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

52 2 "The Pagans breaking and cnunhling Book I.tionihus qui/que coleret, quo maxime indigeret ; frail and toilfome mortalityhas thus broken and crumbled the Deity into parts, mindful of its own infirmity; that fo every one, by parcels and pieces, might worfiip that in God,which himfelf mofi ftands in need of. Which religion of the Pagans, thusworfhipping God, not entirely all together at once, as he is one mod limplebeing, unmixed with any thing, but as it were brokenly, and by piece-meals,as he is feverally manifefted in all the things of nature, and the partsof the world, Prudentius thus perftringeth in his fecond book agairiltSymmachus i.T g 7a, me praterito, meditaris numina mille,389.'] ^'^ fimules parere meis virtutibus, ut mePer varies partes minuas, cui nulla recidiPars aut forma poteft, quia fum fubjlantia fimplex^Nee pars effe queo.[p.From which words of his we may alfo conclude, that Symmachus the Pagan,who determined, that it was one thing, that all worlhipped, and yetwould have vidtory, and fuch like other things, worfhippcd asgods andgoddeffes, did by thefe, and all thofe other Pagan gods before mentioned,underftand nothing but fo many feveral names, and partial confiderations ofone fupreme Deity, according to its feveral virtues or powers: fo that whenhe facrificed to viftory, he facrificed to God Almighty, under that partialnotion, as the giver of vidlory to kingdoms and commonwealths. It wasbefore obferved out of Plutarch, that the Egyptian fable of 0/iris being"oi^^Vupr'eme" Hianglcd and cut in pieces by Typhon, did allegorically fignify the fame thing.Deity, fee the ^y^;. the ouc fimple Deity's being as it were divided (in the fabulous andIgyptian In- . ., 1 i _• _ _ r .i_ 1-. ^ •. •i r_ j : ^ri-_fcnption, in civil theologics of the Pagans) into many partial confiderations of him, as•nio. Smyrn.^^ many nominal and titular gods ; which //is notwithftanding, that is truenpMeuVaV 'knowledge and wifdom, according to the natural or philofophick theology,'J^i'^^s all together into one. And that not only fuch gods as thefe, vidfory,''""""off^TotJis th/mofi virtue, and the like, but alfo thofe other gods, Neptune, Mars, Bellona,Vil'tblng'y'^ &c. were all really but one and the lam.' Jupiter, afting feverally in theworld, Plautus himfelf feems fufficiently to intimate in the prologue of hisAmphitryo in thefe wordsNam quid ego memorem, ut alios in tragcediisVidi, Nepiunum, Virtutem, ViSioriam,Martem, Bellonam, commemorare qu£ bonaVobis feciffent ? ^eis benefaiiis meus pater^Deum regnator, architeifus omnibus.Whereas there was before cited a pafTage out of G. I. Voffius his b ookde Theolog. Gent, which we could not underftand otherwife than thus, thatthe generality of the Pagans by their political (or civil) gods, meant fomany eternal minds independent and felf-exiftent ; we now think ourfelvesconcerned to do Voffius fo much right, as to acknowledge, that we have fmcemet