Hugo Grotius · 76 of 132

SECT. XI. An answer to this, that the rise and decay of religion is owing to the stars.

THERE were some philosophers who ascribed the rise and decay of all religion to the stars; but this starry science, which they profess to know and understand, is delivered in such different rules, that there is nothing certain to be found in it, but this one thing, that there is no certainly in it. I do not speak of those effects which naturally follow from necessary causes; but of such as proceed from the will of man, which is in its own nature so far free, as that no external necessity can be laid upon it; for if the act of willing Bowed from such a necessary impression, that power which we experience in the soul, of deliberating and choosing, would be given us to no purpose: and the justice of all laws, and of rewards and punishments, would be entirely taken away; because there is neither blame nor desert due to that which is plainly unavoidable. Further, since some actions of the will are evil, if they are caused by a certain necessity of the heavens, and because God has given such a power to the heavens and the heavenly bodies, it will follow, that God, who is perfectly good, is the true cause of moral evil; and at the same time that be professes his utter abhorrence of wickedness in his positive law, he has planted the efficient and inevitable cause of it in the nature of things; therefore he wills two things contrary to each other, viz. that the same thing should be, and not be; and that that should be a sin which is done by a divine impulse. It is said by others, with a greater shew of probability, that first the air, and afterwards our bodies, are affected by the influence of the stars, and so imbibe certain qualities, which for the most part excite in the soul desires answerable to them; that by these the will is enticed, and oftentimes yields to them. But if this be granted, it makes nothing to the question in hand: for the religion of Christ could not possibly have its rise from the affections of the body, nor consequently from the power of the stars; which, as was said, act upon the mind no otherwise than by such affections; because this religion, in the highest degree, draws men off from those things that delight the body. The wisest astrologers do except truly knowing and good men from the law of the stars; and such were they who first proposed the Christian religion, as their lives plainly shew: and if we allow a power in learning and knowledge to hinder their bodies from being thus infected, there always were amongst Christians some who might be commended upon this account. Further, the effects of the stars, as the most learned confess, respect only particular parts of the world, and are temporary: but this religion has continued already for above sixteen hundred years, not only in one, but in very distant parts of the world, and such as are under very different positions of the stars.

SECT. XII. The principal things of the Christian religion were approved of by the wisest heathens: and if there be any thing in it hard to be believed, the like is to be found amongst the heathen.

THERE is the less reason for the heathens to oppose the Christian religion; because all the parts of it are so agreeable to the rules of virtue, that, by their own light, they do in a manner convince the mind; insomuch that there have not been wanting some amongst the heathen who have said those things singly, which in our religion are all put together. For instance, that religion does not consist in ceremonies, but is in the mind; that he who has it in his heart to commit adultery, is an adulterer; that we ought not to return an injury; that a husband ought to have but one wife; that the bands of matrimony ought not to be dissolved; that it is every man’s duty to do good to another, especially to him that is in want; that, as much as possible, men ought to abstain from swearing; that in meat and clothes, they ought to be content with what is necessary to supply nature. And if there be any thing in the Christian religion difficult to be believed, the like is to be found amongst the wisest of the heathens, as we have before made appear, with respect to the immortality of the soul, and bodies being restored to life again. Thus Plato, taught by the Chaldeans, distinguished the divine nature into the Father; the Father’s Mind, which he also calls a branch of the Deity, the Maker of the world; and the soul, which comprehends and contains all things. That the Divine nature could be joined with the human, Julian, that great enemy to the Christians, believed, and gave an example in Æsculapius, who be thought came from heaven to deliver to men the art of physic. Many are offended a the cross of Christ; but what stories are there which the heathen authors do not tell of their gods! Some were servants to kings; others were struck with thunderbolts, ripped up, wounded. And the wisest of them affirmed, that the more virtue cost, the more delightful it was. Plato, in his second Republic, says, in a manner, prophetically, that for a man to appear truly good, it is necessary that his virtue be deprived of all its ornaments, so that he may be looked upon by others as a wicked man, may be derided, and at last hanged: and certainly to be an example of eminent patience, is no otherwise to be obtained.