

demonstrations; have been held to have betrayed their cause by the

weakness of the arguments by which they have supported it; by the manner

in which they have attempted to establish their positions. Thus many

of them, when they believed they had surmounted a difficulty, had the

mortification to find they had only given birth to an hundred others.

They seem, indeed, not to be in a capacity to understand each other,

or to agree among themselves, when they reason upon the nature and

qualities of beings created by such a variety of imaginations, which

each contemplates diversely, upon which the natural self-love of each

disputant induces him to reject with vehement indignation every thing

that does not fall in with his own peculiar mode of thinking--that does

not quadrate either with his superstition or his ignorance, or sometimes

with both.

The opponents of Clarke charge him with begging the question in his work

on _The Being and Attributes of God_. They say he has pretended to prove

this existence _a priori_, which they deem impossible, seeing there is

nothing anterior to the first of causes; that therefore it can only

be proved _a posteriori_, that is to say, by its effects. Law, in his

_Inquiry into the Ideas of Space, Time, Immensity, &c_. has attacked him

very triumphantly, for this manner of proof, which is stated to be so

very repugnant to the school-men. His arguments have been treated with

no more ceremony by Thomas D'Aquinas, John Scott, and others of the

schools. At the present day I believe he is held in more respect--that

his authority outweighs that of all his antagonists together. Be that as

it may, those who have followed him have done nothing more than either

repeat his ideas, or present his evidence under a new form. Tillotson

argues at great length, but it would be rather difficult to understand

which side of the question he adopts on this momentous subject; whether

he is a Necessitarian, or among the opposers of Fatalism. Speaking of

man, he says, "he is liable to many evils and miseries, which he can

neither prevent or redress; he is full of wants, which he cannot

supply, and compassed about with infirmities which he cannot remove, and

obnoxious to dangers which he can never sufficiently provide against: he

is apt to grieve for what he cannot help, and eagerly to desire what he

is never able to obtain." If the proofs of Clarke, who has drawn them up

in twelve propositions, are examined with attention, I think they may be

fairly shielded from the reproach with which they have been loaded;

it does not appear that he has proved his positions _a priori,_ but _a

posteriori,_ according to rule. It seems clear, however, that he has

mistaken the proof of the existence of the effects, for the proof of the

existence of the cause: but here he seems to have more reason than his

critics, who in their eagerness to prove that Clarke has not conformed

to the rules of the schools, would entirely overlook the best, the

surest foundation whereon to rest the existence of the _Great Cause of

causes,_ that _Parent of Parents_, whose wisdom shines so manifestly

in nature, of which Clarke's work may be said to be such a masterly

evidence. We shall follow, step by step, the different propositions

in which this learned divine developes the received opinions upon

the Divinity; which, when applied to nature, will be found to be so

accurate, so correct, as to leave no further room to doubt either the

existence or the wisdom of her great author, thus proved through her own

existence. Dr. Clarke sets out with saying:

"_1st. Something has existed from all eternity_."

This proposition is evident--hath no occasion for proofs. Matter has

existed from all eternity, its forms alone are evanescent; matter is the

great engine used by nature to produce all her phenomena, or rather it

is nature herself. We have some idea of matter, sufficient to warrant

the conclusion that this has always existed. First, that which exists,

supposes existence essential to its being. That which cannot, annihilate

itself, exists necessarily; it is impossible to conceive that that which

cannot cease to exist, or that which cannot annihilate itself, could

ever have had a beginning. If matter cannot be annihilated, it could

not commence to be. Thus we say to Dr. Clarke, that it is matter, it is

nature, acting by her own peculiar energy, of which no particle is ever

in an absolute state of rest, which hath always existed. The various

material bodies which this nature contains often change their form,

their combination, their properties, their mode of action: but their

principles or elements are indestructible--have never been able to

commence. What this great scholar actually understands, when he makes

the assertion "that an eternal duration is now actually past," is not

quite so clear; yet he affirms, "that not to believe it would be a real

and express contradiction." We may, however, safely admit his argument,

"that when once any proposition is clearly demonstrated to, be true,

it ought not to disturb us that there be perhaps some perplexing

difficulties on the other side, which merely for want of adequate ideas

of the manner of the existence of the things demonstrated, are not

easily to be cleared."

_2nd, "There has existed from eternity some one unchangeable and

independent Being."_

We may fairly inquire what is this Being? Is it independent of its own

peculiar essence, or of those properties which constitute it such as

it is? We shall further inquire, if this Being, whatever it may be,

can make the other beings which it produces, or which it moves, act

otherwise than they do, according to the properties which it has given

them? And in this case we shall ask, if this Being, such as it way be

supposed to be, does not act necessarily; if it is not obliged to employ

indispensible means to fulfil its designs, to arrive at the end which it

either has, or may be supposed to have in view? Then we shall say, that

nature is obliged to act after her essence; that every thing which takes

place in her is necessary; but that she is independent of her forms.

A man is said to be independent, when he is determined in his actions

only by the general causes which are accustomed to move him; he is

equally said to be dependent on another, when he cannot act but in

consequence of the determination which this last gives him. A body is

dependent on another body when it owes to it its existence, and its mode

of action. A being existing from eternity cannot owe his existence to

any other being; he cannot then be dependent upon him, except he owes

his action to him; but it is evident that an eternal or self-existent

Being contains in his own nature every thing that is necessary for him

to act: then, matter being eternal, is necessarily independent in the

sense we have explained; of course it hath no occasion for a mover upon

which it ought to depend.

This eternal Being is also immutable, if by this attribute be understood

that he cannot change his nature; but if it be intended to infer by it

that he cannot change his mode of action or existence, it is without

doubt deceiving themselves, since even in supposing an immaterial being,

they would be obliged to acknowledge in him different modes of being,

different volitions, different ways of acting; particularly if he was

not supposed totally deprived of action, in which case he would be

perfectly useless. Indeed it follows of course that to change his mode

of action he must necessarily change his manner of being. From hence it

will be obvious, that the theologians, in making their gods immutable,

render them immoveable, consequently they cannot act. An immutable

being, could evidently neither have successive volition, nor produce

successive action; if this being hath created matter, or given birth to

the universe, there must have been a time in which he was willing that

this matter, this universe, should exist; and this time must have been

preceded by another time, in which he was willing that it might not yet

exist. If God be the author of all things, as well as of the motion and

of the combinations of matter, he is unceasingly occupied in producing

and destroying; in consequence, he cannot be called immutable, touching

his mode of existing. The material world always maintains itself by

motion, and the continual change of its parts; the sum of the beings who

compose it, or of the elements which act in it, is invariably the same;

in this sense the immutability of the universe is much more easy of

comprehension, much more demonstrable than that of an other being to

whom, they would attribute all the effects, all the mutations which take

place. Nature is not more to be accused of mutability, on account of the

succession of its forms, than the eternal Being is by the theologians,

by the diversity of his decrees. Here we shall be able to perceive that,

supposing the laws by which nature acts to be immutable, it does not

require tiny of these logical distinctions to account for the changes

that take place: the mutation which results, is, on the contrary, a

striking proof of the immutability of the system which produces them;

and completely brings mature under the range of this second proposition

as stated by Dr. Clarke.

_3dly, "That unchangeable and independent Being which has existed

from eternity without any eternal cause of its existence, must be

self-existent, that is, necessarily existing."_

This proposition is merely a repetition of the first; we reply to it

by inquiring, Why matter, which is indestructible, should not be

self-existent? It is evident that a being who had no beginning, must be

self-existent; if he had existed by another, he would have commenced to

be; consequently he would not be eternal.

_4thly, "What the substance or essence of that Being which is

self-existent, or necessarily existing, is, we have no idea; neither is

it at all possible for us to comprehend it."_

Dr. Clarke would perhaps have spoken more correctly if he had said

his essence is impossible to be known: nevertheless, we shall readily

concede that the essence of matter is incomprehensible, or at least that

we conceive it very feebly by the manner in which we are affected by it;

but without this we should be less able to conceive the Divinity,

who would then be impervious on any side. Thus it must necessarily be

concluded, that it is folly to argue upon it, since it is by matter

alone we can have any knowledge of him; that is to say, by which we can

assure ourselves of his existence,--by which we can at all guess at his

qualities. In short we must conclude, that every thing related of the

Divinity, either proves him material, or else proves the impossibility

in which the human mind will always find itself, of conceiving any being

different from matter; without extent, yet omnipresent; immaterial,

yet acting upon matter; spiritual, yet producing matter; immutable, yet

putting every thing in activity, &c.

Indeed it must be allowed that the incomprehensibility of the Divinity

does not distinguish him from matter; this will not be more easy

of comprehension when we shall associate it with a being much less

comprehensible than itself; we have some slender knowledge of it through

some of its parts. We do not certainly know the essence of any being,

if by that word we are to understand that which constitutes its peculiar

nature. We only know matter by the sensations, the perceptions, the

ideas which it furnishes; it is according to these that we judge it

to be either favorable or unfavourable, following the particular

disposition of our organs. But when a being does not act upon any part

of our organic structure, it does not exist for us; we cannot, without

exhibiting folly, without betraying our ignorance, without falling into

obscurity, either speak of its nature, or assign its qualities; our

senses are the only channel by which we could have formed the slightest

idea of it; these not having received any impulse, we are, in point of

fact, unacquainted with its existence. The incomprehensibility of the

Divinity ought to convince man that it is a point at which he is bound

to stop; indeed he is placed in a state of utter incapacity to proceed:

this, however, would not suit with those speculators who are willing to

reason upon him continually, to shew the depth of their learning,--to

persuade the uninformed they understand that which is incomprehensible

to all men; by which they expect to be able to submit him to their own

views. Nevertheless, if the Divinity be incomprehensible, It would not

be straining a point beyond its tension, to conclude that a priest, or

metaphysician, did not comprehend him better than other men: it is not,

perhaps, either the wisest or the surest way to become acquainted with

him, to represent him to ourselves, by the imagination of a theologian.

_5thly, "Though the substance, or essence of the self-existent Being, is

in itself absolutely incomprehensible to us, yet many of the essential

attributes of his nature are strictly demonstrable, as well as his

existence. Thus, in the first place, the self-existent Being must of

necessity be eternal."_

This proposition differs in nothing from the first, except Dr. Clarke

does not here understand that as the self-existent Being had no

beginning, he can have no end. However this may be, we must ever

inquire, Why this should not be matter? We shall further observe,

that matter not being capable of annihilation, exists necessarily,

consequently will never cease to exist; that the human mind has no means

of conceiving how matter should originate from that which is not itself

matter: is it not obvious, that matter is necessary; that there is

nothing, except its powers, its arrangement, its combinations, which are

contingent or evanescent? The general motion is necessary, but the

given motion is not so; only during the season that the particular

combinations subsist, of which this motion is the consequence, or

the effect: we may be competent to change the direction, to either

accelerate or retard, to suspend or arrest, a particular motion, but the

general motion can never possibly be annihilated. Man, in dying, ceases

to live; that is to say, he no longer either walks, thinks, or acts in

the mode which is peculiar to human organization: but the matter which

composed his body, the matter which formed his mind, does not cease to

move on that account: it simply becomes susceptible of another species

of motion.

_6thly, "The self-existent Being must of necessity be infinite and

omnipresent."_

The word infinite presents only a negative idea--which excludes all

bounds: it is evident that a being who exists necessarily, who is

independent, cannot be limited by any thing which is out of himself;

he must consequently be his own limits; in this sense we may say he is

infinite.

Touching what is said of his omnipresence, it is equally evident that

if there be nothing exterior to this being, either there is no place in

which he must not be present, or that there will be only himself and the

vacuum. This granted, I shall inquire if matter exists; if it does

not at least occupy a portion of space? In this case, matter, or the

universe, must exclude every other being who is not matter, from that

place which the material beings occupy in space. In asking whether the

gods of the theologians be by chance the abstract being which they call

the vacuum or space, they will reply, no! They will further insist, that

their gods, who are not matter, penetrate that which is matter. But it

must be obvious, that to penetrate matter, it is necessary to have some

correspondence with matter, consequently to have extent; now to have

extent, is to have one of the properties of matter. If the Divinity

penetrates matter, then he is material; by a necessary deduction he is

inseparable from matter; then if he is omnipresent, he will be in every

thing. This the theologian will not allow: he will say it is a mystery;

by which I shall understand that he is himself ignorant how to account

for his own positions; this will not be the case with making nature act

after immutable laws; she will of necessity be every where, in my body,

in my arm, in every other material being, because matter composes them

all. The Divinity who has given this invariable system, will without

any incongruous reasoning, without any subterfuge, be also present every

where, inasmuch as the laws he has prescribed will unchangeably act

through the whole; this does not seem inconsistent with reason to

suppose.

_7th, "The Self-existent Being must of necessity be but one."_

If there he nothing exterior to a being who exists necessarily, it must

follow that he is unique. It will be obvious that this proposition is

the same with the preceding one; at least, if they are not willing to

deny the existence of the material world.

_8th, "The self-existent and original Cause of all things, must be an

intelligent being."_

Here Dr. Clarke most unquestionably assigneth a human quality:

intelligence is a faculty appertaining to organized or animated beings,

of which we have no knowledge out of these beings. To have intelligence,

it is necessary to think; to think, it is requisite to have ideas; to

have ideas, supposes senses; when senses exist they are material; when

they are material, they cannot be a pure spirit, in the language of the

theologian.

The necessary Being who comprehends, who contains, who produces animated

beings, contains, includes, and produceth intelligence. But has the

great whole a peculiar intelligence, which moveth it, which maketh

it act, which determineth it in the mode that intelligence moves and

determines animated bodies; or rather, is not this intelligence the

consequence of immutable laws, a certain modification resulting from

certain combinations of matter, which exists under one form of these

combinations, but is wanting under another form? This is assuredly what

nothing is competent absolutely, and demonstrably to prove. Man having

placed himself in the first rank in the universe, has been desirous to

judge of every thing after what he saw within himself, because he

hath pretended that in order to be perfect it was necessary to be

like himself. Here is the source of all his erroneous reasoning upon

nature--the foundation of his ideas upon his gods. He has therefore

concluded, perhaps not with the most polished wisdom, that it would be

indecorous in himself, injurious to the Divinity, not to invest him with

a quality which is found estimable in man--which he prizes highly--to

which he attaches the idea of perfection--which he considers as a

manifest proof of superiority. He sees his fellow-creature is offended

when he is thought to lack intelligence; he therefore judges it to be

the same with the Divinity. He denies this quality to nature, because

he considers her a mass of ignoble matter, incapable of self-action;

although she contains and produces intelligent beings. But this is

rather a personification of an abstract quality, than an attribute of

the Deity, with whose perfections, with whose mode of existence, he

cannot by any possible means become acquainted according to the fifth

proposition of Dr. Clarke himself. It is in the earth that is engendered

those living animals called worms; yet we do not say the earth is a

living creature. The bread which man eats, the wine that he drinks, are

not themselves thinking substances; yet they nourish, sustain, and cause

those beings to think, who are susceptible of this modification of

their existence. It is likewise in nature, that is formed intelligent,

feeling, thinking beings; yet it cannot be rationally said, that nature

feels, thinks, and is intelligent after the manner of these beings, who

nevertheless spring out of her bosom.

How! cries the metaphysician, the subtilizing philosopher, what! refuse

to the Divinity, those qualities we discover in his creatures? Must,

then, the work be more perfect than the workman? Shall God, who made the

eye, not himself see? Shall God, who formed the ear, not himself hear!

This at a superficial view appears insuperable: but are the questioners,

however triumphantly they may make the inquiry, themselves aware of the

length this would carry them, even if their queries were answered with

the most unqualified affirmative? Have they sufficiently reflected

on the tendency of this mode of reasoning? If this be admitted as a

postulatum, are they prepared to follow it in all its extent? Suppose

their argument granted, what is to be done with all those other

qualities upon which man does not set so high a value? Are they also

to be ascribed to the Divinity, because we do not refuse him qualities

possessed by his creatures? By a parity of reasoning we should attach

faculties that would be degrading to the Divinity. Thus it ever happens

with those who travel out of the limits of their own knowledge; they

involve themselves in perpetual contradictions which they can never

reconcile; which only serve to prove that in arguing upon points, on

which universal ignorance prevails, the result is constantly that all

the deductions made from such unsteady principles, must of necessity be

at war with each other, in hostility with themselves. Thus, although

we cannot help feeling the profound wisdom, that must have dictated the

system we see act with such uniformity, with such constancy, with

such astonishing power, we cannot form the most slender idea of the

particular nature of that wisdom; because if we were for an instant to

assimilate it to our own, weak and feeble as it is, we should from that

instant be in a state of contradiction; seeing we could not then

avoid considering the evil we witness, the sorrow we experience, as a

dereliction of this wisdom, which at least proves one great truth, _that

we are utterly incapable of forming an idea of the Divinity_. But in

contemplating things as our own experience warrants in whatever we do

understand, in considering nature as acting by unchangeable laws, we

find good and evil necessarily existing, without at all involving the

wisdom of the great _Cause of causes_; who thus has no need to remedy

that, which the further progress of the eternal system will regulate of

itself, or which industry and patient research on our parts will enable

us to discover the means of futurely avoiding.

_9th, "The self-existent and original Cause of all things, is not a

necessary agent, but a being endued with liberty and choice._"

Man is called free, when he finds within himself motives that determine

him to action, or when his will meets no obstacle to the performance of

that to which his motives have determined him. The necessary Being of

which question is here made, doth he find no obstacles to the execution

of the projects which are attributed to him? Is he willing, adopting

their own hypothesis, that evil should be committed, or can he not

prevent it? In this latter case he is not free; if his will does meet

with obstacles, if he is willing to permit evil; then he suffers man

to restrain his liberty, by deranging his projects; if he has not these

projects, then they are themselves in error who ascribe them to him.

How will the metaphysicians draw themselves out of this perplexing

intricacy?

The further a theologian goes, whilst considering his gods as

possessed of human qualities, as acting by mortal motives, the more he

flounders--the greater the mass of contradiction he heaps together:

thus if it be asked of him, can God reward crime, punish virtue, he will

immediately answer, no! In this answer he will have truth: but then this

truth, and the freedom which is ascribed to him, cannot, according to

human ideas, exist together; because if this being cannot love vice,

cannot hate virtue, and it is evident he cannot, he is in fact not more

free than man himself. Again, God is said to have made a covenant with

his creatures; now it is the very essence of a covenant to restrict

choice; and that being must be considered a necessary agent who is

under the necessity of fulfilling any given act. As it is impossible to

suppose the Divinity can act irrationally, it must be conceded that as

he made these laws, he is himself obliged to follow them: because if he

was not, as we must again suppose he does nothing without a good reason,

he would thereby imply, that the mode of action he adopted would be

wiser; which would again involve a contradiction. The theologians

fearing, without doubt, to restrain the liberty of the Divinity, have

supposed it was necessary that he should not be bound by his own laws,

in which they have shewn somewhat more ignorance of their subject than

they imagined.

_10th, "The self-existent Being, the supreme Cause of all things, must

of necessity have infinite power."_

As nature is adequate to produce every thing we see--as she contains

the whole united power of the universe, her power has consequently no

limits: the being who conferred this power cannot have less. But if the

ideas of the theologians were adopted, this power would not appear

quite so unlimited; since, according to them, man is a free agent,

consequently has the means of acting contrary to this power, which at

once sets a boundary to it. An equitable monarch is perhaps nothing

less than he is a free agent; when he believes himself bound to act

conformably to the laws, which he has sworn to observe, or which he

cannot violate without wounding his justice. The theologian is a man who

may be very fairly estimated neuter; because he destroys with one hand

what he establishes with the other.

_11th, "The Supreme Cause and Author of all things, must of necessity be

infinitely wise."_

As nature produces all things by certain immutable laws, it will require

no great difficulty to allow that she may be infinitely wise: indeed,

whatever side of the argument may be taken, this fact will result as

a necessary consequence. It will hardly admit of a question that all

things are produced by nature: if, therefore, we do not allow her wisdom

to be first rate, it would be an insult to the Divinity, who gave her

her system. If the theologian himself is to take the lead, he also

admits that nature operates under the immediate auspices of his gods;

whatever she does, must then, according to his own shewing, be executed

with the most polished wisdom. But the theologian is not satisfied with

going thus far: he will insist, not only that he knows what these

things are, but also that he knows the end they have in view: this,

unfortunately, is the rock he splits upon. According to his own

admission, the ways of God are impenetrable to man. If we grant his

position, what is the result? Why, that it is at random he speaks. If

these ways are impenetrable, by what means did he acquire his knowledge

of them? How did he discover the end proposed by the Deity? If they

are not impenetrable, they then can be equally known to other men as

to himself. The theologian would be puzzled to shew he has any more

privileges in nature than his fellow mortals. Again, if he has asserted

these things to be impenetrable, when they are not so, he is then in the

situation that he has himself placed Mahomet: he is no longer worthy of

being attended to, because he has swerved from veracity. It certainly is

not very consistent with the sublime idea of the Divinity that he should

be clothed with that weak, vain passion of man, called glory: the being

who had the faculty of producing such a system as it operated in nature,

could hardly be supposed to have such a frivolous passion as we know

this to be in our fellows: and as we can never reason but after what

we do know, it would appear nothing can be more inconsistent than thus

continually heaping together our own feeble, inconsistent views, and

then supposing the great _Cause of causes_ acts by such futile rules.

_12th, "The supreme Cause and Author of all things must of necessity be

a being of infinite goodness, justice, and truth, and all other moral

perfections, such as become the supreme governor and judge of the

world."_

We must again repeat that these are human qualities drawn from the model

of man himself; they only suppose a being of the human species, who

should be divested of what we call imperfections: this is certainly

the highest point of view in which our finite minds are capable of

contemplating the Divinity: but as this being has neither species nor

cause, consequently no fellow creatures, he must necessarily be of

an order so different to man, that human faculties can in no wise

be appropriately assigned to him. The idea of perfection, as man

understands it, is an abstract, metaphysical, negative idea, of which

he has no archetype whereby to form a judgment: he would call that a

perfect being, who, similar to himself, was wanting in those qualities

which he finds prejudicial to him; but such a being would after all be

no wore than a man. It is always relatively to himself, to his own mode

of feeling and of thinking, that a thing is either perfect or imperfect;

it is according to this, that in his eyes a thing is more or less useful

or prejudicial; agreeable or disagreeable. Justice includes all moral

perfections. One of the most prominent features of justice, in the

ideas of man, is the equity of the relations subsisting between beings,

founded upon their mutual wants. According to the theologian, his gods

owe nothing to man. How then does he measure out his ideas of justice?

For a monarch to say he owed nothing to his subjects, would be

considered, even by this theologian himself, as rank injustice;

because he would expect the fulfilment of duties on their part, without

exercising those which devolved upon himself. Duties, according to

the only idea man can form of them, must be reciprocal. It is rather

stretching the human capabilities, to understand the relations between

a pure spirit and material beings--between finity and infinity--between

eternal beings and those which are transitory: thus it is, that

metaphysics hold forth an inconceivable being by the very attributes

with which they clothe him; for either he has these attributes, or

he has them not: whether he has them or has them not, man can only

understand them after his own powers of comprehension. If he does at

all understand them, he cannot have the slightest idea of justice

unaccompanied by duties, which are the very basis, the superstructure,

the pillars upon which this virtue rests. Whether we are to view it as

self-love or ignorance in the theologian, that he thus dresses up his

gods after himself, it certainly was not the happiest effort of his

imagination to work by an inverse rule: for, according to himself,

the qualities he describes are all the negation of what he calls them.

Doctor Clarke himself stumbles a little upon these points; he insists

upon free agency, and uses this extraordinary method to support his

argument; he says, "God is, by necessity, a free agent: and he can no

more possibly cease to be so, than he can cease to exist. He must of

necessity, every moment choose to act, or choose to forbear acting;

because two contradictories cannot possibly be true at once. Man also

is by necessity, not in the nature of things, but through God's

appointment, a free agent. And it is no otherwise in his power to cease

to be such, than by depriving himself of life." Will Doctor Clarke

permit us to put one simple question: If to be obligated to do a

certain given thing, is to be free, what is it to be coerced? Or if two

contradictories cannot be true at once, by what rule of logic are we

to measure the idea of that freedom which arises out of necessity.

Supposing necessity to be what Dr. Johnson, (using Milton as his

authority) says it is, "compulsion," "fatality," would it be considered

a man was less restrained in his actions because he was only compelled

to do what was right? The restraint would undoubtedly he beneficial to

him, but it would not therefore render him more a free agent. If the

Divinity cannot love wickedness, cannot hate goodness, (and surely

the theologians themselves will not pretend he can,) then the power of

choice has no existence as far as these two things are concerned; and

this upon Clarke's own principle, because two contradictories cannot be

true at once. Nothing could, I think, appear a greater contradiction,

than the idea that the _Great Cause of causes_ could by any possibility

love vice: if such a monstrous principle could for a moment have

existence, there would be an end of all the foundations of religion.

The Doctor is very little happier in reasoning upon _immateriality_.

He says, by way of illustrating his argument, "that it is possible to

infinite power to create an immaterial cogitative substance, endued

with a power of beginning motion, and with a liberty of will or choice."

Again, "that immaterial substances are not impossible; or, that a

substance immaterial is not a contradictory notion. Now, whoever asserts

that it is contradictory, must affirm that whatever is not matter is

nothing; and that, to say any thing exists which is not matter, is

saying that there exists something which is nothing, which in other

words is plainly this,--that whatever we have not an idea of, is

nothing, and impossible to be." It could, I am apt to believe, never

have entered into any reasonable mind that a thing was impossible

because he could have no idea of it:--many things, on the contrary, are

possible, of which we have not the most slender notion: but it does

not, I presume, flow consecutively out of this admission, that therefore

every thing is, which is not impossible. Doctor Clarke then, rather begs

the question on this occasion. In the schools it is never considered

requisite to prove a negative; indeed, this is ranked by logicians

amongst those things impossible to be, but it is considered of

the highest importance to soundness of argument, to establish the

affirmative by the most conclusive reasoning. Taking this for granted,

we will apply the doctor's own reasoning. He says, "Nothing is that of

which every thing, can truly be affirmed. So that the idea of nothing,

if I may so speak, is absolutely the negative of all ideas; the idea,

therefore, either of a finite or infinite nothing is a contradiction

in terms." To affirm, of a thing with truth, it must be necessary to be

acquainted with that thing. To have ideas, as we have already proved, it

is necessary to have perceptions; to have perceptions, it is requisite

to have sensations; to have sensations, requires organs. An idea cannot

be, and not be, at the same moment: the idea of substance, it will

scarcely be denied, is that of a thing solid, real, according to Dryden;

capable of supporting accidents, according to Watts; something of which

we can say that it is, according to Davies; body, corporeal nature,

according to Newton; the idea of immaterial, according to Hooker, is

incorporeal. How then am I to understand immaterial substance? Is it

not, according to these definitions, that which cannot couple together?

If a thing be immaterial, it cannot be a substance; if a substance, it

cannot be immaterial: those I apprehend will not have many ideas, who do

not see this is a complete negative of all ideas. If, therefore, on the

outset, the doctor cannot find words, by which he can convey the idea of

that of which he is so desirous to prove the existence, by what chain of

reasoning does he flatter himself that he is to be understood? He will

endeavour to draw out of this dilemma, by assuring as there are things

which we can neither see nor touch, but which do not the less exist on

that account. Granted: but from thence we can neither reason upon

them, nor assign them qualities; we must at least either feel them or

something like them, before we can have any idea of them: this, however,

would not prove they were not substances, nor that substances can be

immaterial. A thing may with great possibility exist of which we have no

knowledge, and yet be material; but I maintain until we have a knowledge

of it, it exists not for us, any more than colours exist for a man born

blind; the man who has sight knows they do exist, can describe them to

his dark neighbour; from this description the blind man may form some

idea of them by analogy with what he himself already knows; or, perhaps,

having a finer tact than his neighbour, he may be enabled to distinguish

them by their surfaces; it would, therefore, be bad reasoning in the

man born blind, to deny the existence of colours; because although these

colours may have no relation with the senses in the absence of sight,

they have with those who have it in their power to see and to know

them: this blind man, however, would-appear a little ridiculous if he

undertook to define them with all their gradations of shade; with all

their variations under different masses of light. Again, if those who

were competent to discriminate these modifications of matter called

colours, were to define them to this blind man, as those modifications

of matter called sound, would the blind man be able to have any

conception of them? It certainly would not be wise in him to aver, that

such a thing as colorific sound had no existence, was impossible; but

at least he would be very justifiable in saying, they appeared

contradictions, because he had some ideas of sound which did not at

all aid him in forming those of colour; he would not, perhaps, be very

inconclusive if he suspected the competency of his informer to the

definition attempted, from his inability to convey to him in any

distinct, understood terms, his own ideas of colours. The theologian is

a blind man, who would explain to others who are also blind, the shades

and colours of a portrait whose original he has not even stumbled upon

in the dark. There is nothing incongruous in supposing that every thing

which has existence is matter; but it requires the complete inversion of

all our ideas, to conceive that which is immaterial; because, in point

of fact, this would be a quality of which "nothing can with truth be

affirmed."

It is, indeed true, that Plato, who was a great creator of chimeras,

says, "those who admit nothing but what they can see and feel, are

stupid ignorant beings, who refuse to admit the reality of the existence

of invisible things." With all due deference to such an authority, we

may still venture to ask, is there then no difference, no shade, no

gradation, between an admission of possibilities and the proof of

realities. Theology would then be the only science in which it is

permitted to conclude that a thing is, as soon as it is possible to be.

Will the assertion of either Clarke or Plato stand absolutely in place

of all evidence? Would they themselves permit such to be convincing if

used against them? The theologians evidently hold this Platonic, this

dogmatical language; they have dreamed the dreams of their master;

perhaps if they were examined a little, they would be found nothing

more than the result of those obscure notions, those unintelligible

metaphysics, adopted by the Egyptian, Chaldean, and Assyrian priests,

among whom Plato drew up his philosophy. If, however, philosophy means

that which we are led to suppose it does, by the great John Locke, it is

"a system by which natural effects are explained." Taken in this sense

we shall be under the necessity of agreeing, that the Platonic doctrines

in no wise merit this distinction, seeing he has only drawn the human

mind from the contemplation of visible nature, to plunge it into the

unfathomable depths of invisibility--of intangibility--of suppositious

speculation, where it can find little other food except chimeras or

conjecture. Such a philosophy is rather fantastical, yet it would seem

we are required to subscribe to its positions without being allowed

to compare them with reason, to examine them through the medium of

experience, to try the gold by the action of fire: thus we have in

abundance the terms spirits, incorporeal substances, invisible powers,

supernatural effects, innate ideas, mysterious virtues, possessed by

demons, &c. &c. which render our senses entirely useless, which put

to flight every thing like experience; while we are gravely told that

"nothing is that, of which no thing can truly be affirmed." Whoever may

be willing to take the trouble of reading the works of Plato and his

disciples, such as Proclus, Iamblicus, Plotinus, and others, will not

fail to find in them almost every doctrine, every metaphysical

subject of the theologian; in fact, the theurgy of many of the modern

superstitions, which for the most part seems to be little more than a

slight variation of that adopted by the ethnic priests. Dreamers have

not had that variety in their follies, that has generally been imagined.

That some of these things should be extensively admitted, by no means

affords proof of their existence. Nothing appears more facile than to

make mankind admit the greatest absurdities, under the imposing name

of mysteries; after having imbued him from his infancy with maxims

calculated to hoodwink his reason--to lead him astray--to prevent him

from examining that which he is told he must believe. Of this there

cannot well exist a more decisive proof than the great extent of

country, the millions of human beings who faithfully and without

examination have adopted the idle dreams, the rank absurdities, of that

arch impostor Mahomet. However this may be, we shall be obliged again

to reply to Plato, and to those of his followers who impose upon us the

necessity of believing that which we cannot comprehend, that, in order

to know that a thing exists, it is at least necessary to have some idea

of it; that this idea can only come to us by the medium of our senses;

that consequently every thing of which our senses do not give us a

knowledge, is in fact nothing for us; and can only rest upon our faith;

upon that admission which is pretty generally, even by the theologian

himself, considered as rather a sandy foundation whereon to erect the

altar of truth: that if there be an absurdity in not accrediting the

existence of that which we do not know, there is no less extravagance in

assigning it qualities; in reasoning upon its properties; in clothing

it with faculties, which may or may not be suitable to its mode of

existence; in substituting idols of our own creation; in combining

incompatible attributes, which will neither bear the test of experience

nor the scrutiny of reason; and then endeavouring to make the whole pass

current by dint of the word infinite, which we will now examine.

Infinite, according to Dennis, means "boundless, unlimited." Doctor

Clarke thus describes it:--he says, "The self-existent being must be a

most simple, unchangeable incorruptible being; without parts, figure,

motion, divisibility, or any other such properties as we find in matter.

For all these things do plainly and necessarily imply finiteness in

their very notion, and are utterly inconsistent with complete infinity."

Ingenuously, is it possible for man to form any true notion of such a

quality? The theologians themselves acknowledge he cannot. Further, the

Doctor allows, "That as to the particular manner of his being infinite,

or every where present, in opposition to the manner of created things

being present in such or such finite places, this is as impossible for

our finite understandings to comprehend or explain, as it is for us to

form an adequate idea of infinity." What is this, then, but that which

no man can explain or comprehend? If it cannot be comprehended, it

cannot be detailed; if it cannot be detailed, it is precisely "that of

which nothing can with truth be affirmed;" and this is Dr. Clarke's own

explanation of nothing. Indeed, is not the human mind obliged by its

very nature to join limited quantities to other quantities, which it can

only conceive as limited, in order to form to itself a sort of confused

idea of something beyond its own grasp, without ever reaching the point

of infinity, which eludes every attempt at definition? Then it would

appear that it is an abstraction, a mere negation of limitation.

Our learned adversary seems to think it strange that the existence of

incorporeal, immaterial substances, the essence of which we are not

able to comprehend, should not be generally accredited. To enforce

this belief, he says, "There is not so mean and contemptible a plant

or animal, that does not confound the most enlarged understanding, upon

earth: nay, even the simplest and plainest of all inanimate beings

have their essence or substance hidden from us in the deepest and most

impenetrable obscurity."

We shall reply to him,

_First_, That the idea of an immaterial substance; or being without

extent, is only an absence of ideas, a negation of extent, as we have

already shewn; that when we are told a being is not matter, they speak

to us of that which is not, and do not teach us that which is; because

by insisting that a being is such, that it cannot act upon any of our

senses, they, in fact, inform us that we have no means of assuring

ourselves whether such being exists or not.

_Secondly_, We shall avow without the least hesitation, that men of the

greatest genius, of the most indefatigable research, are not acquainted

with the essence of stones, plants, animals, nor with the secret springs

which constitute some, which make others vegetate or act: but then at

least we either feel them or see them; our senses have a knowledge of

them in some respects; we can perceive some of their effects; we have

something whereby to judge of them, either accurately or inaccurately;

we can conceive that which is matter, however varied, however subtle,

however minute, by analogy with other matter; but our senses cannot

compass that which is immaterial on any side; we cannot by any possible

means understand it; we have no means whatever of ascertaining its

existence; consequently we cannot even form an idea of it; such a being

is to us an occult principle, or rather a being which imagination has

composed, by deducting from it every known quality. If we are ignorant

of the intimate combination of the most material beings, we at least

discover, with the aid of experience, some of their relations with

ourselves: we have a knowledge of their surface, their extent, their

form, their colour, their softness, their density; by the impressions

they make on our senses, we are capable of discriminating them--of

comparing them--of judging of them in some manner--of seeing them--of

either avoiding or courting them, according to the different modes in

which we are affected by them; we cannot apply any of these tests to

immaterial beings; to spirits; neither can those men who are unceasingly

talking to mankind of these inconceivable things.

_Thirdly_, We have a consciousness of certain modifications in

ourselves, which we call sentiment, thought, will, passions: for want

of being acquainted with our own peculiar essence; for want of precisely

understanding the energy of our own particular organization, we

attribute these effects to a concealed cause, distinguished from

ourselves; which the theologians call a spiritual cause, inasmuch as

it appears to act differently from our body. Nevertheless, reflection,

experience, every thing by which we are enabled to form any kind of

judgment, proves that material effects can only emanate from material

causes. We see nothing in the universe but physical, material effects,

these can only be produced by analogous causes; it is, then certainly

more rational to attribute them to nature herself, of which we may know

something, if we will but deign to meditate her with attention, rather

than to spiritual causes, of which we must for ever remain ignorant, let

us study them as long as we please.

If incomprehensibility be not a sufficient reason for absolutely denying

the possibility of immateriality, it certainly is not of a cogency

to establish its existence; we shall always be less in a capacity

to comprehend a spiritual cause, than one that is material; because

materiality is a known quality; spirituality is an occult, an unknown

quality; or rather it is a mode of speech of which we avail ourselves

to throw a veil over our own ignorance. We are repeatedly told that our

senses only bring us acquainted with the external of things; that our

limited ideas are not capable of conceiving immaterial beings: we agree

frankly to this position; but then our senses do not even shew us the

external of these immaterial substances, Which the theologians will

nevertheless attempt to define to us; upon which they unceasingly

dispute among themselves; upon which even until this day they are not

in perfect unison with each other. The great John Locke in his familiar

letters, says, "I greatly esteem all those who faithfully defend their

opinions; but there are so few persons who, according to the manner they

do defend them, appear fully convinced of the opinions they profess,

that I am tempted to believe there are more sceptics in the world than

are generally imagined."

Abady, one of the most strenuous supporters of immaterialism, says, "The

question is not what incorporeity is, but whether it be." To settle this

disputable point, it were necessary to have some data whereon to form

our judgment; but how assure ourselves of the existence of that, of

which we shall never be competent to have a knowledge? If we are not

told what this is; if some tangible evidence be not offered to the human

mind; how shall we feel ourselves capacitated to judge whether or not

its existence be even possible? How form an estimate of that picture

whose colours elude our sight, whose design we cannot perceive, whose

features have no means of becoming familiar to our mind, whose very

canvas refuses itself to our all research, of which the artist himself

can afford no other idea, no other description, but that it is, although

he himself can neither shew us how or where! We have seen the ruinous

foundations upon which men have hitherto erected this fanciful idea of

immateriality; we have examined the proofs which they have offered,

if proofs they can be called, in support of their hypothesis; we have

sifted the evidence they have been willing to have accredited, in

order to establish their position; we have pointed out the numberless

contradictions that result from their want of union on this subject,

from the irreconcileable qualities with which they clothe their

imaginary system. What conclusion, then, ought fairly, rationally,

consistently, to be drawn from the whole? Can we, or can we not admit

their argument to be conclusive, such as ought to be received by beings

who think themselves sane? Will it allow any other inference than that

it has no existence; that immateriality is a quality hitherto unproved;

the idea of which the mind of man has no means of compassing? Still they

will insist, "there are no contradictions between the qualities which

they attribute to these immaterial substances; but there is a difference

between the understanding of man and the nature of these substances."

This granted, are they nearer the point at which they labour? What

standard is it necessary man should possess, to enable him to judge

of these substances? Can they shew the test that will lead to an

acquaintance with them? Are not those who have thus given loose to their

imagination, who have given birth to this system, themselves men? Does

not the disproportion, of which they speak with such amazing confidence,

attach to themselves as well as to others? If it needs an infinite

mind to comprehend infinity--to form an idea of incorporeity--can the

theologian himself boast he is in a capacity to understand it? To what

purpose then is it they speak of these things to others? Why do they

attempt descriptions of that which they allow to be indescribable? Man,

who will never be an infinite being, will never be able to conceive

infinity; if, then, he has hitherto been incompetent to this perfection

of knowledge, can he reasonably flatter himself he will ever obtain it;

can he hope under any circumstances to conquer that which according to

the shewing of all is unconquerable?

Nevertheless it is pretended, that it is absolutely necessary to know

these substances: but how prove the necessity of having a knowledge of

that which is impossible to be known? We are then told that good sense

and reason are sufficient to convince us of its existence: this is

taking new ground, when the old has been found untenable: for we are

also told that reason is a treacherous guide; one that frequently leads

us astray; that in religious matters it ought not to prevail: at least

then they ought to shew us the precise time when we must resume this

reason. Shall we consult it again, when the question is, whether what

they relate is probable; whether the discordant qualities which they

unite are consistently combined; whether their own arguments have all

that solidity which they would themselves wish them to possess? But we

have strangely mistaken them if they are willing that we should recur to

it upon these points; they will instead, insist we ought blindly to

be directed by that which they vouchsafe to inform us; that the most

certain road to happiness is to submit in all things to that which they

have thought proper to decide on the nature of things, of which they

avow their own ignorance, when they assert them to be beyond the reach

of mortals. Thus it would appear that when we should consent to accredit

these mysteries, it would never arise of our own knowledge; seeing this

can no otherwise obtain but by the effect of demonstrable evidence;

it would never arise from any intimate conviction of our minds; but it

would be entirely on the word of the theologian himself, that we should

ground our faith; that we should yield our belief. If these things are

to the human species what colours are to the man born blind, they have

at least no existence with relation to ourselves. It will avail the

blind man nothing to tell him these colours have no less existence,

because he cannot see them. But what shall we say of that portrait whose

colours the blind man attempts to explain, whose features he is willing

we should receive upon his authority, whose proportions are to be taken

from his description, merely because we know he cannot behold them?

The Doctor, although unwilling to relinquish his subject, removes none

of the difficulty when he asks, "Are our five senses, by an absolute

necessity in the nature of the thing, all and the only possible ways of

perception? And is it impossible and contradictory there should be any

being in the universe, indued with ways of perception different from

these that are the result of our present composition? Or are these

things, on the contrary, purely arbitrary; and the same power that gave

us these, may have given others to other beings, and might, if he

had pleased have given to us others in this present state?" It seems

perfectly unnecessary to the true point of the argument to reason upon

what can or cannot be done: I therefore reply, that the fact is, we have

but five senses: by the aid of these man is not competent to form any

idea whatever of immateriality; but he is also in as absolute a state of

ignorance, upon what might be his capabilities of conception, if he had

more senses. It is rather acknowledging a weakness in his evidence,

on the part of the Doctor, to be thus obliged to rest it upon the

supposition of what might be the case, if man was a being different to

what he is; in other words, that they would be convincing to mankind

if the human race were not human beings. Therefore to demand what the

Divinity could have done in such a case, is to suppose the thing

in question, seeing we cannot form an idea how far the power of

the Divinity extends: but we may be reasonably allowed to use the

theological argument in elucidation; these men very gravely insist,

upon what authority must be best known to themselves, "that God cannot

communicate to his works that perfection which he himself possesses;"

at the same moment they do not fail to announce his omnipotence. Will

it require any capacity, more than is the common lot of a child, to

comprehend the absurd contradiction of the two assertions? As beings

possessing but five senses, we must then, of necessity, regulate our

judgment by the information they are capable of affording us: we cannot,

by any possibility, have a knowledge of those, which confer the capacity

to comprehend beings, of an order entirely distinguished from that

in which we occupy a place. We are ignorant of the mode in which even

plants vegetate, how then be acquainted with that which has no affinity

with ourselves? A man born blind, has only the use of four senses; he

has not the right, however, of assuming it as a fact, there does not

exist an extra sense for others; but he may very reasonably, and with

great truth aver, that he has no idea of the effects which would be

produced in him, by the sense which he lacks: notwithstanding, if this

blind man was surrounded by other men, whose birth had also left

them devoid or sight, might he not without any very unwarrantable

presumption, be authorized to inquire of them by what right, upon what

authority, they spoke to him of a sense they did not themselves

possess; how they were enabled to reason, to detail the minutiae of that

sensation upon which their own peculiar experience taught them nothing?

In short, we can again reply to Dr. Clarke, and to the theologians, that

following up their own systems, the supposition is impossible, and ought

not to be made, seeing that the Divinity, who according to their own

shewing, made man, was not willing that he should have more than five

senses; in other words, that he should be nothing but what he actually

is; they all found the existence of these immaterial substances upon

the necessity of a power that has the faculty to give a commencement to

motion. But if matter has always existed, of which there does not seem

to exist a doubt, it has always had motion, which is as essential to it

as its extent, and flows from its primitive properties. Indeed the human

mind, with its five senses, is not more competent to comprehend matter

devoid of motion, than it is to understand the peculiar quality of

immateriality: motion therefore exists only in and by matter; mobility

is a consequence of its existence; not that the great whole can occupy

other parts of space than it actually does; the impossibility of

that needs no argument, but all its parts can change their respective

situations--do continually change them; it is from thence results the

preservation, the life of nature, which is always as a whole immutable:

but in supposing, as is done every day, that matter is inert, that is to

say, incapable of producing any thing by itself, without the assistance

of a moving power, which sets it in motion, are we by any means enabled

to conceive that material nature receives this activity from an agent,

who partakes in nothing of material substance? Can man really figure to

himself, even in idea, that that which has no one property of matter,

can create matter, draw it from its own peculiar source, arrange

it, penetrate it, give it play, guide its course? Is it not, on the

contrary, more rational to the mind, more consistent with truth, more

congenial to experience, to suppose that the being who made matter is

himself material: is there the smallest necessity to suppose otherwise?

Can it make man either better or worse, that he should consider the

whole that exists as material? Will it in any manner make him a worse

subject to his sovereign; a worse father to his children; a more unkind

husband; a more faithless friend?

Motion, then, is co-eternal with matter: from all eternity the particles

of the universe have acted and reacted upon each other, by virtue

of their respective energies; of their peculiar essences; of their

primitive elements; of their various combinations. These particles must

have combined in consequence of their affinity; they must have been

either attracted or repelled by their respective relations with each

other; in virtue of these various essences, they must have gravitated

one upon the other; united when they were analagous; separated when that

analogy was dissolved, by the approach of heterogeneous matter; they

must have received their forms, undergone a change of figure, by the

continual collision of bodies. In a material world the acting powers

must be material: in a whole every part of which is essentially in

motion, there is no occasion for a power distinguished from itself;

the whole must be in perpetual motion by its own peculiar energy. The

general motion, as we have elsewhere proved, has its birth from the

individual motion, which beings ever active must uninterruptedly

communicate to each other. Thus every cause produces its effect; this

effect in its turn becomes a cause, which in like manner produces an

effect; this constitutes the eternal chain of things, which although

perpetually changing in its detail, suffers no change in its whole.

Theology, after all, has seldom done more than personify this eternal

series of motion; the principle of mobility inherent to matter: it has

clothed this principle with human qualities, by which it has rendered it

unintelligible: in applying these properties, they have taken no means

of understanding how far they were suitable or not: in their eagerness

to make them assimilate, they have extended them beyond their own

conception; they have heaped them together without any judgment;

and they have been surprised when these qualities, contradictory in

themselves, did not enable them satisfactorily to account for all the

phenomena they beheld; from thence they have wrangled; accused each

other of imbecility; yet infuriated themselves against whoever had the

temerity to question that which they did not themselves understand; in

short, they have acted like a man who should insist that all other men

should have precisely the same vision that he himself had dreamed.

Be this as it may, the greater portion of what either Dr. Clarke or

the theologians tell us, becomes, in some respects, sufficiently

intelligible as soon as applied to nature--to matter: it is eternal,

that is to say, it cannot have had a commencement, it never will have

an end; it is infinite, that is to say, we have no conception of its

limits. Nevertheless, human qualities, which must be always borrowed

from ourselves, and with others we have a very slender acquaintance,

cannot be well suitable to the entire of nature; seeing that these

qualities are in themselves modes of being, or modes which appertain

only to particular beings: not to the great whole which contains them.

Thus, to resume the answers which have been given to Dr. Clarke, we

shall say: _First_, we can conceive that matter has existed from all

eternity, seeing that we cannot conceive it to have been capable of

beginning. _Secondly_, that matter is independent, seeing there is

nothing exterior to itself; that it is immutable, seeing it cannot

change its nature, although it is unceasingly changing its form and its

combinations. _Thirdly_, that matter is self-existent, since not being

able to conceive it can be annihilated, we cannot possibly conceive

it can have commenced to exist. _Fourthly_, that we do not know the

essence, or the true nature of matter, although we have a knowledge of

some of its properties; of some of its qualities: according to the

mode in which they act upon us. _Fifthly_, that matter not having had a

beginning, will never have an end, although its numerous combinations,

its various forms, have necessarily a commencement and a period.

_Sixthly_, that if all that exists, or every thing our mind can conceive

is matter, this matter is infinite; that is to say, cannot be limited by

any thing; that it is omnipresent, seeing there is no place exterior

to itself, indeed, if there was a place exterior to it, that would be a

vacuum. _Seventhly_, that nature is unique, although its elements or

its parts may be varied to infinity, indued with properties extremely

opposite; with qualities essentially different. _Eighthly_, that matter,

arranged, modified, and combined in a certain mode, produces in some

beings what we call intelligence, which is one of its modes of being,

not one of its essential properties, _Ninthly_, that matter is not a

free agent, since it cannot act otherwise than it does, in virtue of the

laws of its nature, or of its existence; that consequently, heavy bodies

must necessarily fall; light bodies by the same necessity rise; fire

must burn; man must experience good and evil, according to the quality

of the beings whose action he experiences. _Tenthly_, that the power

or the energy of matter, has no other bounds than those which are

prescribed by its own existence. _Eleventhly_, that wisdom, justice,

goodness, &c. are qualities peculiar to matter combined and modified,

as it is found in some beings of the human species; that the idea of

perfection is an abstract, negative, metaphysical idea, or mode of

considering objects, which supposes nothing real to be exterior to

itself. _Twelfthly_, that matter is the principle of motion, which it

contains within itself: since matter alone is capable of either giving

or receiving motion: this is what cannot be conceived of immateriality

or simple beings destitute of parts, devoid of extent, without mass,

having no ponderosity, which consequently cannot either move itself or

other bodies.