Understanding The Works of God

1. The works of God cannot be thought of as too vast.

The principles of material things are derived not from the prejudices of the senses, but from the light of reason in such a way that we cannot doubt their truth.

We must begin with principles that are most universal and upon which the others depend, namely, the general structure of the entire visible world.

But first we must consider 2 things:

1. We should always bear in mind the infinity of the power and goodness of God

In this way, we avoid the mistake of imagining his works to be too great, beautiful, and perfect. Instead, we must not put limits to those which we have no certain knowledge. This will prevent us from thinking less highly of the power of God.

2. We should not think too highly of ourselves

2. We tend to put limits to the world, without being assured of their existence either:

• by natural reasons or
• by divine revelation.

Putting limits on the world will make the power of our thought extend beyond what God has made in reality.

It will lead us to believe that:

• all things were created by God for us only.
• our intellect could comprehend the ends which God proposed to himself in creating the universe.

3. How were all things were created for the sake of man?

Morally, it may be pious to believe that God made all things for us. It can incite us to be more thankful and loving towards him.

It is even in some sense true, because we can imagine using anything in existence. This will lead us to believe that all things were created for us.

But this supposition would be plainly ridiculous and inept in physical reasoning because there are many things that exist that we cannot see or know, and were not useful to us.

4. Phenomena and experiments, and their use in philosophy.

The following is a brief history of the principal phenomena of nature. I will investigate their causes here.

5. To us, at first glance, the Earth appears much larger than all other bodies in the universe

The Sun and Moon seem to be much smaller than the Earth, but not so small as to be imperceptible.

We can easily calculate the distance between the Earth and the Moon to be about thirty times the diameter of the Earth, and the distance between the Sun and the Earth to be about a hundred times the diameter of the Earth.

These calculations are based on the apparent diameters of the Sun and Moon, which we can observe and measure

6. What is the distance of the planets from the Sun?

Mercury is more than 200 Earth diameters away from the Sun.

Venus is more than 400.

Mars is 900 or 1,000.

Jupiter is 3,000 or more.

Saturn is 5-6,000.

7. The fixed stars are not too near.

Nothing prevents us from supposing that the fixed stars are at any immeasurable distance.

It is inferred from the motions of the heavens, explained below, that they are so distant from us that Saturn, compared to them, seems very near.

8. The Earth is not visible from the sky, nor does it appear to be a planet, nor is it comparable to Jupiter or Saturn.

The Moon and Earth are smaller compared to Jupiter or Saturn, as Jupiter or Saturn are smaller compared to the Sun.

And so, we should not compare the Moon, or Earth, or Sun, to the stars in terms of size.