of those philofophers God is a mind, xweisov do, not an abstract idea compounded of inconfiftencies and prefcinded from all real things, as fome moderns understand abstraction; but a really exifting fpirit, diftinct or feparate from all fenfible and corporeal beings. And although the Stoics are reprefented as holding a corporeal deity, or that the very fyftem of the world is God, yet it is certain they did not, at bottom, diffent from the forementioned doctrine; inafmuch as they fuppofed the world to be fan animal (a), confifting of foul or mind as well as body. " 324. This notion was derived from the Pythagoreans, who held the world, as Timæus Locrus teacheth, to be one perfect animal, endued with foul and reafon but then they believed it to have been generated: whereas the Stoics looked on the world as the fupreme God, including therein mind or intellect. For the elementary fire, or, if one may fo fpeak, the animal fpirit of the world, feemeth, according to them, to have been the vehicle of the foul (b), the vehicle of intellect or v8s; fince they styled the Divinity wug voegèv (c), or intel lectual fire. 325. The Egyptians, if we may credit the Hermaic writings, maintained God to be all things, not only actual but poffible. He is styled by them, that which is made and that which is unmade. And therein it is faid, Shall I praise thee for those things thou haft made manifeft, or for the things thou haft hidden? therefore, in their fenfe, to manifeft, was to create; the things created having been before hidden in God. 326. Now whether the vs be abstracted from the fenfible world, and confidered by it felf, as diftinct from, and prefiding over the created fy(a) 275, 279. (6) 277, 284. (c) 272. ftem, ftem, or whether the whole univerfe, including mind together with the mundane body, is conceived to be God (d), and the creatures to be partial manifeftations of the divine effence, there is no atheism in either cafe, whatever mifconceptions there may be; fo long as mind or intellect is understood to prefide over, govern, and conduct the whole frame of things. And this was the general prevailing opinion among the philofophers. 327. Nor if any one, with Ariftotle in his Metaphyfics, fhould deny that God knows any thing without himself; feeing that God comprehends all things, could this be juftly pronounced an atheistical opinion. Nor even was the following notion of the fame author to be accounted atheism, to wit, that there are fome things beneath the knowledge of God, as too mean, bafe, and vile; however wrong this notion may be, and unworthy of the divine perfection. 328. Might we not conceive that God may be faid to be all in divers fenfes; as he is the cause. and origine of all beings; as the vs is the vola, a doctrine both of Platonics and Peripatetics (e); as the vs is the place of all forms, and as it is the fame which comprehends, and orders (ƒ), and fuftains the whole mundane fyftem. Ariftotle declares, that the divine force or influence permeates the intire univerfe (g), and that what the pilot is in a fhip, the driver in a chariot, the præcentor in a choir, the law in a city, the general in an army, the fame God is in the world. This he amply fets forth in his book De mundo, a treatise which having been anciently afcribed to him, ought not to be fet afide from the difference of style, which (as Patricius rightly obferves) being in a letter to a king, might well be fuppofed to differ from the other dry and crabbed parts of his writings. 329. And although there are some expreffions to be met with in the philofophers, even of the Platonic and Ariftotelic fects, which fpeak of God as mixing with, or prevading all nature and all the elements; yet this must be explained by force and not by extenfion, which was never attributed to the mind (b) either by Aristotle or Plato. This they always affirmed to be incorporeal and, as Plotinus remarks, incorporeal things are diftant each from other not by place, but (to use his expreffion) by alterity. 330. Thefe difquifitions will probably seem dry and useless, to fuch readers as are accuftomed to confider only fenfible objects. The employment of the mind on things purely intellectual is to moft men irkfome: whereas the fenfitive powers, by conftant ufe, acquire ftrength. Hence, the objects of fenfe more forcibly affect us (k), and are too often counted the chief good. For these things men fight, cheat, and fcramble. Therefore, in order to tame mankind, and introduce a sense of virtue, the best humane means is to exercise their understanding, to give them a glympfe of another world, fuperior to the fenfible, and while they take pains to cherish and maintain the animal life, to teach them not to neglect the intellectual. 331. Prevailing ftudies are of no fmall confequence to a state, the religion, manners, and civil government of a country ever taking fome bias from its philofophy, which affects not only the minds of its profeffors and ftudents, but also the opinions of all the better fort, and the practice of the whole people, remotely and confequentially, indeed, though not inconfiderably. Have not the (k) 264, 294. polemic (b) 290, 293, 297, 319. ་ polemic and fcholaftic philosophy been obferved to produce controverfies in law and religion? And have not Fatalifm and Sadducifm gained ground, during the general paffion for the corpufcularian and mechanical philofophy, which hath prevailed for about a century? This indeed might usefully enough have employed fome fhare of the leifure and curiofity of inquifitive perfons. But when it entered the feminaries of learning as a neceffary accomplishment, and most important part of educa tion, by engroffing men's thoughts, and fixing their minds fo much on corporeal objects, and the laws of motion, it hath, however undefignedly, indirectly, and by accident, yet not a little indifpofed. them for fpiritual, moral, and intellectual matters. Certainly had the philofophy of Socrates and Pythagoras prevailed in this age, among thofe who think themfelves too wife to receive the dictates of the gofpel, we fhould not have feen intereft take fo general and faft hold on the minds of men, nor public spirit reputed to be yevvatav terav, a generous folly, among those who are reckoned to be the most knowing, as well as the most getting, part of mankind. 332. It might very well be thought serious trifling to tell my readers, that the greateft men had ever an high efteem for Plato; whose writings are the touchftone of a hafty and fhallow mind; whofe philofophy has been the admiration of ages; which fupplied patriots, magiftrates, and lawgivers to the moft flourifhing ftates, as well as fathers to the church, and doctors to the schools. Albeit in thefe days, the depths of that old learning are rarely fathomed, and yet it were happy for thefe lands, if our young nobility and gentry, inftead of modern maxims, would 'mbibe the notions of the great men of antiquity. But in these free-thinking times many an empty heal is 4 flook fhook at Ariftotle and Plato, as well as at the holy fcriptures. And the writings of thofe celebrated ancients are by moft men treated on a foot with the dry and barbarous lucubrations of the schoolmen. It may be modeftly prefumed, there are not many. among us, even of those who are called the better fort, who have more fenfe, virtue, and love of their country than Cicero, who in a letter to Atticus could not forbear exclaiming, O Socrates et Socratici viri ! nunquam vobis gratiam referam. Would to God many of our countrymen had the fame obligations. to thofe Socratic writers! Certainly where the people are well educated, the art of piloting a ftate is best learned from the writings of Plato. But among bad men, void of difcipline and education, Plato, Pythagoras and Ariftotle themfelves, were they living, could do but little good. Plato hath drawn a very humorous and inftructive picture of fuch a ftate; which I fhall not tranfcribe for certain reafons. But whoever has a mind, may fee it in page 78. of the fecond tome of Aldus's edition of Plato's works. 333. Proclus, in the first book of his commentary on the theology of Plato, obferves, that, as in the myfteries, those who are initiated, at first meet with manifold and multiform gods, but being entered and thoroughly initiated they receive the divine illumination and participate the very deity; in like manner, if the foul look abroad fhe beholds the fhadows and images of things; but returning into herself she unravels and beholds her own effence: At first she feemeth only to behold her felf: but having penetrated farther, fhe discovers the mind. And again, ftill farther advancing into the innermoft fanctuary of the bul, fhe contemplates the Jewv yévos. And this, he faith, is the most excellent of all human acts, in. the ilence and repofe of the faculties of the foul to tendupwards to the very divinity; to approach and be |