That doctrine of
Epicurus, that denied the providence of God, was no
atheism, but a magnificent and high-strained conceit of
his majesty, which he deemed too sublime to mind the
trivial actions of those inferior creatures. That fatal
necessity of the stoicks is nothing but the immutable
law of his will. Those that heretofore denied the
divinity of the Holy Ghost have been condemned but
as hereticks; and those that now deny our Saviour,
though more than hereticks, are not so much as atheists:
for, though they deny two persons in the Trinity, they
hold, as we do, there is but one God.
That villain and secretary of hell,<26> that composed that
miscreant piece of the three impostors, though divided
from all religions, and neither Jew, Turk, nor Christian,
was not a positive atheist. I confess every country hath
its Machiavel, every age its Lucian, whereof common
heads must not hear, nor more advanced judgments too
rashly venture on. It is the rhetorick of Satan; and
may pervert a loose or prejudicate belief.
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