whereby they are fitted to live and move, and be vitally informed by the Soul, is unquesti onably the Workmanship of a moft wife and powerfull and beneficent Maker: To which Almighty Creator, together with the Son and the Hoby Ghoft, be all Honour and Glory and Majesty and Power both now and from henceforth evermore. Amen. FINIS. E A Confutation of Atheilm FROM THE Structure and Origin of Human Bodies. PART I. A SERMON Preached catonics Saint Martin's in the Fields, Being the Third of the Lecture Founded by the Honourable ROBERT BOYLE, Esquire. By RICHARD BENTLEY, M. A. Chaplain to the Right Reverend Father in God, EDWARD, Lord Bishop of Worcester. The Second Edition. LONDON, Printed for H. Mortlock at the Phenix in Imprimatur. Geo. Royfe, R. Rmo in Chrifto Patri ac Dno Do Johanni Archiep. Cantuar. à Sacris Domest. 3 ACTS XVII. 27. That they should feek the Lord,if haply they might feel after him,and find him: though he be not far from every one of us; for in him we Live,and Move,and have our Being. I Livius, Have faid enough in my laft, to fhew the fitness and pertinency of the Apostle's Discourse to the Perfons he address'd to: whereby it fufficiently appears that he was no Babler, as fome of the Athenian Rabble reproached him; not a oneguarój, a busie prating Fellow; as in another language they fay Sermones ferere, and Rumores fe- Plautus. rere in a like mode of Expreffion; that he did not Virgil. talk at random, but was throughly acquainted with the several humors and opinions of his Auditors. And as Mofes was learned in all the Wisdom of the Egyptians, fo it is manifest from this Chapter alone, if nothing else had been now extant, that St. Paul was a great Master in all the Learning of the Greeks. One thing further I fhall obferve from the words of the Text, before I enter upon the Subject which I proposed; That it requires fome Industry and Confideration to find out the Being of God; we must seek the Lord, and feel after him, before we can find him by the Light of Nature. The search indeed A 2 is is not very tedious, nor difficult; He is not far from every one of us; for in him we live,and move, and have our Being. The Confideration of our Mind and Understanding, which is an incorporeal Substance independent from Matter, and the contemplation of our own Bodies, which have all the ftamps and characters of excellent Contrivance; these alone, though we look upon nothing abroad,do very easily and proximately guide us to the wife Author of all things. But however,as we see from our Text, some Thoughts and Meditation are neceffary to it; and a man may poffibly be so stupid, or wilfully ignorant or perverfe, as not to have God in all his thoughts, or to fay in his heart, There is none. And this being obferved, we have an effectual answer to that Cavil of the Atheists; who make it an objection against the Being of God, that they do not discover him without any Application, in spite of their corrupt Wills and debauch'd Understandings. If, fay they, fuch a God as we are told of, had created and formed us,furely he would have left upon our Minds a native and indeleble Infcription of Himself, whereby we must needs have felt him, even without feeking, and believed in him whether we would or no. So that thefe Atheists being conscious to themselves, that they are void of fuch Belief, which (they fay) if God was, would actually and neceffarily be in them, do bring their own wic ked. |