C gination.' Therefore it was, that Xenophanes pleasantly faid,That if Beafts do frame any Gods to themselves, as 'tis likely they do, they make them certainly fuch as themselves are, and glorify themselves in it, as we do.' For why may not a Goofe fay thus, All the Parts of the Univerfe I have an Intereft in, the Earth ferves me to walk upon, the Sun to light me, the Stars have their Influence upon me: I have fuch Advantage by the Winds, and fuch Conveniencies by the Waters: There is nothing that yonder heavenly Roof looks upon fo favourably as me; I am the Darling of Nature. Is it not a Man that treats, lodges and ferves me? 'Tis for me that he both fows and grinds: If he eats me, he does the fame by his Fellow-creature, and fo do I the "Worms that kill and devour him.' As much might be faid by a Crane, and with greater Confidence, upon the Account of the Freedom of his Flight, and the Poffeffion of that fublime and beautiful Region. conciliatrix, et tam fui eft lena ipfa naturao. and wheedling a Bawd, is Nature to herself. fore, by the fame Confequence, the Deftinies are for us; for us is the World; it fhines, it thunders for us; and the Creator and Creatures are all for us f. The Mark and Point at which the Univerfality of Things does aim is this. Look into the Regifter that Philofophy has kept, for two thoufand Years and more, of the Affairs of Heaven: The Gods all that while have neither acted nor fpoken but for Man: She does not allow them any other Consultation or Vacation. But here we find them in War against us. Domitofque Herculea manu Telluris juvenes, unde periculum Saturni veteris . i. e. Tam blanda So flattering, Now there Man imagines that every Thing was made for him. The brawny Sons of Earth, fubdu'd by Hand T 3 e Idem, ibid. c. 27. Where Eufeb. Evang. Prep. lib. xiii. c. 13. f I have known fome Divines, who laid down this Principle for an Article of Faith, and ready to pronounce their Anathema's against any, whọ dared to question it, Hor. lib. ii. Ode 12. v. 6, E. Where the rude Shock did fuch a rattle make, The Gods efpoufing the Quarrels of Mortals. And here we see them participate of our Neptunus muros magnóque emota tridenti Prima tenet ".. i. e. Neptune his maffy Trident did employ, With which he shook the Walls of mighty Troy, The Caunians, jealous of the Authority of their own pe- Hic illius arma, Here lay her Armour; Hic currus fuit1. i. e. here her Chariot stood, O fante Apollo, qui umbilicum certum terrarum obtinesTM : i. e. O facred Phebus, who, with glorious Ray, Pallada Cecropide, Minoïa Creta Dianam, Vulcanum tellus Hipfipylæa colit. Junonem Sparte, Pelopeiadefque Mycena, Pinigerum Fauni Menalis ora caput, Mars Latio venerandus ".. i. c. Th' Athenians Pallas, Cynthia Crete adores, } This has only one Town, or one Family in his Poffef fion: One lives alone, another in Company, either voluntary, or upon Neceffity. Junitaque funt magno templa nepotis avo". i. e. Jove and his Grandfon in the fame Temple dwell. There are fome fo wretched and mean (for the Number amounts to fix and thirty Thousand) that they must pack five or fix together, to pro- Deities. Sorry, vulgar duce one Ear of Corn, and they thence take their feveral Names. Three to the Door, viz. One to the Plank, one to the Hinge, and one to the Threshold. Four to an Infant; Protectors of its Swathing-Clouts, its Pap, and the Breafts which it fucks. Some certain, fome uncertain and doubtful, and fome that are not yet entered Paradise. Quos, quoniam cali nondum dignamur honore, i. e. Whom, fince we yet not worthy think of Heaven, Ovid. Faft. lib. iii. v. 81, &c. • Ovid. Metam. lib. i, Fab. 6, v There T 4 There are amongst them Phyficians, Poets, and Civil Deities. Some middle ones, betwixt the divine and human Nature, Mediators betwixt God and us, adored with a certain fecond and diminutive Sort of Adoration: Infinite in Titles and Offices: Some good, and others ill; fome old and decrepid, and fome that are mortal. For Chryfippus was of Opinion, that, in the last Conflagration of the World, all the Gods were to die but Jupiter: And makes a Thousand Similitudes betwixt God and him. Is he not his Countryman ? Jovis incunabula Creten 9. i. e. Crete noted for Jupiter's Cradle. This is the Excufe we have upon Confideration of this Subject, from Scævola, a High-Priest, and Varro, a great Divine, in their Times: That it is neceffary that the People fhould be ignorant of many Things that are true, and believe many Things that are falfe.' Quum veritatem, qua liberetur, inquirat: Credatur ei expedire, quod fallitur. Seeing he inquires into the Truth, by which he would be made free, 'tis fit he fhould be deceived.’ Human Eyes cannot perceive Things, but by the Forms they know of them. And we do not remember what a Fall poor Phaeton had, for attempting to govern the Reins of his Father's Horfes, with a mortal Hand. The Mind of Man falls into as great a Profundity, and is after the fame Manner bruifed and fhattered by its own Temerity. If you ask Philofophy of what Matter the Sun is? What Anfwer will fhe return, if not, that it is Iron and Stone, or fome other Matter that she makes ufe of? If a Man require of Zeno, What Nature is? An artificial Fire, fays he, proper for Generation, and regularly proceeding. Archimedes, Mafter of that Science, which attributes to itself the Precedency before all others, for Truth and Certainty; fays, the Sun is a God of red-hot Iron. Was not this a fine Imagination, extracted from the inevitable Neceffity of Geometrical De monstrations? Yet not fo inevitable and profitable, but that Socrates thought it was enough to know fo much of 6 W Geometry only, as to measure the Land a Geometry Man bought or fold; and that Polyanus, how far usewho had been a great and famous Master in ful. it, defpifed it, as full of Falfity and manifeft Vanity", after he had once tafted the delicate Gardens of Epicurus. Socrates, in Xenophon, speaking of Anaxagoras, reputed by Antiquity learned above all others in Celestial and Divine Matters, fays, That he had cracked his Brain, ⚫ as all other Men do, who too immoderately fearch into Knowledge of Things which do not appertain to them.' When he made the Sun to be a burning Stone, he did not confider, that a Stone does not shine in the Fire; and, which is worse, that it will there confume. And in * making the Sun and Fire one, that Fire does not turn Complexions black in fhining upon them: That we are able to look steadily upon Fire: And that Fire kills Herbs and Plants. 'Tis Socrates's Opinion, and mine too, That it is the beft Judgment concerning Heaven, not to judge of it at all.' Plato, having occafion in his Timæus, to speak of Dæmons: This Undertaking, fays he, exceeds my Ability. We are therefore to believe thofe Ancients, who have pretended to have been begotten by them.' 'Tis against all Reafon to disbelieve the Children of the Gods, though what they fay fhould not be proved by neceffary or probable Reasons; feeing they engage to fpeak of domeftic and familiar Things. Let us fee if we have a The Sum of little more Light in the Knowledge of Human and Natural Things. Is it not a ridiculous Attempt for us to forge for thofe Things, to which, by our own Confeffion, our Knowledge of Natural Things. our Know ledge "Cic. Acad. Quæft, Xenophon. Mirabilium, lib. iv. fect. 7. c. 2. lib. iv. c. 33. w Id. ibid. c, 6, 7. * Socrates was no great Natural Philofopher, if we may judge, by what he fays of Fire, in Oppofition to the Sun; for who does not know that Fire will blacken the Skin of any Perfon, that fhould stay long very near it; that, at a very fmall Distance, one cannot look upon it fixedly, and that, at a proper Diftance, instead of killing Herbs and Plants, it nourishes them. |