o them as an
absolute prince employing a despotic power, unfitted to be loved and
unworthy of being loved. These notions are the more evil in relation to God
inasmuch as the essence of piety is not only to fear him but also to love
him above all things: and that cannot come about unless there be knowledge
of his perfections capable of arousing the love which he deserves, and
which makes the felicity of those that love him. Feeling ourselves animated
by a zeal such as cannot fail to please him, we have cause to hope that he
will enlighten us, and that he will himself aid us in the execution of a
project undertaken for his glory and for the good of men. A cause so good
gives confidence: if there are plausible appearances against us there are
proofs on our side, and I would dare to say to an adversary:

_Aspice, quam mage sit nostrum penetrabile telum._

7. _God is the first reason of things_: for such things as are bounded, as
all that which we see and experience, are contingent and have nothing in
them to render their existence necessary, it being plain that time, space
and matter, united and uniform in themselves and indifferent to everything,
might have received entirely other motions and shapes, and in another
order. Therefore one must seek the reason for the existence of the world,
which is the whole assemblage of _contingent_ things, and seek it in the
substance which carries with it the reason for its existence, and which in
consequence is _necessary_ and eternal. Moreover, this cause must be
intelligent: for this existing world being contingent and an infinity of
other worlds being equally possible, and holding, so to say, equal claim to
existence with it, the cause of the world must needs have had regard or
reference to all these possible worlds in order to fix upon one of them.
This regard or relation of an existent substance to simple possibilities
can be nothing other than the _understanding_ which has the ideas of them,
while to fix upon one of them can be nothing other than the act of the
_will_ which chooses. It is the _power_ of this substance that renders its
will efficacious. Power relates to _being_, wisdom or understanding to
_truth_, and will to _good_. And this intelligent cause ought to be
infinite in all ways, and absolutely perfect in _power_, in _wisdom_ and in
_goodness_, since it relates to all that which is possible. [128]
Furthermore, since all is connected together, there is no gr