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branch of his FIRST PHILOSOPHY; which casts so malignant a shade over the whole religious World.

He pretends to prove That we have NO ADEQUATE ideas of God's moral attributes, his GOODNESS and JUSTICE, as we have of his natural, his Wisdom and Power. Here let me observe, that his Lordship uses the words, inadequate ideas, and, no ideas, as terms of the same import. And I think, not improperly. I have therefore followed him in the different use of either expression, For the reason of his calling our ideas of God's moral attributes INADEQUATE, is, because he denies, that goodness and justice in God, and goodness and justice amongst Men, are the same IN KIND. But if not the same in kind, we can have NO IDEA of them; because we have no idea of any other kind of goodness and justice.

He lays down these three propositions :

1. That, by METAPHYSICS, or by reasoning à priori, we can gain no knowledge of God at all;

2. That our knowledge of his Attributes is to be acquired only by a contemplation on his WORKS, or by the reasoning à posteriori;

3. That in this way, we can only arrive at the know ledge of his NATURAL Attributes, not of his MORAL.

"It is from the CONSTITUTION OF THE WORLD ALONE (says his Lordship) and from the state of "mankind in it, that we can acquire any ideas of the "divine attributes, or a right to affirm any thing about "them*."

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"The knowledge of the Creator is, on many ac❝counts, necessary to such a creature as man and

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therefore we are made able to arrive by a proper "exercise of our mental faculties, from a knowledge " of God's works to a knowledge of his existence, and "of that infinite POWER and WISDOM which are "demonstrated to us in them. OUR KNOWLEDGE

CONCERNING GOD GOES NO FURTHER *."

"Artificial Theology connects by very problemati"cal reasoning à priori, MORAL ATTRIBUTES, such as we conceive them, and such as they are relatively

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to us, with the physical attributes of God; though "there be no sufficient foundation for this proceeding, nay, though the phænomena are in several cases répugnant t."

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Having thus assured us that the ideas of God's moral attributes are to be got by no consequential reasoning at all, either à priori or à posteriori, the two only ways we have to knowledge; He rightly concludes, that if Man hath such ideas, they were not FOUND but INVENTED by him. And therefore, that nothing might be wanting to the full dilucidation of this curious point, he acquaints us who were the Authors of the FICTION, and how strangely the thing came about.

"Some of the Philosophers (says his Lordship) "having been led by a more full and accurate con"templation of Nature to the knowledge of a supreme "self-existent Being of infinite power and wisdom,

and the first Cause of all things, were not contented "with this degree of knowledge. They MADE 4 "SYSTEM of God's MORAL as well as physical ArTRIBUTES, BY WHICH TO ACCOUNT FOR THE PROCEEDINGS OF HIS PROVIDENCE."

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Vol. IV. p. 86. + Vol. V. p. 316. Vol. IV. p. 48.

These

These Philosophers then, it seems, invented the system of God's moral attributes, in order to account for the difficulties arising from the view of God's moral government. If the World till now had been so dull as to have no conception of these Attributes; his Lordship's Philosophers, we see, made amends ; who were so quick-witted to conceive, and so sharpsighted to find out, the obliquities of a crooked line before they had got any idea of a straight one. For just to this, neither more nor less, does his Lordship's observation amount, that they made a System of God's moral attributes, by which to account for the proceedings of his Providence, Till now, none of us could conceive how any doubts concerning moral Go, vernment could arise but on the previous ideas of the moral attributes of the Governor. This invention of his Lordship's old Philosophers puts me in mind of an ingenious Modern, the curious SANCHO PAN, CHA; who, as his historian tells us, was very inquisitive to discover the author of that very useful invention we call SLEEP for, with this worthy Magistrate, Sleep and good Cheer were the FIRST PHILOSO PHY. Now the things sought after by Sancho and his Lordship, were at no great distance; for if Sleeping began when men first shut their eyes, it is certain the idea of God's Goodness appeared as soon as ever they opened them.

Dr. Clarke's Demonstration of the moral attributes à priori, I shall leave, as his Lordship is pleased to do, in all it's force. If the Doctor's followers think their Master's honour concerned, where his arguments are not, they have a large field and a safe to shew their prowess. I rather choose to undertake the NOBLE PHILOSOPHER on his own terms, without

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without any other arms than the arguments à postegiori. For he is such a Champion for the good Cause, that he not only appoints his Adversaries the Field, but prescribes to them the use of their weapons.

But his Lordship, like other great men, is not easily approached; and when he is, not always fit to be seen. You catch his FIRST PHILOSOPHY, as Butler's Hero did Aristotle's FIRST MATTER, undressed, and without a rag of form; however flaunting and fluttering in FRAGMENTS. To speak plainly, his Lordship's entire neglect or ignorance of Method betrays him into endless repetitions: and, in these, whether for want of precision in his ideas, propriety in his terms, or art in his composition, the question is perpetually changing; and rarely without being new-covered by an equivocal expression. If you add to this, the perpetual contradictions into which he falls, either by defect of memory, excess of passion, or distress of argument, you will allow it to be no easy matter to take him fairly, to know him fully, and to represent him to the best advantage: in none of which offices would I be willingly defective. Indeed, when you have done this, the business is over; and his Lordship's reasoning generally confutes itself.

When I reflect upon what this hath cost me, the reading over two or three bulky volumes to get possession of a single argument; which now you think you hold, and then again you lose; which meets you full when you least expect it; and slips away from you the very moment it promises to do most; when, I say, I reflect upon all this, I cannot but lament the hard luck of the English CLERGY, who, though apparently least fit, as being made Parties; certainly the least concerned,

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concerned, as there is nothing that can impose on a Scholar, though a great deal that may mislead the People, are likely to be the men most engaged with his Lordship in this controversy. Time was, when

if a Writer had a disposition to seek Objections against Religion, though he found them hardly, and urged them heavily, yet he would digest his thoughts, and methodize his reasoning. The Clergy had then nothing to do but to answer him, if they found themselves able. But since this slovenly custom (as Lord SHAFTESBURY calls it) has got amongst our Freethinkers, of taking their physic in public, of throwing about their loose and crude indigestions under the name of FRAGMENTS, things which in their very name imply not so much the want, as the exclusion of all form, the Advocate of Religion has had a fine time of it: he must work them into consistence, he must mould them into shape, before he can safely lay hold of them himself, or present them handsomely to the Public. But these Gentlemen have provided that a Clergyman should never be idle. All, he had of old to attend, was the saving the souls of those committed to his care. He must now begin his work a great deal higher; he must first convince his flock that they have souls to be saved. And the spite of all is, that at the same time his kind masters have doubled his task, they appear very well disposed to lessen his wages.

We have observed, that the DENIAL of God's moral attributes is the great barrier against Religion in general; but it is more especially serviceable in his Lordship's idiosyncratic terrors, the terrors of a future State. To these we owe his famous book of FRAGMENTS, composed occasionally, and taken as an extemporaneous cordial, each stronger than the other, to support him

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