Do but behold the Heavens Let your thoughts out into the vastness of their Extension consider the swiftness of their course view them by night when they sparkle and are all bespangl'd with Stars or by day when they are all bright and resplendent from the Sun and you will easily discern the wonderful and Divine skill of the Supream Governour in the ordering and poizing of all these Again consider how the Sun by his course through the Zodiack measures out the Year and distinguishes its Seasons as the Moon does the Months by her increase and decrease What shall I say of this continual vicissitude of Light and Darkness which affords us the agreeable and necessary enterchange of Labour and Rest But I must leave the further discourse of the Stars to the Astrologers whose proper business it is to inquire into their Virtues and influences and who teach us which of them rule the Winds and inform the wary Mariner in the Art of Navigation and which of them determine the time for Plowing and Reaping and are the perpetual Almanack of the laborious Husbandman From all which it is undeniably evident that these Wonders could never have been created fram'd and dispos'd in that excellent Order without the perfect Wisdom of the Supream Artist seeing we cannot so much as know or understand them without a great sagacity of mind and reason What shall we say of that exact Disposal of Time and Seasons wherein we do not know which we are to admire most their Constancy or their Variety How loudly do they proclaim their Divine Author and Wise Director The Spring is not more pleasant by its fair Days and Flowers than the heat of Summer is useful and advantagious to ripen the Fruits of the Earth and the liberal Plenty of Autumn is not more joyful than the wet and frost of Winter is needful Which Order might easily be disturbed if it were not dispensed by the steady Hand of Power and Wisdom Oh! the Wonders of Providence which has allay'd the nipping frosts of Winter and scorching heats of Summer with the intervening temperature of the Spring and Autumn and that with such exactness that the change of these extreams of heat and cold is so far from being intolerable that it is even easie and delightful giving us the pleasure of variety and yet sliding gently and insensibly from one extremity to another Cast your eye upon the Sea and to your amazement you shall see how the loose Banks of Sand give a check to its proud and raging Waves Consider the wonderful ebbings and flowings of the Ocean Behold the Springs whose waters flow continually View the Rivers which pursue their uninterrupted course without ceasing and ever returning to that vast Deep which is the Center of their Emanation Take a prospect of those vast Woods and Forrests which deck and grace the face of the Earth they are all fed from its bowels and yet the Earth is never the less What shall I say of that pleasant and useful disposal of the steepness of Mountains the risings of Hills the vast extension of Plains Or what shall I say of such numberless numbers of Creatures who are each of them severally furnish'd with their peculiar Weapons of defence some are armed with horns others fenced with teeth some strength'ned with hoofs others sharp'ned and edged with claws some appointed with stings and spurs others defended with a prickly and unaccessible skin whilst others again secure themselves by the lightness of their heels or swiftness of their wings Nature having bestow'd on every one of them either strength or cunning for their own defence But above all the perfection and beauty of the Shape of Man proclaims and owns GOD to have been the Artist that fram'd it His upright Stature his rais'd Countenance in the upper part whereof the eyes are posted as on a Watch-tower and where all the other Senses have their several Stations and Quarters allotted them as in a Castle or Citadel We should never have done in going about to treat in particular of all these Wonders There is not one part in Man which is not ornamental and graceful as well as necessary And what is yet more admirable is That the same Figure which is common to us all is diversified by such an infinite variety of Features in each of us that as there is a likeness in all so there is in every one something that makes him unlike to another Besides how wonderful is the manner of our Birth How strong and prevalent the desire of begetting our Like Upon whom can you father these Wonders but upon GOD alone who swells the breasts with milk against the time the Infant breaks his Prison and comes to breath the free and open Air suiting their nice tenderness with a proportionate delicate nourishment Nor do's this bountiful GOD content himself to take a general care of the Universe but provides also for each part of it What Great Britain wants of the heat of the Sun is made up by the warm Vapours which arise from the Sea that surrounds it The overflowing of the River Nilus serves Egypt instead of Rain Euphrates makes Mesopotamia fruitful and the River Indus is said both to sow and water those Eastern Parts If perchance you should come into a house and there find all the Rooms richly furnished beautified and adorned would you not without the least hesitancy conclude That there is some Lord and Owner of it who is far better than all this rich and glorious Furniture so likewise in this stately Palace of the World when you take a view of Heaven and Earth and that Providence Order and Law which dispenseth and directs all things in them doubt if you can that there is a Lord and Father of this great Family whose Glory far transcends that of the Sun Moon and Stars and who is more beautiful than the most lovely part of it But perhaps since there is no doubt whether there be a Providence or not you may think it a Question whether there be but one or many that have a hand in the administration of this Celestial Government it will not be a hard matter to fix this your incertainty if you will but attentively consider the Kingdoms of the Earth which are but so many Copies of the One Heavenly Original Empire When did ever a Monarch either admit of a Partner in his Soveraignty in full trust and confidence or lay him aside without blood I omit speaking of the Persians who refer'd the choice of their Prince to the neighing of an Horse and purposely pass-by that old Story of the Theban Brothers All the World knows what dissension there arose between two Twins which of them should be King over a Company of Shepherds and their poor Cottages The Wars of Caesar and Pompey have spread themselves over the whole World and the Fortune of so vast an Empire was not big enough to satisfie theambition of two so nearly ally'd as Father
Fables Xenophon the Disciple of Socrates holds That the shape of the true GOD cannot be seen and consequently is not to be searcht after Aristo of the Isle of Chios says That he is altogether incomprehensible Both which Philosophers had doubtless a right sense of the Divine Majesty in that they despair'd of ever fully understanding Him As for Plato he does more openly and clearly speak of GOD and does less mistake both as to the Name and the Thing it self and his Discourses might have been accounted altogether Heavenly but that they are here and there blemish'd and tainted with his Politicks In his Timaeus he calls GOD by his Own Name and declares Him to be the Father of this Universe the Creator of the Soul and the Architect of Heaven and Earth who by reason of his superlative and incomprehensible Power and Majesty is hard to be found and when found cannot possibly be express'd and declar'd Which are in a manner the very same things which we say for we also know GOD and own Him to be the Parent of the World but unless we be demanded we do not speak publickly of Him THUS I have rehears'd the Opinions of almost all the Philosophers whose glory it is that they have all pointed at One and the same GOD though under various Names insomuch as it would make a Man think either that our Christians now are Philosophers or that the ancient Philosophers were Christians Now if it be granted that Providence rules the World and is govern'd by the Will and Counsel of the One only GOD then ought not we to suffer our selves to be impos'd upon with the silly Fables of Antiquity which are both repugnant to Reason and condemn'd by the Philosophers of ancient Times Our Fathers indeed were so credulous as to believe things altogether monstrous and inconsistant as a Scylla with several Bodies a Chimaera with many shapes an Hydra that receiv'd a new life from his happy Wounds and Centaures which were Horse and Man united and growing together In short they very readily believ'd whatever any one was pleas'd to feign or fancy as Men's being metamorphos'd into Birds Beasts into Men and again Men into Flowers and Trees with so many other fabulous things which had they ever been would happen still but because they cannot be are hereby sufficiently demonstrated never to have been Their Opinions concerning the Gods were likewise full of inconsiderate credulity and ignorant simplicity for by giving Religious Worship to their Kings and desiring by Pictures and Statues to preseve their memory after their Death they at last made a Religious Ceremony of that which at first was only intended to comfort themselves for the loss of them For before the World was open'd by Commerce and Trade and that Nations had mixt their Customs and Ceremonies together every one of them ador'd their first Founder or Famous Leader or some Queen Chast and valiant above her Sex or an Inventor of some useful and necessary Art or Calling as considering that the Memory of such Renowned Persons well-deserved to be preserv'd by them since by this means they at once gave a reward to the Virtue of the Deceased and an example to Posterity Read the Writings of Wise-men and particularly of the Stoicks and you will acknowledge with me that Men have been worship'd as Gods either for their good Deeds or their Dignity Euhemerus gives us an exact account of their Birth Countries and Names as also the several Places where they were buryed particularly he instanceth in Jupiter call'd Dictaeus from the Mountain Dictae in Candia where he was nurs'd and Apollo nam'd Delphicus from the City Delphos in Phocis a Province of Greece and Isis who had the Sirname of Pharia from the Island Pharos in Egypt and Ceres who was styl'd Eleusina from the City Eleusis in Achaia where she was more particularly worship'd Prodicus tells us that they were reckon'd among the Gods who by rambling through the World were the first Inventors of Husbandry and by this means became useful to Mankind And Perseus discourseth much at the same rate adding that it was from this ground that the Names of the Inventors were bestow'd upon the things invented by them as appears by that Comical Expression Without Ceres and Bacchus Venus is a cold Which in other terms is no more than this That without good Meat and Drink Lust languisheth Alexander the Great in a famous Treatise which he writes to his Mother tells her That the dread of his Power had so far wrought upon a Priest as to make him discover to him this great Secret and Mystery that the Gods were but Men. In which Discourse he makes Vulcan the first of all the Gods and after him the Race of Jupiter Consider the Story of Isis and the scatter'd members and empty Tomb of thy Serapis or Osiris and lastly their Religious Rites and Mysteries and you 'l find them made up of the dismal Events Deaths Funerals Mourning and Wailings of these caitive Gods Isis in company of the Dog's-Head-Idol and her bald Priests mourns for laments and seeks her lost Son and her miserable Worshippers beat their breasts to express and imitate the sorrow of this unhappy Mother and soon after you see Isis by and by overjoy'd for having found her Little-One her Priests are merry and the Dog's snout triumphs for the feat he has done in finding him Thus they fail not punctually every year to lose what they have found and then to find again what they have lost Now I pray you what can be more ridiculous than to bewail that which we worship or to worship that which we bewail And yet such fopperies as these which formerly were the Religion of the Egyptians are now forsooth become the Devotions of the Romans Ceres with lighted torches in her hands and Serpents twisting about them seeks her Daughter Proserpina full of languishing care and trouble who having stray'd too far was stoln away and ravish'd by Pluto This is the sum and substance of the Eleusinian Mysteries And the Rites used in the Worship of Jupiter are no less ridiculous He is suckled by a She goat for want of a better Nurse and the poor Infant is stoln away from his Father for fear he should devour him the Corybantes in the mean while soundly plying their Cymbals to drown the cryes of the Bantling from coming to the ears of his more than inhumane Father I am asham'd to relate the Account they give of Cybele how she gelded Atys and made him an Eunuch-God because she could not tempt him to commit Adultery with her who was old and ugly having been the Mother of so many Gods And therefore answerably to this Story her Priests voluntarily geld themselves to the end they might be capable of that Dignity I leave you to judge whether these be not real miseries rather than Religious Mysteries Come we now to speak of the goodly form meen and accoutrements of your Gods than
which what can be more shameful and ridiculous Vulcan is a limping crazy God Apollo though he has liv'd so many Ages is still a beardless Boy whereas his Son Aesculapius has a fair and comely Beard Neptune's Eyes are blue Minerva's gray Juno has Ox-Eyes Pan's Feet are garnish'd with claws Saturn's are charg'd with fetters and Mercury's fledg'd with Wings Janus has two faces as if he would go backward and forward at once Diana the Huntress has her Garments tuck'd up to her thighs but She at Ephesus is in a manner made up all of paps As she is the Goddess of Hell they give her three Heads and good store of Arms and Hands Yea your Jupiter himself sometimes has a Beard of much gravity and at other times has a Chin as bare as my hand When he has the Sirname of Hammon he wears horns when that of Capitolinus he is arm'd with Thunder-bolts when that of Latiaris he is all besmear'd with blood and when that of Feretrius he is very still and quiet And not to go over the many several Jupiters there being as many Monsters of him as there are Names Erigone hangs her self and the Merit of Self-murther hath advanc'd her to shine a perpetual Virgin among the Stars Castor and Pollux dye and live by turns Aesculapius is struck down with a Thunderbolt that with the greater Ceremony he may rise up a God And Hercules must burn himself upon Mount Octa to get rid of his Humanity These are the fine Stories which we learn from our ignorant Fore-fathers and what is worse make them the subject of our Studies and a great piece of Learning In these the Poets excel all others and have by their Authority done vast prejudice to the Truth So that Plato was much in the right when he banish'd Homer that renown'd celebrated and crown'd Poet out of his Common-wealth For it is he chiefly who in his Poem of the Trojan Wars has made a mock of the Gods by mingling them so familiarly in the actions and affairs of Men. He brings them in fighting together He wounds Venus He fetters and binds Mars wounds him and puts him to flight He make Briareus to rescue Jupiter out of the hands of the rest of the Gods when they were conspiring to bind him to his good behaviour and represents him lamenting the death of his Son Sarpedon as not being able to prevent it He describes him embracing his Juno with more heat than he us'd to do his belov'd Mistresses being inflam'd with Venus's Girdle Hercules is made a Scavenger and cleanseth Stables Apollo turns Cow-herd to Admetus Neptune binds himself as a Day-labourer to Laomedon to build up the Walls of Troy and is so unhappy withal as not to be paid for his drudgery Aeneas's Armour and Jupiter's Thunder-bolt are both hammer'd out upon one and the same Anvil as if Heaven and its Thunders had not been long before Jupiter was born in Crete or as if the Cyclopses could have made those affrighting flashes which Jupiter himself could not choose but be afraid of What shall I say of Mars and Venus being caught in the very Fact of Adultery or of Jupiter's abominable filthiness with Ganymedes whom he translated into Heaven All which Fables were invented on purpose to authorize the faults and vices of Men. And it is with those and such like pleasing Fictions and Lyes that the Minds of Youth are corrupted and being instill'd into them in their tender years grow up with them to Manhood So that which is to be lamented in their very old Age their Minds continue tainted with these sottish Fancies And yet the truth of these Matters is most plain and evident to those who will take the pains to enquire into it All the Antient Writers whether Greek or Roman do unanimously assert that Saturn the first of the goodly Generation of Gods was but a Man This Nepos and Crassus do affirm in their History and Thallus and Diodorus relate the same thing viz. That this Saturn for fear of falling into his Son's hands fled out of Greece into Italy where Janus receiv'd him into his house and being a Grecian full of ingenuity and instructed in Arts and Sciences taught those barbarous people several things as the forming of the Letters of the Alphabet coining of Money and making diverse sorts of useful Instruments He call'd the Country Latium as if he had said an Hiding-place because he had found there a safe retreat to hide and conceal himself from the attempts of his Son and to the end he might have his Memory preserv'd he call'd the City from his own Name Saturnia as Janus call'd the City built upon the Hill Janniculus by that Name to rescue his own from oblivion You see then plainly that Saturn was a Man for he was fain to flee and hide himself and was the Father as well as the Son of a Man And whereas they call'd him the Son of Heaven and Earth it was only because his Original and Parentage were unknown to the Italians as we are wont to say of those that come unexpectedly upon us that they are dropt from the Skies and of such whose birth is mean and obscure that they are the Sons of the Earth As for Jupiter he Reign'd in Crete after he had banish'd his Father from that Island there he begot Children and there he was buried And at this very day they shew the Cave which bears his Name and point you to the Grave where he was interred yea and the very Ceremonies they use in his Worship declare him to have been a Man It would be to no purpose to insist on particulars and to recount his whole Genealogy It is enough that we have prov'd the Father was Mortal to convince that the same Quality was conveigh'd to all his Posterity except you suppose that they became Gods after their Death as by the Perjury of Proculus Romulus was rank'd among the Number of the Gods or as Juba by the unanimous consent and desire of the Africans was made a God and as other Kings were Deifi'd by their Subjects not because they really believ'd them to be Gods but to give them a more honourable discharge from their Soveraignty Besides this extravagant Honour is confer'd upon them against their Wills they desire to continue Men as they are and are afraid of being Deify'd and though old are not at all ambitious of that Glory Wherefore we are not to look for Gods among those that dye because the Gods are Immortal nor among those who are born because they are likewise obnoxious to Death That only deserves the Name of a Deity which hath neither Beginning nor End For if Gods were ever born why are they not so still except you will say that now Jupiter is too old and Juno past Child-bearing or that they are of the humour of Minerva who chose to be an old Maid rather than a Mother Or indeed have not those pretended Deities ceased to
and Son-in-Law You may from these instances easily judge of the rest The Bees can suffer no more than one King Flocks follow one Leader and every Herd has its own Ruler And can you imagine the Supreme Power of Heaven to be divided and that the Soveraignty of that only true and Divine Monarchy is shared amongst many Especially when you consider that GOD the Father of all things has neither Beginning nor End and as he gives Beginning to all other things so an Eternity and perpetuity of Being to himself Who before this World was made was a World to Himself who by his Word commanded all things into Being governs them by his Wisdom and perfects them by his Power He cannot be seen because he is more bright and glorious than our sight can endure to behold Neither can He be comprehended being greater than our minds infinite immense and only known to Himself what He is indeed our breasts are too narrow to conceive and we can never form a worthy notion of Him but when we own Him Inestimable and Incomprehensible May I speak what I think Whosoever fancies he knows the Greatness of GOD has already lessen'd it and therefore he who would not lessen it must not pretend to know it Neither do thou enquire after his Name His Name is GOD. 'T is then we stand in need of Names when we are to divide a multitude into particulars by their distinguishing Titles and proper appellations But GOD being alone and by himself the Name of GOD must wholly belong to Him and to none else For if I call Him Father you 'l be apt to think Him an Earthly One if I call Him King you 'l fancy Him a Worldly Prince if I call Him Lord you 'l apprehend Him Mortal Abstract but these additions of Names from our gross imagination and you 'l see Him in his own Brightness and Glory Besides in this I have the general assent of all Men concurring with me Mind the Common-people When they lift up their hands to Heaven whom have they in their mouths but GOD Their ordinary Saying is GOD is great GOD is true and ever and anon If it pleases GOD Which Words though they contain the Confession of a Christian yet are as well the Voice of Nature in the Common People Yea those who will have Jupiter to be the Soveraign of the Universe do only mistake in the Name but agree with us in the Thing it self That there is but One only Power The Poets also in their Verses celebrate One Father both of the Gods and Men and say That the Minds and Thoughts of Men are such as GOD every day puts into them And what shall we say of Virgil Does not he speak yet more clearly and more near to Truth when he saith That in the beginning there was a Spirit which inwardly cherished and foster'd both Heaven and Earth and that all the Parts of them were actuated by a Mind infused throughout the Whole and that from thence Men and all other Creatures derive their Original The same Prince of Poets calls in another place this Mind and Spirit GOD as where he saith that GOD is diffused throughout the vast Extent of the Earth and Seas and of the high Heaven and that from Him Men and Beasts Rain and Lightning do proceed And what do we say else but that GOD is an Eternal Mind Reason and Spirit Let us take a view if you please of the Opinions of Philosophers and you will find that though they seem diverse yet they all agree in this Matter And omitting those rude and primitive Men who by their Sayings purchased the Name of Sages Thales the Milesian who was before them all and who first maintain'd any Dispute concerning Celestial Things held that Water was the Original Matter of all things and that GOD was that Mind or Understanding Spirit who fram'd them out of it Which is certainly a more profound and sublime Account concerning the Water and its actuating Spirit than could proceed from the understanding of Man without the assistance of Divine Revelation Thus you plainly see that the Opinion of the first of Philosophers does entirely concur with ours After him Anaximenes and Diogenes Apolloniates make God to be Air but Immense and Infinite and in ascribing these perfections to the Divinity they also consent with us Anaxagoras was of opinion that GOD was an Infinite Spirit containing and moving all things Pythagoras calls Him a Mind penetrating all things and diffus'd through the Universe taking care of and giving Life to all the Creatures therein Zenophanes affirms That GOD is an Animated Infinity or a Spirit joyn'd with Infinite Matter Antisthenes declar'd That there were several Gods belonging to several Countries but that there was but One Principal and Soveraign amongst them all who was GOD by Nature Speusippus was of opinion that GOD was nothing else but a Natural Power quick'ning and governing all things Yea and does not Democritus himself though he was the first Inventor of Atoms often call Nature which is the Former of all Ideas and Understanding GOD Strato calls Him Nature And even Epicurus who either believed that there were no Gods or if there were that they were idle and without any concern about the things of this World yet sets Nature above them As for Aristotle though he seem sometimes divided in his thoughts about this Matter yet he positively asserts One Soveraign Power For sometimes he saith That an Understanding Spirit is GOD sometimes that the World is GOD and then again he will have GOD to govern the World Heraclides of Pontus asserts GOD to be a Divine Spirit but with some incertainty For sometimes he attributes the Supremacy to the Divine Spirit and sometimes to the World it self Theophrastus Zeno Chrysippus and Cleanthes do likewise vary in their Opinions Yet all of them at last agree in One Providence which superintends the Whole For Cleanthes sometimes affirms GOD to be a Spirit sometimes that He is an Aethereal Fire but most frequently calls Him Reason His Master Zeno holds a Natural and Eternal Law and sometimes Fire and sometimes Reason to be the first Cause of all things He also evidently reproves and convinceth the common Error about the Gods by shewing that Juno is nothing but the Air Jupiter Heaven Neptune the Sea and Vulcan the Fire And that many of their other Gods are but the Elements dress'd up in other Names Chrysippus is much of the same Opinion for with him sometimes a Divine Power and a Rational Nature is GOD and at other times the World and a fatal Necessity and imitates Zeno in his interpreting the Fables of the Gods which are found in Homer Hesiod and Orpheus In like manner Diogenes the Babylonian was us'd in his Discourses to declare That Jupiter's Brain being with child and deliver'd of Minerva and other like Stories were not an account of the true Original of their Gods but of some other things couch'd under those