Serrn. CLXVI. a Religious and `Divine Faith. II. What are the Arguments whereby this Faith or Perfwafion of thefe Prin- ciples of Natural Religion is wrought 3 You may remember that I reduc'd all thofe Arguments whereby any kind of Faith or Perfwafion is wrought in us, ro thefeforr Heads; Senfe, Experience, Reafons drawn from.the Thing, and the Te- ftimonyor Authority of tome Perlon. Now a Faith of Perfwafion of thefe Prin= ciples cannot be wrought in us by Senfe : for No Alas hath feen Godat any time; and being a pure Spirit, hecannot be the Obje&of any Corporeal Senfe. Nor can the Soul, or any modeof its Exiflence, fall under anyof our Senfes : nor a Future State ; becaufe Senfe is only of things prefent. Nor can it be wrought inus meetly by Experience : for no Man can conclude from any thing he experienceth in him- fell, that there is a God, unlefs he be fiat perfwaded of it by other Arguments and the Immortality of theSoul, and a Future State, are things which none in this Life can experience. Nor can the Authority or Teftimony of any Perfon be the Argument that induceth that Perfwafion. Not any Humane Authority : for thefe things are of fuck Confequence, and fo much depends upon them, that is, the be- lief of them puts us upon fo many things, which Men would nor do if they did not believe then, as particularly the venturing of our Lives upon the account of Religion, and all our Worldly Interefts,.if occafion call for it ; that it were a fond thing to take Matters of fuch Moment and Importance upon any Man's bare word without other affurance ofthem. Nor can the Teftimonyor Authority of God be the Argument that.perfwades me of the Exiftence of a God. I grant that for the other two, the Immortality of the Soul, and a Future State, it is an excellent, and may be a fufftcient Argument. Tho' that thefe may be proved likewife by other Arguments without a Revelation, is evident in the Heathens, who by the Light of Nature did anent to them without a Revelation. But a Divine Revelation cannot poflibly be an Argument inducing me to believe the Exiftence of a God, for this plain Reafon ; becaufe a Divine Revelation can be no Argument to any that is not perfwaded that it is a Divine Revelation : but before I can be perfwaded that any Revelation is fromGod, I muff be perfwaded there is a God ; and if fo, there is noneed of this Argument to prove to me that there is one : and therefore you do not find it any where reveal'd in all the Scripture, that there is a God The Scripture often declares that yehovah is the true and living God, and that betides him there is no other : but it doth not reveal, but every where fuppofee that there is one. It remains then, that it muff be another kind of Argument whereby we muffbe perfwaded of the Exiftence of a God, and that is by fuch Reafons is may be drawn from things themfelves ro perfwade us hereof ; as either from the Notion and Idea which we have of a God, that he is aBeing that hath all Perfe&ions, whereof neceffary Exiftence is one, and confequently that he mutt be or elfe from the Univerfal confent of all Nations, and the generalityof Perfons agreeing in this ap- prehenfion, which cannot be attributed reafonably to any other Caufe, than to impreffions ftamp'd upon our Underftandings by God himfelf ; or (which is molt plain of all) from this visible frame of the World, which we cannot, without great violence to our Underfiandings, impute to any other Caufe than a Being endow'd with infinite Goodnefs, and Power, and Wifdom, which is that we call God. As for the other two Principles of Natural Religion, the Immortality of the Soul, and a Future State; after we believe aGod, we may be perfwadedof there from Divine Revelation , and that cloth give us the higheft and firmeft affurance of them in the Refurreftion of Chrift from the Dead. Yet I do not find but that thefe alto are rather fuppos'd, than exprefly reveal'd in the Bible. Indeed the Immortalityof the Soul may be inferr'd from feveral places of Scripture, and the tenour of the whole Bible : and fo a Future State, which, as for the thing it felt, feems to be fupppofed as a thing acknowledged by Natural Light only the Scripture bath reveal'd the circumftances of it more particularly to us, and given us higher affluence. of the thing but if there were no Revelation, Men might be perfwaded of thefe ; and fo the Heathens were by Arguments drawn partly from the operations of the Saul, which would almoft perfwade any Man that the Soul TIT >c is 4.33:
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