wherein all the reason and philosophy of atheism is confuted, and

Chap. III. ajferied hy fpU7'iGus Stoich, 133XXVIII. We do not deny it to be poffible, but that fome in all agesmight have entertained fuch an atheiftical conceit as this, that the original ofthis whole mundane fyllem was from one artificial, orderly and methodical,butfenfelefs nature lodged in the matter-, but we cannot trace the footfteps ofthis dodrine any where fo much as among the Stoicks, to which feet Seneca,who fpeaks fo waveringly and uncertainly in this point, (whether the worldv/ere an animal or a plant) belonged. And indeed diverfe learned men havefufpefted, that even the Zenonian and Heraclitick Deity it felf was no otherthan fuch aplaltick nature or fp^-rmatick principle in the univerfe, as in thefeeds of vegetables and animals doth frame their refpective bodies orderlyand artificially. Nor can it be denied, but that there hath been juft caufegiven for fuch a fufpicion •, forafmuch as the beft of Stoicks, fometimes confoundingGod with nature, fecmed to make him nothing but an artificialfire, orderly and methodically proceeding to generation. And it was familiarwith them, as Laertius ' tells us, to call God ijTrcpy.xTntoj x6yo-j t? xoV,a», (befpermatick reafon, or form of the ivorld. Neverthelefs, becaufe Zeno * andothers of the chief Stoical dodors did alfo many times alfert, that there was(puVif \o:^a. i^ >^oyixr\, a rational and intellectual nature (and therefore not aplaftick principle onlyj in the matter of the univerfe; as likewife that the wholeworld was an animal, and not a mere plant : therefore we incline rather toexcufe the generality of the firft and molt ancient Stoicks from the imputationofatheifm, and to account this form of atheifm, which we now fpeak of, tobe but a certain degeneracy from the right Heraclitick and Zenonian Cabala,which feemed to contain thefe two things in it ; firft, that there was an animalifh,fentient and intelleftual nature, or a confcious foul and mind, thatprefided over the whole world, though lodged immediately in the fiery matterof it : fecondly, that this fentient and intellectual nature, or corporealfoul and mind of the univerfe, did contain alfo under it, or within it, as theinferior part of it, a certain plaftick nature, or fpermatick principle whichwas properly the fate of all things. For thus Heraclitus = defined Fate, xiyovTov SiO, riii isViaj tou ttocvIo; Sirixoitlx, ») oa^ipiov (tuux, (TsripfAX rrj T« Trai/loV ^'fi'SirfM;*yf certain reafoji paffing through the fiibjlance of the whole 'jcorld, or an etherealbody, that was the feed of the generation of the univerfe. And Zifw's"* firft principle,asitisfaid to be an intelledtual nature, fo it is alfo faid to have containedin it nivrx^ ts? a-TrspfAalixs; AoJ/^?, >ca9' k? 'i-axrx, )t;t9' ilfji-ocf^iMriv •yi'yjilai^all the fpermatick reafons and forms, by which every thing is done according tofate. However, though this feem to have been the genuine do£trine, bothoi Heraclitus and Zeno ;yet others of their followers afterwards divided thefetwo things from one another, and taking only the latter of them, made theplaftick or fpermatick nature, devoid of all animality or confcious intelk(5luality,to be the higheft principle in the univerfe. Thus Laertius tells us %R Sthat» Lib.VIT. fcgm. 156. p. 450. Lib. I. cap. XXVIII. p. 8S5. Tom. II.* Vide Diog. Laert. Lib. VII. fegm. Oper.p 148. p. 459. • VidePlutai-ch.ubifupi'a,Lib. I.cap.VlI.3 A pud Plutarch de Placitis Philofbphor. p. SSi.» Lib. VII, fegm. 143. p. 4^5.