than cruel; true, than faithless; just, than unjust; or, if the fatalist pleases, what we call unjust. For it is said, indeed, that what upon supposition of freedom, would be just punishment, upon supposition of necessity, becomes manifestly unjust; because it is punishment inflicted for doing that which persons could not avoid doing: as if the necessity, which is supposed to destroy the injustice of murder for instance, would not also destroy the injustice. of punishing it. However, as little to the purpose as this objection is in itself, it is very much to the purpose to observe from it, how the notions of justice and injustice remain, even whilst we endeavour to suppose them removed; how they force themselves upon the mind, even whilst we are making suppositions destructive of them; for there is not, perhaps, a man in the world, but would be ready to make this objection at first thought. But though it is most evident, that universal necessity, if it be reconcilable with any thing, is reconcilable with that character in the Author of nature which is the foundation of religion; "yet does it not plainly destroy the proof that he is of that character, and consequently the proof of religion?" By no means. For we find that happiness and misery are not our fate, in any such sense as not to be the consequences of our behaviour, but that they are the consequences of it.* We find God exercises the same kind of government over us, with that which a father exercises over his children, and a civil magistrate over his subjects. Now, whatever becomes of abstract questions concerning liberty and necessity, it evidently appears to us, that veracity and justice must be the natural rule and measure of exercising this authority, or government, to a Being, who can have no competitions, or interfering of interests, with his creatures and his subjects. But as the doctrine of liberty, though we experience its truth, may be perplexed with difficulties which run up into the most abstruse of all speculations, and as the opinion of necessity seems to be the very basis upon which infidelity grounds itself, it may be of some use to offer a more particular proof of the obligations of religion, which may distinctly be shown not to be destroyed by this opinion. The proof, from final causes, of an intelligent Author of nature, is not affected by the opinion of necessity; supposing necessity a thing possible in itself, and reconcilable with the constitution of things.* And it is a matter of fact, independent on this or any other speculation, that he governs the world by the method of rewards and punishments;† and also that he hath given us a moral faculty, by which we distinguish between actions, and approve some as virtuous and of good desert, and disapprove others as vicious and of ill desert. Now this moral discernment implies, in the notion of it, a rule of action, and a rule of a very peculiar kind; for it carries in it authority and a right of direction; authority in such a sense, as that we cannot depart from it without being self-condemned.§ And that the dictates of this moral faculty, which are by nature a rule to us, are moreover the laws of God, laws in a sense includ. ing sanctions, may be thus proved. Consciousness of a rule or guide of action, in creatures who are capable of considering it as given them by their Maker, not only raises immediately a sense of duty, but also a sense of security in following it, and of danger in deviating from it. A direction of the Author of nature, given to creatures capable of looking upon it as such, is plainly a command from him; and a command from him necessarily includes in it, at least, an implicit promise in case of obedience, or threatening in case of disobedience. But then the sense or perception of good and ill desert, which is contained in the moral discernment, renders the sanction explicit, and makes it appear, as one may say, expressed. For, since his method of government is to reward and punish actions, his having annexed to some + Chap. ii. * Page 104, &c. § Sermon 2nd at the Rolls. Dissertation II. Dissertation II. actions an inseparable sense of good desert, and to others of ill, this surely amounts to declaring upon whom his punishments shall be inflicted, and his rewards be bestowed. For he must have given us this discernment and sense of things, as a presentiment of what is to be hereafter; that is by way of information beforehand, what we are finally to expect in this world. There is, then, most evident ground to think, that the government of God, upon the whole, will be found to correspond to the nature which he has given us, and that in the upshot and issue of things, happiness and misery shall, in fact and event, be made to follow virtue and vice respectively; as he has already, in so peculiar a manner, associated the ideas of them in our minds. And from hence might easily be deduced the obligations of religious worship, were it only to be considered as a means of preserving upon our minds a sense of this moral government of God, and securing our obedience to it; which yet is an extremely imperfect view of that most important duty. Now, I say, no objection from necessity can lie against this general proof of religion: none against the proposition reasoned upon, that we have such a moral faculty and discernment; because this is a mere matter of fact, a thing of experience, that human kind is thus constituted: - none against the conclusion, because it is immediate, and wholly from this fact. For the conclusion, that God will finally reward the righteous and punish the wicked, is not here drawn from its appearing to us fit* that he should, but from its appearing that he has told us he will. And this he hath certainly told us, in the promise and threatening which, it * However, I am far from intending to deny, that the will of God is determined by what is fit, by the right and reason of the case; though one chooses to decline matters of such abstract speculation, and to speak with caution when one does speak of them. But if it be intelligible to say, that it is fit and reasonable for every one to consult his own happiness, then, fitness of action, or the right and reason of the case, is an intelligible manner of speaking. And it seems as inconceivable, to suppose God to approve one course of action, or one end preferably to another, which yet his acting at all from design implies that he does, without sup hath been observed, the notion of a command implies, and the sense of good and ill desert, which he has given us, more distinctly expresses. And this reasoning from fact is confirmed, and in some degree even verified, by other facts; by the natural tendencies of virtue and of vice ;* and by this, that God, in the natural course of his providence, punishes vicious actions as mischievous to society; and also vicious actions, as such, in the strictest sense. So that the general proof of religion is unanswerably real, even upon the wild supposition which we are arguing upon. It must likewise be observed farther, that natural religion hath, besides this, an external evidence, which the doctrine of necessity, if it could be true, would not affect. For, suppose a person, by the observations and reasoning above, or by any other, convinced of the truth of religion-that there is a God, who made the world, who is the moral Governor and Judge of mankind, and will, upon the whole, deal with every one according to his works; I say, suppose a person convinced of this by reason, but to know nothing at all of antiquity, or the present state of mankind, it would be natural for such a one to be inquisitive, what was the history of this system of doctrine; at what time, and in what manner, it came first into the world; and whether it were believed by any considerable part of it. And were he upon inquiry to find, that a particular person, in a late age, first of all proposed it as a deduction of reason, and that mankind were before wholly ignorant of it; then, though its evidence from reason would remain, there would be no additional probability of its truth from the account of its discovery. posing somewhat prior in that end to be the ground of the preference: as to suppose him to discern an abstract proposition to be true, without supposing somewhat prior in it to be the ground of the discernment. It does not, therefore, appear, that moral right is any more relative to perception than abstract truth is; or that it is any more improper to speak of the fitness and rightness of actions and ends, as founded in the nature of things, than to speak of abstract truth as thus founded. But instead of this being the fact of the case, on the contrary, he would find what could not but afford him a very strong confirmation of its truth; First, That somewhat of this system, with more or fewer additions and alterations, hath been professed in all ages and countries of which we have any certain information relating to this matter. Secondly, That it is certain historical fact, so far as we can trace things up, that this whole system of belief, that there is one God, the Creator and moral Governor of the world, and that mankind is in a state of religion, was received in the first ages. And, thirdly, That as there is no hint or intimation in history, that this system was first reasoned out; so there is express historical or traditional evidence, as ancient as history, that it was taught first by revelation. Now, these things must be allowed to be of great weight. The first of them, general consent, shows this system to be conformable to the common sense of mankind. The second, namely, that religion was believed in the first ages of the world, especially as it does not appear that there were then any superstitious or false additions to it, cannot but be a farther confirmation of its truth. For it is a proof of this alternative either that it came into the world by revelation, or that it is natural, obvious, and forces itself upon the mind. The former of these is the conclusion of learned men. And whoever will consider, how unapt for speculation rude and uncultivated minds are, will, perhaps from hence alone, be strongly inclined to believe it the truth. And as it is shown in the second part* of this Treatise, that there is nothing of such peculiar presumption against a revelation in the beginning of the world, as there is supposed to be against subsequent ones; a sceptic could not, I think, give any account, which would appear more probable even to himself, of the early pretences to revelation, than by supposing some real original one, from whence they were copied. And the third thing above mentioned, that there is express historical * Chap. ii. |