Thus the same Disadvantages too often attend both in publick and private an exceeding good Production equally the same as a very bad one: But the Author is not vain enough to think this Work without Faults, has rather Reason to fear, from the Weakness of his own Capacity, that there may be many; but he hopes the Design of the Whole will, in some measure, plead for the Imperfection of the Parts, if the Merits of the Plan should be found insufficient for his full Pardon, in attempting so extensive a Subject. In a System thus naturally tending to propagate the Principles of Virtue, and vindicate the Laws of Providence, we may indeed say too little, but cannot surely say too much; and to make any further Apology for a Work of such Nature, where the Glory of the Divine Being of course must be the principal Object in View, would be too like rendering Virtue accountable to Vice for any Author to expert to benefit by such Excuse. The Motive which induces us to the Attempt of any Performance, where no good Reason can be supposed to be given for the Omission, or Neglect of it, will always be judged an unnecessary Promulgation, and consequently every Attempt towards the Discovery of Truth, the Enlargement of our Minds, and the Improvement of our Understandings will naturally become a Duty. If therefore this Undertaking falls short of being instrumental towards the advancing the Adoration of the Divine Being in his infinite Creation of higher Works, and proves unable to answer all Objections that may possibly arise against it, yet will its Imperfections appear of such a Nature to every candid Reader, as to afford the Author a sufficient Apology for producing them to the World: And it is to be hoped farther, that where a Work is entirely upon a new Plan, and the Beginning, as it were, of a new Science, before unattempted in any Language, the Author having dug all his Ideas from the Mines of Nature, is surely entitled to every kind of Indulgence. To those who are weak enough to think that such Enquiries as these are over-curious, vain, and presumptive, and would willingly, suitable to their own Ignorance and Comprehension, set Bounds to other People's Labours, I answer with Mr. _Huygens_, "That if our Forefathers had been at this Rate scrupulous, we might have been ignorant still of the Magnitude and Figure of the Earth; or that there was such a Place as _America_. We should not have known that the Moon is enlightened by the Sun's Rays, nor what the Causes of the Eclipses of each of them are; nor a Multitude of other Things brought to Light by the late Discoveries in Astronomy; for what can a Man imagine more abstruse, or less likely to be known, than what is now as clear as the Sun."