for the actions of our lives. It fhall next be shewn under what obligation it is that natural religion lays us, and wherein (as the world now ftands) that natural religion is deficient, and how this deficiency in it is to be accounted for, confiftently with the divine wisdom and goodnefs. This will naturally prepare the way for our feeing how the Chriftian Revelation was expedient and even ncceffary; and then it may be proper to confider what marks there are of its divine authority, that we may know upon what grounds we receive it, and what benefits it conveys to all faithful believers.

This is the fcheme which I intend to purfue, and to begin with that point upon which all religion turns, the existence of a God; not that I fufpect any here present to have their minds fo far darkened as to doubt of so plain a truth: but because, plain as it is, the arguments by which we come at the conclufion, are not always fo clearly feen or fo well remembered, as they fhould be, by men who are not accustomed to think closely and deeply upon fuch refined enquiries.

The being of a God is a truth fo furẻ, that a man of weak parts would not give it up to

one of the strongest and most exercised understanding he may perhaps be puzzled and unable to maintain the proofs, but he cannot eafily be made to lofe fight of the great and convincing truth, viz. that there is fuch a being in the universe, the Father and Creator, the Preferver and Governor of all things and - yet still it is not enough that we are fure of it, unless we are fure upon good authority of reafon; for it would grieve a good man in a dispute with an Atheist (if he should chance to meet with fuch a one) not to be able to convince him of his folly, and to fet up a good defence in the best cause that can be in

nature.

For this reafon I fhall begin with an enquiry into the existence of a God, a being independent of all other beings,and upon which all other beings wholly depend.

The invifible things of God, fays the Apostle in the text, viz. his eternal power and godhead are fo clearly feen, from his having created the world, that fuch as deny his eternal power and godhead are without excufe. And that I may prove the truth of this affertion in the best and plainest manner, I fhall, in the first place, obferve

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obferve that we ourfelves exift, that is, we live, and move, and have a being; a question then arifes, which reafon directs us to afk, how came we here? whence have we this life, this motion, and this being? I do not fpeak of individuals; for every man can readily anfwer, that he derived his being from his parents but I fpeak of the whole race of mankind, the whole number of men in all ages and countries: now with refpect to mankind in general, the only answer that can be given to the queftion, is, either, that there has been from all eternity an infinite fucceffion of men derived one from another, without any original caufe at all; or, that from all eternity there has existed some other Being, which was the original cause of the beginning of mankind. Only one of these two anfwers can poffibly be given, and therefore, if the firft fhall appear not to be the true one, it will follow that the latter of the two muft be fatisfactory.

I fhall, therefore, in the fecond place, endeavour to prove, that there has not been from all eternity an infinite fucceffion of men produced one from another, without any original caufe of

their production. And of this there are two kinds of proof, the one from the nature, the other from the circumftance of the thing.

From the nature of the thing, it may be feen, by confidering, that men at prefent, and as far back as history furnishes us with any account of things, are produced one from another by generation: every fon had a father, and that father stood in the fame relation to fomebody before him : and if we could reckon back through thousands, or even millions of ages, the cafe must have been the very fame. Now it can never be conceived probable, or indeed poffible, that there fhould be no beginning to the whole number of mankind, when it is fo plain, that every particular man, every fingle part, of which that number is composed, had a vifible cause and beginning of its existence. There is no better, or furer way, to argue about the nature of the whole of any thing, than by taking a view of its parts; because every part fhares in the nature of the whole; it is not different and diftinct from it, but only fo much less than the amount comes to. Would we, for instance, know the nature of fire? what other way do B 3

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we, or can we take, than to obferve the effential properties of that which is before us? and, finding them out, from thence we conclude, and very rationally too, that such now are, and ever were the effential properties of fire in general. It is fo in the cafe before us; what is diftant from us in point of time is on the fame footing in this respect with what is distant from us in point of place: because no particular man exifts without a prior cause, therefore, the whole race of men, who are all of the fame nature, did not from all eternity exist without an original caufe.

To fupport this mode of reafoning, we have another kind of proofs drawn, as I said, from the circumftances of the thing.

For, first, we have the general consent of all the most ancient writers in favour of this notion, that mankind began to exist at fome period of time. Many of the Heathen Philofophers, especially the earliest, taught “that "God made the world out of water. doctrine which plainly attributes a beginning to mankind. And this opinion of theirs, that the world was framed out of water, feems to a Tillotson, vol. 1. fol. p. 8, 9. Cic. de Nat. Deor. l. 1. c. 10.

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