fary a Concomitant of Religion and divine Worship, according to Cicero, that he makes it, in another place, to be that which distinguishes Religion from Superftition: (e) Cultus autem Deorum eft optimus, &c. But that Religion, that Worship of the Gods is the beft, the pureft, the holieft, and fulleft of Piety, that we always revere and worship them with a pure, upright, and undefiled Mind and Voice. For, faith he, not only the Philofophers, but our Forefathers, have diftinguished Superftition from Religion; which he affigns the Difference of, and then tells us, That the one hath the Name of a Vice, the other of Praise.

Thus as the Heathens have, by the Light of Nature, deduced the Existence and Attributes of God from his Works, and particularly those of the Heavens; fo have they,

(e) De Nat. Deor. 1. 2. c. 28.

at

at the fame time, collected what the principal Duties are which Men owe to God; fo reasonable, so natural, so manifest they are to all Mankind.

CHA P. IV.

Lactantius his Argument against the Heathen Gods.

HE next Inference shall be one

T made by

made by the eloquent Lactancollitius: (a) Argumentum illud quo gunt univerfa Cæleftia Deos effe, &c. i. e. That Argument whereby they conclude the heavenly Bodies to be Gods, proveth the contrary: For if therefore they think them to be Gods, because they have fuch certain and well contrived rational Courses, they err. For

(a) Inftitut. 1. 2. c. 5.

from hence it appears that they are not Gods, becaufe they are not able to wander out of thofe Paths that are prefcribed them: Whereas if they were Gods, they would go here and there, and every where, without any Compulfion, like as Animals upon the Earth do; whofe Wills being free, they wander bither and thither, as they lift, and go whitherfoever their Minds carry them.

Thus Lactantius, with great Reafon, refutes the Divinity of the heavenly Bodies; which, on the contrary, are so far from being Gods, and Objects of divine Honour and Worfhip, that fome of them have been taken to be Places of Torment. Thus Comets particularly, which must needs have a very unequal and uncomfortable Temper of Heat and Cold, by reafon of their prodigiously near Approaches to the Sun, and as great Receffes from it. Thus according to

2

the

the before commended Sir Ifaac Newton's (b) Computation, the Comet in 1680, in its Perihelion, was above 166 times nearer the Sun than the Earth is; and confequently its Heat was then 28000 times greater than that of Summer: So that a Ball of Iron as big as the Earth heated by it, would hardly become cool in 50000 Years. Such a Place therefore, if defigned for Habitation, may be imagined to be destined rather for a Place of Torment, than any other Sort of living.

But above all, the Sun itself, the great Object of heathen Worship, is, by fome of our own learned Countrymen, fupposed to be probably the Place of Hell. Of which Mr. Swinden hath written a Treatife called, An Enquiry into the Nature and Place of Hell.

(b) Principia, p. 466.

CHAP.

CHAP. V.

This Survey of the Heavens teaches us not to overvalue the World; with Reflections of the heathen Writers thereupon.

FR

ROM the Confideration of the prodigious Magnitude and Multitude of the heavenly Bodies, and the far more noble Furniture and Retinue which fome of them have more than we, we may learn not to overvalue this World, nor to fet our Hearts too much upon it, or upon any of its Riches, Honours, or Pleafures. For what is all our Globe but a Point, a Trifle to the Universe! a Ball not fo much as vifible among the greatest Part of the Heavens,

name