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• Foreword
• A Note On This Edition
• A Treatise of the Laws of Nature
• To His Excellency, John, Lord Carteret, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland . 1
• The Translator’s Preface
• Names of Subscribers
• Two Introductory Essays
• Essay I: Of the City, Or Kingdom, of God In the Rational World, and the Defects In Heathen Deism
• Essay II: Concerning the Imperfectness of the Heathen Morality
• The Introduction
• A Philosophical Inquiry Into the Laws of Nature , &c. and a Confutation of the Elements of Mr. Hobbes ’s Philosophy .
• Chapter I: Of the Nature of Things .
• Chapter II: Of Human Nature, and Right Reason .
• Chapter III: Of Natural Good .
• Chapter IV: Of the Practical Dictates of Reason .
• Chapter V: Of the Law of Nature, and Its Obligation.
• Chapter VI: Of Those Things Which Are Contain’d In the General Law of Nature.
• Chapter VII: Of the Original of Dominion, and the Moral Virtues.
• Chapter VIII: Of the Moral Virtues In Particular .
• Chapter IX: Corollaries.
• Editor’s Note
• Appendices
• Appendix I: A Summary of the Controversy Between Dr . Samuel Clark and an Anonymous Author, Concerning the Immateriality of Thinking Substance .
• Appendix II: A Treatise Concerning the Obligation, Promulgation, and Observance of the Law of Nature
• Appendix 1. Richard Cumberland’s Original Dedication to De Legibus Naturae
• Appendix 2: Hezekiah Burton’s “address to the Reader”

A TREATISE OF THE LAWS OF NATURE

a

TREATISE

of the

LAWS of NATURE.

By the Right Reverend Father in God, Richard Cumberland, Lord Bishop of Peterborough.

Made English from the Latin by John Maxwell, M.A. Prebendary of Connor, and Chaplain to his Excellency the Lord Carteret, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland.

To which is prefix’d,

An Introduction concerning the mistaken Notions which the Heathens had of the DEITY, and the Defects in their Morality, whence the Usefulness of Revelation may appear.

At the End is subjoin’d,

An Appendix, containing two Discourses, 1. Concerning the Immateriality of Thinking Substance. 2. Concerning the Obligation, Promulgation, and Observance, of the LAW of NATURE, by the Translator.1

LONDON:

Printed by R. Phillips; and Sold by J. Knapton, in St. Paul’s Church-Yard, J. Senex, over against St. Dunstan’s Church, in Fleet-Street, F. Fayram, at the South-Entrance of the Royal-Exchange, J. Osborne, and T. Longman, in Pater-Noster-Row, and T. Osborne, by Gray’s-Inn-Walks. 1727.

[1. ]In some copies the following variant text replaces “by the Translator”: “the Introduction and latter part of the Appendix being chiefly extracted out of the writings of the learned Mr. Brocklesby, by the translator.” Richard Brocklesby (1636–1714) was the author of An Explication of the Gospel—Theism and the Divinity of the Christian Religion (1706). Maxwell makes liberal use of Brocklesby’s text, particularly books I and V, adapting, paraphrasing, and sometimes plagiarizing the text without reference.