AND now, dear Eleutherius, you have the whole Bundle of those Papers that I found and tack’d together, (for they are not all that I have written) touching my Free Enquiry into the Receiv’d Notion of Nature: At the Close of which Essay, I must crave leave to represent two or three things about It.
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Since this Treatise pretends to be but an Enquiry, I hope that any Discourses or Expressions that you may have found Dogmatically deliver’d, about Questions of great moment or difficulty, will be interpretated with congruity to the Title and avow’d Scope of this Treatise; and that so favourable a Reader, as Eleutherius, will consider, that ‘twas very difficult in the heat of Discourse, never to forget the Reserves, that the Title might suggest, especially since, on divers occasions, I could not have spoken, with those Reserves, without much enervating my Discourse, and being, by Restrictions and other cautious Expressions, tedious or troublesome to you. But this, as I lately intimated, is to be understood of Things of great moment or difficulty. For otherwise, there are divers Notions, Suppositions, and Explanations, in the Vulgarly Receiv’d Doctrine of Nature, and Her Phaenomena; which I take to be either so precarious, or so unintelligible, or so incongruous, or so insufficient, that I scruple not to own, that I am dissatisfied with them, and reject them.
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Though, upon a transient view of these Papers, I find that several Parcels, that came first into my hands, having been laid and fasten’d together, (to keep them from being lost, as others had already been) before the others were lighted on, some of them will not be met with in Places that are not the most proper for them; yet Haste and Sickness made me rather venture on your good Nature, for the Pardon of a venial Fault, than put myself to the trouble of altering the Order of these Papers, and substituting new Transitions and Connections, in the room of those, with which I formerly made up the Chasms and Incoherency of the Tract, you now receive. And if the Notions and Reasonings be themselves solid, they will not need the Assistence of an exact Method to obtain the Assent of so discerning a Reader, as they are presented to: Upon the score of whose Benignity, ‘tis hop’d, that the former Advertisement may likewise pass for an Excuse, if the same things, for substance, be found more than once in a Tract written at very distant Times, and in differing Circumstances. For, besides that such seeming Repetitions will not (if I be not mistaken) frequently occur, and will, for the most part, be found, by being variously express’d, to elucidate or strengthen the Thought or Argument, they belong to: And besides, that the Novelty and Difficulty of some Points may have made it needful, not only to display, but to inculcate them; besides these things, (I say) ‘tis very possible that the same Notion may serve to explicate or prove several Truths; and therefore may, without Impertinency, be made use of in more than one Part of our Treatise. And if our Enquiry shall be thought worthy to be Transcrib’d, and presented to you a second time, after I shall have review’d it, and heard Objections against it, and consider’d the Things, that either you, or I myself, may find fault with in it; ‘tis very possible, that (if God grant me Life and Leisure,) this Tract, which, in its present Dress, I desire you would look on but as an Apparatus (towards a more full and orderly Treatise,) may appear before you in a less unaccurate Method: And that my Second Thoughts may prove more Correct, more Mature, or better Back’d and fortifi’d, than my First.
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The Subject of my Enquiry being of great Extent, as well as Consequence, it oblig’d me to consider, and treat of many Things, (as Philosophical, Medical, Theological, &c.) and, among them, of divers that are not at all of easie Speculation. And I found it the more difficult to handle them well, because the Attempt I have ventur’d upon being new, and to be prosecuted by Discourse, many of them opposite to the general Sentiments of Mankind, I was not to expect much Assistence from any thing, but Truth and Reason. And therefore, as I cannot presume not to need your Indulgence, so I cannot despair of obtaining it, if in this my first Essay, upon a variety of difficult Points, I have not always hit the Mark, and as happily found the Truth as sincerely sought it. But if you shall (which ‘tis very probable you will) find that I have fallen into some Errors, ‘twill be but one Trouble for you, to make me discern them, and forsake them, (especially any, wherein Religion may be concern’d) which I have, by way of Praevision, made it the more easie for myself to do; because (if my Style have not wrong’d my Intentions,) I have written this Discourse, rather like a doubting Seeker of Truth, than a Man confident that he has found It.