XVI. That prejudices hinder many from clearly knowing the necessity
of the existence of God.

Our mind would have no difficulty in assenting to this truth, if it
were, first of all, wholly free from prejudices; but as we have been
accustomed to distinguish, in all other things, essence from
existence, and to imagine at will many ideas of things which neither
are nor have been, it easily happens, when we do not steadily fix
our thoughts on the contemplation of the all-perfect Being, that a
doubt arises as to whether the idea we have of him is not one of
those which we frame at pleasure, or at least of that class to whose
essence existence does not pertain.

XVII. That the greater objective (representative) perfection there
is in our idea of a thing, the greater also must be the perfection
of its cause.

When we further reflect on the various ideas that are in us, it is
easy to perceive that there is not much difference among them, when
we consider them simply as certain modes of thinking, but that they
are widely different, considered in reference to the objects they
represent; and that their causes must be so much the more perfect
according to the degree of objective perfection contained in them.
[Footnote: "as what they represent of their object has more
perfection."--FRENCH.] For there is no difference between this and
the case of a person who has the idea of a machine, in the
construction of which great skill is displayed, in which
circumstances we have a right to inquire how he came by this idea,
whether, for example, he somewhere saw such a machine constructed by
another, or whether he was so accurately taught the mechanical