HI.

ing good: And if the natural Course of CHAP. things be the Appointment of God, and our natural Faculties of Knowledge and Experience, are given us by him; then the good and bad Confequences which follow our Actions, are his Appointment, and our Forefight of thofe Confequences, is a Warning given us by Him, how we are to act.

"Is the Pleasure then, naturally accompa"nying every particular Gratification of Paf"fion, intended, to put us upon gratifying "Ourselves in every fuch particular Inftance, "and as a Reward to us for fo doing?" No certainly. Nor is it to be faid, that our Eyes were naturally intended to give us the Sight of each particular Object, to which they do or can extend; Objects which are deftructive of them, or which, for any other Reason, it may become us to turn our Eyes from. Yet there is no Doubt, but that our Eyes were intended for us to fee with. So neither is there any Doubt, but that the foreseen Pleasures and Pains belonging to the Paffions, were intended, in general, to induce Mankind to act in fuch and fuch Manners.

Now from this general Obfervation, obvious to every one, that God has given us to understand, he has appointed Satisfaction and Delight to be the Confequence of our acting

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in

PART in one Manner, and Pain and Uneafinefs of I. our acting in another, and of our not acting at wall; and that we find the Confequences, which we were beforehand informed of, uniformly to follow; we may learn, that we are at prefent actually under his Government in the ftrictest and most proper Senfe; in such a Senfe, as that he rewards and punishes us for our Actions. An Author of Nature being fuppofed, it is not fo much a Deduction of Reason, as a Matter of Experience, that we are thus under his Government: under his Government, in the fame Sense, as we are under the Government of civil Magiftrates. Because the annexing Pleasure to fome Actions, and Pain to others, in our Power to do or forbear, and giving Notice of this Appointment beforehand to those whom it concerns; is the proper formal Notion of Government. Whether the Pleasure or Pain which thus follows upon our Behaviour, be owing to the Author of Nature's acting upon us every Moment which we feel it; or to his having at once contrived and executed his own Part in the Plan of the World; makes no Alteration as to the Matter before us. For if civil Magiftrates could make the Sanctions of their Laws take Place, without interpofing at all, after they had paffed them; without a Trial and the Formalities of an Execution: If they were able to make their Laws execute

them

themselves, or every Offender to execute CHAP. them upon himself; we should be just in the II. fame Senfe under their Government then, as we are now, but in a much higher Degree, and more perfect Manner. Vain is the Ridicule, with which, one forefees, fome Perfons will divert themselves, upon finding leffer Pains confidered as Inftances of divine Punishment. There is no Poffibility of answering or evading the general thing here intended, without denying all final Caufes. For final Caufes being admitted, the Pleasures and Pain's now mentioned must be admitted too as Inftances of them. And if they are; if God annexes Delight to fome Actions, and Uneafinefs to others, with an apparent Design to induce us to act fo and fo; then He not only difpenfes Happiness and Mifery, but alfo rewards and punishes Actions. If, for Example, the Pain which we feel, upon doing what tends to the Destruction of our Bodies, fuppofe upon too near approaches to Fire, or upon wounding Ourselves, be appointed by the Author of Nature to prevent our doing what thus tends to our Destruction; this is altogether as much an Instance of his punishing our Actions, and confequently of our being under his Government, as declaring by a Voice from Heaven, that if we acted fo, he would inflict fuch Pain upon us, and inflicting it, whether it be greater or lefs,

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Thus

PART Thus we find, that the true Notion or I. Conception of the Author of Nature, is That

of a Master or Governor, prior to the Confideration of his moral Attributes. The Fact of our Cafe, which we find by Experience, is, that He actually exercises Dominion or Government over us at prefent, by rewarding and punishing us for our Actions, in as strict and proper a Sense of these Words, and even in the fame Senfe, as Children, Servants, Subjects, are rewarded and punished by those who govern them.

And thus the whole Analogy of Nature, the whole present Courfe of things, most fully fhows, that there is nothing incredible in the general Doctrine of Religion; that God will reward and punish Men for their Actions Hereafter: nothing incredible, I mean, arifing out of the Notion of rewarding and punishing. For the whole Course of Nature is a prefent Inftance of his exercifing That Government over us, which implies in it rewarding and punishing.

UT as divine Punishment is what Men

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chiefly object against, and are most unwilling to allow; it may be proper to mention fome Circumftances in the natural Course

of

II.

of Punishments at prefent, which are analo-CHAP. gous to what Religion teaches us concerning a future State of Punishment: Indeed fo analogous, that as they add a farther Credibility to it, fo they cannot but raise a moft ferious Apprehenfion of it in those who will attend to them.

It has been now obferved, that fuch and fuch Miseries naturally follow fuch and such Actions of Imprudence and Willfulness, as well as Actions more commonly and more diftinctly confidered as vitious; and that these Confequences, when they may be foreseen, are properly natural Punishments annexed to fuch Actions. For the general thing here infifted upon, is, not that we see a great deal of Mifery in the World, but a great deal which Men bring upon themselves by their own Behaviour, which they might have foreseen and avoided. Now the Circumftances of these natural Punishments, particularly deferving our Attention, are fuch as these; That oftentimes they follow, or are inflicted in confequence of, Actions, which procure many present Advantages, and are accompanied with much present Pleasure: for Instance, Sickness and untimely Death is the Confequence of Intemperance, though accompanied with the highest Mirth and Jollity: That these Punishments are often much greater, than the E 4 Advan