and there behold the several orbs moving on in an uninterrupted order the swiftness of their motion and withall the greatness of their bodies that the earth about which poor mortals contend so much and to get a little part and share of which they cannot possess long venture their quiet and their lives and oftentimes their very souls is but a point in respect of them the vast distance between us and the heavens the glorious and inexhaustible brightness of the sun and the stars and the kind influences of them upon all things here below and the like and we cannot but be filled with the admiration of God who made them The heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament sheweth his handy work Let us reflect upon the situation of the earth how it is hung upon nothing in the middle of the heavens having no foundation to rest upon but a magnetical vigour imprinted by the hand of God whereby the parts of it are so firmly united all of them tending toward the center by an innate principle of gravity that if it were possible for it according to the phansy of Archimedes to be moved out of its place by any engine it would return speedily to it again the virtue and fruitfulness of it in producing those various sorts of plants flowers and trees with those several minerals and metals and other fossils which lye hid in the bowels of it the great variety of living creatures which serve for the ornament and beauty of the creation and above all let us contemplate man the curious make and frame of his body and the uses of each part but chiefly the faculties of his mind whereby he is able to govern himself and the other creatures subject to him and even make use of those things which he cannot alter and change and derive a benefit from them to himself Now the conclusions naturally arising hence are 1. That the builder and maker of all is God because this frame and constitution of the world is above all created strength and power and things could not make themselves but owe their being and original to his divine will and to his infinite power and wisdom and 2. That he who made the heavens and the earth and all things therein who has hung up those lights in the sky which flame so brightly who has imprinted such a swift and unwearied motion in the stars who has filled that vast distance of space between us and them with so subtil and perspicuous a body who has cast the earth into such a figure that every part of it might enjoy the influences of the heavens with the greater advantage and as it were interchangeably and by turns who has caused those deep channels for the waters upon which Ships may pass from one extreme part of the world to the other and keep up and maintain a commerce with all mankind and the like He can do much more his power is not confined to any one effect if he does but once will the same presently a new world shall start up out of nothing For what shall hinder it being equally easie to an infinite and inexhaustible power to make more as one Who questions an Artists power who has brought some curious piece to perfection whether a statue or a picture or a watch or a medal but that supposing the same conveniences he can make more according to the first model and vary and alter it according to the several workings and movings of his phansie and if this be so easily conceivable and withal so agreeable to reason who can doubt of those lesser things which have been brought to pass in the several ages of the world such as are the alterations of the course of nature for a time as the standing still of the sun and moon that disorder in the heavens which this interruption might cause being soon after removed and the former regular motion restored the dividing of the red sea into two parts the waters of it rising up and standing on an heap the wonders of Aegypt and all those stupendious miracles wrought by our blessed Saviour and his Apostles for if we consider things thoroughly as great things are done every day but the commonness of them takes away the wonder and makes us slight and neglect them Let us embrace either of the two Hypotheses it matters not One would judge it more incredible that so great a body as the sun or earth should move at all than that the motion of the one or other should be interrupted and stopt for some hours but that our senses and the interchanges and vicissitudes of day and night and the several seasons of the year assure us of it and it is as great if not a greater wonder that the tides should be so regular and periodical according to the course of the moon and that this flux and reflux should be made twice almost in five and twenty hours than that the waters in a small gulph as is the Arabian should rise and swell as it were into a mountain and leave part of the channel dry and bare and to be passed over on foot They will say that these admirable effects are according to nature a word used by these men who are afraid to own a Deity to very ill purposes But what do they mean by nature Do they mean a principle of things void of life and understanding but can the stately and curious and regular frame of things flow from such a principle Can that which has no sense or understanding or life or skill be the author of such beings which are endowed with all How comes it to confer that upon others which it has not in it self If they say that they mean by nature that order of things which was fixt and established by God the supreme cause in the beginning by which the world is ordinarily governed why then will they deny the God of nature to be able to alter it when it shall make for his glory A serious reflexion upon the ordinary works of nature will quickly silence all those doubts and scruples which have been raised by a company of ignorant illiterate and debauched Atheists and Deists against the belief of the miracles recorded in the Scriptures and confirmed by unquestionable evidence of thousands who have seen them done and were actually present at the doing of them upon this foolish pretence because they seem to contradict the present state of things as if that could not be altered changed and exceeded which is nothing less than to limit and tye up as it were the hands of an almighty Agent Thus nature and reason fully and unconstrainedly give in their suffrages to the truth of this article and certainly tho' some shallow wits may acquiesce in second causes and think that they have attained their end if they can find out some of the nighest and most immediate and relying very vainly and presumptuously upon the supposed strength of the
reason ought to be demanded of his divine will and pleasure and of his actions ad extra as the School-phrase is For want of this consideration also others there are and the Platonists especially who under a pretense of advancing the divine goodness do really and in effect destroy it whilst they make the emanations of it physical and necessary which are most arbitrary and free and the pure results of his will The powers of moral Agents are at their own disposal to use when and how they please and by this they are discriminated from natural who act according to their utmost strength and vigour unless their activity be hindred by a miracle and from brutes birds and other animals who are devoy'd of reason and follow their innate instincts motions and appetites Where there is a principle of knowledge and liberty in the mind to guide and direct it as in men who have thereby a power over themselves and their actions it is far otherwise and it is not necessary that they do all which they can do Nor is this power therefore to be accounted idle and to no purpose because they can make use of it whensoever it shall make for their interest and advantage or whensoever their reason or even their phansie shall judge it fit and proper to reduce it into act Much more is this to be allowed to God whose other attributes are as infinite as his power Psalm cxv 3. Our God is in the heavens he hath done whatsoever he pleased Psalm cxxxv 6. Whatsoever the Lord pleased that did he in heaven and in earth in the seas and in all deep places And if his wisdom had thought fit and if he had once willed the same instead of creating one world he might have created a thousand However the object of the divine power in its fullest latitude and comprehension abstractedly considered is whatsoever is absolutely and simply possible By which terms we are to exclude b 1. Whatever is contrary to the nature and essential perfections of the Godhead Thus it is impossible for God to lye 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ebr. vi 18 to which passage as to many others in that Epistle S. Clement alludes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because he is a God of infinite veracity God cannot deny himself 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2 Tim. ii 13. God cannot but make good his word whether we will believe or no if we are resolved to be Infidels and Scepticks in the midst of so much conviction which Christianity affords concerning the truth of its mysteries and doctrine and the truth of its promises if we throw in our scruples and doubts and distrust his word we shall one day be convinced and ashamed of such irrational infidelity his word shall infallibly be effected veracity being as essential to God as necessary existence and if God cannot but be he cannot be otherwise than just and true If we believe not yet he abideth faithful he cannot deny himself And for the same reason we remove from God whatsoever savours of imperfection as being repugnant to the idea which we have of him who is a being infinitely and absolutely perfect And in strictness of speech if such things could be done he would not be omnipotent because they are arguments and demonstrations of weakness For what is a lye but a plain confession of guilt and of fear that we dare not tell and own the truth when we are demanded it Unfaithfulness is a breach of that moral honesty and integrity which humane nature and the civil laws and rules of government require between man and man God is alsufficient and therefore cannot stand in need of the assistence of his creatures whereas we want because we have not an absolute and full power and command over things and cannot dispose of them as and when we will to supply our selves Our being deceived proceeds from our ignorance but God cannot be deceived because he is omniscient and knows the secret thoughts and intentions of the heart and all things are naked and open before him there being an utter impossibility of error in the divine understanding Our sickness flows from ilness of temper natural decays of animal and vital spirits and tainted and vitiated bloud and other humors and death is the punishment of sin and the effect and consequence of a frail and brittle constitution the curious machine of the body being quite worn out by age at last falling into pieces tho' otherwise never so carefully preserved from the disorders of intemperance or the mischiefs of chance or the assaults of violence All which imperfections the very notion of a God does wholly exclude and remove 2. By this we are to exclude whatever implies a contradiction or a repugnancy in its nature as that the same thing should be and not be at the same time and in the same manner and respect and that things which have been should now be made not to have been Things might not have been before they were but when once they have been they cannot but be which onely is a necessity by way of supposition Whatever then is repugnant to the nature and essence of a thing is therefore impossible because otherwise the thing would be the same and not the same the essence would remain entire and yet be destroyed at the same time which is a clear and manifest contradiction Power therefore in the essential notion of it is no way extensible either to the doing or reconciling real and perfect contradictions because the opposite terms destroy each other and consequently there is an utter impossibility of their subsisting together and if we examine the contradiction thoroughly we shall find that there is always in one of the terms a plain and manifest denial of being Thus to imagine that the humane nature of our B. Saviour by reason of its union with the word should become in a manner immense and fill all places because the Godhead does what is it but to confound essential properties of things which are altogether irreconcileable or to assert that a body continuing one and the same should yet be multiplied into several entire wholes that the entire body of Christ should be in the least crum of a wafer and the several parts of it be distinct and retain the same figure and order and be extended at their full length as they lye unconfused as it were in an indivisible point be in heaven and upon earth at the same time be upon a thousand altars together in the most distant parts of the world without any discontinuity and be brought thither by the pronunciation of five words not to urge the ugly and horrid consequences which flow from the admittance of such a grosly absurd opinion what is it but to impose under the pretense of an infallible authority upon the faith understanding and reason of all mankind and peremptorily lay down contradictory and self-destroying notions as necessary terms and conditions of Catholick
from those mountains which they had laid one upon another to scale heaven with to feel the revenging effects of that power which before they had so much slighted Here below power may be either balanced and resisted with success or else it may be undermined or baffled by wit and policy and stratagems of war and great armies have sometimes been routed and vanquished by inconsiderable numbers and have met with shameful defeats and overthrows But the divine power is irresistible there is no withstanding it the whole creation must needs tremble and sink at the presence of God and this the proud Assyrian King was forced to confess when he was recovered from his phrensie Dan. iv 35. That the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing and that God doth according to his will in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth and none can stay his hand and say unto him what dost thou So that we see that the credibility of this article is founded not onely upon Scripture and revelation but upon nature and right reason which I shall more fully prove by making good II. The second general head that the attribute of infinite power is essentially involved in the notion and idea of God Power in it self is an excellence and perfection and things are more or less valued according to the greater or lesser degrees which they have of it I do not mean that force and energy onely such as is found in inanimate beings arising from the several dispositions of matter whereby they are apt to make those great alterations that are in the world because their operations are necessary but withal limited to a few particular effects nor such a power as is in brute creatures arising from the strength and quantity of animal spirits from the temper of bloud and from the make and constitution of their bodies but such a power as is directed by reason and is arbitrary and free and may be used or not used according as upon debate and deliberation shall be judged most convenient such a power as extends it self to various objects and effectually brings to pass what is designed in the mind and contrived in the brain a power whereby a man has a full command over things and can subject them to his will and disposal and make use of so as to advance himself and get the mastery over others and make himself be dreaded every where Yet however such a one who has attained a despotick power whether rightfully by succession or by force of arms and cruelty or by the arts whether of lawful or wicked policy may please himself with the success of his councils and stratagems and dextrous management of affairs both in peace and war and phansie great matters of himself and swell with the thoughts of his acquired greatness he is not able to withstand the least sickness this can soon mortifie him and bring him upon his knees and make him sensible of his weakness and the folly of his pride When God does but arm the most despicable creatures against him and gives them a commission to assault and invade him the least infliction baffles and routs his hopes and confidences gives him a fair prospect of himself and of his defects and shews him what a miserable creature man is at the best who cannot secure himself of health of happiness of life for one moment By this he is made to see and acknowledge that there is something above him to whom he is accountable that orders and disposes of all things at his pleasure that all that power which is distributed among so many creatures in such a strange variety and subordination is derived from some supreme being in whom it is united and infinitely much more and if that he withdraw his influence or blows upon any counsel it comes to nothing and the designs of these mighty men who have got the empire of the world into their hands are soon at an end together with their lives and they faint away and drop into their graves and all their thoughts perish because all the power they have is but the communication of his will an emanation of his providence and an imperfect shadow of that power by which he governs the world all second causes being influenced by him and acting onely by virtue of what they have received For it is the plain and unconstrained collection of reason that nothing has of it self a power to act whereby it contributes to make up the harmony of the world that their essences and the operations flowing from them are both limited and are easily dissolvible by that power which first made them and that they have a dependence upon a being which is infinite and almighty and independent What a blot and stain would it be to that fair idea of a God to imagine that any thing possible could be above his power or too hard for his omnipotence what were this but to cloath him with the infirmities of a man to level him with his creatures and to take off that essential and necessary distinction between them This power then must be infinite for what can limit or restrain it who can put a force upon him or stop his procedures when there is nothing equal and co-ordinate can man whose breath is in his nostrils who a few years since had no being and that which he has he owes wholly to another born an infant into the world made to his hands he as soon as he comes to years and can use his reason and discern things quickly perceives his weaknesses and wants and cannot help himself Can the united strength of other creatures They act onely as they are directed all that they have is plainly borrowed and at the disposal of him who made them They may be traced to their originals and are perishable in their natures it is the power of God which as at first gave still continues to them their being Now to demand why is there then no infinite effect of an infinite power is to forget that this implies a contradiction infinity being an incommunicable attribute and onely peculiar to God and therefore the distance will ever remain infinite between the opposite terms of such a relation as that of the Creator to the creature But God has given sufficient displays of his power and the effects of it are so various and innumerable that they are convincing and demonstrative arguments of its being infinite and that no power less than such could ever have produced them The invisible things of God from the creation of the world are clearly seen being understood by the things that are made even his eternal power and Godhead i Rom. 20. We judge of worldly productive power by vast piles of building but what is a Pyramid or an Aquaeduct or a Colossus or an Amphitheater to the orderly and glorious frame of things how pitiful and mean in comparison of the heavens Let us cast up our eyes thither