CttAP. 11.] ITATURAL THEOLOGY. 121 



IS all-powerful, wise, prescient, good, a just vewai'der and 

 piinisher, and to be adored, may be shown and enforced Ironi 

 ins worlds ; and many other wonderful secrets, with regard to 

 his attributes, and much more as to his dispensation and 

 government over the universe, may al.-o be solidly deduced, 

 and made appear from the same. And this subject has been 

 usefully treated by several.*' 



But from the contemplation of nature, and the princijjles of 

 human reason, to dispute or urge anything with vehemence, 

 as to the mysteries of faith, or over-curiously to examine and 

 sift them, by prying into the manner of the mystery, is no 

 safe thiuG' : " Give unto faith the things that are faith's." 

 And the heathens grant as much in that excellent and divine 

 fable of the golden chain, where '•' men and gods are repre- 

 sented as unable to draw Jupiter to earth, but Jupiter able 

 to draw them up to heaven."*^ So that it is a vain attempt 

 to draw down the sublime mysteries of religion to our 

 reason, but we should rather raise our minds to the adorable 

 throne of heavenly truth. And in this part of natural 

 theology, we find rather an excess than any defect ; which 

 Ave have however turned .a little aside to note, on account of 

 the extreme prejudice and danger which both religion and 

 philosophy hence incur, because a mixture of these makes 

 both an heretical religion and a fantastic and superstitious 

 ])hilosophy.** 



It is otherwise, as to the nature of spirits and angels ; 

 this being neither unsearchable nor forbid, but in a great 

 part level to the human mind, on account of their afiinity. 

 We are, indeed, forbid in Scripture to worship angels, or to 

 entertain fantastical opinions of them,* so as to exalt them 



*^ And more particularly since, by Cudwortb, in his " Intellectu.nl 

 System of the Universe ; " Mr. Boyle, in his "Christian Virtuoso;" 

 Mr. Ray, in his " Wisdom of the Creation ;" Dr. Bentley, in his " Dis- 

 course of the Folly and Unreasonableness of Atheism ;" Dr. Clarke, in 

 his "Demonstration of the Being and Attributes of God;" and by 

 Derham, in his "Physico-Theology." See also Raphson's " De Deo;'* 

 Dr. Xieuwentyt's "Religious Philosopher;" Mr. Whiston's "Astrono- 

 mical Principles of Religion ;" Commenius's " Physicse ad lumen divi- 

 num reformatae Synopsis;" Paley's "Natural Religion;" the Bridge- 

 water Treatises, and Cardinal Wiseman's " Connection of Science with 

 Bevealed Religion." Ed. ^ Iliad, ix. 



« See above, Prelim, sec. iii. 8, and hereafter of Theology, sec. nU. 



« St. Paul, Coloss. ii. 5, 18. 



