So that...

So that, considering man barely as an animal of three or four score years' duration, and then to end, his condition and state requires no other knowledge than what may furnish him with those things which may help him to pass out to the end of that time with ease, safety, and delight, which is all the happiness he is capable of: and for the attainment of a correspondent measure mankind is sufficiently provided.

He has faculties and organs well adapted for the discovery, if he thinks fit to employ and use them. Another use of his knowledge is to live in peace with his fellow-men, and this also he is capable of.

Besides a plenty of the good things of this world, with life, health, and peace to enjoy them, we can think of no other concernment mankind hath that leads him not out of it, and places him not beyond the confines of this earth; and it seems probable that there should be some better state somewhere else to which man might arise, since, when he hath all that this world can afford, he is still unsatisfied, uneasy, and far from happiness.

It is certain, and that all men must consent to, that there is a possibility of another state when this scene is over; and that the happiness and misery of that depends on the ordering of ourselves in our actions in this time of our probation here.

The acknowledgment of a God will easily lead any one to this, and he hath left so many footsteps of himself, so many proofs of his being in every creature, as are sufficient to convince any who will but make use of their faculties that way,and I dare say nobody escapes this conviction for want of sight; but if any be so blind, it is only because they will not open their eyes and see; and those only doubt of a Supreme Ruler and a universal law, who would willingly be under no law, accountable to no judge; those only question another life hereafter, who intend to lead…