XVI. Of Atheism.
I had rather believe all the fables in the Legend[1] and the Talmud,[2] and the Alcoran,[3] than that this universal frame is without a mind. And therefore God never wrought miracle to convince[4] atheism because his ordinary works convince it. It is true, that a little philosophy inclineth man's mind to atheism; but depth in philosophy bringeth men's minds about to religion. For while the mind of man looketh upon second causes scattered, it may some times rest in them, and go no further; but when it beholdeth the chain of them, confederate and linked together, it must needs fly to Providence and Deity. Nay, even that school which is most accused of atheism doth most demonstrate religion; that is, the school of Leucippus[5] and Democritus and Epicurus.[6] For it is a thousand times more credible, that four
- ↑ The Legend. A book of miraculous stories, so called because it was appointed to be read in churches on certain days.
- ↑ The Talmud. The book of Jewish traditional or oral laws and regulations of life explanatory of the written law of the Pentateuch, together with the commentaries of the rabbins thereon. The two recensions of the Talmud, the Palestinian and the Babylonian, were composed between the ends of the 2d and 6th centuries A.D.
- ↑ Alcoran (Arabic, the book), or Koran, the Mohammedan book of faith and worship.
- ↑ Convince. To disprove; to refute. "There was never miracle wrought by God to convert an atheist, because the light of nature might have led him to confess a God." Advancement of Learning. II. vi. 1.
- ↑ Leucippus, Greek philosopher, flourished about 500 B.C. He founded the atomic school of philosophy.
- ↑ Epicurus, Greek philosopher, 342–270 B.C. Epicurus taught that pleasure is the only possible end of rational action, and that the ultimate pleasure is freedom. With Democritus, he accepted and helped to develop the theory of atoms of Leucippus.
