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establish, and the arguments by which they support them; never admitting any thing on mere philosophical authority, however high, unless supported by reasoning perfectly intelligible to yourself and convincing to your own judgment; nor rashly rejecting any thing, till you have again and agam considered it, merely because you find some difficulty in comprehending the evidence on which it is said to rest. When you have completed these previous studies, you may with advantage enter on the study of Natural Theology; and it shall be my endeavour to direct you in the prosecution of it in some future letter.

LETTER III.

REMARKS ON SOME CELEBRATED SYSTEMS OF NATURAL THEOLOGY.

So much has been written on Natural Theology, that it would require almost a whole life to read one-half of the treatises on this important subject. Such extensive reading, however, is by no means necessary; for the great object of the study is to teach the young divine to deduce for himself, from the phenomena of nature, that which "may be known of God," and which we are assured is manifest in these phenomena; "for the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead !" A few standard works, as guides in the prosecution of this study, are, I think, all that you have occasion to peruse; and by much the most valuable of these, with which I am acquainted, are Paley's Natural Theology, Bentley's Sermons, being the first set preached at Boyle's Lecture; Dr Clarke's Demonstration

of the Being and Attributes of God; Archbishop King's Essay on the Origin of Evil, translated by Bishop Law, and Wollaston's Religion of Nature Delineated. All these are indeed worthy of the most attentive perusal, though not perhaps exactly in the order in which they were published, but concluding with Dr Paley's admirable work.

Dr Clarke's propositions being, I think, more scientifically arranged than Mr Wollaston's, it may be convenient to study the various questions which occur when inquiring into the evidence for the existence and attributes of God, in the order in which they are treated in his far-famed demonstration; and when his reasoning appears inconclusive, or difficult to be understood, which you will frequently find it to be, you may consult King or Wollaston on the same point, and above all the unbiassed meditation of your own mind.

That Dr Clarke was a very great man no one will deny; and I think it will be generally admitted, that, in his three first propositions, he has very clearly demonstrated that there is one unchangeable and independent Being, which has existed from all eternity, and must be self-existent, or, as he chooses to express it, necessarily existent. It is a pity that he introduced into these simple demonstrations, useless, and, as it appears to me, unintelligible discussions on the nature of eternity and immensity, as well as on the necessity of the existence of God. His notions on these subjects have been keenly controverted by a variety of able writers, but by none

more successfully than by Dr Edmund Law, lately Bishop of Carlisle, who has, to my entire conviction, proved them to be either unintelligible or erroneous; and it is chiefly on that account that I recommended to you that prelate's inquiry into the ideas of space, time, and immensity, &c.

In his fourth, fifth, and sixth proposition, Dr Clarke clearly proves that, though the substance or essence of the self-existent Being is utterly incomprehensible by us, it yet cannot be supposed to be matter,* and that the self-existent Being must of necessity be eternal, infinite, and omnipresent; but unfortunately, in his endeavours to show how eternity and immensity was to be conceived, he attempts what no human-perhaps no created intellect can accomplish; and, as the prelate already referred to hath clearly shown, advances notions contradictory and inconsistent with themselves, such as eternity already exhausted, and infinite extension not made up of parts!

In his seventh proposition, he endeavours to demonstrate that the self-existent Being can be but one, and that to suppose two or more self-existent Beings is impossible. That the self-existent Being is really ONE, appears to be in the highest degree pro

* I think this has been more completely proved by Bentley, who doth not perplex either himself or his readers with obscure discussions on the nature of necessary existence; and on that account I would advise you to read Bentley's eight sermons before you enter on the scientific study of Clarke, King, and Wollaston.

bable, from the unity of plan observable in the universe. This has been so perspicuously proved by Dr Paley, as to leave no room for doubt in any candid mind; but, as that judicious writer observes, the whole argument proves nothing more than a unity of counsel. Dr Clarke, however, who had adopted some notions respecting the Holy Trinity not agreeable to the doctrine of the Church, seems to have thought that those notions might be supported by a rigid demonstration that the self-existent Being must, in the strictest sense, be but one; and he attempts to demonstrate this from what he calls the necessity of that Being's existence. But through the whole of his reasoning, he seems to forget that the word necessity, from which he deduces so much, has two meanings; and that in both, it is immediately applicable only to our own thoughts, or the workings of our own mind.

From the indisputable fact that something now exists, he clearly demonstrates that something must have always existed, because it is impossible that any thing could produce itself, or start into existence without any cause. The existence of at least one self-existent Being is therefore said to be necessary, because it is a law of human thought or belief that no effect can be produced without a cause; but, as I have already observed, this necessity is immediately applicable only to ourselves;-we necessarily believe, and cannot do otherwise, that every event or change is an effect, and that every effect must have been produced by some adequate cause.

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