himfelf. This wrought the greatest confufion in the unbelieving Jews, and the greateft conviction in the Gentiles, who every where fpeak with aftonishment of thefe truths they met with in this new magazine of learning which was opened to them, and carry the point fo far as to think whatever excellent doctrine they had met with among Pagan writers, had been ftole from their converfation with the Jews, or from the perufal of these writings, which they had in their cuftody.

ADDI

ADDITIONAL

DISCOURSES.

SECT. I

Of GoD, and his Attributes:

Qui mare & terras variifque mundum
Temperat boris:

Unde nil majus generatur ipfo,
Nec viget quicquam fimile aut fecundum.

Hor.

IMONIDES being ask'd by Dionyfius the tyrant what God was, defired a day's time to confider of it before he made his reply. When the day was expired, he defired two days; and afterwards, instead of returning his anfwer, demanded still double the time to confider of it. This great poet and philofopher, the more he contemplated the nature of the Deity, found that he waded

E 5

waded but the more out of his depth; and that he loft himself in the thought, instead of finding an end of it.

If we confider the idea which wife men, by the light of reafon, have framed of the Divine Being, it amounts to this: That he has in him all the perfection of a spiritual nature; and fince we have no notion of any kind of fpiritual perfection but what we discover in our own fouls, we join Infinitude to each kind of thefe perfections, and what is a faculty in an human foul, becomes an attribute in God. We exist in place and time, the Divine Being fills the immenfity of fpace with his prefence, and inhabits eternity. We are poffeffed of a little power and a little knowledge, the Divine Being is Almighty and Omniscient. In fhort, by adding Infinity to any kind of perfection we enjoy, and by joining all thefe different kinds of perfections in one Being, we form our Idea of the great Sovereign of

nature.

Though every one who thinks must have made this obfervation, I fhall produce Mr. Locke's authority to the fame purpose, out of his effay on human understanding. If we examine the Idea

6 ⚫ we

we have of the incomprehenfible fupreme Being, we fhall find that we come by it the fame way; and that the complex ideas we have both of God and separate fpirits, are made up of the fimple ideas we receive from reflection: v. g. having, from what we experiment in ourselves, got the ideas of existence and duration, of knowledge and power, • of pleasure and happiness, and of fe• veral other qualities and powers, which

it is better to have, than to be withC out; when we would frame an idea ⚫ the most suitable we can to the fupreme Being, we enlarge every one of these with our idea of infinity, and fo putting them together make our complex • idea of God.

It is not impoffible that there may be many kinds of fpiritual perfection, befides those which are lodged in an human soul ; but it is impoffible that we fhould have ideas of any kinds of perfection, except thofe of which we have fome small rays and fhort imperfect ftrokes in ourselves.

It would be therefore a very high prefumption to determine whether the fupreme Being has not many more Attributes than thofe which enter into our conceptions

of

of him. This is certain, that if there be any kind of fpiritual perfection which is not marked out in an human foul, it belongs in its fulness to the Divine Na

ture.

Several eminent Philofophers have imagined that the foul, in her feparate ftate, may have new faculties fpringing up in her, which fhe is not capable of exerting during her prefent union with the body; and whether thefe faculties may not correfpond with other attributes in the Divine Nature, and open to us hereafter new matter of wonder and adoration, we are altogether ignorant. This, as I have faid before, we ought to acquiefce in, that the Sovereign Being, the great Author of Nature has in him all poffible perfection, as well in kind as in degree; to fpeak according to our methods of conceiving. I fhall only add under this head, that when we have raised our notion of this infinite Being as high as it is poffible for the mind of man to go, it will fall infinitely short of what he really is. There is no end of his greatness: The most exalted creature he has made, is only capable of adoring it, none but himself can comprehend it.

The