Masonic Notes And Queries.

MASONIC NOTES AND QUERIES .

OPINIONS UPON THE VOLUME OE THE SACRED LAW . Lord Bacon . — "There never was found in auy age of the world , either philosopher , or sect , or law , or discipline , which did so highly exalt the public good as the Christian faith . " John Selden . — "There is no ^ book upon which Ave can rest iu a dying moment but the Bible . "

John Milton . — "There are no songs comparable to the songs of Zion ; no orations equal to those of the prophets ; and no politics like those which the Scriptures teach . " Salmasius . — " Had I but one year more , it should have been spent iu studying David ' s Psalms and

Paul's Epistles . " Sir Matthew Hale . — " There is no book like the Bible for excellent wisdom , learning , and use . " Hon . Robert Boyle . — " The Bible is a matchless volume ; it is impossible we can study it too much , or esteem it too highly . "

John Locke . — " It is all pure , all sincere ; nothing too much , nothing wanting . " Sir Isaac INewton . — "The authority of emperors , kings , and princes is human — the authority of councils , synods , bishops , and presbyters is human ; but the authority of the prophets , and Moses , aud the apostles is divine . "

Sir William Jones . — " The adamantine pillars of our Christian faith cannot be moved by the result of any debates ou the comparative antiquity of the Hindus and the Egyptians , or of any inquiry into the Indian theology . " J . J . Rousseau . — "Iconfess to you , the majesty of

the Scriptures astonishes me ; the holiness of the Gospel speaks to my heart . If the life and death of Socrates are those of a sage , the life and death of Jesus are those of a God . " Lord Byron . — " Christianity is the purest and most liberal religion in the world , but the numerous teachers who are continually worrying mankind with their denunciations and their doctrines are the

greatest enemies of religion . I have read Avith more attention than half of them the Book of Christianity , and I admire the liberal and truly charitable principles which Christ has laid down . " —EKATEE . KNOWLEDGE OE THE EXISTENCE OE GOD . Though God has given us no innate ideas of

Himself ; though He has stamped no original characters on our minds Avherein we may read His being ; yet having furnished us with those faculties our minds are endowed with , He hath not left Himself without witness ; since we have sense , perception , and reason and cannot want clear proof of Him as long as Ave

carry ourselves about us . JSTor can we justly complain of our ignorance on this great point since He has so plentifully provided us with the means to discover and know Him , —so far as is necessary to the end of our being , and the great concernment of our happiness . But though this be the most obvious truth that reason

discovers , and though its evidence be—if I mistake not—equal to mathematical certainty ; yet it requires thought and attention , and the mind must apply itself to a regular deduction of it from some part of our intuitive knowledge , or else we shall be as uncertain and ignorant of this as of other propositions which are in themselves capable of clear demonstration . To

There is no truth more evident than that something must be from eternity . I never yet heard of any one so unreasonable , or that could suppose so manifest a contradiction as a time wherein there was perfectly nothing , —this being of all absurdities the greatest , to imagine that pure nothing- —the perfect negation and absence of all beingsshould ever produce any real

, existence . Next it is evident that what has its being and beginning from another must also have all that which is in and belongs to its being from another too . All the powers it bas must be owing to and received from tbe same source . This eternal source then of all

show , therefore , that we are capable of Icnowing , i . e ., being certain tliat there is a God , and how we may come by this certainty , I think we need go no farther than ourselves , and that undoubted knowledge we have of our own existence . I think it is beyond question that man has a clear perception of Ids own heiny ; he knows certainlthat

y he exists , and that he is something . Him that can doubt whether he be anything or no , I speak not to : no more than I would argue with pure nothing , or endeavour to convince nonentity that it' were something . If anyone pretends to be so sceptical as to deny his own existence—for reallto doubt it is

y manifestly impossible—let him for me enjoy the blessed happiness of being nothing , until hunger or some other pain convince him to the contrary . This then I think I may take for a truth which everyone ' s certain knoAvledge assures him of , beyond the liberty of doubting , viz ., that he is something that actually

exists . In the next place , man knows by intuitive certainty that bare nothing can no more produce any real heiny , than it can be equal to two right angles . ¦ If a man knoAvs not that nonentity , or the absence of all being , cannot be equal to two right angles , it is impossible

he should know auy demonstration in JSuclid . If , therefore , Ave know that there is some real being , and that nonentity cannot produce any real being ; it . , is an evident demonstration that from eternity there has been something ; since what was not from eternity had a beginning ; and what bad a beginning must be produced by something else .

being must also be the source and orig inal of all power and so this eternal heiny -must also he the most powerful . Again , a mau finds iu himself perception and knowledge . We have then got one step farther ; and we are certain UOAV that there is not only some Being , but some knowing , intelligent Being in the universe .

There was a time then when there was no knowing Being , and Avhen knowledge began to be , or else there has been a Icnowing ' Being from eternity . If it be said , there was a time Avhen no being had any knowledge , when that Eternal Being was void of understanding ; I reply that then it Avas impossible there should ever haA e been any knoAvledge ; it being as impossible that

things Avholiy void of knoivledge and operating blindly and without perceptions should produce a knowing Being , as it is impossible that a triaugle should make itself three angles bigger than two right ones . For it is as repugnant to the idea of senseless matter that it should put into itself sense , perception , and knoAvledge , as it is as repugnant to the idea of a triaugle that it should put into itself greater angles than two right ones .