We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 January 2010
[Editor's Note: We do not know the name of Clarke's correspondent. Clarke's letter dealt extensively with the issue of divine immensity and its compatibility with the fact that God is an immaterial thinking substance. It should be read in conjunction with supplementary text 1. The text is from Wii, 751–4]
Sir,
You will give me leave, without any preface or apology, to propose directly the best answer I can to the objections you have offered.
There are but two ways by which the being and all or any of the attributes of God can possibly be proved. The one, a priori; the other, a posteriori.
The proof a posteriori is level to all men's capacities because there is an endless gradation of wise and useful phenomena of nature, from the most obvious to the most abstruse, which afford at least a moral and reasonable proof of the being of God to the several capacities of all unprejudiced men who have any probity of mind. And this is what, I suppose, God expects, as a moral governor, that moral agents should be determined by.
To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.
Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.
Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.
