Wesley Corpus

Has not fire more mobility than this? Did there need omnipotence, to convert fire into fire, into the sun, or moisture into water? "Darkness was absolutely unknown to the angels till they fell. Hence it appears, that darkness is the ground of the mate riality of nature." Appears to whom? Nothing appears to me, but the proving ignotum per ignotius.f See the Spectator. + The proving of an unknown proposition by one still less known.-EDIT. "All life is a desire." (Spirit of Love, Part II., p. 198.) "Every desire, as such, is and must be made up of contra riety. God's bringing a sensible creature into existence is the bringing the power of desire into a creaturely state." (Ibid.) Does not all this require a little more proof, and not a little illustration? "Hard and soft, thick and thin, could have no existence, till nature lost its first purity. And this is the one true origin of all the materiality of this world. Else, nothing thick or hard could ever have been." (Part I., p. 21.) Does not this call for much proof? since most people believe God created matter, merely because so it seemed good in his sight. But you add a kind of proof. "How comes a flint to be so hard and dark? It is because the meekness and fluidity of the light, air, and water are not in it." (Ibid.) The meekness of light, and air, and water / What is that? Is air or water capable of virtue? "The first property of nature is a constraining, attracting, and coagulating power." I wait the proof of this. "God brought gross matter out of the sinful properties of mature, that thereby the fallen angels might lose all their power over them." And have they lost all power over them? Is Satan no longer prince of the power of the air? "As all matter is owing to the first property of nature, which is an astringing, compressing desire." Stop here, Sir. I totally deny, that any unintelligent being is capable of any desire at all. And yet this gross, capital mistake, runs through your whole theory. "The fourth property is fire." Where is the proof? "Which changes the properties of nature into an heavenly state." Proof again?