be taken from what Mofes fays, that the fpirit of God at the creation moved upon the face of the waters: which St. Peter expreffes almost in the words of the ancient philofophers, when he fays, that by the word of God the heavens and the earth (which is the Jewish phrafe for the world) were of old ftanding out of the water (or rather made of the water) as the words more literally rendered fignify*. We have a fecond strong argument to prove, that mankind has not exifted from all eternity, because we have plain footsteps of the peopling the world by degrees within the compass of a few thousands of years paft. Men, well versed in ancient history, can trace the arrival of almost every particular people into that part of the earth where it now inhabits: fome nations by degrees have moved farther weftward, others to the fouth, and others to the north, all fetting out from the eastern countries, where Mofes affures us, and we Chriftians believe, that mankind had its beginning in our first parents. Whereas, if men had existed from all eternity, the whole earth a 2 Pet. iii. 5. 'Etudatos aves Woa. Tillotf. vol. 1. fol. p. 8. muft must have been peopled millions of ages before the date which our hiftorical records bear; and, no place after fo long a series of time, could have been left uninhabited within the compass of the last fix thousand years. A third circumftance to prove this is the progrefs of the feveral arts and sciences among mankind; which we can clearly trace backwards, and find the original of, at the dif tance of no more years than are affigned in the fcriptures for the age of the world. But, if mankind had no beginning, all thofe arts and fciences must have been invented and perfected long before any remembrance of the hiftories which we now have: unlefs we will be so unreasonable as to suppose, that from eternity, till within the compafs of the laft fix thousand years, the inhabitants of this earth were all ftupidly ignorant, and incapable of any invention and improvement in know, ledge. And to thefe proofs, I may add one more circumstance no lefs convincing, viz. that there are extant neither hiftories, nor records, nor even traditions of any actions of heroes, lawgivers, or other celebrated men before that that time, which we ufually fix upon for the infancy of the world. And it would be very ftrange, that all memory fhould be loft, that no footsteps should remain of this fuppofed eternal race, if it were true that there never was a time when that race of men did not live and flourish here on earth.' Unbelievers may fuppofe, if they will, that all these four circumftances have been brought about by fome univerfal deluge, which happened once or at several times within the compass of eternity, and swept away the whole body of mankind, except a very few, and those of the most ignorant fort: able indeed to recover the race of mankind, but unskilled to recover any of the arts or sciences, and retain any knowledge of what was paft. But an univerfal deluge is one of the greatest miracles: fuch as could not happen without the power of fome fuperior Being to bring it on; and the suppofition of this is in effect giving up the point. Has not Mofes given us an account of one fuch deluge? and does not he introduce God himself as the author of it? and did ever any writer attempt to folve the poffibility of it, without fuppofing, that the common courfe courfe of nature (which we call the laws of nature) was some how changed, a thing to be accomplished only by a Being fuperior to nature fo that to talk of a general deluge, is to allow the being a God; for the confequence must be that, whether they will fee it or no. Befides, of one general deluge we have an ac count in Mofes's writings; and did that deluge deftroy the knowledge of all that preceeded it, as the objection requires? no: for we are still acquainted with many things done before that time: many inventions then first put in practice are remembered even now, and they are ascribed to the true original discoverers of them. So that fhould the fuppofition of feveral fuch univerfal deluges be true, yet nothing would be gained thereby, to fhew, that there might have been an eternity of ages, in which mankind exifted, before the prefent account which we have of things in the world, It being proved, therefore, that there cannot have been either in the nature of the thing, or confiftently with the circumstances of it, an infinite fucceffion of men producing one another without any first and leading caufe caufe of their beginning, it follows, as a plain truth, That there has exifted from all eternity fome other Being, which was the original cause of the beginning of mankind. We are now to enquire what this original caufe was: and it can be but one of thefe two things; either an accidental caufe, or a defigning one; that is, men must have been created at first either by chance, or by a Being which had will, choice and understanding. Some philofophers in former days, and fome, who would be thought philofophers in ours, feem willing to attribute the first production of men to chance. They fuppofe that there always was matter and motion in the world, and that these two once upon a time, in a lucky feason, by a felicity which never happened again, fo jumbled themselves together, that the refult of their unmeaning fcuffle was the production of man and woman, or of many men and women; and that from this first extraordinary compofition all the reft of the human race are defcended. No thanks to thefe philofophers for the difparaging discovery! why fhould they rob us |