bemus arrogare ut ejus Conciliorum participes effe poffimus. We can by no means admit any Reafons about natural Things taken from the end which God or Nature propos'd to themselves in making of them: because we ought not to arrogate fo much to our felves, as to think we may be partakers of his Councils. And more exprefly in his fourth Anfwer, viz. to Gaffendus's Objections; Nec fingi poteft, aliquos Dei fines magis quàm alios in propatulo effe: omnes enim in imperfcrutabili ejus Sapientia abyfo funt eodem modo reconditi; that is, neither can nor ought we to feign or imagine that fome of God's Ends are more manifeft than others; for all lie in like imanner or equally hidden in the unfearchable Abyfs of his Wifdom.

This confident Affertion of Des Cartes is fully examin❜d and reproy'd by that honourable and excellent Perfon Mr. Boyl, in his Difquifition about the final Caufes of Natural Things, Sect. 1, from Page. to. to the end; and therefore I fhall not need fay much to it, only in brief this, that it feems to me falfe and of evil confequence, as being derogatory from the Glory of God, and deftructive of the acknowledgment and belief of a Deity:

For firft, Seeing, for instance, that the Eye is imploy'd by Man and all Animals for the ufe of Vifion, which as they are fram'd, is fo neceflary for them, that they could not live without it; and God Almighty knew that it would be fo; and feeing it is fo admirably fitted and adapted to this ufe, that all the Wit and DA

Art

Art of Men and Angels could not have contriv'd it better, if fo well, it muft needs be highly abfurd and unreasonable to affirm, either that it was not defign'd at all for this use, or that it is impoffible for Man to know whether it was

or not.

Secondly, How can Man give thanks and praise to God for the use of his Limbs and Senfes, and those his good Creatures which ferve for his fuftenance, when he cannot be fure they were made in any refpect for him; nay, when tis as likely they were not, and that he doth but abuse them to ferve ends for which they were never intended?

Thirdly, This Opinion, as I hinted before, fuperfedes and caffates the beft Medium we have to demonftrate the Being of a Deity, leaving us no other demonftrative Proof but that taken from the innate Idea; which, if it be a Demonstration, is but an obfcure one, not fatisfying many of the Learned themfelves, and being too fubtle and metaphifical to be apprehended by vulgar Capacities, and confequently of no force to perfuade and convince them.

Secondly, They endeavour to evacuate and difannul our great Argument, by pretending to folve all the Phanomena of Nature, and to give an account of the Production and Efformation of the Univerfe, and all the corporeal Beings therein, both celeftial and terreftrial, as well animate as inanimate, not excluding Animals themselves, by a flight Hypothefis of Matter fo and fo divided and mov'd. The Hypothefis you.

have in Des Cartes's Principles of Philosophy, Part 2. All the Matter of this vifible World is by him fuppos'd to have been at firft divided by God into Parts nearly equal to each other, of a mean fize, viz. about the bigness of thofe whereof the Heavenly Bodies are now compounded, all together baving as much motion as is now found in the World, and thefe to have been equally mov'd severally every one by it felf about its own Center, and among one another, fo as to compose a fluid Body; and alfo many of them jointly, or in company, about feveral other points fo far diftant from one a nother, and in the fame manner difpos'd as the Centers of the fix'd Stars now are. So that God had no more to do than to create the Matter, divide it into parts, and put it into motion accor ding to fome few Laws, and that would of it felf produce the World and all Creatures therein.

For a Confutation of this Hypothefis, I might refer the Reader to Dr. Cudworth's Syftem, p. 603, 604. but for his cafe I will tranfcribe the words: God in the mean time standing by as an idle Spectator of this Lucus Atomorum, this fportful Dance of Atoms, and of the various Refults thereof. Nay, thefe mechanick Theifts have here quite outftripp'd and outdone the Atomick Atheists themselves, they being much more extravagant than ever those were; for the profeffed Atheists durft never venture to affirin, that this regular Syfteme of things refulted from the fortuitous Motions of Atoms at the very first, before they had for a long time together produced many, other inept Combinations, or aggregate

Forms

Part I. Forms of particular things and nonfenfical Systems of the whole, and they fuppos'd also that the regularity of things here in this World would not always continue fuch neither, but that some time or other Confufion and Diforder will break in again. Moreover, that befides this World of ours, there are at this very inftant innumerable other Worlds irregular, and that there is but one of a thousand or ten thousand among the infinite Worlds that have fuch regularity in them; the reafon of all which is, because it was generally taken for granted, and look'd upon us as a common Notion, that a'm' nixus

αυτομάτὲ ἐδὲν ἀεὶ ἔτω γίνεται, as Arifotle expreffeth it; none of thofe things which are from Fortune or Chance come to pafs always alike. But our mechanick Theifts will have their Atoms never fo much as once to have fumbled in these their Motions, nor to have produc'd any inept Syftem, or incongruous forms at all, but from the very first all along to have taken up their Places, and ranged themfelves fo orderly, methodically and directly, as that they could not poffibly have done it better had they been directed by the moft perfect Wisdom. Wherefore thefe Atomick Theifts utterly evacuate that grand Argument for a God, taken from the Phanomenon of the Artificial frame of things, which hath been fo much infifted upon in all Ages, and which commonly makes the ftrongeft impreffion of any other upon the Minds of Men, &c. the Atheists in the mean time laughing in their "Sleeves,and not a little triumphing to fee theCause

of

of Theifm thus betray'd by its profefs'd Friends and Afferters, and the grand Argument for the fame totally flurr'd by them, and fo their work done, as it were, to their hands.

Now as this argues the greatest Infenfibility of Mind, or Sottifhnefs and Stupidity in pretended Theifts, not to take the leaft notice of the regular and artificial Frame of things, or of the Signatures of the Divine Art and Wifdom in them, nor to look upon the World and things of Nature with any other Eyes than Oxen and Horfes do. So are there many Phanomena in Nature, which bcing partly above the force of thefe mechanick Powers, and partly contrary to the fame, can therefore never be falv'd by them, nor without final Caufes and fome vital Principles: As for example, that of Gravity or the Tendency of Bodies downward, the Motion of the Diaphragm in Refpiration, the Syftole and Diaftole of the Heart, which is nothing but a Mufcular Conftriction and Relaxation, and therefore not mechanical, but vital. We might alfo add, among many others, the Interfection of the Plains of the Equator and Ecliptick, or the Earth's diurnal Motion upon an Axis not parallel to that of the Ecliptick, nor perpendicular to the Plain thereof: For tho' Des Cartes would needs imagine this Earth of ours once to have been a Sun, and fo it felf the Centre of a leffer Vortex, whofe Axis was then directed after this manner, and which therefore ftill kept the fame Site or Pofture, by reafon of the.flriate Particles finding no fit Pores or Traces for their paffages through

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