what courfe to take. The probability of fafety in the main would ftill be upon the fide of virtue; and there would ftill be reafon to fear that vice and irregularity would end ill. This alone would be enough to keep wife and confiderate beings to their duty, as far as known. But our condition is very different; and our knowledge of all neceffary truth fufficiently clear, extenfive and certain.

The Being and Attributes of God established as the Foundation of Morality.

NOTHING is more indifputable than

that fomething now exifts. Every perfomething

fon may fay to himfelf, I certainly exift: for "I feel that I exift. And I could neither feel

that I exift, nor be deceived in imagining it, "if I was nothing. If, therefore, I exift, the

next question is, How I came to be?" Whatever exifts, muft owe its being, and the particular circumftances of it, to fome caufe prior to itfelf, unless it exifts neceffarily. For a being to exift neceffarily, is to exist so as that it was impoffible for that being not to have exifted, and that the fuppofition of its not exifting should imply a direct contradiction in terms. Let any perfon try to conceive of fpace and duration as annihilated, or not exifting, and he will find it impoffible, and that they will ftill return upon his

mind in fpite of all his efforts to the contrary. Such an existence therefore is neceffary, of which there is no other account to be given, than that it is the nature of the thing to exift; and this account is fully fatisfying to the mind.

Whatever difficulty we may find in conceiving of the particular modus of a neceffary existence; an existence, which always was, and could not but be; always continuing, but which never had a beginning; as all the difficulty of fuch conceptions évidently arifes from the narrowness of our finite and limited minds, and as our reason forces us upon granting the reality and neceffity of them, it would be contradicting the most irrefiftible convictions of our reafon, to difpute them; and it is indeed out of our power to dispute them.

To have recourfe to an infinite' fucceffion of dependent caufes, produced by one another from eternity, and to give that as an account of the existence of the world, will give no fatisfaction to the mind; but will confound it with an infinite abfurdity. For if it be abfurd to attempt to conceive of one fingle dependent being, produced without a caufe, or exifting without being brought into exiftence by fome pre-exiftent caufe; it is infinitely more fo, to try to conceive of an infinite feries of dependent beings exifting without being produced, by any original and uncreated caufe; as it would be more fhock

ing

ing to talk of a thousand links of a chain hanging upon nothing, than of one.

That the material world is not the firft caufe, is evident, because the first cause, existing neceffarily, without which neceffity he could not poffibly exist, as a firft caufe, must be abfolutely perfect, unchangeable, and every where the fame, of which afterwards. This, we fee, is by no means to be affirmed of the material world; its form, motion, and substance, being endlessly various, and fubject to perpetual change. That nothing material could have been the neceffarily exiftent first cause is evident, because we know, that all material fubftances confift of a number of unconnected and feparable particles; which would give, not one, but a number of first causes, which is a palpable abfurdity. And that the firft caufe cannot be one single indivisible atom, is plain, because the firft caufe, being neceffarily exiftent, muft be equally neceffary throughout infinite fpace.

That chance, which is only a word, not a real being, should be the cause of the existence of the world, is the fame as faying, that nothing is the cause of its existence, or that it neither exifts neceffarily, nor was produced by that which exifts neceffarily, and therefore does not exist at all. Therefore, after fuppofing ever fo long a feries of beings producing one another, we must at laft have recourfe to fome Firft Caufe of all, himself uncaufed, exifting neceffarily, or fo, as

that

that the fuppofition of his not existing would imply a contradiction. This firft caufe we call God.

The first cause muft of neceffity be one, in the most pure, fimple, and indivifible manner. For the first caufe muft exift neceffarily, that is, it is a direct abfurdity to fay, that fomething now exists, and yet there is no original first cause of existence. Now, when to avoid this abfurdity, we have admitted one independent, neceffarily-exiftent, first cause, if we afterwards proceed to admit another first cause, or number of first causes, we fhall find, that all but one are fuperfluous. Becaufe one is fufficient to account for the exiftence of all things. And as it will evidently be no contradiction to suppose any one out of a plurality not to exist, since one alone is fufficient; it follows that there can be but one single first cause.

Befides, it will be made evident, by and by, that the first cause must be abfolutely perfect, in every poffible respect, and in every poffible degree. Now that which ingroffes and swallows up into itself ail poffible perfection, or rather, is itfelf abfolute perfection, can be but one; because there can be but one abfolute Whole of perfection.

We may poffibly, through inattention, commit mistakes with refpect to what are, or are not, perfections fit to be afcribed to the first caufe, as fome of the Heathens were abfurd enough to

afcr.be

afcribe even to their fupreme deity attributes which ought rather to be termed vices than virtues. But we can never mistake in ascribing to the Supreme Being all poffible, real, and confiftent perfections. For a Being, who exifts naturally and neceffarily, muft of neceffity exift in an infinite and unbounded manner, the ground of his existence being alike in all moments of duration, and all points of space. Whatever exifts naturally and neceffarily in the East, must of courfe exift naturally and neceffarily in the Weft, in the South, and in the North, above and below, in former, prefent, and in future times. Whatever exists in this manner, exifts in a perfect manner. Whatever exifts in a perfect manner, in respect of extent and duration, must evidently be perfect in every other respect, of which its nature is capable. For the whole idea of fuch a Being is by the fuppofition natural and neceffary; a partial neceffity being an evident absurdity. That the first cause therefore fhould be deficient in any one perfection confiftent with the nature of such a Being as we must conclude the first cause to be, is as evident a contradiction, as to say that the firft caufe may naturally and neceffarily exist in the East, and not in the Weft, at prefent, but not in time paft, or to come. For fuppofe it were argued, that the first cause may not be infinite, for example, in wisdom; I afk firft, Whether wifdom can be faid to be a

property