SER M. deed, the greatest certainty we have is in the

I.

clear perception of an agreement between our own abftract ideas; fo that a concurring perfuafion concerning propofitions form'd of fuch ideas, and concerning rational deductions from them, has the best appearance of being founded on truth, because in them men are least obnoxious to deception.

There have been however fome, very few of mankind in comparison, who have profeffedly denied the being of God, and pretended to account for the formation of the world, and all the phænomena of nature, without Him. These men ridicule the common belief as fuperftitious, proceeding wholly from ignorance of caufes, political fiction, customary tradition, or the paffion of fear, which often produces groundless imaginations, I may afterwards have occafion to examine these pretences. In the mean time without refting this first principle of all religion on the prefumption in its favour, taken from the general confent of mankind, or any other prefumptions, however strong, I shall proceed directly to establish it by clear evidence of reason, in the method which appears to

me

the moft fimple and natural. be obferved,

Only let it

That

I.

That the notions of men, concerning the SER M. Deity and his Attributes, have been very confused, and their opinions widely different, even theirs who agree in the profeffed belief of his Being: Some have declared themselves unable to form any idea of fubftance distinct from body; and therefore concluded, that as the human foul is only a fubtile kind of matter, or a particular modification of it, fo God himself is corporeal. This way of thinking, tho' very grofs, is plainly discover'd in the writings of the celebrated ftoic philosophers, mixt at the fame time with noble fentiments, concerning the Divine moral perfections and providence. Some conceived that the creation of material substance was abfolutely impoffible, tho' it is entirely subject to the disposal of active intelligence; and that therefore it must be coeval with the fupreme Being, whom they imagined to be the eternal foul of an eternal universe. Others feem to have deny'd the unity of the Godhead, at least, they divided their worship among a plurality of divine beings, fo called; tho' 'tis probable, the Polytheism of the Gentiles is to be understood, concerning a multiplicity of inferior agents in the Divine administration, or minuting spirits, all subject to the one Supreme. Others again, have fo perplex'd the doctrine of the Divine

eter

I.

SERM. eternity and immensity, as to render them unintelligible. But above all, the errors concerning the moral perfections, as they are most pernicious, have been the most frequent in the world, the Chriftian world itself not altogether excepted. Not to mention the Gods of Epicurus, which he imagined, or pretended to have imagined, to be a kind of indolent happy things, neither the makers nor rulers of any thing, but like other beings, made out of atoms by accident: I fay, pretended to have imagined; for it is not unlikely that part of his scheme was a complement to the religion of mankind, or rather a fneer, such as is not unusual with writers of his fort. The heathens had, many of them, very abfurd conceptions of the morals of their inferior gods; and Jupiter himself was far from being perfectly pure and good. There are, even among those who have the best means of instruction, very gross opinions, and of a dangerous tendency, concerning the justice and goodness of God, and the measures of his government over moral agents; which it is needlefs now to infift on more particularly.

The use I shall make at present of this observation, is, to avoid at our entrance on this fubject, a particular definition of the Deity, by enumerating all the perfections, which I

hope

I.

hope we shall, in the sequel, fee reason to at- SERM. tribute to him, because the present controverfy is only with Atheists, not with any, even of the most imperfect Theifts. Befides, I think, in fuch an inquiry, we ought to begin with the plaineft principles, that having once feen them established with clear evidence, we may then proceed to points less obvious. Thus, if it firft appears by convincing proof, that there is an intelligent defigning cause in the universe, to which the order and appearances of it are to be ascribed, we may thence take our rife to the confideration of the characters of that cause, and so by degrees advance to the most compleat notion of God which we can form.

I fhall therefore confider the subject before us in the fimpleft view, and begin with an inquiry into the true cause of the visible frame of nature, ftating the queftion, as it thus plainly ftands between us and our adverfaries, Whether the material world, with its principal and most obvious phænomena which fall under our obfervation, is formed and guided by mere chance, or blind neceffity, (which are the different hypothefes of Atheism) and I shall examine them feverally: Or, if on the contrary, it was produced by, and is under the direction of an active, understanding, and intending Caufe?

In

SERM.

I.

In order to this, let us firft confider the ideas of intelligence and activity, of cause and effect, and of neceffity and chance, which arife in our minds, by attending to what paffes in them, and by obferving what our fenfes inform us of, in the ordinary course of things. Perception is always and neceffarily accompanied with consciousness. That a man fees and hears, and remembers and understands, and reafons, and defires, and wills, needs no proof to him, nor indeed is capable of any; nothing being fo evident to his mind, not the very exiftence of any thing without him; nor is it poffible, without consciousness, to convince a man of any operation or perception in his own mind. Our agency, from an inward felf-determining principle, is as well known to us, as our paffive perceptions are: As we cannot help seeing, hearing, perceiving pleasure upon fome occafions, and pain upon others, whether external or internal; we are as fenfible that we can, without a consciousness of any neceffity impelling, turn our attention to one object in preference to another; we can recal the ideas which have been formerly in our minds; we can variously affociate them, compare and examine their relations to each other; conscious that these operations do not