burft one or other of them every Moment; and in this State their highest Demonstration is to prove one Falfhood by another. They tell you God can cómmunicate the Power of Life and SelfMotion to a Creature, as well as he has communicated Being; because they fee it in the Creature. What is it they fee? Nothing. God has not, nor can, communicate Being to a Creature. To be is the infeparable Diftinction between that Effence and all Creatures, or other Things. Though God has created the Matter of a Creature, the Creature bees not, but depends here, not upon the first Hand, but upon the Form of its Veffels and Parts, made of Atoms, kept together, &c. by fecond Caufes, by the Machine the Names. The Species of Life and Motion in a Creature is not the fame as thofe in the Effence, which, as above, are incommunicable, but fupported by the Irradiation of the Names, and performed by Circulation of Fluids. Much lefs is the Power of Life and Self-Motion of the fame Species, or fuch as that in the Effence communicable. Nor is the Power of either communicated immediately by God to the Creature, or is it in the Creature. God cannot communicate

I 3

nicate the Power or Manner, in which the Effence enjoys and exercises them, to any other Substance: But that Species of Life and Motion the Creature has, is continually fupplied from without. God has framed mechanical Motion in the Names, and adapted the Organs of Animals, and the Fluids in them; fo that the Names can give the Fluids Circulation, and the Parts Life, Motion, and Senfation: And do but take off one of the Agents, and there is neither Circulation, Motion, nor Sensation. So God has communicated Life and Motion to Creatures by the fame Agents as he communicates Motion to all other Things, Orbs, Stones, &c. If there had not been mechanical Powers in this System of the Names, the Motions and Actions of our Bodies, or their Parts, must have been performed by the immediate Power or Finger of Jehovah Aleim.

If we were to fee a Creature born without Legs move, without Eyes fee, without Ears hear, or fee it force other Creatures without fuch Members or Organs to obey and follow it, and had never fufpected there were any Medium to execute thefe Actions, direct or force them to move, what fhould we

think

think of that or these Creatures? Should we suppose there were Virtues in a Creature to do thefe Actions? Or fhould we fearch for a mechanical Caufe? Would it be enough to say they were once fet a going, and fo would go till they run against fomething that would stop them, divert their Courfe, or &c. We are fure the Soul, while in the Body, acts mechanically by the Help of real or borrowed Ideas, taken from this Machine, from Imaller or Microcofms, or e. and that the Ideas of higher Objects, conveyed to it by Revelation, are borrowed from them, and it knows nothing otherwise. And the Faculties of Man's Mind act geometrically as well as thofe of his Body; he can by his Mind compare the Length, Breadth, &c. of two or more Things ideally given, but knows the Length, &c. of none of them, nor whether the Things exift, till the Idea be teally given, much lefs of higher Objects; we are fure there are no other Powers in Man. When Mofes was directed to go into Egypt, and make all the Earth know, that Jehovah was Aleim, and was in the higheft Station, perhaps, that ever Creature, Angel, or Man was, till John the Baptift came; it does not apI 4

pear,

8

pear, that he had any greater Power of Body, or any greater Faculty of Mind, except Faith, which produced a Readinefs to obey, &c. though those Faculies were preferved for above forty Years after. He was only to make a Declaration, and give the Signal; but 'tis when properly expreffed, Jehovah made the Names act, or acted without them, He can give Power to a Creature to declare his Will in any Action fit for him to do; but he performs every Action, which is beyond the Power of Mechanifm, or that in a Creature. He can make a dumb Creature speak; but he cannot make any Creature create. He may fay, when thou fpeakeft, a World fhall be created; but the Creature would have no Hand in the Creation. He puts lower Questions to Job, Cap. xxxviii. The Power irradiating from the Effence of the Perfons, needs no fecond Hand to execute what those Perfons defign, it directed and attended Mofes, the Prophets, and Apostles, to give Authority to their Words, to make them the Rule of the Belief and Actions of Men. The Creation was performed by the Aleim, the three Perfons in Jehovah, the Effence exifting jointly, that was not left to any one Perfon, nor to

any

any fecond Hand, There is no Veil o ver the Hebrew, each Perfon there is of the fame Effence, and equal, Deut. vi. 4. Hear, O Ifrael, Jehovah, our Aleim, is one [the fame] Jehovah. The Veil is caft over the Greek, cach Perfon there is described as acting the part in the Covenant he swore to perform. When the Effence in Chrift is diftinguished from the Man, and in Oppofition to the irradiating Power, he is unveiled, as, John i. 1, 16 Col. i. 19. Because all Fulness was pleafed to dwell in him. Col. ii. 9, For in him dwelleth all the Fulness of the Godhead bodily. The limited Power in Man is fo ill qualified to guide, that few have been able to chufe or stick to their true Guide; some formerly have been immediately directed by the Holy Ghoft or Chrift. Some by the Rules revealed by the Holy Ghoft, first by Tradition, after recorded by Writing in the Scriptures. Some by the Faculty in the Mind, we call Reason, fometimes true, fometimes falfe. Some by the Appetite, fuch as is in Brutes. Some by the Law or Commands of the Prince. Many by the pretended Difcoveries of the fuppofed Will of the Names, by Obfervation, Oracles, &c. Some by the Direction of the Devil, who poffeffed them.

Many