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An Apology for Atheism - Addressed to Religious Investigators of Every Denomination - by One of Its Apostles by Charles Southwell
page 72 of 129 (55%)
good--but one _what_? From the information, 'He is the same for ever and
everywhere,' we conclude that Newton thought him a Being. Here however,
matter stops the way; for the idea of Being is in all of us inseparably
associated with the idea of substance. When told that God is an 'Immense
Being,' without parts, and consequently unsubstantial, we try to think
of such a Being; but in vain. Reason puts itself in a _quandary_, the
moment it labours to realise an idea of absolute nothingness; yet
marvellous to relate, Newton did distinctly declare his Deity 'totally
destitute of body,' and urged that _fact_ as a _reason_ why He cannot be
either seen, touched, or understood, and also as a _reason_ why He ought
not to be adored under any corporeal figure!

The proper function of 'Supernaturality or Wonder,' according to
Phrenologists, is to create a belief in the reality of supernatural
beings, and begets fondness for news, particularly if extravagant. Most
likely then, such readers of our Apology as have that organ 'large' will
be delighted with Newton's rhodomontade about a God who resists nothing,
feels nothing, and yet with condescension truly divine, not only
contains all things, but permits them to move in His motionless and
'universal presence'; for 'news' more extravagant, never fell from the
lips of an idiot, or adorned the pages of a prayer-book.

By the same great _savan_, we are taught that God governs all, not as
the soul of the world, but as the Lord and sovereign of all things; that
it is in consequence of His sovereignty He is called the Lord God, the
Universal Emperor--that the word God is relative, and relates itself
with slaves--and that the Deity is the dominion or the sovereignty of
God, not over his own body, as those think who look upon God as the soul
of the world, but over slaves--from all which _slavish_ reasoning, a
plain man who had not been informed it was concocted by Europe's pet
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