A philosophical amusement upon the language of beasts / Written originally in French. By Father Bougeant ... , now confined at La Fleche on account of this work.
- Bougeant, père, 1690-1743. Amusement philosophique sur le langage des bêtes
- Date:
- 1739
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: A philosophical amusement upon the language of beasts / Written originally in French. By Father Bougeant ... , now confined at La Fleche on account of this work. Source: Wellcome Collection.
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![' . t 8 ] dôrt nor any Notion of. Aiid who knows but that which is a meer Chimæra with regard to us, is really foin Nature and in itfelf? If it is fo in itfelf, God has not been able to create it, becaufe he can make no ens rationis. Now who fhall re- folve lb reafonable a Doubt ? An antient Author, whofe Works are collated among thofe of the Fathers, Firmianus Laftantius, explained himfelf more frankly. He pretended that God had granted the Ufe of Reafon to whatever breathes, but to Beads for the Preferva- tion of their Lives only, without any religious Du¬ ty ; and to Men to enable them to acquire Im¬ mortality and an eternal Happinefs, by the' Prac¬ tice of a religious Worlhip. What a Notion ! To be lure Firmianus did not lee, that foppofing a reafonable and of courfe a Ipiritual Soul without any Duty of Religion, was undermining the Foundations of the Law of Nature and of all Religion, degrading the fpiritual Soul, deltroying the Immortality of its Nature, and bringing us down to the State of Beads, in trying to advance thefe to our own. You fee I only touch upon Sydems, for fear I fhould tire you by particular Arguments. How¬ ever, this is all Philofophy teaches with regard to the Knowledge of Beads. How narrow is the human 'Underdanding, you will fay, how fhort its Lights, how great its Obfcurity 1 It is enough to fright one. We know we exid and think : We fee FaCts -, we know the Exidence of a thou- fand Things ; but when we are asked how and why they are fo ; we then lofo ourfelves in an Abyls of frivolous Conjectures and falfe Suppoli- tions : We confufe our own Brains with a thou- land vain Arguments, which, far from enlightening our Minds, have generally no other effeCt than to fmother](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b30376166_0016.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
