Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n
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A34535
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A humble endeavour of some plain and brief explication of the decrees and operations of God, about the free actions of men, more especially of the operations of divine grace written by Mr. John Corbet ...
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Corbet, John, 1620-1680.
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1683
(1683)
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Wing C6253; ESTC R233166
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37,069
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64
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his Creatures his not decreeing of Sin doth not at all lessen his Providence about sinful Actions 8. A Decree to permit Sin is not necessary TO Permit is not to Act and not to Act is nothing and of nothing there is no Decree at least there is no need of a Decree No more is needful to a Not-being than Gods not Willing and not Effecting Consequently there is no Decree of the Permission of Sin at least there is no necessity of holding such a Decree It may be Objected That a Non-esse is the Object of Gods Will when he wills that some Evil Action shall not come to pass The answer is That in such a case the thing that God properly wills is his restraining and limiting of mens evil Inclinations and Actions and the Non-esse of those Actions is said to be willed by him but improperly and reductively as being the Consequent of that which he properly Wills And his Will is further terminated on the good Consequence of his preventing the said Evil Actions It may be likewise objected If a man may rightly say I will or Purpose to permit why may not God rightly say so The answer is that when a man makes such a Determination it commonly means a Purpose of restraining the Inclination or Will that is or may be in him to hinder the thing and the said Purpose is further terminated on the Consequents of the Permission and the ordering of them So God may be said to Will or Purpose a Permission as he wills or purposeth the limiting of his restraining Agency and as this Will and purpose is also terminated on the Consequents of the thing permitted and the disposal thereof by his Providence 9. The Effect of Sin may be the Object of Gods Decree THough God decree no mans sin yet he may decree the Effect which sinners cause by sin So God decreed the death of Christ and the passive constupration of David's Concubines but he decreed not the sin of the Actors Accordingly such places of holy Scripture as seem to import Gods Willing the sins of men do indeed signifie no more than the Effects of their sins as willed by him Though sin hath no Good in it and works nothing Good in it self and cannot be willed of God as a thing convenient or conducible yet it may be an occasion of the greatest Good and it may work an Effect which though bad in it self I mean Physically bad may be conducible to Good and so far the Effect may be willed as convenient If it be objected That a Decree of the Effect one would think doth imply a Decree of the Cause The answer is 1. That the meer decreeing of a thing includes no more than a willing that it shall be joyned with a Knowledg of its convenience And so a Decree of the Effect of sin doth imply a Foreknowledg of the conducibility of that Effect to some Good yet it no way implyes a Decree of the sin but only a Foreknowledg of it 2. Though God doth not Decree mans sin yet he decrees his own concurse to the Act in its general nature but not as morally specified He decrees also the disposing and ordering of all Concauses and necessary Antecedents of the Effect which sinners accomplish And this with his Foreknowledg of the sin it self sufficeth to a Decree of such an Effect 10. Of the Futurition of Sin from Eternity THat the Futurition of sin is from Eternity is no Argument that Gods Decree is the Cause thereof For Futurition in not a real Being distinct from the thing future but it is meerly a respect of reason or conception of the mind about it and it requires no distinct Cause from the Future thing it self No real Being is Eternal but God and Eternal Futurition is but ens rationis and an extrinsick denomination of the Divine Mind as conceiving it The Cause whereby a thing doth exist in Time is the Cause whereby it was Eternally Future though the Cause did not exist from Eternity as the Cause whereby a thing sometime was is the Cause why it shall be a thing past even to Eternity though that Cause do not exist to Eternity 11. Of Gods Eternal Prescience of Sin GOd doth Foresee whatsoever is Future and of determinate verity by the meer Infinity and Eternity of his Understanding And no other Cause is to be supposed necessary to his Foreknowledg of sin That there can be no Futurity of a determinate Verity the Causes whereof are undeterminate must be proved by the Asserters thereof That a thing will be sufficeth to the truth of its Futurity without consideration from what Cause it will be And who can say that Futurity is not by it self intelligible or that God cannot Foreknow what a Creature acting freely and contingently will do Let it be noted that the thing under consideration is what the Infinity of the Divine Understanding can reach unto 12. In what Sense Benefits are absolutely decreed of God IN whatsoever Order God doth bring any thing to pass in Time he decreed from Eternity to bring it to pass in the very same Order There 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 use of Means requisite to the bringing to pâ—ss of that Good which is decreed and God willeth also that those Conditions shall be performed and those Means used and so in the issue he absolutely willeth all those Benefits that come to pass That which God doth not but upon conditions he absolutely Decreed to do and he absolutely Decreed to do it upon such Conditions So that the Decree is absolute though the thing Decreed be Conditional 13. Punishments are not alike absolutely Decreed yet in some sense absolutely THough the Favours and Benefits that are given conditionally be absolutely decreed because the giving of the Conditions is decreed also yet the Punishments that are inflicted are not alike absolutely decreed because the sins which are the Condition or the Meritorious Cause thereof are not decreed But in regard of Gods certain Foreknowledg of those sins which merit the decreed Punishments the Decree thereof doth not hang in suspence and it may be rightly said that the Punishments are so far absolutely decreed He that certainly foresees the Condition of the decreed Event absolutely willeth it though he willeth not the Condition And so God's Omniscience proves that he hath at no instant a will properly Conditional that is suspended upon a Condition as to the Act it self though the Event decreed be so suspended 14. Of the diversity and order of Gods Decrees ALl the Decrees of God are one as in him but they have a formal diversity in respect of the Objects and Effects in which regard we must necessarily think and speak of them as divers According to this diversity Predestination includes divers Decrees among which these are notable viz. a Decree of Redemption a Decree of the first Saving Grace or Conversion a Decree of Perseverance and a Decree of Glory All the Decrees of God are executed in certain Order the
Agency about Humane Actions and the Natural Liberty of Mans Will GOds part in all Humane Acts is to us unsearchable but this is sure that the way of his Operation on man is agreeable to the Nature of Man who is a free Agent The Natural Liberty of the Will is not a perfect Indifferency but an Indetermination with a Power of self-determining This self-determining Power of the Will makes us capable Subjects of Gods Moral Government by Laws And its present indetermination between Good and Evil is not a state absolutely best but most sutable to a Creature during his Probation in Order to a Future Confirmation 3. The Self-Determining Power of the Will is no Derogation from God THat which is ascribed to the Creature doth not always detract from the Creator For much of his Honour is in the nobleness of his Creature It his honour to make a Creature of so noble a Faculty as is this of self-determination And the Faculty and Exercise of it Exists no otherwise than as upheld and actuated by him The denying of this Self-determining Power in design of ascribing the more to God is clogged with these incongruities 1. Of limiting his Power as not able to make a Self-determining Creature 2. Of overthrowing his Moral Government by Laws Notwithstanding this noble Faculty mans will is not independently free but God is still Lord of it and disposeth it according to the counsel of his own will and can do with it as he pleaseth by a sapiential Government without a necessitating hand over it Yet that there may be and sometimes is a Divine Predetermination of it is not here denyed 4. Of Gods Physical and Moral Operation upon Mans Will IT is most congruous to the Nature of reasonable Creatures that the general course of Gods Government over them should be by Moral Means And it is also congruous that the Father of Spirits the God in whom we live move and have our being should have an inward and most intimate access tò our Spirits in his Operations God acts by his Essence and not by an Act that is an accident in him In his Physical Agency what there is between his Essence and mans Act effected by the said agency may be above the understanding of mortals to apprehend Some Express it by an inward urgency to the act whereby the mind is more disposed to it than it was before All that I can speak of it is this That the said urgency denotes no act of God besides his Essence but it is God himself so urging or influencing the mind of man without any alteration in himself 5. Of Commmon Concurse and Gracious Operation IT is most generally and safely said by Divines that Gods Acts on the part of the Agent are all one and all Eternal as being his Essence and that on the part of the Objects and Effects they are many and some of them new and temporary It is likewise wisely and humbly said that the comprehending of this passeth the understanding of mortal men In a sinners turning to God and in every holy act there is besides a common concurse from God as the Fountain of Nature a special Influence from him as the Fountain of Grace The diversity of the said Concurse and Influence is undiscernible by us in it self but in the Effects it is made manifest to us And that which on Gods part hath no difference is diversified to us in the Effect 6. God doth not Operate to the uttermost GOds Agency upon Mans will is not always in the same but generally in very different degrees For he doth not operate to the uttermost or to the infinity of his Power in every Effect that is wrought by him It is true that God is Infinite in Power and whatsoever he doth he doth it with an omnipotent facility But that his Power is equally or always irresistibly put forth in all his Agency on the Creature I apprehend not For if it were so it would follow that whatsoever is brought to pass comes under the highest Necessitation 7. God may so operate as to leave the Effect in part to Mans Will THat in some Cases God should Irresistibly Predetermine the Will to a good Act is not against its Essential Liberty For such Predetermination is not inconsistent with a Self-determining Power but only supposeth it to be subject to God's Omnipotence And it being to a good act it is a Premotion perfective of our Nature and to its well-being and therefore not unbecoming the Goodness of God Nevertheless the being of all Moral Good doth not necessarily require such Predetermination but God may so operate as to leave the Effect in part to the liberty of Mans Will Otherwise a man could do no good to which he is not necessitated Yet when man doth his part he doth it not independently on God but in a total subordination to him and by the Power and Liberty which God only gives upholds and actuates 8. How God is a Total and not a Partial Cause and wherein a Sole Cause THe Notion of a Partial Cause is properly applyed to that which is in coordination with other Causes and therefore not fit to be applyed to God to whom all things are wholly subordinate and nothing coordinate Yet seeing there are other Causes evidently in conjunction with him their own share in producing the Effect may be ascribed to them without Impeachment of his honour But it must be also considered that they have all their Causation from him and in him God and nothing besides him is the Cause of his own Act and so far he is both a total and solitary Cause But he is not the sole Cause of Mans Act because man himself is a Cause thereof in Subordination to him Yet he is a total Cause of the Act done by man as it is an Act and of all that is laudable in the Act. For none is coordinate with him or assistant to him in his Agency And whatsoever man doth be it that wherein his Privilege is greatest viz. the determining of his own will he doth it altogether as therein upheld and actuated by God and dependent on him 9. Gods Agency is not determined or limited by the Creature MEn do variously receive Gods Agency but they do not determine or limit it any otherwise than the various terminating of it may be called a determining or limiting of it And the variation is not of Gods act absolutely considered but as variously terminated on men according to their various disposition God hath enabled men freely and variously to receive his Influx So that it is not the Creature but God himself that determines his Agency by the condition of the Creature according to his own Will And men do not limit Gods Will but only the Effect which Gods Agency would produce if mans will concurred 10. How Gods Operation on man is never without Effect IF the good Effect in man doth not follow the Operation of God that is