Chap.IV. ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. 213 



he may be faicl thereby to have laid the very foundations of philo- 

 fophy. There are, according to him, four kinds of Caufes, the Ma- 

 teria/, the Formal, the Efficient, and the Final. This Divifion I 

 have explained in the firft part of this work *; and I fhall only add 

 here, that, however Httle Final Caufes may be ftudied by philofo- 

 phers at prefent, yet, if we believe in God, and hold that every 

 thing in this univerfe is produced and governed by Intelligence, we 

 muft of neceffity, at the fame time, believe that the Final Caufe is 

 truly the Firft of all Caufes, and therefore moft worthy of the ftudy 

 of the Philofopher, being that for the fake of which every other 

 Caufe is employed : So that it may be called the Cau/e of Caufes ; 

 for it is for the fake of the end that the Efficient Caufe a£ls, that the 

 Form is given to the thing, and the Matter provided to receive that 

 Form. And, as the Final Caufe is the firft: and higheft of Caufes, 

 fo the Material is the loweft ; yet it is of abfolute neceflity, as it is 

 the fubjedl in which the Form muft exift, in the works both of 

 Nature and of Art t. 



To 



* Vol. I p. 33. 



t Ariftotle, in the laft chapter of his 2cl Book of Phyfics, fpeaking of thejffn.:/ 

 and Tnaf^r/a/ caufes, exprefles the diiTerence of them in this way. He fays, a thing 

 is done «i* "Ji, meaning the final Caufe, or the iv h%x.a. ; but, at the fame time, 

 he fays, that the thing cannot be done «i/k a.iiv t^vJi, meaning the Va«, or material 



Caufe. And he adds, xa* nu-^a fi.ii t* (pus-iit* Aixtmi in ccHimi, ftaXXet it 'n Tift inx»' 

 itiTitt y«5 rtvTt T7i< »A)i;, <icA>.' tv^ iwro rev nXtUf, that IS, " Both Caufcs, (the Final 

 ♦' and Material), ought to be treated of by the Natural Philofopher -, but chiefly 

 " the Final, becaufe this is the Caufe of the Material, not the Material of il." 

 Our modern philofophcrs have juft reverfed this method of treating Phyfics ; for 

 they fpeak a great deal of Material Caufes, but little or nothing of Final. 



1 will fubjoin here Simplicius's account of the pre-eminence of the Final Caufe ; 



To x{<«T(c-1«» «it;o» t» ri>.ix»f iu inxn x«i r» vtir.rixct ?r«i«, x»i t» {i^icir •{'^a, x«; r» »A(- 



xo» cciTf 'vvt7T^0Tca •iKKOf T«i{ TT^Kyfittu — in libros Dt Anima, lib. 3. fol. 80. p. 2. 

 where the learned reader will obferve, that he fays the r» eiJif, or Species, ij/^ii 

 T« 5r{«yft«, that is, bounds or determines the thing, becaufe it is by the Species, 

 not by the Matter, that every fhing is what it is, and is 'Vpirrir-»d from every thing 

 elfe ; and accordingly it is by the Species that we know every thing. 



