from final causes, he seems to lay more
stress on the metaphysical argument of the necessity of the divine
existence. He first proves the existence of personality and will,(569) and
uses this idea for the purpose of exploring the outer world; arguing that
matter is inert and not self-active, he regards matter in motion as
indicating force, and therefore volition; uniformity in its motion as
proving a law, and therefore an intelligent will,(570) in which wisdom,
power, and goodness combine.(571) This being is God, to whom man is
subject. The universe is universal order. The physical evil therein
originates in our vices, the moral in our free will.(572)

Having established the being of a God, he next proceeds to give reasons
for believing in immortality. He bases it on the fact of the goodness of
God, which leads Him to recompense with happiness the suffering good; and
he disbelieves the eternity of punishment for the bad.(573) Having fixed
the objects of belief, he next lays down the rule of duty in conscience,
which he regards as an innate and infallible guide.(574) After thus
establishing natural religion, he proceeds to criticise revealed, arguing
its want of irrefragable evidence,(575) the discrepant(576) opinions in
reference to it, the improbability of portions of its history;(577)
attacking strongly the external evidence of prophecy and miracles; the
former on the alleged want of proof of agreement between prophecy and its
fulfilment; the latter on the ground of the alleged circle, that miracles
are made to prove doctrine, and doctrine miracles.(578) He accordingly
rejects the idea of Christianity being necessary to salvation; but renders
a tribute of praise to its moral precepts, and regards the gospels, though
partly fictitious, as containing indestructible moral truths; and
concludes with the well-known comparison of Socrates to Christ, showing
the stupendous superiority of the death and example of the latter. "If the
death of Socrates," he says, "was that of a sage, that of Jesus was that
of a God."(579)

It would have been thought that such teaching as this would hardly have
excited a legal prosecution, in comparison with the more violent attacks
that were made on religion: but the wide reputation and fascinating style
of the author, the extraordinary ability of the work, above all the fact
that many of the previous infidel doctrines had been published without the
writers' names, were the means of subjecting