ine meditations, he made his
friends sing him bawdy verses and scurrilous songs. Let them take heaven,
paradise, and that future happiness that will, _bonum est esse hic_, it is
good being here: there is no talking to such, no hope of their conversion,
they are in a reprobate sense, mere carnalists, fleshly minded men, which
howsoever they may be applauded in this life by some few parasites, and
held for worldly wise men. [6638]"They seem to me" (saith Melancthon) "to
be as mad as Hercules was when he raved and killed his wife and children."
A milder sort of these atheistical spirits there are that profess religion,
but _timide et haesitanter_, tempted thereunto out of that horrible
consideration of diversity of religions, which are and have been in the
world (which argument Campanella, _Atheismi Triumphati, cap. 9._ both
urgeth and answers), besides the covetousness, imposture, and knavery of
priests, _quae faciunt_ (as [6639]Postellus observes) _ut rebus sacris
minus faciant fidem_; and those religions some of them so fantastical,
exorbitant, so violently maintained with equal constancy and assurance;
whence they infer, that if there be so many religious sects, and denied by
the rest, why may they not be all false? or why should this or that be
preferred before the rest? The sceptics urge this, and amongst others it is
the conclusion of Sextus Empericus, _lib. 3. advers. Mathematicos_: after
many philosophical arguments and reasons pro and con that there are gods,
and again that there are no gods, he so concludes, _cum tot inter se
pugnent, &c. Una tantum potest esse vera_, as Tully likewise disputes:
Christians say, they alone worship the true God, pity all other sects,
lament their case; and yet those old Greeks and Romans that worshipped the
devil, as the Chinese now do, _aut deos topicos_, their own gods; as Julian
the apostate, [6640]Cecilius in Minutius, Celsus and Porphyrius the
philosopher object: and as Machiavel contends, were much more noble,
generous, victorious, had a more flourishing commonwealth, better cities,
better soldiers, better scholars, better wits. Their gods overcame our
gods, did as many miracles, &c. Saint Cyril, Arnobius, Minutius, with many
other ancients of late, Lessius, Morneus, Grotius _de Verit. Relig.
Christianae_, Savanarola _de Verit. Fidei Christianae_, well defend; but
Zanchius, [6641]Campanella, Marinus Marcennus, Bozius, and Gentillettus
answer all these atheistical arguments at l