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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
nature_n	according_a	act_n	act_v	674	4	7.7102	4	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A45645	A refutation of the atheistical notion of fate, or absolute necessity in a sermon preach'd at the cathedral-church of St. Paul, November the seventh, 1698 : being the eighth of the lecture for that year, founded by the Honourable Robert Boyle, Esq. / by John Harris ...	Harris, John, 1667?-1719.	1698 (1698)	Wing H853; ESTC R15217	16,696	30

A Refutation of the Atheistical Notion OF Fate or Absolute Necessity IN A SERMON Preach'd at the CATHEDRAL-CHURCH of St. Paul November the Seventh 1698. BEING The Eighth of the LECTURE for that Year Founded by the Honourable Robert Boyle Esq By JOHN HARRIS M. A. and Fellow of the ROYAL-SOCIETY LONDON Printed by J. L. for Richard Wilkin at the King 's Head in St. Paul's Church-Yard 1698. JEREM. ix 24. Let him that glorieth glory in this that he understandeth and knoweth me that I am the Lord who exercise loving kindness judgment and righteousness in the earth for in these things do I delight saith the Lord. I Did in my last Discourse begin to Speak to the Second Particular considerable in these Words viz. An Account of some of those Attributes which God is here said to Exercise in the Earth and in which he Delights On which I did not think it necessary to Discourse particularly but from thence took an Occasion to Remove two Great Bars to the true Knowledge of God and of his Attributes which Sceptical and Unbelieving Men had raised in the Way Which were These I. That there is in reality no such Thing as Moral Good or Evil But that all Actions are in their own Nature indifferent II. That all things are determined by absolute Fatality And that God himself and all Creatures whatsoever are Necessary Agents without having any Power of Choice or any real Liberty in their Natures at all The former of These I did then dispatch plainly proving the Existence of Moral Good and Evil and answering the Objections against it I proceed now to speak to the latter which is an Objection that our Adversaries are very fond of and do all of them upon Occasion have recourse to And it is indeed a great Point gain'd if they could make it out and will effectually destroy all manner of Religious Obligation and all dread of Punishment for doing amiss For as one observes on these Three things all Religion is founded 1. That there is a God who made presides over and governeth all things 2. That there are some things 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in their own Natures good and just 3. That there is also something 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 something in our own Power to do whereby we are Accountable for our Actions and become guilty when we do amiss But there can certainly be neither Good nor Evil in any Man's Actions and no Rewards or Punishments can be the Consequents of them if nothing at all be in our own Power if whatever we act or commit it is absolutely impossible for us to avoid acting or committing Which yet must be the case if as they assert Things are determined by absolute Fatality and that God himself and all Creatures whatsoever are necessary Agents without having any Power of Choice or any real Liberty in their Natures at all I shall therefore at this Time 1. Shew you that this is plainly their Assertion from their own words 2. I shall endeavour to shew the Groundlesness of of those Reasons on which they build their Hypothesis And 3. from some Arguments Establish the contrary Position of the Freedom and Liberty of Human Nature 1. And that this is the Assertion of the Two great Atheistical Writers is very plain Mr. Hobbs declares himself to be of the Opinion That no Man can be free from Necessitation That Nothing taketh beginning from it self but from the Action of some other Immediate Agent without it self And that therefore when first a Man hath an Appetite or Will to something to which immediately before he had no Appetite nor Will the Cause of his Will is not the Will it self but something else not in his own disposing So that whereas it is out of Controversie that of Voluntary Actions the Will is the Necessary Cause and by this which is said the Will is also caused by other things whereof it disposeth not it followeth that Voluntary Actions have all of them Necessary Causes and therefore are necessitated This saith he also is a certain Truth that there are Certain and Necessary Causes which make every Man to will what he willeth Ib. p. 306. And then as to the Deity I have already more than once taken notice That Hobbs denies Him any Understanding Sense or Knowledge and asserts him to be without any Ends or Designs in his Actions and Operations Which plainly makes Him an Agent absolutely and physically Necessary as indeed follows also from the Notion of his Being Corporeal which the same Writer every where maintains Spinoza also is very Express in this Matter as I have already shewn in some Measure In mente saith he nulla est absoluta five libera voluntas sed Mens ad Hoc vel illud Volendum determinatur à Causà quae etiam ab aliâ haec iterùm ab aliâ sic in Infinitum And in another place Voluntas non potest vocari Causa libera sed Tantum necessaria And yet on another Occasion and in another Book he hath these words Clarè distinctè Intelligimus si ad Nostram naturam attendamus nos in nostris actionibus esse liberos de multis deliberare propter id solum quod volumus Which is as plain and palpable a Contradiction to what he with the same air of Assurance delivers in other places as can possibly be Mr. Hobbs also cannot be acquitted from expresly contradicting himself as to this Point of Liberty and Necessity for he tells us in his Reasons for his Opinion That he that reflecteth on himself cannot but be satisfied That a Free Agent is he that can do if he will and forbear if he will And such an Agent he allows Man to be and saith he hath proved it too But how he will reconcile this with his Assertion that no Man can be free from Necessitation and that all our Actions have Necessary Causes and therefore are necessitated I cannot imagine As to Spinoza's Account of the Deity in Reference to this Point I have given a hint or two of it already He makes God to be the same with Nature or the Universe to be Corporeal and an absolutely necessary Agent one who cannot possibly help doing as he doth one who hath no Power of Creation nor doth act according to free Will But is Limited and Restrained to one constant Method of Acting by the Absolute Necessity of his Nature or by his Infinite Power And lest any one should misunderstand him so far as to imagine that he means by this that God is by the Excellency and Perfection of his Nature in all his Operations exactly conformable to the Rules of Justice Goodness and Right Reason He plainly excludes that Notion in these words Qui dicunt Deum omnia sub Ratione Boni agere Hi aliquid extra Deum videntur ponere quod à Deo non dependet ad quod Deus tanquam ad Exemplar in Operando

is the absence of all external Impediments which if he intended any thing by it but to palliate a bad Cause and to amuse the Person he wrote to is as much Nonsense and Contradiction to what he himself advances about Necessity as is possible For how a Man can be said to Act necessarily that hath no external Impediments to hinder him or Causes to compel him but is free to Act if he will or forbear if he will is what I believe no Man can possibly conceive Thus we see plainly that this great Patron of Necessity hath very little to say for his Darling Notion and that he plainly contradicts and is Inconsistent with himself Had he indeed dared speak out and thought it time to declare his Opinion freely he would no doubt have proceeded on other Grounds in this Point and made use of Arguments more agreeable to his Set of Principles which being allowed him would have demonstrated an absolute Necessity of all things whatsoever For he was a thorough Corporealist and maintained that there was nothing more in Nature but Matter and Motion which if it were true it is most certain that all Things and Actions must be inevitably Fatal and Necessary for as Mr. Lock well observes nothing but Thought or Willing in a Spirit can begin Motion The Necessity therefore in such an Hypothesis would be the true Ancient Democritick Fate the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or as Epicurus calls it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a through Material necessity Mechanically producing all Things or the Fate of the Naturalists who held nothing besides Matter and Motion But this Notion for some Reasons best known to himself he did not think fit to insist on when he wrote this Tract against the Liberty of Human Nature Tho' his Successor Spinoza with a little Variation did whose Arguments we must next consider Spinoza as I have formerly shewed was an Absolute Corporealist as well as Mr. Hobbs but finding that Cogitation could never be accounted for from Matter and Motion only he supposes Cogitation Essential to Matter and as he makes but one only Substance in the World which is the Matter of All Things or God so he supposes Cogitation to be one of the Essential Attributes of this Deity as Extension is the other And from hence he concludes That all things according to the Infinite variety of their several Natures must necessarily flow from God or the whole and must be just what they are and cannot be nor could not possibly have been any otherwise He doth indeed Stile the Deity Causa Libera and say he is only so But the reason he assigns for it is only because nothing can compel him to or hinder him from doing any Thing but he expresly denies him to have either Understanding or Free Will And he declares oftentimes That all things flow from the Deity by as Absolute a Necessity as that the Three Angles of a Triangle are equal to Two right ones And then as to the Mind of Man he gives this Reason why it cannot have any free Will Quia mens ad hoc vel illud Volendum determinatur à Causâ quae etiam ab alia haec iterum ab aliâ sic in Infinitum The same thing also he asserts in another Place and from thence undertakes to prove also that God cannot have any Free Will and withal saith That Understanding and Will as they are called belong to the Nature of God just as Motion and Rest. and other Natural Things do which are absolutely determined to Operate just as they do and cannot do otherwise This is the Argument of Spinoza to prove that there is no such thing as freedom in the Nature of Man but that he is determined in every thing by Absolute and Inevitable Necessity And this Necessity also 't is plain according to him is purely Physical and Mechanical As to the Refutation of which I think I have already effectually removed the foundation on which it is all built by proving that there are such Beings as Immaterial Substances and that God himself is such an One or a Spirit For all the Necessity Spinoza contends for depends purely on his Notion of the Deity as appears sufficiently from what I have produced of his words If therefore it be true that God be an Immaterial Substance a Being Distinct from Nature or the Universe and the Creator and Producer of all things as I think I have very clearly proved 't is most certain that the whole Chain of Spinoza's Argument for Necessity is broken to pieces For the Reason he assigns for the necessary Operations of the Deity are not the Perfections of his Nature determining him to Good and Just Lovely and Reasonable things but that the Deity being Universal Nature All things and Operations are Parts of him and their several Ways and Manners of Acting and existing according to the necessary Laws of Motion and Mechanism are his Understanding and Will which Ignorant People he saith may perhaps take in a literal Sense and think that God can properly Know or Will any thing but that in reality there is no such thing as Understanding or Free Will in God since all things flow from Him by Inevitable Necessity And if there be not any freedom in the Deity that is in the whole there can be none in Men or in any other Beings who are but Parts of him If this indeed be true that there is no other God but Nature then 't is easie to see that all things must be governed by absolute Fatality and be in every respect Physically necessary there can then be no such thing as Contingency or any Voluntary Actions and if we were sure of this 't is indeed the greatest Ignorance and Folly in the World to pretend to talk any thing about it But on the other hand if there be a Deity who is an Infinitely perfect Being distinct from Nature who Created all things by the Word of his Power and for whose sole Pleasure they are and were Created then none of those Consequences will follow but it will appear very reasonable to believe that God hath still a Care and Providence over that World which he made at first and that he delights to exercise loving Kindness Judgment and Righteousness in the Earth as the Prophet here speaks That he hath made some Creatures capable of Knowing and Understanding this and who consequently have a free Power as in other things so of giving Praise and Glory to so Great and Wonderful a Being nay and of Glorying themselves in being capacitated to attain so Excellent a Knowledge And that Man hath such a Power or Freedom of Will in his Nature is what I shall now proceed in the last place plainly to prove 1. And the first Argument I shall make use of to demonstrate this shall be the Experience of all Mankind And this one would think should be of great Weight and turn the

attendit vel ad quod tanquam ad certum scopum collimat Quod profectò nihil aliud est quam Deum Fato subjicere Now I think nothing can more shew the wicked Perversness of this Writer's Mind than this Passage For he could not but know very well that when Divines assert the Deity to be Essentially and necessarily Good they do not mean that Goodness is any thing Extrinsical to the Divine Nature much less that it is something which hath no dependance upon it but only that the Excellency and Perfection of his Nature is such as that it is in every thing exactly conformable to Right Reason and therefore this was certainly a wilful Perversion of their Sense set up on purpose to overthrow the Notion of Moral Goodness in the Deity But how vain is it for him to tell us that for the Deity to Act sub Ratione Boni is for Him to be Subject to Fate when at the same time he Himself Asserts that God is in every respect a Necessary Agent without any free Will nay without any Knowledge or Understanding in his Nature at all This is so plain a Demonstration that it was his chief and Primary Design to banish out of Mens Minds the Notion of Moral Goodness that nothing can be more and therefore tho' he was resolved to Introduce absolute Necessity into all Actions both Divine and Human yet it should be such an one as should leave no Umbrage for any distinction between Good and Evil or any Foundation for Rewards and Punishments And in this Notion of Necessity these Writers follow Democritus Heraclitus Leucippus and that Atheistical Sect who maintain'd that there was Nothing in all Nature but Matter and Motion And therefore when these Modern Writers assert that there is nothing in the Universe but Body as they do they run Fate farther than most of the Old Heathen Patrons of Necessity did For there was none but the Democritick Sect that supposed Fate to have a Power over the Will of Man and in this particular even they were deserted by Epicurus as I observe below The Pythagoreans Platonists and Stoicks agreed that the Mind of Man was free And 't is well known that the Stoicks did in this Free Power of the Will of Man found that arrogant Assertion of theirs That a Wise Man was in one respect more excellent than the Gods for they were Good by the Necessity of their Nature and could not help it whereas Man had a Power of being otherwise and therefore was the more commendable for being so There was indeed some of the Poets and some few of the Philosophers too who did subject the Gods themselves to Fate or Necessity Thus Seneca in one place saith Necessitas Deos alligat Irrevocabilis Divina pariter ac Humana Cursus vehit Ille ipse omnium Conditor ac Rector scripsit quidem Fata sed sequitur semper paret semel jussit Which Opinion is effectually refuted and exposed by Lucian in that Dialogue of his called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 As also by Lactantius in his First Book De falsâ Religione Chap. 11. But this as I doubt not but Seneca and some others understood in a softer sense than at first sight it appears to have so was it the Doctrine of but a few for generally the Heathens did fully believe that Prayers and Sacrifices would alter a Man's Fortune and Circumstances for the better that they would appease the Anger and gain the Favour and Blessing of the Gods and that Their Nature was not so absolutely Fatal and Necessary but that they could freely deal with their Creatures according as they deserved at their hands For we find Balbus the Stoick mentioned by Cicero telling us That the Nature of God would not be most Powerful and Excellent if it were Subject to the same Necessity or Nature Quâ Coelum maria terraeque reguntur Nihil Enim est praestantius Deo Nulli igitur est Naturae Obediens Subjectus So that these Writers tread in the Steps of the worst and most Atheistical of the Heathen Philosophers and maintain a more rigid Fate and a more irresistible Necessity than most of them did But 2. I come next to shew the Groundlesness of those Reasons and Arguments on which these Men build their Hypothesis of Absolute Necessity And first as to the Reasons of Mr. Hobbs The Chief that he brings against the freedom of Human Actions are these saith Mr. Hobbs In all Deliberations and alternate Successions of Contrary Appetites 't is the last only which we call Will this is immediately before the doing of any Action or next before the doing of it become Impossible Also Nothing saith he can take beginning from it self but must do it from the Action of some other immediate Agent without it if therefore a Man hath a Will to something which he had not before the Cause of his Willing is not the Will it self but something else not in his own disposing So that whereas 't is out of Controversie that of Voluntary Actions the Will is the Necessary Cause and by this which is now said the Will is also Caused by Other things whereof it disposeth not it follows that Voluntary Actions have all of them Necessary Causes and therefore are necessitated Agen also Every sufficient Cause saith he is a Necessary one for if it did not produce its Effect necessarily 't was because something was wanting to its Production and then it was not sufficient Now from hence it follows that whatsoever is produced is produced Necessarily and consequently all Voluntary Actions are Necessitated And to define a Free Agent to be that which when all things are present which are necessary to produce the Effect can nevertheless not produce it is Contradiction and Nonsense for 't is all one as to say the Cause may be sufficient i. e. Necessary and yet the Effect shall not follow This is the Substance of all Mr. Hobbs his Proof against Free Will in which there are almost as many Mistakes as there are Sentences and from hence it plainly will appear that either he had no clear Idea's of what he wrote about or else did designedly endeavour to perplex darken and confound the Cause For in the first place He confounds the Power or Faculty of Willing in Man with the last act of Willing or Determination after Deliberating And consequently doth not distinguish between what the Schools would call Hypothetical and Absolute Necessity which yet ought to be carefully done in the Point between us for an Agent may be free and no doubt every Man is free to deliberate on and to compare the Objects offered to his Choice and yet not be so after he hath chosen Then indeed Necessity comes in 't is impossible for any one to choose and not to choose or to determine and not to determine and after the Election is made no one ever supposed that a Man is free not to make it And