It Is... A Just Political Maxim, That

I Never Asserted Such An Absurd Thing As That Things Arise Without A Cause.

What Is Easy And Obvious Is Never Valued; And Even What Is In Itself Difficult, If We Come To Knowledge Of It Without Difficulty, And Without And Stretch Of Thought Or Judgment, Is But Little Regarded.

Happy The Man Whom Indulgent Fortune Allows To Pay To Virtue What He Owes To Nature, And To Make A Generous Gift Of What Must Otherwise Be Ravished From Him By Cruel Necessity.

There Is No Method Of Reasoning More Common, And Yet None More Blameable, Than, In Philosophical Disputes, To Endeavour The Refutation Of Any Hypothesis, By A Pretence Of Its Dangerous Consequences To Religion And Morality. When Any Opinion Leads To Absurdities, It Is Certainly False; But It Is Not Certain That An Opinion Is False, Because It Is Of Dangerous Consequence. Such Topics, Therefore, Ought Entirely To Be Forborne; As Serving Nothing To The Discovery Of Truth, But Only To Make The Person Of An Antagonist Odious.

Convulsions In Nature, Disorders, Prodigies, Miracles, Though The Most Opposite Of The Plan Of A Wise Superintendent, Impress Mankind With The Strongest Sentiments Of Religion.