True Christian Religion

The catchword from the previous page was "that" (quod).

...and regarding Nature and the World, they carried the idea with them that Nature performs everything that happens in the Created Universe, and that God, after Creation, instilled and impressed that faculty and power into it, and that God only sustains and preserves those things so they do not perish. For this reason, all things that exist, are born, and are reborn upon the Earth are today ascribed to Nature. But I replied that Nature does nothing from itself, but God works through nature. Because they demanded a demonstration, I said: those who believe in Divine operation in every detail of nature can, from the many things they see in the world, confirm their belief in God much more than in Nature. For those who confirm their belief in Divine Operation in every detail of nature pay attention to the wonders seen in the productions of both plants and animals.

In the PRODUCTION OF PLANTS, from a tiny seed cast into the earth, a root comes forth, then through the root a stem, and successively branches, shoots, leaves, flowers, and fruits, even unto new seeds, exactly as if the Seed knew the order of succession or the process by which it was to renew itself. What rational person can think that the Sun, which is pure fire, knows this, or that it can instill into its heat and light the power to effect such things or to intend these uses? A person whose rational mind is elevated, while seeing and rightly weighing these things, cannot think otherwise than that they are from Him who has infinite Wisdom—that is, from God. Those who recognize Divine Operation in every detail of nature also confirm their belief when they see these things.

On the other hand, those who do not recognize it do not see such things with the "eyes of reason in the forehead," but rather in the back of the head original: "in occipitio." This suggests a backward or inverted way of thinking that looks only at effects, not causes.. These are people who draw all the ideas of their thought from the senses of the body and confirm their fallacies, saying: "Do you not see the Sun performing all these things through its heat and light? What is there that you do not see? Is there anything else?"

Those who confirm their belief in the Divine pay attention to the WONDERS they see in the PRODUCTION OF ANIMALS. To mention first what occurs in Eggs: within them, the chick lies hidden in its seed with every requirement for its formation, and also with the entire progression it will follow after hatching until it becomes a bird in the form of its parent. Furthermore, if one pays attention to flying creatures in general, things are presented to a mind that thinks deeply which create amazement. For instance, in the smallest of them as in the largest, in the invisible as in the visible—that is, in tiny insects as in large birds and beasts—there are organs of sense (sight, smell, taste, and touch) as well as organs of motion (muscles, for they fly and walk). There are also internal organs attached to the heart and lungs, which are activated by brains.

Those who ascribe everything to Nature certainly see such things, but they think only that they "are," and say that Nature produces them. They say this because they have turned their minds away from thinking about the Divine. Those who have turned away from the Divine, while seeing the wonders in Nature, cannot think about them rationally—much less spiritually—but think sensually and materially. In such a state, they think in nature from nature, and not above it. Their only difference from beasts is that they possess rationality rationality: the capacity to understand truths if they choose to use it; that is, they are able to understand if they wish.

Those who have turned away from thinking about the Divine, and have thereby become sensual and corporeal, do not consider that the sight of the eye is so coarse and material that it views many tiny insects as a single dark speck. And yet, every single one of them is organized to feel and to move itself, and is thus endowed with fibers and vessels, as well as little hearts, pulmonary tubes, tiny organs, and brains. These are woven from the purest elements in nature, and these textures correspond to life in its lowest degree, by which the smallest parts of them are distinctly moved. Since the sight of the eye is so coarse that many things—with innumerable parts in each—appear to it as a small dark speck, and yet those who are sensual think and judge based on that sight, it is clear how thickened their Minds are, and consequently in what darkness they reside regarding spiritual things.

Anyone can confirm their belief in the Divine from the visible things in Nature if they wish; and anyone who thinks about God and His Omnipotence in creating the Universe, and His Omnipresence in preserving it, does so confirm it. For instance, when one sees the flying creatures of the sky...