These questions we have agreed to forbear on
both sides; and it is chiefly his interest on the present
occasion to stick to this agreement. Judging by our limited and
imperfect experience, generation has some privileges above
reason: for we see every day the latter arise from the former,
never the former from the latter.
Compare, I beseech you, the consequences on both sides. The
world, say I, resembles an animal; therefore it is an animal,
therefore it arose from generation. The steps, I confess, are
wide; yet there is some small appearance of analogy in each step.
The world, says C/LEANTHES\, resembles a machine; therefore it is
a machine, therefore it arose from design. The steps are here
equally wide, and the analogy less striking. And if he pretends
to carry on my hypothesis a step further, and to infer design or
reason from the great principle of generation, on which I insist;
I may, with better authority, use the same freedom to push
further his hypothesis, and infer a divine generation or theogony
from his principle of reason. I have at least some faint shadow
of experience, which is the utmost that can ever be attained in
the present subject. Reason, in innumerable instances, is
observed to arise from the principle of generation, and never to
arise from any other principle.
H/ESIOD\, and all the ancient mythologists, were so struck
with this analogy, that they universally explained the origin of
nature from an animal birth, and copulation.
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