A CONFUTATION OF ATHEISM FROM THE ORIGIN AND FRAME OF THE WORLD. PART I. SERMON VI. Preached October the 3d, 1692. Acts xiv. 15-17. That ye should turn from these vanities unto the living God, who made heaven and earth, and the fea, and all things that are therein: who in times paft fuffered all nations to walk in their own ways. Nevertheless, he left not himself without witness, in that he did good, and gave us rain from heaven, and fruitful feafons, filling our hearts with food and gladness. ALL the arguments that can be brought, or can be demanded, for the existence of God, may, perhaps not abfurdly, be reduced to three general heads: the first of which will include all the proofs from the vital and intelligent portions of the universe, the organical bodies of the various animals, and the immaterial fouls of men. men. Which living and understanding substances, as they make incomparably the most confiderable and noble part of the naturally known and visible creation; so they do the most clearly and cogently demonftrate to philofophical enquirers the neceffary felf-existence, and omnipotent power, and unfearchable wifdom, and boundless beneficence of their Maker. This firft topic therefore was very fitly and divinely made ufe of by our Apostle in his conference with philofophers and that inquifitive people of Athens: the latter spending their time in nothing elfe, but either to tell or hear Some new thing; and the other, in nothing, but to call in question the most evident truths that were delivered and received of old. And these arguments we have hitherto pursued in their utmoft latitude and extent. So that now we shall proceed to the second head, or the proofs of a Deity from the inanimate part of the world; fince even natural reason, as well as holy Scripture, affures us, b that the heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament Sheweth his handy-work; that he made the earth by his power, he hath established the world by his wisdom, and hath ftretched out the heaven by his understanding; that he commanded, and they were created; he hath C a Chap. xvii. 2. b Pfal. xix. 1. Jer. li. 15. d Pfal. cxlviii. 5, 6. alfo alfo eftablished them for ever and ever; he covereth the heaven with clouds, he prepareth rain for the earth, fhe crowneth the year with his goodness. These reasons for God's exiftence, from the frame and fyftem of the world, as they are equally true with the former, so they have always been more popular and plaufible to the illiterate part of mankind; infomuch as the 8 Epicureans, and fome others, have observed, that men's contemplating the most ample arch of the firmament, the innumerable multitude of the stars, the regular rifing and setting of the fun, the periodical and conftant viciffitudes of day and night, and feafons of the and the other affections of meteors and heavenly bodies, was the principal and almost only ground and occafion that the notion of a God came firft into the world: making no mention of the former proof from the frame year, e Pfal. cxlvii. 8. f Pfal. lxv. II. Præterea, cœli rationes ordine certo, Et varia annorum cernebant tempora vérti. Lucret. v. 1182. Id. vi. 57. Quis hunc hominem dixerit, qui cum tam certos cœli motus, tam ratos aftrorum ordines, &c. Cic. de Nat. Deor. lib. ii. ☺sẽ yàg ἔννοιαν ἔσχον ἀπὸ τῶν φαινομένων ἀσέρων, ὁρῶντες τούτες μεγάλης συμφωνίας ὄντας αἰτίες, καὶ τεταγμένας ἡμέραντε καὶ νύκτα, χειμῶνά τε nai Digos, ávaτorás te xai dvoμás. Plutarch. de Plac. Phil. i. 6. of of human nature, that in God we live, and move, and have our being. Which argument being so natural and internal to mankind, doth nevertheless (I know not how) seem more remote and obfcure to the generality of men; who are readier to fetch a reason from the immense distance of the starry heavens and the outmost walls of the world, than feek one at home, within themselves, in their own faculties and constitutions. So that hence we may perceive how prudently that was waved, and the second here infifted on by St. Paul to the rude and fimple femi-barbarians of Lycaonia: he left not himself without witness, in that he did good, and gave us rain from heaven, and fruitful feafons, filling our hearts with food and gladness. Which words we shall now interpret in a large and free acceptation; fo that this fecond theme may comprehend all the brute inanimate matter of the universe, as the former comprised all visible creatures in the world, that have understanding, or sense, or vegetable life. These two arguments are the voices of nature, the unanimous fuf-. frages of all real beings and substances created, that are naturally knowable without revelation. And if, laftly, in the third place, we can evince the divine exiftence from the adjuncts and circumstances of human life; if we find in all ages, in all civilized nations, an universal belief and worship of a divinity; if we find many unquestionable records of fupernatural and miraculous effects; if we find many faithful relations of prophecies punctually accomplished; of prophecies fo well attefted, above the fufpicion of falfehood; fo remote, and particular, and unlikely to come to pass, beyond the poffibility of good gueffing, or the mere forefight of human wisdom; if we find a most warrantable tradition, that at fundry times and in divers manners God Spake unto mankind by his Prophets, and by his Son, and his Apoftles, who have delivered to us in facred writings a clearer revelation of his divine nature and will: if, I say, this third topic from human teftimony be found agreeable to the standing vote and attestation of naturè, what further proofs can be demanded or defired? What fuller evidence can our adversaries require, fince all the claffes of known beings are fummoned to appear? Would they have us bring more witnesses than the all of the world? and will they not ftand to the grand verdict and determination of the univerfe? They are incurable infidels, that perfift to deny a Deity; when all creatures in the world, as well fpiritual as corporeal, all from human race to the loweft of infects, from the cedar of Libanus to the mofs upon the wall, from the vast globes of the fun and planets to the smallest particles of duft, do declare their abfolute N |