262 ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. Book 11. 



in its nature, the confequence would neceflarily be, that the motion 

 muft be combined : For the Deity mud have given a projedile force 

 to the body, in order to counteract and overcome fo far its gravitating 

 power, fo that it would be a contention, as it were, betwixt material 

 neceffity and the pov/er of the Deity ; the refult of which is a kind of 

 compromife, by which neither the one nor the other prevails, but the 

 matter is divided pretty equally betwixt them. But, though Sir Ifaac 

 do not pofitively affirm, that gravitation is not eflential to body, I 

 am pcrfuaded, that he believed the one movement, as well as the 

 other, to be produced by mind ; and, if fo, it is impoffible to fuppofc 

 that the motion of the planets fliouid be combined of two motions ; 

 for, how can we fuppofe that mind, whether fupreme or fubordinate, 

 would ufe two movements, when one fimple one, in a circular or el- 

 liptical line, w^ould do the bufincfa ? This would be a fuppofition, 

 contrary to the firfl law of philofophifing laid down by Sir Ifaac, 

 ' That Nature does nothing in vain ; and, that it is in vain to do a 



* thing by many means that can be done by fewer.' And again, 



* Nature is fimple, and does not wantonly abound in fuperfluous cau- 



* fes of things*;' and, if we were to fuppofe Nature fo fuperfluous, it is 

 not eafy to conceive how it could be done; for, we cannot conceive that 

 mind, in order to produce one motion, fhould firft give the body a 

 movement tov;ards the center, and then the projedtile motion, by 

 which it is carried from the center; and if, at once, it was moved ia 

 the ellipfis, it is, to me at leafl, inconceivable how it fhould be mo- 

 ved at one and the fam.e time, and by the fame moving power, two 



motions 



prcfcnt po(:tiveIy on this fubjcd ; all I rrean to fhow is, that It is much too narrow a 

 fyftem of Theifm, which excludes from the appellation oiTheiji fo many philofophers 

 •who have been always efteemed, not onlyTheifts, but many of them very religious meni 



• Natura nihil .igit fruftra, et fruftra fit per plura quod fieri poteft per pauciora.— 

 Natura enim (implex t(l, et rerum caufis fuperfluis non luxuriat> Principia Mathema" 

 tica, vol- , Rcgiila Ptima Philojophandi — And in this he agrees with Ariflotle, who 

 has faicl, fpeakin^ of the motion of the celeflial bodies, that God and Nature do no- 

 thing in vain- e «6 ©t»;x«< n (pvs-ii tvho f^xTct 7ir«tov<rt, Lib. I. dc Coelo, cap. /\. infne. 



