the one active the other passive the one working the other wrought the one conceiving the other expressing what it conceives the one may be termed not unfitly Ratio ratiocinans Reason reasoning the other Ratio ratiocinata Reason reasoned Thus the Idea of some curious and sumptuous building framed in the minde of a skilful Architect is Reason reasoning that is contriving working acting ordering digesting the prefect proportion of that building within it self But the building it self accomplished according to the Idea will be Ratio ratiocinata Reason reasoned that is wrought expressed formed and framed according to the thoughts of that Idea Thus a learned person composes a Treatise both according to be sense and words by his inward thoughts which are Reason reasoning and after couches it in writing which is Reason reasoned and though whosoever contemplates with a considerate eye the strength and art of reason comprised in such expressions yet he plainly discovers that neither the parts of the Building nor the words of the Treatise had it from themselves but from a working and active reason expressing it self in them and though those parts and words so long as they remain conform to that reason which framed them cannot swerve from reason nor fall into disorder or non-sense yet they contain nothing in their actual beings which essentially repugns against the disordering and depraving them but would retein them no less being dissipated and disordered then they did before And if the reason from whence they issued were so vigorous and active that it constituted them in so firm a consistency of that posture and order which it imprinted upon them that no natural cause should have power to deface or sully it yet even that immobility would disclose it self to a piercing eye no more to proceed from it then it proceeded from it self And though such a constant beauty and decorum could not be interessed by the force of nature or disturbed in its course yet that touches not the essential but the natural or well-being of it not that it would lose its being were it put in some disorder but that nothing in nature is impowered to disorder it Thus though the cariere of the Sun and Heavens finde no obstancle or remora in nature yet were they curbed in their full speed they would not in a moment fall to nothing By this distinction thus illustrated whereon I will more insist hereafter it is evidenced that the light of reason is onely essentially opposed to all inconveniences and deordinations and that whensoever that which is not illustrated with this active light preferves it self from any of them it proceeds not originally or essentially from it but from that participation of passive reason which the active hath infused into it Seeing therefore that all the beauty and decorum of irrational beings is onely a copy drawn by the alive hand of Reason the ninth Proposition remains evident That nothing can be an actual being essentially and of it self which is not indued with the light of Reason Hence therefore followes first the implicancy of that old deceased buried rotten and consumed Error now lately raked out of the ashes of Heathenish Ignorance and Poetical Fictions That there is an universal Matter infinite in extent and eternall in durance without beginning or ending whose being is essentially actual and of it self incapable of being produced or destroyed by any cause whatsoever For seeing this supposed matter is not indued essentially with the actual light of reason nay is so far from it that it is in the least capacity of all other things to preserve it self from disorders as being nothing but a compact of disorders a chaos of confusion and a being so rude and deformed that were not there some intelligent cause to order and digest it into some form and fashion it would remain the most absurd of all beings and the very next to nothing having as they coin it all things in power or possibility and yet being nothing of any thing which it hath In a word it is no better when these new inventors have made the best of it then all things in disorder it is the Mirror of misule the Embrio of beings the World in a lump Heaven and Earth in morter and the first edition of Absurdities written in the large volumes of infinty For whether they make it consist of Atomes as the Ancients did or of different Spirits as others lately have conceited it is nothing but infinite confused mixtures both of the one and the other till brought into some fixed posture and proportion some determinate being is drawn out of it Is it then possible to conceive that such anear alliance to nothing as this Matter is should arrive to that infinite height of perfection to be essentially and actual being of and from it self Were it of it self it must be essentially and absoluterly necessary as is proved but what absolute necessity is there of absurdities and disorders Were it wholly necessary it could admit of no change or alteration for whatsoever is essentially necessary is and must be always what ever it was but this supposed Matter is and ever was and will be subject to infinite alterations putting on perpetually new forms postures proportions mixtures distances approximations places figures correspondences conjunctions separations unities divisions continuations contiguities and a thousand more so that it is constant in nothing but inconstancy were it an actual being essentially it must be a rule of rectitude to it self and so be essential rectitude excluding all disorders when this Matter has disorder coeternal with it and coessential to it How came it alone of it self to give being to it self when of it self alone it can give a determinate being to nothing else but onely suffer other active and efficient causes to make out of it determinate beings Let therefore the authors of this most pernicious and Antichristian novelty either prove that this infinite eternal and uncreated matter had from all eternity a most perfect actual light and use of understanding to rectifie it self according to the perfect rule of reason or confess that it must essentially depend in the actuality of its being of some cause indued with such a light or all the world will see that they speak against reason and deceive themselves and others by a vain and sensless fiction Hence also it followes evidently against Arislotle that the whole Moles or fabrick of this visible World could not be of it self or essentially an actual being without any cause for neither the Earth whereof all inferior visible things are naturally composed nor the other Elements nor the spacious body of the Heavens nor that glory of the Sun not that beauty of the Moon nor that lustre of the Stars nor that admirable composition and proportion of the bodies of Men and Beasts seeing they are so far from possessing the light of Reason that have neither sense nor life nor Plants and Trees though they have some degree of
press as little to instance in the imaginary moments of precedent time begore any thing was produced by a cause which were infinite à parte ante and yet came to an end à parte post when things were first caused For I answer that those moments were pure nothings and mere fictious or false conceipts of our understanding for time is nothing but either the measure of mutable things or rather the mutability or mutation it self as I shall declare hereafter when therefore it is supposed that no mutable thing is in actual being it is impossible to conceive truly that there is any time for those fained moments are nothing else then that improducible and immutable cause which hath power to produce something actual and mutable which should have bin before all other things which he hath caused as the imaginary moments possible to be hereafter are nothing save the same cause either alone or with other causes which can produce mutable effects after all those which shall have been actually produced by reason therefore that this power of the first cause is without beginning or ending as being wholly immutable and so not measurable by time we conceipt that time possible in precedency and of futurition is composed of successive moments Thus therefore having passed through these occurring difficulties I return to my former Argument and press it thus All the effects which now are in actual being even according to the adverse opinion have necessary dependance mediate or immediate of all the causes which have preceded them in the line of their causation therefore it is a truth and a proper expression to say that all those causes have concurred mediately or immediately to these present effects but it is impossible that all those precedent causes should be produced by a cause for then they would be all and not all as I have already proved therefore amongst the causes which in the line of causation have concurred immediately or mediately to these present effects there must be at least some one which is a producing onely and not a produced cause which is my fifth Proposition Hitherto I have only labor'd to evince that such beings as are subject to continual generation and corruption and which by a line of Succession follow one another in production and desition must have had some improducible cause some difficulty may yet remain in these greater and more solid parts of this Universe as the Earth Water Air Heaven Sun Moon Stars c. for these still remaining so far as we can judge by our experience in that main substantial being which they ever had may occasion a difficulty how they came to be Forasmuch therefore as touches this present propostion either it must be said that they are of themselves and never had any producing cause and then my present proposition is in part afferted that amongst all actual beings there must be improducible causes or that they were produced by causes successive one to another and all caused which I have already confuted or that they are causes one above another and one producing another without end and all actually and eternally existent which I have à fortiori evinced to be false by my former Argument against infinite successive causes for it would be both an actu infinitum and as hard to understand or believe as a first improducible cause and it would destroy it self by being as impossible as that of succeeding causes c. Neither will the instance of infinite divisible parts less and less without end in continuo make a parity with infinitum actu For first that opinion is not certain and secondly if it be true I answer that parts whilst they are in continuo are onely potential and not actual parts no nor entia actu for nothing is an actual being but the totum it self and when that is divided of one totum or whole thing there is made two and if each of them be divided they become two less totums and so without end by each division a new totum will begin to be which was onely in potentia before for so long as they are in continuo they are the continuum without any beginning ending term or determination save onely the terms of the whole continuum so that it is impossible to say the part a is of this determinate length bredth or profundity so long as it remains in continuo for it hath nothing to terminate it till it come to the utmost superficies or point of the continuum And seeing every actual being must be determinate and no indeterminate thing can be ens actu there will be nothing actual in continuo save the totum it self or the continuum because that onely is ens determinatum having its fixed and determinate limits so that in every continuo there is onely one actual thing containing in potentia many things which by actual division may become acta less continuums then that is wherein they are contained and so every continuum contained in potentia in a greater will be less then its continent when it becomes a continuum by a new division and this without end there being then no actual determination of different parts in continuo there can be no actual distinction of them and if no distinction no actual number and if no actual number there can be no actual infinity or infinitum actu Thus I have proved my fifth Proposition and have been something prolix in it because it contains the mainest difficulty of the whole deduction Against the three last precedent propositions may be objected that there appears no contradiction in constituting the essence of something not absolutely and alwayes necessary but yet having a necessary and essential connection with such a determinate term of time v. g. that it have an essence requiring necessarily to begin its actual being in the determinate instant A and to continue till the determinate instant G and the same is of so many determinate hours dayes moneths years c. and this without any cause at all but of its particular essence or of it self whence will follow that one thing may begin to be actually in such a term of time and then cease to be and after many revolutions of time another thing may begin and desist from being in another discontinued portion of time c. So that a time may be given wherein there was nothing at all nor shall be any thing though there be something now in actual being I answer that such an essence as this implies a manifest contradiction in our present supposition of no being at all for supposing once that there be nothing at all it cannot be supposed that there are any determinate instants or parts of time to which that being can have any necessary and essential relation for those instants or parts must be something and so this objection suppose nothing at all to be and yet something to be which is a clear contradiction And hence also follows
ergo The Minor is evident by the Reasonableness Order Beauty Perfection Connection and Symmetry which are found in those things which we experience to be The Major I prove for nothing can give that which it hath not it self therefore if that which gives that is produces all things be absurd and contrary to reason it cannot give that is produce any thing which is perfect and according to reason For if that which is contrary to reason could work according to reason and whatsoever gives or produces any thing which is according to reason must work according to reason then that which is contrary to reason will be according to reason for whatsoever works according to reason must participate of reason and so be according to reason Again whatsoever is there must be some reason why it is But there can be no reason why any thing which is contrary to reason should be ergo The Minor is evident for if there were reason for it it could not be contrary to reason unless you make the same thing to be according to reason and contrary to reason I prove the Major for if any thing could be without any reason why it is then any one may put what he pleaseth to be or not to be without any reason and so all humane discourse will be frustrated which gives reasons for what it affirms and deduceth all things from reason But of this more hereafter The eighth Proposition No Actual Being which is oboxious to Deordinations and Absurdities can be essentially necessary or of it self Proof SEeing no absurdity can be essentially necessary as is proved nothing which can be subject to any absurdity can be essentially necessary for whatsoever actual being is essentially necessary must alwayes be necessary but that which is subject to such deviations may at some time not be necessary for it may happen that it falls into some of those absurdities to which it is obnoxious and then it becomes abfurd and inordinate but nothing which is absurd can be essentially necessary seeing therefore every actual being essentially necessary excludes all absurdities nothing which can be absurd can be an actual being essentially necessary The ninth Proposition Nothing can be an actual being essentially and of it self which is not indued with the light of Reason Proof WHatsoever is an actual being essentially must essentially exclude all disorders and abfurdities as is proved in the two former Propositions but nothing save that which is indued with the light of reason can essentially exclude all disorders and absurdities ergo I prove the Minor whatsoever excludes essentially all disorders and absurdities must have something essentially repugnant to all disorders and absurdities this is evident But nothing is essentially repugnant to all disorders and absurdities save the light of reason Therefore what soever hath not the light of reason excludes not essentially all disorders and absurdities I prove the Minor Therefore onely is any thing disordered and absurd because it is contrary or difform to the light of reason is essentially repugnant to all disorders and absurdities The antecedent is evident for why is any thing disordered or absurd then because it is otherwise then reason dictates it should be I prove the consequence for if disorder be nothing save a repugnancy to the light of reason then nothing but the light of reason is essentially repugnant to all disorders I will give force and light to this Argument by propounding it in another manner thus Whatsoever is not capable of it self to govern and direct it self perfectly according to the rule of reason cannot of it self preserve it self from all inconverniences disorders and absurdities this is evident But whatsoever hath not the light of reason cannot of it self govern it self perfectly according to the rule of reason ergo The Minor is clear for who can possibly conceive that that which hath no knowledge nor understanding of it self which neither knows whether it be good or bad right or wrong well or ill orderly or disorderly according or contrary to reason nay nor whether there be any such thing as reason or no should be capable to govern perfectly it self of it self according to the rule of reason Thus were the Sun constituted so far from the Earth that it could neither heat not enlighten it or so near that it blinded all who saw it and burnt up all before it or that the Earth were removed so far off or near to the Sun that the same inconveniences and disorders followed if neither any Tree ever bore fruit not any sensible Creature exercised any faculty of his senses if all bodies were weak feeble diseased and deformed if all things were put out of order place time number weight measure proportion beauty fill'd with nothing but horrid disorders defects deformities disproportions absurdities fooleries which certainly if we respect onely the course of Nature are main transgressions against the rule of Reason foul blots upon the beauty of creatures and prodigious monsters in the progress of natural causes yet what soever had not the light of reason could neither prevent them nor resent them nor redress them of and by it self or by any thing included essentially in the actuality of its being but every thing would actually exist as before if some external cause did not destroy them which could not be if they were essentially actual beings as is already proved It will be said this Argument proves too much and so in effect proves just nothing for it concludes not onely that actual beings devoid of the light of reason cannot free themselves from all disorders and defects but that they can free themselves from none at all for if the light of reason be onely that which is essentially repugnant to disorders they will have nothing essentially repugnant to any disorder whatsoever and so will be exposed to all and unable to preserve themselves from any one Which notwithstanding appears manifestly false to all who cast an eye upon the constant Symmetry Splendor and Proportion of this Universe and the specious progress of natural causes and effects which though wholly empty of the light of reason digest all things conformably to the rule of reason I answer that the Argument contends not that actual beings not inriched with the use of reason cannot conform themselves to the prescript of reason in many things but that they cannot effect it of themselves in all things as not retaining any thing essentially repugnant to all inconveniences which may be cast upon them in the actuality of their beings for if they had any such perfection they could not possibly be obnoxious to the least disorder that conformity therefore which they have to reason and the resistance to many accidents of disorder thwarting the laws of reason they injoy not from themselves but from reason and that onely so far as they flow from reason and are certain particles and participations of reason That this may be understood I divide reason into two branches