unexceptionable, is well and safely expressed by Baxter. "That which could be eternally without a cause, and itself cause all things, is self sufficient and independent." (Reasons of the Christian Religion.) This seems the only true notion of necessary existence, and care should be taken to use the term in a definite and comprehensible sense. The word necessity when applied to existence may be taken in two accepta. tions, either as it arises from the relation which the existence of that of which it is affirmed has to the existence of other things, or from the relation which the actual existence of that thing has to the manner of its own existence. In the former sense, it denotes that the supposition of the non-existence of that of which the necessity is affirmed, implies the non-existence of things we know to exist. Thus some independent being does necessarily exist; because to suppose no independent being, implies that there are no dependent beings, the contrary of which we know to be true. In the second sense, necessity means that the being of which it is affirmed exists after such a manner as that it never could in time past have been non-existent, or can in future time cease to be. Thus every independent being, as it exists without a cause, is necessarily existing, because existence is essential to such a being; so that it never could begin to exist, and never can cease to be: for to suppose a being to begin to exist, or to lose its existence, is to suppose a change from non-entity to entity, or vice versâ; and to suppose such a change is to suppose a cause upon which that being depends. Every being therefore which is independent, that is, which had no cause of its exist. ence, must exist necessarily, and cannot possibly have begun to exist in time past, or cease to be in time future.

Still farther on Dr. S. Clarke's view of the necessary existence of the Supreme Being, it has been observed,

"But what is this necessity which proves so much? It is the ground of existence (he says) of that which exists of itself; and if so, it must, in the order of nature, and in our conceptions, be antecedent to that being of whose existence it is the ground. Concerning such a principle, there are but three suppositions which can possibly be made; and all of them may be shown to be absurd and contradictory. We may sup pose either the substance itself, some property of that substance, or something extrinsic to both, to be this antecedent ground of existence prior in the order of nature to the first cause.

"One would think, from the turn of the argument which here reprc. sents this antecedent necessity as efficient and causal, that it were considered as something extrinsic to the first cause. Indeed, if the words have any meaning in them at all, or any force of argument, they must be so understood, just as we understand them of any external cause producing its effect. But as an extrinsic principle is absurd in itself, and is beside rejected by Dr. S. Clarke, who says expressly, that

of the thing which derives not its being from any other thing, this ne cessity or ground of existence must be in the thing itself,' we need not say a word more of the last of these suppositions.

"Let us then consider the first; let us take the substance itself, and try whether it can be conceived as prior or antecedent to itself in our conceptions or in the order of nature. Surely we need not observe that nothing can be more absurd or contradictory than such a supposition. Dr. S. Clarke himself repeatedly affirms, and it would be strange indeed if he did not affirm, that no being, no thing whatever, can be conceived as in any respect prior to the first cause.

·

"The only remaining supposition is, that some attribute or property of the self-existent being may be conceived as in the order of nature antecedent to that being. But this, if possible, is more absurd than either of the two preceding suppositions. An attribute is attributed to its subject as its ground or support, and not the subject to its attribute. A property, in the very notion of it, is proper to the substance to which it belongs, and subsequent to it both in our conceptions and in the order of nature. An antecedent attribute, or antecedent property, is a solecism as great, and a contradiction as flat, as an antecedent subsequent or a subsequent antecedent, understood in the same sense and in the same syllogism. Every property or attribute, as such, presupposes its subject; and cannot otherwise be understood. This is a truth so obvious and so forcible, that it sometimes extorts the assent even of those who upon other occasions labour to obscure it. It is confessed by Dr. S. Clarke, that the scholastic way of proving the existence of the self. existent being from the absolute perfection of his nature, is vσTɛpov προτερον. For all or any perfections (says he) presuppose existence; which is a petitio principii.' If therefore properties, modes, or attri butes in God, be considered as perfections, (and it is impossible to con sider them as any thing else,) then, by this confession of the great Author himself, they must all or any of them presuppose existence. is indeed immediately added in the same place, that bare necessity of existence does not presuppose, but infer existence;' which is true only if such necessity be supposed to be a principle extrinsic, the absurdity of which has been already shown, and is indeed universally confessed. If it be a mode or property, it must presuppose the existence of its subject, as certainly and as evidently as it is a mode or a property. It might perhaps à posteriori infer the existence of its subject, as effects may infer a cause; but that it should infer in the other way à priori s altogether as impossible as that a triangle should be a square, or a gl be a parallelogram." (Law's Inquiry.)

It

The true idea of the necessary existence of God is, that he thus exists because it is his nature, as an independent and uncaused being, to be, his being is necessary hecause it is underived, not underived because it

is necessary. The first is the sober sense of the word among our old divines; the latter is a theory of modern date, and leads to no practical result whatever, except to entangle the mind in difficulty, and to give a colour to some very injurious errors.

Equally unsatisfactory, and therefore quite as little calculated to serve the cause of truth, is the argument from space; which is repre. sented by Newton, Clarke, and others, as an infinite mode of ar infinite substance, and that substance God, so that from the existence of space itself may be argued the existence of one supreme and infinite Being. Berkeley, Law, and others, have however shown the fallacy of consi dering space either as a substance, or a mode, and have brought these speculations under the dominion of common sense, and rescued them from metaphysical delusion. They have rightly observed, that space is a mere negation, and that to suppose it to have existence, because it has some properties, for instance, of penetrability, or the capacity of receiving body, is the same thing as to affirm that darkness must be some. thing because it has the capacity of receiving light, and silence some. thing because it has the property of admitting sound, and absence the property of being supplied by presence. To reason in this manner is to assign absolute negations, and such as, in the same way, may be applied to nothing, and then call them positive properties, and so infer that the chimera, thus clothed with them, must needs be something. The argu. ments in favour of the real existence of space as something positive, have failed in the hands of their first great authors, and the attempts since made to uphold them have added nothing but what is exceedingly futile, and indeed often obviously absurd. The whole of this contro versy has left us only to lament the waste of labour which has been employed in erecting around the impregnable ramparts of the great arguments on which the cause rests with so much safety, the useless incumbrances of mud and straw.

The proof of the being of a God reposes wholly then upon arguments à posteriori, and it needs no other; though we shall see as we proceed that even these arguments, strong and irrefutable as they are when rightly applied, have been used to prove more as to some of the attri. butes of God, than can satisfactorily be drawn from them. Even with this safe and convincing process of reasoning at our command, we shall find, at every step of an inquiry into the Divine nature, our entire de. pendence upon Divine revelation, for our primary light. That must both originate our investigations, and conduct them to a satisfactory

result.

CHAPTER II.

ATTRIBUTES of God: (5) Unity, Spirituality.

THE existence of a supreme Creator and First Cause of all things, himself uncaused, and independent, and therefore self existent, having beer. proved, the next question is, whether there exists more than one such Being, or, in other words, whether we are to ascribe to him an absolute unity or soleness. On this point the testimony of the Scriptures is express, and unequivocal. "The Lord our God is ONE Lord," Deut. vi, 4. "The Lord he is God; there is NONE ELSE beside him," Deut. iv, 35. "Thou art God alone,” Psalm lxxxvi, 10. "We know that an idol is nothing in the world, and there is none other God but one.” Nor is this stated in Scripture, merely to exclude all other creators, governors, and deities, in connection with men, and the system of created things which we behold; but absolutely, so as to exclude the idea of the existence, any where, of more than one Divine nature.

Of this unity, the proper Scripture notion may be thus expressed. Some things are one by virtue of composition, but God hath no parts, nor is compounded; but is a pure simpie Being. Some are one in kind, but admit many individuals of the same kind, as men, angels, and other creatures; but God is so one that there are no other gods, though there are other beings. Some things are so one, as that there exists no other of the same kind, as are one sun, one moon, one world, one heaven; yet there might have been more, if it had pleased God so to will it. But God is so one, that there is not, there cannot be, another GOD. He is one only, and takes up the Deity so fully, as to admit no fellow. (LAWSON's Theo-Politica.)

The proof of this important doctrine from Scripture is short and simple. We have undoubted proofs of a revelation from the Maker and Governor of this present world. Granting him to be wise and good, "it is impossible that God should lie," and his own testimony assigns to him an exclusive Deity. If we admit the authority of the Scriptures, we admit a Deity; if we admit one God, we exclude all others. The truth of Scripture, resting as we have seen on proofs which cannot be resisted without universal skepticism, and universal skepticism being

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(5 They are called attributes, because God attributes them to and affirms them of himself. Properties, because we conceive them proper to God, and such as can be predicated only of him, so that by them we distinguish him from aï other beings. Perfections, because they are the several representations of that one perfection which is himself. Names and Terms, because they express ad Notions, because they are so many apprehen. sions of his being as we conceive of him in our minds." (LAWSON's Theo Politica.

signify something of his essence.

proved to be impossible by the common conduct of even the most skeptical men, the proof of the Divine unity rests precisely on the same basis, and is sustained by the same certain evidence.

On this as on the former point however there is much rational confirmation, to which revelation has given us the key; though without that, and even in its strongest form, it may be concluded from the prevalence of polytheism among the generality of nations, and of dualism among others, that the human mind would have had but too indistinct a view of this kind of evidence to rest in a conclusion su necessary to rue religion and to settled rules of morals.

To prove the unity of God several arguments à priori have been made use of; to which mode of proof, provided the argument itself be logical, no objection lies. For though it appears absurd to attempt to prove ù priori the existence of a first cause, seeing that nothing can either in order of time or order of nature be prior to him, or be con. ceived prior to him; yet the existence of an independent and self-exist. ent cause of all things being made known to us by revelation, and confirmed by the phenomena of actual and dependent existence, a ground is laid for considering, from this fact, which is antecedent in order of nature, though not in order of time, the consequent attributes with which such a Being must be invested.

Among the arguments of this class to prove the Divine unity, the following are the principal:

:

Dr. S. Clarke argues from his view of the necessary existence of the Divine Being:-"Necessity," he observes, "absolute in itself, is simple and uniform, and universal, without any possible difference, difformity, or variety whatsoever; and all variety or difference of existence must needs arise from some external cause, and be dependent upon it." And again: "To suppose two or more distinct beings existing of themselves necessarily, and independent of each other, implies this contradiction., that each of them being independent of each other, they may either of them be supposed to exist alone, so that it will be no contradiction to suppose the other not to exist, and consequently neither of them will be necessarily existing." (Demonstration, Prop. 7.) These arguments being however wholly founded upon that peculiar notion of necessary existence, which is advocated by the author, derive their whole authority from the principle itself, to which some objections have been offered.

The argument from space must share the same fate. If space be an infinite attribute of an infinite substance, and an essential attribute of Deity, then the existence of one infinite substance, and one only, may probably be argued from the existence of this infinite property; but if space be a mere negation, and neither substance nor attribute, which has been sufficiently proved by the writers before referred to, then it is worth aothing as a proof of the unity of God.

VOL. I.

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