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

456 TTje Sun, according to Mzcrohms, Book I.fenflefs and inanimate bodies, as fuch, for gods, but the contrary ; fodoth he there diRinguifli from thofe firft inhabitants of Greece, and otherB.irbarians, the afterwaid civilized Greeks, who took notice of invifibfegods alfo. However, if this of Plato fhould be true, that fome of the ancientPagans worfhipped none but vifible and fenfible gods, (thty takingno notice of any incorporeal beings ;) yet does it not therefore fjHow, thatthofe Pagans had no notion at all amongft them of one fupreme and univerfalNumen. The contrary thereunto being manifeft, that fome ofthofe Corporealifts looked upon the whole heaven and ^tl.er animated asthe highcft God, according to that of Euripides cited by CiccrCyDe N. D. p. Fides fublime fufum, immoderatum at hera,rf^h Ti r ^' tenero terram cinumve^u ample.^ittir ;XXV. p.Hunc fummum habeto divum, hunc perhibetu Jovem,2993]As alfo that others of them conceived, that fubtil firy iublLince, which permeatesand pervades tlie whole world, (fuppofcd to be intclleclu.il} to be thefupreme Deity, which governs all ; this opinion hiving been entertained byphilofophers alfo, as namely the Heracliticks and Stoicks. And laftly,fince Macrobius ', in the perfon of Vettiiis Prutexiatus, refers fo many ofthe Pagan gods to the fun ; this renders it not improbable, but that fome ofthefe Pagans might adore the animated fun, as the fov. reign Numen, aivltiius perhaps invoke him in that form of prayer ihcr^r mentioneil *, "HAi.- vxi-Tcxp'rif, Ha'^uu Ts-.iZ^x, O omnipotent Jioi^ the mind and fpirit of the ivholetic/'/V, &c. And even Cleanthes himfelf, that learned Stoick, and devout i\:-ligionift, is fufp:ded by fome to have been of this pcrh afion.Neverthelefs, v/e think it opportune here to obferve, that It was not Macrobiushis dcfign, in thofe his Saturnalia, to defend this, either as his owaopinion, or as the opinion of the generality of Pagans, that the animatedfun was abfolutcly the higheft Deity, (as fom.e have conceived ;) nor yet toreduce that multiplicity of Pagan gods, by this device of his, into a feemingmonarchy, and nearer compliance with Chriftianity ; he there plainly confininghis difcourfe to the dii duntaxaly qui fub cctio funt, that is, the lowerfort of mundane gods; and undertaking to fhew, not that all of thefe neither,but only that many of them were reducible to the fun, as polyonymous, andcalled by feveral names, according to his fcveral virtues and effects. For, whatJ\