organised by an Almighty Designer; for the maker of a thing must be
superior to the thing made; and if there be a maker of the universe
there can be no doubt, but that if such maker were minutely examined by
man, man would discover such indications of wisdom and design that it
would be more difficult for him to admit that such maker was not caused
or constructed by a pre-existing Designer, than to admit that the
universe was not caused or constructed by a Designer. But no one will
contend for an infinite series of Makers; and if, continues the Atheist,
what would, if viewed, be indications of design, are no proofs of a
designer in the one case, they are not; in the other; and as such
indications are the only evidence we have of the existence of a Designer
of the universe, we, as rational beings, contend there is no God. We do
not suppose the existence of any being, of which there is no evidence,
when such supposition, if admitted, so far from diminishing would only
increase a difficulty, which at best is sufficiently great. Surely, if a
superior being may have existed from all eternity, an inferior may have
existed from all eternity; if a great God sufficiently mighty to make a
world may have existed from all eternity, of course without beginning
and without cause, such world may have existed from all eternity,
without beginning, and without cause.' [31:1]

These are 'strong reasons' for Atheism--they prove that Theists set at
nought the rule of philosophising which forbids us to choose the greater
of two difficulties. Their system compels them to do so, for having no
other groundwork than the strange hypotheses that time was when there
was no time--something existed when there was nothing, which something
created everything; its advocates would be tongue-tied and lost if
reduced to the hard necessity of appealing to facts, or rigidly
regarding rules of philosophising, which have only their reasonableness
to recommend them. They profess ability to account for nature, and are