ESii,AY I. 413 that attend human nature are derived from the same spring; because man was wholly at his first formation in the likeness of God, who made him in the image of his holiness and his happì= Hess, and designed him to live for ever, if he continued inno- cent ; Gen. i. 26. and chapter ii. 17. But on the other hand, the scripture teaches us that brutes originally are made to die, and wild beasts made to be taken and destroyed, partly for the natural food of man, and partly for his safety and ease ; Gen. ix. 3. 2 Peter ii. 12. Besides, it is evident to reason, and constant ob- servation, that brutes are appointed for feed for each other, as flying insects for the spider, small birds for the hawk, and sheep for wolves and lions. Now this cannot be without wounds and bruises, and mortal convulsions, and death. It is manifest there- fore, that we mayinfer guilt from the endless pains, calamities, and death of men, because scripture reveals it, as the original cause; but we cannot' infer the same from the sicknesses, wounds and deaths of brute -creatures, which are made by the God of nature for food to others, nor from all the appearances of pain and anguish which are found among the brutal crea- tion : These must be solved therefore, and explained some ether way. III. The objection here supposes, that all the brutal crea- tion have really the same acute sensations of anguish and pain as mankind, because many of them make use of the same sort of sounds and motions, groanings and howlings, and distortions of limbs, as we do When we are under acute pain. But it is hard to suppose that a righteous and merciful God should inflict such keen and extreme anguishupon millions of creatures whose race and geuerations are sinless, and perfectly innocent, and entirely such as they came out of his own hands; or that he should, in the.course of nature, permit it to be inflicted, without any de- gree of sin or moral evil in any of them to deserve it. And I think therefore it would be much more eligible and rational, with some modern philosophers, to suppose that brutes being made of mere matter, have no proper sensations of pleasure or of pain ; or at least that all their sensations of pain are but feeble and dull, and very, imperfect,. notwitstanding all their hideous outcries and convulsions of their flesh; I say, it . is more rational to think so, than it is to suppose that there is any such sharp agonizing anguish and keen torment as sin- ful men endure, provided by the blessed God for creatures which are perfectly innocent, and which have no relation to any guilt or crime*. Will a God of infinite equity and goodness inflict *If we were to consultreason and scripturejointly on this head, would they not bothiocline no to believe, that brutal sensations are not quite the same, nor aim- so intense as the sensationsof mankind ?' for scripture, as well as reason, teach us, that the very soul and life and supreme principle of actioà ist brutes is
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