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exiftent and Unproduc'd: For Ariftotle dothonot deny God to be the efficient Caufe of the World but only afferts, that he created it from Eter+ nity, making him a neceffary Cause thereof; it proceeding from him by Way of Emanation, as Light from the Sun., wo

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This Hypothefis, which hath fome Shew of Reafon, for fomething muft neceffarily exist of itfel; and if fomething why may not all Things? This Hypothefis, I fay, is fo clearly and fully confuted by the Reverend and Learned Dr. Tillotson, late Lord Archbishop of Canter bury, and Primates of all England, in his first printed Sermon; and the Right Reverend Ea ther in God, John, late Lord Bishop of Chester, in Book I. Chap. V. of his Treatife of the Principles of Natural Religion, that nothing material can by me be added: To whom there fore I refer the Reader.

The Epicurean Hypothefis rejected.h quali

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The fecond Hypothefis is that of the Epicureans, who held, that there were two Principles felf-exiftent. First, Space, or Vacuity; Secondly, Matter, or Body; both of infinite Duration and Extenfion. In this infinite. Space, or Vacuity, which hath neither Beginning, nor End, nor Middle, no Limits, or Extreams, innumerable minute Bodies, into which the Matter was divided, call'd Atoms, becaufe by Reafon of their perfect Solidity they were really indivifible (for they hold no Body capable of Di

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vifion,

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vifion, but what hath Vacuities interfpers'd
with Matter, of various but a determinate Ñum-
ber of Figures, and equally ponderous, do per-
pendicularly defcend, and by their fortuitous
Concourfe make compound Bodies, and at last
the World itself. But now, because if all these
Atoms fhould defcend plum down with equal
Velocity, as according to their Doctrine they
ought to do, being (as we faid) all perfectly
folid and imporous, and the Vacuum not refifting
their Motion, they would never the one over-
take the other, but like the Drops of a Shower
would always keep the fame Distances, and fo
there could be no Concourfe, or Cohæfion of
them, and confequently nothing created; partly
to avoid this deftructive Confequence, and
partly to give fome Account of the Freedom
of Will (which they did affert contrary to the
Democratick Fate) they did abfurdly feign a De-
clination of fome of thefe Principles, without
any Shadow, or Pretence of Reafon. The former
of thefe Motives you have fet down by Lucre-
tius de Nat. Rerum, L. 2. in thefe Words:

Corpora cum deorfum rectum per inane feruntur
Ponderibus propriis, incerto Tempore fortè,
Incertifque locis, Spatio difcedere paulùm ;
Tantum quod nomen mutatum dicere poffis.
And again,

Quod nifi declinare folerent, omnia deorfum
Imbris uti gutta caderent per inane profundum,
Nec foret offenfus natus, nec plaga creata
Principiis, ita nil unquam natura creâsset.

Now

Now Seeds in downward Motion must decline,
Tho' vary little from th' exacteft Line;
For did they still move ftrait, they needs must
fall
Like Drops of Rain, diffolv'd and scatter'd all,
For ever tumbling thro' the mighty Space,
And never join to make one fingle Mafs.

The second Motive they had to introduce this gratuitous Declination of Atoms, the fame Poet gives us in these Verses, Lib. 2.

Si femper motus connectitur omnis,

Et vetere exoritur femper novus ordine certo; Nec declinando faciunt primordia motûs Principium quoddam quod fati fœdera rumpat, Ex infinito nè caufam caufa fequatur;

Libra per terras unde hæc animantibus, extat,
Unde hæc eft, inquam, fatis avolja voluntas?

Befides, did all Things move in direct Line,
And still one Motion to another join
In certain Order, and no Seeds decline,
And make a Motion fit to diffipate

}

The well-wrought Chains of Causes and strong Fate;

Whence comes that Freedom living Creatures find?

Whence comes the Will fo free, fo unconfin'd, Above the Power of Fate?

The Folly and Unreasonableness of this ridiculous and ungrounded Figment, I cannot bet

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ter display and reprove than in the Words of Cicero, in the Beginning of his first Book De Finibus Bonorum & Malorum. This Declination (faith he) is altogether childishly feign'd, and yet neither doth it at all folve the Difficulty, or effect what they defire: For, first, They fay the Atoms decline, and yet affign no Reason why. Now nothing is more fhameful and unworthy a Natural Philofopher [turpius Phyfico] than to affert any thing to be done without a Caufe, or to give no Reafon of it. Befides, this is contrary to their own Hypothefis taken from Sense, that all Weights do naturally move perpendicularly downwards. Secondly, Again fuppofing this were true, and that there were fuch a Declination of Atoms, yet will it not effect what they intend; for either they do all decline, and fo there will be no more Concourfe than if they did perpendicularly defcend; or fome decline, and fome fall plum down, which is ridiculously to affign diftinct Offices and Tasks to the Atoms, which are all of the fame Nature and Solidity. Again, in his Book De Fato, he smartly derides this fond Conceit thus; What Cause is there in Nature which turns the Atoms afide? Or do they caft Lots among themselves which fhall decline, which not? Or why do they decline the leaft Interval that may be, and not a greater? why not two or three minima as well as one? Optare hoc quidem eft non difputare. For neither is the Atom by any extrinsical Impulse diverted from its natural Courfe; neither can there be any Cause imagin'd in the Vacuity through which

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which it is carried, why it fhould not move directly; neither is there any Change made in the Atom it felf, that it fhould not retain the Motion natural to it, by Force of its Weight or Gravity.

As for the whole Atomical Hypothefis, either Epicurean or Democritick, I shall not, nor need I, fpend Time to confute it; this having been already folidly and fufficiently done by many learned Men, but efpecially Dr. Cudworth, in his Intellectual Syftem of the Universe, and the late Bishop of Worcester, Dr. Stillingfleet, in his Origines Sacra. Only I cannot omit the Ciceronian Confutation thereof, which I find in the Place first quoted, and in the first and fecond Books De Naturâ Deorum, because it may serve as a general Introduction to the following Particulars. Such a turbulent Concourfe of Atoms could never, (faith he) bunc mundi ornatum efficere, compofe fo well-order'd and beautiful a Structure as the World; which therefore both in Greek and Latin hath from thence [ab ornatu & munditie] obtain'd its Name. And again most fully and appofitely in his fecond De Nat. Deorum: If the Works of Nature are better, more exact and perfect, than the Works of Art, and Art effects nothing without Reason, neither can the Works of Nature be thought to be effected without Reafon; for, is it not abfurd and incongruous, that when thou beholdeft a Statue or curious Picture, thou should'ft acknowledge that Art was us'd to the making of it; or when thou feest the Course of a Ship upon the Waters, thou

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