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purfue reasonable things that are extremely useful, tho' great difficulties fometimes attend them. Hence it is, that the ftudy of Geometry and the practice of the arts depending upon it, is not in the leaft retarded by thofe difficulties attending one propofition, which lie in the road of that science. Land is furveyed upon principles of Geometry, houfes and fhips and mills are built, towns are fortified, and numberless machines for manufactures contrived, all upon the principles of that science. And in this, mankind act wifely; and fo they thould in religion: The plain reasoning, upon which religious truths depend, fhould convince; and the difficul ties fometimes attending them should not ftagger their faith; but only make them modest and humble. They fhould be thankful for the light, which God has given them, and not perverfely extinguish it, thereby to bring all things into chaos, and darkness, and confufion.

To this geometrical difficulty may be added a fimilar cafe in optics. The ingenuous Doctor Barrow in the conclufion of his optic Lectures fays, "before I quit this fubject for good "and all, the fair dealing that I owe both to " you and to truth, obligeth me to acquaint

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you,with a certain untoward difficulty, which "feems directly oppofite to the doctrine I have

been hitherto inculcating, at least admits of "no folution from it. Then he proposes the difficulty, and further remarks. "Nor is our

tenet alone ftruck at by this experiment, but "likewife all others, that ever came to my knowledge are, every whit as much, endan

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* gered by it. But as for me, neither this, "nor any other difficulty, fhall have fo great "influence on me, as to make me renaunce "that, which I know to be manifeftly agree

able to reafon, especially, when, as it here "falls out, the difficulty is founded on the pe-. "culiar nature of a certain odd and peculiar "cafe. For in the prefent cafe fomething pecu "liar lies hid, which being involved in the fubtilty of nature, will perhaps hardly be dif "covered, till fuch time as the manner of vi "fion is more perfectly made known..

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Concerning the very fame cafe, another writer in his treatise of Dioptrics fays, “And so "he (ie. Dr. Barrow) leaves this difficulty to "the folution of others, which I (after fo great "an example) fhall do likewife, but with the "refolution of the fame admirable Author, of

not quitting the true doctrine, which we have "before laid down, for determining the locus "objecti, on account of being preffed by one "difficulty; which feems inexplicable, till a "more intimate knowledge of the vifive fa❝culty be obtained by mortals.

The fame question may be put, and the fame inference made from this cafe, as from the former, which it is needless to repeat: And you are not unacquainted, that this important difficulty is now entirely removed, and the matter fairly explained by a learned Prelate, well known to the world for many ingenious performances, as well as his new theory of vifion; which fhould give us hopes, that fome difficulties now belonging to the fciences may hereafter be explained. ARCHIMEDES

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science; orare already arrived at the honour and station of being wife mafter builders. Ye are now examining the fields of nature, where every object to a philofophic mind demonstrates a felf exiftent BEING, infinitely powerful, wise, and good; the whole creation being as one volume, in which every line expreffes the divine Attributes: For the invifible things of God from the creation of the world are clearly feen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and godhead.

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By natural philofophy alone you are able to anfwer many of the pretenders to atheism. For if one of them afferts that the fupreme being is material, you can fhew from bodies moving in fluids, that there is a vacuum, but the fupreme being is infinite as to fulness, as well as extent, confequently not material: For matter is not infinite as to fulness, fince there is a vacuum. You can alfo fhew that inertnefs is öne of the firft, and moft obvious properties of matter, whereby it ever continues in one state, unless altered by fome impelling or refifting power; confequently it can never begin motion; but the fupreme being must be the author of motion in the world, otherwife there would be no fuch thing as motion at all: Hence is it demonftrated that God is not material.

If it be objected by another to the doctrine of the refurrection of the fame body, that human bodies may pafs into one another, either among those who live upon human flesh, if there be any fuch, or by paffing in food into fuch animals, as are cuftomary food to man

* σοφὸς αρχιτέκτων. 1 Cor. iii. 10.

in either of which cafes, they may feem to become conftituent parts of a body, to which they did not originally belong: you may answer from discoveries in natural philofophy, owing to the fagacity of fome late obfervers of natural things by the help of glaffes; that all living bodies in their firft ftate of existence confift of certain STAMINA, which are folded into a very narrow compafs, yet are capable of a great expansion; and that all that matter which was taken in by food, and which opened their original parts to the fize, which nature intended for them, does not conftitute the parts of a human body which fhall rife.

~For that matter is only a kind of exuviæ, that must be thrown off from the original ftamina which alone will rife.

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The foundation of this reafoning is very plain in moft feeds of plants, which are found to contain in miniature every thing belonging to a full grown state. An acorn is no less than an oak contracted into the fize of a nut: And an oak is no more than an acorn expanded into the fhape and Dimensions of a Tree. This is but confirming and explaining St. Paul's meaning, who replies to the two questions: How are the dead raifed? And with what body do they come? to the firft: How are the dead raised? he answers. Thou Fool that which thou foweft, is not quickened except it die, that is, the body muft firft die: To the second, and with what body do they come? he answers: Thou foweft not that body which shall be, but bare grain, it may chance of wheat, or fome other grain: But God giveth it a body, as it bath

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pleafed bim, and to every feed his own body. That is, in every grain of corn, is contained a minute feminal principle, which is itself the entire blade, and ear; and in due feafon expands itself when all the rest of the grain is corrupted, and dead, that is, the lobe, which being fingle in corn, is almoft peculiar to it. For most feeds have two or more lobes, which fometimes rife in diffimilar leaves; but in corn the fingle lobe dies, and the feminal principle containing the plume and radical, evolves and unfolds itself, into the vifible form of both, fo our prefent mortal and corruptible body may, be but the extraordinary expanfion, of fome minute; hidden, and at prefent infenfible principle, which at the refurrection fhall difcover itself in its proper form.

Thus you fee a confiderable ufe may be made of these kinds of studies even in matters of Re ligion, to which in the opinion of the ignorant they seem to have no relation,

And as natural philofophy affifts you in defending Religion, fo will mathematics alfo. From this science you may answer many of the objections to the myfteries of faith. For if it be required to affent to religious propofitions, though we have not always clear and adequate ideas of things fignified by the terms, this is no more unreasonable, than the affent required to all the propofitions relating to infinity, with which the mathematical science does abound; and which no man converfant in those kind of ftudies ever prefumed to deny. For infinity is equally incomprehenfible to the mind of man See part 2. and Grew's anatome of plants. whether

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