SERM. tion of bare poffibility beyond the compass of VI. known exiftence, is a poor refuge, unworthy of a fair reasoner, when the inquiry is concerning what has actually existed. If it be certain beyond all rational contradiction, that fomething has exifted from everlasting, and there is no difficulty or pretence of argument against the eternity of intelligence, but what is equally against the eternity of any existence whatever; and if it be alfo certain, that there is nothing we can difcern or fix our thoughts upon in the whole circle of being, but what, in the production and the frame of it, must be attributed to intelligence in the Cause, so that it must be acknowledg'd prior to the whole known univerfe; the conclufion feems to be very evident that intelligence is abfolutely eternal. Besides, the very fame reasoning which demonstrates that something must have exifted from eternity, proves also that understanding is eternal, or without beginning. For as Non-entity could never have produc'd being, fo unintelligent Being could never have produc'd understanding. To imagine it, is the fame abfurdity, as in the other cafe, to imagine an effect without a cause. And not to infift on this, which yet is very plain to any attentive mind, that to deny intelligence to a Cause, Cause, is really to deny caufality or efficiency SER M. altogether, there being properly no caufe but VI. a voluntary and defigning, that is, an intelligent one; the tranfition is as great, (and requires no less power to effect it,) from mere fenseless inanimate being to intellectual capacities, as from nothing to existence. And Laftly, to deny intelligence to the first Cause, or, which amounts to the fame, to say that fomething unintelligent existed before it, and produc'd it, is to attribute the order and all the appearances of the world to chance, or neceffity, or to nothing, if not immediately, yet remotely; that is, to run directly into Atheism, which has been already refuted; or at least into as great an abfurdity as any Atheist has ever yet advanced, namely, that indeed intelligence produc'd the regular system of the universe, but mere hazard or undefigning neceffity, as a præ-existent Cause, produc'd intelligence. Laftly, The active intelligence which form'd the world, and ftill governs it, is seated in one eternal Mind; the effects of it are diffus'd through the whole extent of being; and there is no one appearance in the universal system of nature in which it is not manifefted, and which is not under its direction; but the fource is one everlafting fpring of thought, one conscious understanding principle. This 'I fhall 6 SERM. I fhall take for granted as already prov'd. For VI. if there be one Caufe of all things, in whom they confift, form'd by his fovereign power and wisdom, into a regular whole under his fupreme abfolute dominion, it must be acknowledged that he is before all things. The Atheistic fcheme agrees with ours in acknowledging eternity; nay, the human understanding muft neceffarily acknowledge it, it being impoffible for it, as was before obferv'd, to remove from itfelf the idea of eternal duration. It is agreed farther, that fomething has exifted from eternity; but that scheme fixes on no individual permanent being to which the character of eternal belongs, unless it be chance or neceffity, which are only confus'd general notions, rather empty infignificant names; and with respect to individual beings, eternity is the attribute of none, but belongs to a feries of feparate existences; which is at least as difficult to conceive as the everlasting duration of a fingle abfolutely perfect being. But if it be true, and it has been prov'd, that the character eternal must be afcrib'd to the one intelligent Caufe of all things, this leads us to the idea of a peculiar condition or manner of existence. While it is undetermined to a certain object in our thoughts, and unappropriated to a fingular exiftence, it seems to be appre 191 apprehended no otherwise than as a long con- SER M. tinuance, or as duration in general, which is VI. common to all beings, not distinguished by any differences in their nature; it belongs just the fame way to the most excellent and the most contemptible of all things. But the idea of eternity, as folely the attribute of one intelligent Being, carries in it what must appear to our minds grand, and attractive of a special veneration, as fhall be afterwards obferv'd. In the mean time this leads me to what I pos'd in the next place, pro Secondly, To fhew what feem to be the most proper, tho' they are imperfect conceptions, we can form of the Divine eternity. And First, it includes felf-existence, neceffary exiftence, and independence. These are characters of the fupreme Being, of which we have very imperfect and inadequate ideas, because there is nothing that we are confcious of in ourselves, nor does any thing appear in the objects we perceive by our fenfes, and from these fources are deriv'd all the first materials of our knowledge; there is nothing, I fay, that we know, which bears the leaft refemblance to the felf-existence, neceffary existence, and independence of the Deity, or can give us any notion of them. The felf-existence of God is not to be undeftood SERM. in this positive sense, that he produc'd himVI. felf, or was the cause of his own being; for that is evidently an abfurdity, fuppofing him |