But were this world ever so perfect a production, it must still remain
uncertain, whether all the excellences of the work can justly be ascribed
to the workman. If we survey a ship, what an exalted idea must we form of
the ingenuity of the carpenter who framed so complicated, useful, and
beautiful a machine? And what surprise must we feel, when we find him a
stupid mechanic, who imitated others, and copied an art, which, through a
long succession of ages, after multiplied trials, mistakes, corrections,
deliberations, and controversies, had been gradually improving? Many
worlds might have been botched and bungled, throughout an eternity, ere
this system was struck out; much labour lost, many fruitless trials made;
and a slow, but continued improvement carried on during infinite ages in
the art of world-making. In such subjects, who can determine, where the
truth; nay, who can conjecture where the probability lies, amidst a great
number of hypotheses which may be proposed, and a still greater which may
be imagined?

And what shadow of an argument, continued PHILO, can you produce, from
your hypothesis, to prove the unity of the Deity? A great number of men
join in building a house or ship, in rearing a city, in framing a
commonwealth; why may not several deities combine in contriving and
framing a world? This is only so much greater similarity to human
affairs. By sharing the work among several, we may so much further limit
the attributes of each, and get rid of that extensive power and
knowledge, which must be supposed in one deity, and which, according to
you, can only serve to weaken the proof of his existence. And if such
foolish, such vicious creatures as man, can yet often unite in framing
and executing one plan, how much more those deities or demons, whom we
may suppose several degrees more perfect!

To multiply causes without necessity, is indeed contrary to true