 Clarke thought highly of the argument from design, largely because it is widely accessible and easily grasped. However, due to the rise of atheistic systems of philosophy, he thought it was necessary to give an argument that would satisfy his fellow metaphysicians, such as the following, presented in his first set of Boyle lectures. The Boyle lectures, especially Clarke’s were crucial to spreading Newton’s views. As Margaret Jacob (1977, 2) has convincingly argued, “Without these sermons, Newton’s system of the world would have remained relatively unknown, and possibly even feared, by an educated and literate public on both sides of the Channel which could not have begun to understand the mathematical intricacies of the Principia.”