be ingenuous, purfuing fuch analogies as I am able to find, and no farther than they will naturally lead me.

Whether what I have already advanced

your

will appear as fatisfactory to you as it does to me, I cannot tell. If mind be as unbiaffed, as I am willing to hope it is, I think it must make some impreffion; for there is a ftrong natural evidence in favour of the belief of a God, and only fomething incomprehenfible to us, but by no means contrary to evidence, or reafon, against it. And there is something so pleasing in the idea of a fupreme author, and confequently, as I shall show, of a fupreme governor of the world, to virtuous and ingenuous minds, infinitely preferable to the idea of a blind fate, and a fatherless deferted world, that if the mind was only in equilibrio with respect to the argument, it would, in fact, be determined by this bias. A truly ingenuous mind, therefore, will not only decide in favour of the belief of a God, but will fo decide with joy.

I am, &c.

LETTER

LETTER IV.

Of the necessary Attributes of the original Caufe of all Things.

DEAR SIR,

Ν

IN the preceding Letters I hope I have re

moved your greatest difficulties with res spect to the belief of an original intelligent cause of the universe; having proved that, how incomprehenfible foever fuch as Being may be to us, yet that fuch a Being must neceffarily exift. My argument in short was this. There are in the universe innumerable and moft evident marks of defign, and it is direly contrary to all our obfer vation and experience, to fuppofe that it should have come into being without a cause adequate to it, with refpect both to power and intelligence. A Being, therefore, poffeffed of fuch power and intelligence must exift. If this Being, the immediate maker

of

of the univerfe, has not exifted from all eternity, he must have derived his being and powers from one who has; and this originally exiftent and intelligent Being, which the actual existence of the univerfe compels us to come to at laft, is the Being that we call God.

1

It is of no avail to fay, that we have no conception concerning the original existence of fuch a Being, for our having no idea at all of any thing implies no impoffibility, or contradiction whatever. This istmere ignorance, and an ignorance which, circumstanced as we are, we can never overcome and the actual phenomena cannot be accounted for without the fuppofition of fuch a Being. Incomprehenfible as it may be, in ever so many respects, it is an hypothesis that is abfolutely neceffary to account for evident facts. We may, therefore, give what fcope we will to our astonishment, and admiration, yet believe (if we be guided by demonftrative evidence) we muft. And it is a belief mixed with joy. as well as with wonder. Let us now confider what may be either neceffarily inferred,

or is with the greatest probability implied, in the idea of this original caufe of all things.

The first observation I would make is, that this Being must be what we term infinite; that is, fince he is intelligent, there can be no bounds to his intelligence, or he must know all that is capable of being known; and fince he is powerful (his works corresponding to what we call effects of power) his power must be infinite, or capable of producing whatever is poffible in itself.

Since the reason why we cannot help concluding that a man, or any other Being that we are acquainted with, could not be this originally exiftent Being, is the limitation of his knowledge and power (not being capable even of comprehending any thing equal to himself) and fince this must have been the cafe with respect to any other Being, how great fo ever, who had not this felf-comprehenfion, the originally exifting Being muft neceffarily have this power. A Being perfectly comprehending himself and every thing else cannot have knowledge lefs than what may, in one fenfe at leaft, be termed

infinite,

infinite, for it comprehends every thing that exifts. Admitting this, we cannot suppose that it does not likewife extend to every thing that neceffarily follows from all that actually exifts; and after this, we shall not know how to fuppofe that he should not be able to know what would be the result of any pofible exiftence, for we cannot think this to be more difficult than the former.

Befides, in purfuance, in fome measure, of this argument, we cannot help concluding, that a power capable of producing all that actually exifts (so immenfe and wonderful, is what is known of the fyftem of the univerfe) must be equal to any effect that is poffible in itself. At least, if this inference be not strictly necessary, yet, having been compelled to admit the existence of a power fo far exceeding all that we can compre hend, and all that we can imagine, when we even strain our conceptions to form an idea of infinite, we can fee no reafon why it fhould not be actually and ftrictly fo.

Nay, having arrived at the knowledge of a Being who must have the power of selfcompre

I