8 8 The consequences of the

but as much force as the strength of a childcould impress, the force in the last would beinconceivable. The battering rams of anti-quity, or the modern cannon would scarcehelp us to form a notion of it. How then isit possible to conceive that poor sluggish mat-ter should so prodigiously increase the quan-

is certainly once wholly extinguished in both cafes; forif Contrary force doth it in one cafe , it cannot not do it in theother, be it re-excited what way it will: and if mattercannot move itself in any case, it cannot move itselfhere: whence the conclusion is obvious. As I have saidabove then, I with men would examine this argumenton all sides; and if they cannot find a fault in it, thatthey would embrace the consequences of it with a phi-losophical ingenuity. I am of opinion, and think itwould be easy to stiew it, if one had leisure to runthrough the several particulars, that unless an immateri-al Power continually re-excited motion in the materialuniverse, all motion would stop in it, in a very shorttime, perhaps in less than half an hour, except that theplanets would run out in streight-lined directions. Andthen what a face of things should we have! Darkness,silence, and unsuccestive rest. For certainly matter ofitself can pursue no end , ohey no law, nor change the di-rection of its motion, nor any way alter its presentfate:and since in all motions in the universe an end is pursued,a law obeyed, the direction changed ; and since in all theremarkable phænomena of nature there is a circulationof motion; the truth of what I here suggest must bepretty obvious to any thinking person. jjty