Selected quad for the lemma: religion_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
religion_n	false_a	true_a	worship_n	4,780	5	7.8086	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A29780	Miracles, work's above and contrary to nature, or, An answer to a late translation out of Spinoza's Tractatus theologico-politicus, Mr. Hobbs's Leviathan, &c. published to undermine the truth and authority of miracles, Scripture, and religion, in a treatise entituled, Miracles no violation of the laws of nature.	Browne, Thomas, 1654?-1741.	1683 (1683)	Wing B5062; ESTC R1298	42,132	76

it is beyond their power and efficacy to Effect it But yet so far it is within our Capacity that it is possible for us to know whether it be an effect supernatural or not and when it is known to be such it is sufficient to demonstrate the immediate operation of God's Power and Providence To the Second nothing is more false or groundless than that Assertion It is so far from being true that a finite Effect cannot be a Proof of an infinite Cause that every finite Effect is so either immediately as when the Effect though finite exceeds the force and efficacy of any finite being in the Order and Sphere wherein it acts or mediately when the Effect is produced by a train of finite Causes which yet must have had their own being and their first motion or power to act from an infinite Agent The argument for an Infinite from the existence of finite beings proceeds thus every finite being is contingent and so might not have been therefore the reason of its being must not be in it self but in something else viz. the Cause that produced it Again every finite being has limits of Perfection these cannot be set by it self but by something else which gave it such a degree of Perfection and no greater and this must be the cause that produced it If this Cause be finite too it must proceed from another and the Question will recur till we stop at last in a Cause self-existent and infinite So much therefore may be said in answer to his Arguments from reason for the former part of his second Proposition viz. That by Miracles we cannot know the Essence Existence or Providence of God To what he says for the other part viz. That all these may be better known by the fixt and immutable Order of Nature the Answer may be shorter His reason is because the Laws of Nature are infinite eternal and immutable and therefore in some measure indicate to us the infinity eternity and immutability of God or rather to make him speak more plainly out of his Opera Posthuma because God and Nature are all one and the more I know of Nature the more I understand of the modifications of the Divine Essence But if he tells us that the belief of Miracles leads us to Scepticisme we may reply that this Discovery of the Divine Essence which he pretends to make from Nature will rather carry us either to Atheisme or Idolatry I proceed to his Arguments from Scripture which are two 1. He argues from Deut 13. v. 1 2 3. Because a Miracle as is plain from that place may be wrought by a Person that designs to introduce the worship of a false God 2. He argues from the corrupt notions the Israelites had of God and his Providence notwithstanding so many Miracles wrought among them The words in Deut. 13. v. 1 2 3. are these If there arise among you a Prophet or a Dreamer of Dreams and giveth thee a Sign or a Wonder and the Sign or Wonder come to pass whereof he spake unto thee saying let us go after other Gods which thou hast not known and let us serve them thou shalt not hearken unto the words of that Prophet or Dreamer of Dreams for the Lord your God proveth you to know whether you love the Lord your God with all your Heart and with all your Soul And that Prophet or that Dreamer of Dreams shall be put to death c. From hence he argues a Miracle may be wrought by one that designs to introduce the Worship of a false God Ergo by Miracles we may be as easily induced to embrace the Worship of a false God as of the true E. God cannot be made known to us by Miracles This is a difficulty commonly propounded for these Words in Deut. viz. How Miracles can be an undoubted evidence of the authority of a Prophet and the truth of his Doctrine yet it be possible for a Miracle to be wrought by a false Prophet in the highest degree viz. a Preacher of Idolatry And the best way to give a clear and satisfactory Answer to it will be to consider the utmost force of it as it is urged from this place The Israelites to whom these Words were spoken had already a Law given them and the Authority of it attested by unquestionable Miracles the same Law repeated again in this book of Deut. with a repetition likewise of the History of those mighty Works which had been wrought for it's confirmation Their Religion therefore being thus settled to fortifie them against all Temptations that might draw them to the Worship of the Gods of the Nations round about them they are fore-warned in this place not to give ear to any Person that should entice them to Idolatry though he should work a Miracle to confirm the Authority of his false Doctrine for that God might possibly permit such a Person to work a Miracle meerly to try the stedfastness of their Faith and Adherence to his Worship This is the Case wherein those Words Deut. 13. must be understood to be spoken and this is all that can be rationally drawn from them that God may permit a Miracle to be wrought by a false Prophet after he has established the true Religion and fore-warned his people not to believe a Miracle against it We are to enquire therefore whether if this be possible Miracles can be sufficient evidences of a true Prophet The Argument is in form this If God after he has established the true Religion and fore-warned his people not to believe a Miracle against it may permit a false Prophet to work a Miracle to try the stedfastness of their faith then Miracles are not sufficient Evidences of a true Prophet But God may in this case permit a Miracle to be wrought by a false Prophet Ergo. If the consequence is That Miracles are not always sufficient Evidences or not in this particular Case I readily grant it If That they never are in any case which must be the Conclusion if to the purpose I deny it and the reason of my denial of it is this because notwithstanding an Impostor may work a Miracle in this case and so the Miracle he works be no evidence of a true Prophet yet in any other case notwithstanding the force of these words it may be and I may positively say is impossible for a true Miracle to be wrought by an Impostor and therefore all other Miracles which are not reducible to this Case may be certain and infallible Evidences of a true Prophet For Instance two sorts of Miracles are excepted from this Case 1. Those Miracles suppose that were wrought among the Israelites after this warning given them not to believe any person that would seduce them to Idolatry though he should work a Miracle by persons that did not attempt to seduce them from the Worship of the true God 2. Those Miracles which were wrought at any time by any

tacit Act of his Will c. 2. Where Mention is made of Means used but those such as cannot be conceived to be in their own Nature proper or sufficient to produce the Effect As the Clay wherewith our Saviour cured the Eyes of the Person born Blind the Spittle wherewith he loosed the tongue of the other that was Dumb c. These effects may be justly affirmed to be related in Scripture as Miracles not upon this account that the Scripture refers them immediately to God without mention of any train of Natural Causes subservient to him in their Production it appears we have some surer Grounds whereupon to proceed in examining what Effects in Scripture are related as Miracles though that which he would possess his Readers with the Opinion that it is the only 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we have be as has been shewed not only false but ridiculous and absurd From what has been said I may rationally draw these two consequences 1. That for the Scripture to refer any Effect immediately to God is not for it to relate the Effect as Miraculous and therefore from its referring the Effects of Nature immediately to God we cannot infer as he does that the Scripture relates many memorable things as Miracles which yet notwithstanding proceeded from the fixt and immutable Order of Nature 2. That there are yet many Effects plainly related in Scripture for Miracles by it 's express Declaration and it 's relating of them in such Terms from whence we may by undeniable Consequence gather as much And so supposing that the Scripture is a true History for which we have infinitely more evidence than for any other History in the World it follows evidently against his main Assertion from the relations of these miraculous Effects in Scripture that there really have been Miracles in the sense wherein he denies them i. e. Works beside above and contrary to Nature But this Corollary though very pertinent to our purpose is ex abundanti All that we were obliged to was to shew that the Conclusion which he draws from the Principles he takes out of Mr. Burnett is false and illogical Since therefore Mr. Burnett asserts positively that there are Miracles as is shewed above and nothing here produced out of him can infer or insinuate the contrary we may justly demand both in his Name and in behalf both of Religion Reason and good Logique that this part of the Premonition be returned into the Place from whence it came where it may stand with more Truth and Coherence and the Conclusion of the Translator left to stand apart by it self as a bold and I may say Impious Assertion without any Proof But not to wrong him he has some Succedaneous Arguments in the close of the Premonition but these ' as I before hinted are only some brief Touches of what we have after more at large out of Spinoza viz. That for God to work by a power immediate or supernatural is inconsistent with and Point-blank repugnant the Fundamental Laws and Constistutions of Nature It sounds somewhat like to the King's Prerogative being inconsistent with the Fundamental Laws of Property and Priviledge That these Laws are the Acts of the Divine Wisdom extend themselves to whatever events he hath Willed and Decreed that the power of Nature is infinite as being one and the same with the Power of God He has one thing which he asserts besides that among all the Miracles related to be done in favour of the Israelites there is not one that can be apodictically Demonstrated to be repugnant to the established Order of Nature Now here I am not bound to Demonstrate it for his sake for two Reasons 1. Because it were to prove a Negative 2. Because his main Ground or Spinoza's rather why he denies all supernatural Effects is not upon account of his own great reach in Natural Philosophy whereby he could undertake to solve Mechanically all the effects related in Scripture for Miraculous but from Arguments purely Metaphysical proving in his Opinion the impossibility of any such thing as a Work above Nature For to this he holds and not the other as appears from p. 21. of the Treatise where he concludes absolutely from his Arguments against the possibility of Miracles That all the Events that are truly related in Scripture to have come to pass proceeded necessarily according to the immutable Laws of Nature And that if any thing be found which can be apodictically Demonstrated to be repugnant to those Laws or not to have followed from them we may safely and piously believe the same not to have been dictated by Divine inspiration but impiously added to the Sacred Volumes by sacrilegious Men. So that unless the Scripture Miracles will submit to his Touch-stone unless they will come and lay open their Occult Qualities and the whole plot and confederacy of those natural Causes that combined to Effect them he has an Index Expurgatorius to blot their Names out of the holy Scripture and a Court of Inquisition for those that relate them to arraign them for Sacriledge and Impiety But I pass on to consider each part of the Treatise in order The Treatise is divided between Mr. Hobbs and Spinoza Mr. Hobbs speaks as far as to the middle of the third page out of the Chapter about Miracles in the third Part of his Leviathan He first explains the signification of the Word from its Etymology and other words in sacred and profane Writers of like import with it From its Etymology he deduces that it signifies A Work of God which men admire or wonder at Then proposes to enquire what works are such and reduces them to two kinds 1. Such as are rare and the like thereof seldom or never seen 2. Such as we cannot conceive to be produced by natural Causes but only by Gods immediate hand He gives some Instances of both An Oxe or an Horse speaking preter-natural Births the Conversion of a man into Stone and the first Rainbow that appeared That such Effects as these seem Miraculous because rare or no natural cause of them conceivable On the contrary the Works of Art however wonderful not reputed to be Miracles because their Causes known Upon the same ground he observes That the same thing may seem to be a Miracle to one Man and not to another in proportion to their different degrees of Knowledge and Experience So Eclipses Miracles to the vulgar not to Philosophers Simple Men made to believe that others can know their most secret Actions by Inspiration when the more wary and prudent perceive the juggle So far Mr. Hobbs here in his Leviathan he proceeds to assign another property of a Miracle viz. That it be wrought to confirm the Divine Mission of some Prophet or other and then to give a definition of it but there his Translator leaves him and passes on to Spinoza Before we follow him thither we may reflect a little 1. Upon