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FEMALE PHYSICIAN.
CHAP. I. Of GOD.
REASON, and the mere Contemplation of Nature (abstracted from the Light and Assistance of Revelation or Faith) afford us sufficient convincing Arguments, for the Existence of this great and incomprehensible Being; as Heathens themselves do testify.
ACCORDING to Plato (that most excellent Heathenish Divine) Philosophical Demonstrations are the only Catharticks (i. e. Purgers) of the Soul; being the most proper means to cleanse it from Error, and give us an exact Relish of Sacred Truths. Wherefore I shall strictly confine myself to These, in proving the Being of this Existence, from the Maxims of all the four principal Sects of Heathen Philosophers; which I shall discuss in the briefest Terms, by only touching upon a few of their respective Proofs; viz.
THE Naturalist insists chiefly upon three Heads; That of Motion, the Final, and the Efficient Cause.
UPON the Axiom of Motion, that Sect could not exceed, or go beyond the Primum Mobile among created Beings; and therefore allows, that there is something above it, which moves itself and is not moved by Another.
UPON that of the Final Cause, they could find no created Being capable of directing that Nature, which directs and appoints all Creatures to aim at some peculiar End; and thence conclude, that this Nature is directed by something superior to itself.
UPON that of the Efficient Cause, they confess, from the many Vicissitudes of created Beings, that they’ve all had a Beginning: and (because no Beginning can be without an Efficient) acknowledge, that something more excellent than all created Beings, hath created them.
THE Metaphysician useth a vast Variety of sublime Arguments; whereof I shall only give a few Instances: viz.
I. THAT every finite Being must needs proceed from something else, limiting it in that Finiteness, in which its Nature conflicts.
II. THAT all Multitude must proceed from Unity, as the Motions of the lower Orbs proceed from that of the one highest; or as the many particular distinct Actions and different Motions of the Man, proceed from (their Superior) the Soul.
III. THAT the Subordination of the Creatures, one serving another, and all concurring to the Common Good, must needs proceed from the Disposal of some most wise Governour.
IV. THAT the wonderful and incomparable Art, observable in the Make and Form of every the minutest Part of the least and most despicable Creature, must necessarily proceed from some very great and omnipotent Artificer.
V. THIS Sect acknowledges also the Immortality of the Soul, as Cicero witnesses; because it is an immaterial Substance, and independent of the Body: And consequently they allow it to proceed from an immortal Author, and to return to the same, after a Dissolution from the Body.
AS to the Moralist, his way of Reasoning is plainer to our common Capacities.
I. HE proves this Argument from the natural Disposition and Propensity of the worst of Men, even Atheists themselves, upon the Approach of Death or any heavy Calamity, to acknowledge some superior divine Power; as Seneca witnesseth of Caligula, &c.
II. FROM the ultimate End and chief Good of Man; which (according to Plato) is nothing Terrestrial: Our Souls being insatiable in this Life, have a constant Tendency to that particular End, for which we are created; which (in his Words) consists only in being inseparably united to God.
III. FROM Virtue and Vice, the Rewards and Punishments due to these from Nature and Reason; which agree with Equity and Justice, that they, who live well, should be rewarded with this their ultimate End and final Felicity: And those who live otherwise, should be punished by the Loss thereof forever. Thence they (of consequence) acknowledge, that there must be a just and powerful Judge, above all created Beings, to inflict this impartial Sentence.
THE Mathematician acknowledges That to be some Being superior to all others; whose Center he finds every where, and whose Circumference he can limit or discover no where. But because this Sect borrows the better Part of their Proofs from the other three mentioned, I shall go no farther; designing nothing but Brevity thro’out this Work, especially upon a Thesis so manifest as This: Which indeed I should not so much as have touched upon, considering how elegantly and copiously many very learned Divines, and other eminent Writers, have treated that Subject; were it not that some subsequent Hypotheses depend immediately upon it. Wherefore I proceed to
