SPINOZISM. 



m Holland, Majus in Germany, and Dela Mothe in Eng- 

 land, wrote ac;ainft his Tradatiis ; but Bredenburg, accord- 

 ing to Mr. Bayle, fucceeded belt on this lubjedi ; who, 

 however, is laid to have been afterwards a convert to Spi- 

 nozifm, and to have written a demonltration of the truth of 

 it : a refutation of his defence by Ifaac Orobio, a learned 

 Jewifh phyfician at Amilerdam, was publifhed in 8vo. 

 1703. See alfo Buddeua's Thefes de Atheifmo et Super- 

 ftitione, c. i. feft. 26 ; and Fabricius's Syllab. Script, de 

 Verit. Relig. Chrilt. p. 357, &c. Mr. Bayle, and above 

 all Dr. Clarke and Dr. Cudworth, have diltinguiflied them- 

 felves by their refutation of the fyltem of Spino/.a. See 

 Bayle's Dift. art. Spinoza, and Clarke's Demonltration of 

 the Being and Attributes of God, p. 25 — 45, &c. ed. 

 1725. Cudworth's Intelleftual Syitem. 



Spinoza, in his Tradtatus above-mentioned, is very full 

 on the fubjeft of the authors of tlie fcriptures ; and en- 

 deavours to Ihew, that the Pentateuch is not the work of 

 Mofes ; contrary to the common opinion, both of the Jews 

 and Chriftians. He has alfo his particular fentiments as to 

 the authors of the other books. This part of the work 

 has been anfwercd by Mr. Huct, in his Demonllratio Evan- 

 gelica ; and by M. Simon, in his Hill. Crit. du Vieux Tell. 

 See Pentateuch. 



Spinozifm is a fpecies of naturalifm, or pantheifm, or 

 hylotheifm, as it is fometimes called, i. e. of the dogma 

 which allows of no other God but nature, or the univerfe ; 

 and, therefore, makes matter to be God. Accordingly, 

 Buddeus, in a dilicrtation " De Spinozifmo ante Spino- 

 zam," proves at large, that Spinoza'^ dotlrine of God 

 and the world, is far from being his own invention, but 

 that it had been held by many philofophers of ditierent feCts, 

 both among the Chaldeans and Greeks. It is certain, the 

 opinion of the Stoics, and of thofe who held an anima mimdi, 

 was not far from it. Lucan introduces Cato dilcourfing 

 thus ; 



" Eftne Dei fedcs nifi terra, et pontus, et aer, 



Et CGclum, et virtus ? fuperos quid quaerimus uhra .' 

 Jupiter ell quodcunq ; vides, quocunq : moveris." 



Luc. Pliarf. 1. 9. V. 578. 



Strato likevvife, and others among the Peripatetics, main- 

 tained fomething very like it ; and, what is more, though 

 no ancient feft feems farther removed from Spinozifm than 

 the Platonic, as they attributed the greatell freedom to 

 God, -iud carefully diliinguilhod him from matter; yet 

 Gundhngius has proved at large, that Plato j^ave matter 

 much the fame origin witli Spinoza. But the feft that ap- 

 proached nearell to Spinozifm was that which taught, that 

 all things were one, as Xenophanes the Colophonian, P.ir- 

 menidos, MelilTus, and efpccially Zcno Eleates ; whence it 

 obtairied the name of the " Ele;-.tic Sytleni of Atheilm." 

 To the fame may alio be reduced the opinion of thofe, who 

 held the lirll matter for God, as Amalricus and David of 

 Dinantum. Add, that the fe£l of Foe in China and Japan, 

 and that of the Soufi in Perfia, and tiiat of the Ziiidikites 

 ia Turkey, are found to philofophizc much after the man- 

 ner of Spmoza. 



The impious fyltem of Spinoza was fo iiigcnioufly main- 

 tained, that it found many patrons in the United Provinces, 

 among whom were Lewis Meyer, who republifhed Spinoza's 

 works, and who himfelf wrote a work entitled *' Philofophy 

 the Interpreter of Scripture," and Van Leenhof, an ccelc- 

 fiallic of Zwoll, who wrote a piece entitled " Heaven in 

 Earth," of the doftrinc of which he was obliged to make 

 a public recantation. Others, under the pretence of re- 

 futing Spino/a, fecretly f;.vouredhis fylttm. 

 2 



The chief articles in Spinoza's fyllem are reducible to 

 thefe: that there is but one fubitance in nature; and that 

 this only fubftance is endued with an infinite number of at- 

 tributes, among which are extenfion and cogitation : that 

 all the bodies in the univerfe are modifications of this fub- 

 itance, confidered as it is extended ; and that all the fouls 

 of men are modifications of the fame fubftance, confidered 

 as cogitative : that God is a necellary and infinitely pcrfeft 

 Being, and is the caufe of all things that exiit. but is not 

 a different being from them : that there is but one being, 

 and one nature ; and that this nature produces within itfelf, 

 liy an immanent aft, all thofe which we call creatures : and 

 that this being is at the fame time both agent and patient, 

 efficient caufe and liibjett ; but that he produces nothing 

 but modifications of himfelf. 



As Spinoza taught, that there is no difference of fub- 

 Itances, he maintained, that the whole and every part of 

 the material world is a necellary exillinir beinc;, and that 

 there is no other God, but the univerfe : and^^ moreover, 

 fince it is abfolutely impoffible for any thing to be created 

 or produced by another, and alfo abfolutely impollible for 

 God to have caufcd any thing to be in any relpedl different 

 from what it now is; every thing that exilts mult needs be 

 fo a part of the divine fubftance, not as a modification 

 caufed in it by any will or good pleafnre or wifdom in the 

 whole, but as of abfolute neceffity in itfelf, with relpeCt to 

 the manner of the exiftence of each part, no Icfs than with 

 refpedl to the felf-exillence of the whole ; confequently 

 the material world, and every part of it, with the order and 

 manner of being of each part, is, upon this fcheme, the 

 only felf-exiftent, or neceifarily exilling being. 



And he alfo maintains, that motion, as a dependent be- 

 ing, has been eternally communicated from one piece of 

 matter to another ; and, therefore, without having at all 

 any original caufe of its being, either within itfelf or from 

 without : this. Dr. Clarke has proved to be a plain contra- 

 diflion, and confequently, motion mull of neccffity be ori- 

 ginally caufed by fomething that is intelligent, or elfe there 

 never could have been any fuch thintj as motion in the 

 world ; and, therefore, the felf-exillent being, the original 

 caufe of all things, mult of neccffity be an intelligent be- 

 ing. Hence it follows, that the material world cannot 

 poffibly be the original felf-exiftent being. For fir.ce the 

 felf-exillent being is intelligent, and the material world 

 plainly is not fo, it follows, that the material world cannot 

 poffibly be felf-exillent. 



Agreeably to Spinoza's fyllem, he is led to maintain tint 

 the fupreme caufe is a necellary agent, and, therefore, that 

 no thing, or mode of exiftence of any thing, could poffibly 

 have been in any refpetl different from what it now adually 

 is ; becaufe, he fays, from an infinitely perfeft nature, infinite 

 things in infinite manners mull needs proceed : if any thing 

 could poffibly be otherwife than it is, the will and nature 

 of God mull be fuppofed capable of change ; and if all 

 poffible things in all pollible manners do not always and 

 neccfl'arily exill, they never can all exift, but fome things 

 that do not exift, will Hill always be poffible only, and never 

 can aftually exill ; and fo the aftual omnipotence of God 

 is taken away. To this rcafoning Dr. Clarke replies, that 

 the firll argument is a plain begging of the qiieltion ; for, 

 that an infinitrly perfert nature is able indeed to jiroduce 

 infinite things in infinite manners, is certainly true ; hut that 

 it mull always ailually do fo, by an abfolute luccffity of 

 nature, without any power of choice, either a; to time, or 

 manner, or circumltances, does by no means follow from 

 the pcrfetliou of its nature, unlcls it be firft fujipofed to 



be 



