272 A N T I E N T METAPHYSICS. Book IL 



nomena of the motions of the celeftial bodies may be explained with- 

 out it. 



Final caufesy as Arluwile has obferved, arc the principal caufes : 

 And, indeed, every man who believes that the univerle is the produc- 

 tion of intelligence and deiign, muft hold that the final caufe is, as the 

 name imports^ the cajije of caujes^ being that, for the fake of which 

 the other three caufes are employed : For, if it had nor been for a 

 certain end, the efficient caufe would not have operated ; the formal 

 would not have given a nature and effence to the thing, fit to anfwer 

 the end intended ; and matter would not have been employed to pro- 

 duce a 'viftble world. Further, the beauty of nature, as Ariftotle has 

 obferved, confifts in final caufes, without which we can conceive no 

 beauty in any thing *. Now, if we are to judge in this matter by fi- 

 nal caufes, it is evident that the principle of motion, we call gra^uita^ 

 tion, ^^as abfolutely neceflary here below, as the bufinefs of nature 

 could not be carried on without it. But, in the celeftial regions, it 

 ferves no purpofe, except what can be ferved in a more natural and 

 fimple manner without it. 



But gravitation is not the only fa£t which Sir Ifaac*s fyflem of a- 

 ftronomy fuppofes ; for there is another which he alfo requires us to 

 believe, and that is, the impulfeof projedion given by the Deity to the 

 celeftial bodies. Now, this is a poftulatum which none of the philo- 

 fophers of antiquity, who, as I have fhown, all believed the world to 

 be eternal, would have granted ; becaufe it plainly fuppofes the world 

 not to have been an eternal produdion of an eternal caufe, but to have 

 been made and fet agoing at a particular time, like any piece of hu- 

 man machinery. 



Thus, 



* T« yuf un rvy^t^rm^ «Aa' (»£«« mn U rtn; tyu ^vc-ia; i^yit;, ia-Ti Kkt /u,xXtcrTtc. cv it'^fiKtt 



wnvrny-ii 'n yiytntiXtvi, rni rov KitX»v x,*>^hi iiM<fif — Dc Partibus Animaliunii lib' l. 

 cap. 5. 



