a most necessary truth to say that God is the Author or cause of sin I have more abundantly made apparent in Three distinct Tracts viz. Correct Copy p. 9 10 50. especially Div. Philanthropy defended ch 3. sect 34. p. 132. c. to p. 139. sect 35. p. 141. and again Div. Purity def ch 4. sect 3. p. 19 20. And I shall do it yet more effectually in the second and third Chapters of this following Work in particular ch 3. sect 13. 27. And therefore Thirdly That they would not so frequently and affectionately contend for that very Doctrine which sometimes though very rarely they confesse to be false blasphemous but that they find it must follow from their espoused Principles of God's Decrees so as they see they must relinquish either both or neither I have abundantly evinced in the Div. Pur. def ch 4. sect 7. p. 33 c. to p. 39. especially from the citations out of Doctor Twisse Du Moulin Remigius and the other friends of Gotteschalc Bishop Cuthert Tunstal and above all out of Prosper whom they many times dream to have been their Patron and therefore cannot gainsay him without Discomfort And again I shall evince it in several parts of the following work and in particular ch 3. sect 8. 10. Besides that the thing is so conspicuous of it self that I may venture to make the Adversary the sole Iudge of the Businesse For Nothing but their Principles of Gods Decrees can lead them to blasphemies of such a nature Sect. 8. I demand of any man living what should move such learned men as Huldericus Zuinglius Doctor Twisse Piscator Zanchy Triglandius Beza Calvin Martyr Borrhaus and many others to teach posterity in their printed works That God doth make men transgressors For the several pages of their works see the Div. Philan. def ch 3. sect 34. especially the Div. Purity def ch 4. sect 3. p. 19 20. sect 6. p. 31 32. and is the Author of adultery and that murder is the work of God and that sinners do sin by the force of Gods will that God predestines men to sin and to sin quatenus sin that he is the Author of evil not onely of punishment but of sin too that he is the cause not onely of humane actions but of the very defects and privations that he effecteth sins that he exciteth and tempteth and * All the excuse Mr. B. makes for the saying that God doth compel men to sin is that they use it but seldom See what shall be said ch 3. sect 27. num 5. compelleth men to sin and a world the like stuff I say what moved them to print such loathsom Doctrines Was it that they esteemed them as flowers of Rhetorick or witty sentences or pretty conceits or well-sounding periods or soul-saving preachments or Hosanna's to the most High This cannot be no not so much as to be imagined What invited Mr. Hobbs to say That Mr. Hobbs of Liberty and Necessiâ—y p. 23 24. sin may be necessarily caused in man by God's ordering all the world that God doth will it and necessitate it and * Id. in Animadvers p. 11. 107. 106. cause men to erre and is the principal Agent in the causing of all actions which he who saith doth also say that he findes no difference betwixt the action and the sin of that action from which great truth he should have inferred that God cannot be the cause of sinful actions not that he is the cause of sins What made the * p. 36 37 Comforter of believers to say that God is the Author of sinfulnesse it self and hath more hand in mens sinfulness then they themselves Were these Writers afraid lest men should think too reverently of God too hardly of the Devil and too profanely of themselves or were they moved with an itch to revive the Doctrine of Carneades and to make men believe that sin is nothing but a name invented by Ecclesiasticks and that the thing call'd sin is just as good as the thing call'd virtue as being equally the work of God 't is very hard to think this Or if this was one of their reasons yet it was not certainly the first But I have yet a harder Question What should move Mr. Whitfield and Mr. Barlee in the very books which they have printed on purpose to vindicate their Doctrine from all the horrible absurdities wherewith they stood charged and wherein they knew it concerned them to speak as warily as they were able as knowing that they were liable to be publickly called to an account what I say should move them at such a time and in such a manner to affirm that God * For Mr. W's several pages where these things are taught see the first and second chapters of the following work especially the second and in that for instance Sect. 14. doth will and work sin that he hath an efficiency in sin that in all the wickedness in the world God hath a hand a working hand yea the chief hand that sin doth make for Gods glory and that it hath a respect of good and that God hath a hand in effecting it yea that God doth act in it as a natural cause that God decreed the sin of Adam and so ordered the whole business that he should certainly fall that it was necessary the first man should sin that the Gospel doth stirr up evil affections in the hearts of wicked men and hardens mens hearts and God intends it should do so and sends it for this very purpose that of sinful actions God is the Author and proper Cause yea that he doth both will and work in the Sin of the Act because not onely the action simply consider'd but the very Pravity and Deformity of it makes way for Gods glory What moved Mr. Barlee to adde his suffrage to Mr. Whitfield and to say in plain terms That * For Mr. B's several pages where these things are taught see the third whole chapter of the following work and the Index of the Divine Philanthropy Def. which will direct to the rest God is the Soveraign Author of the material part of sin which is the doing or leaving undone not onely a natural but moral act such as David's lying with Bathshebah or Cain's killing Abel as Doctor Twisse himself interprets the material part of sin nay farther that God is the cause of the very Obliquity of the Act of Sin that God exciteth men to the act of adultery that he stirreth them up to unjust acts as a man puts spurrs to a dull Jade that he tempts men to sin and a world the like blasphemies Nay what made him and Mr. Hick to tell the World †See what shall be said ch 3. Sect. 18. that if sin is a positive Entity either God is the Creator of sin or else sin it self is God Did this prodigious pair of Writers think that these were quaint Apophthegms which
inferred to punish men without cause 2. Where there is no efficient there is no effect that is there is nothing and so according to Mr. B. men are either not damned or damned for nothing 3. If the sinner is but deficient as to the being of sin he is less the cause of it then God is inferred to be by them who say that Gods will of sin is efficacious and irresistible as that which predetermines decrees and necessitates sin and efficacious ab efficiendo is prevalent forcible c. 4. Mr. B. confesseth in a sober fit that the sinning creature is the * Corrept p. 79. efficient cause of sin although he saith in a fit of passion that sin hath †Ib d. p. 55. no efficient cause 5. He often mentions the * Ibid. p. 79. Being of sin as when he saith that God * p. 178. ordained it Whereby he infers it to be effected and so to have an efficient 6. If he saith as at other times he doth that sin consists wholly in a deficiency he infers what is worse that no creature can effect sin nor by consequence commit it 7. Whilest he affirms Gods absolute ordination of sin in one breath and that sin hath onely a deficient cause in another breath he chargeth on God all the causality of sin of which he allowes it to be capable 8. As when he breaths hot he saith that God ordained and determined sin so when he breaths cold he saith that God can ordain nothing but good which is to infer that sin is good And to what is good he allows an efficient cause 9. If sins of omission as not praying and not giving almes c. had but a deficient cause yet sins of commission as cursing and sacrilege c. have a cause efficient with a witness 10. Admitting that sin were a privative Entity it would not follow that it hath not any efficient cause For he who deprives a man of life or sight is the efficient cause of death or blindness And darkness the privative of light was one of the works of Gods Creation Gen. 1.4 5. of all which he was the efficient cause 11. What is privative in one respect may be positive in another as our sicknesses and sins do daily teach us Murder is not onely privative of vertue but also constitutive of vice and must have something in it of positive to make it differ in specie from all other sins and in degree from all other murders Of some we say they are not good whilest others are not onely positively but superlatively evil 12. Every privation presupposeth an habit to which it stands in opposition but a man may be covetous who never was liberal 13. An Agent morally deficient in the performance of a Duty doth effect that evil action which is so morally deficient For 1. The Adulterer is the efficient of his filthy Act which is his sin 2. The Devil is the Father of lyes and a Father is an efficient 3. A man through grace is the efficient cause of a good Action And Mr. B. is worse then a Pelagian if he will say that man is more efficient of good then of evil 14. Mr. B. * Corrpt 111. confesseth in a lucid interval that there may be something positive in a privation 15. Punishment is a positive Entity and owned to have an efficient cause But Mr. B. saith often that sin is a punishment 16. Whilest he denies his making God the Author of sin because sin forsooth hath no efficient he unavoidably infers 1. Either that God is not the Author of death or 2. that he is the Author of sin if of death or 3. of both or 4. of neither 17. If when they say that God is the cause of sin they do not infer he is the Author because the cause is but deficient they plead no more for God then for the Devil for if nothing is an Author which is not efficient and if sin hath no efficient then neither Men nor Devils can be the Authors of sin 4. In stead of answering these things 4. Mr. B's impertinencies and railings in lieu of Answers do stricke obliquely at S. James Mr. B. talks thus p. 111. sect 3. First that my opinion of sins having a positive Entity and an efficient cause is a dreadful opinion Secondly that there is no question between us about any thing else which if true then my evincing this concludes the Controversie between us Thirdly that he trembles more at the thought of commiting sin then many of my party if not my self at the open acting of it Fourthly that Gods judicial hand appears against me Fifthly that my conclusion out of S. James ch 1. v. 15. is 1000. times more for Gods being the Author of sin then the words of his party which I have cited Sixthly that Gods just hand is upon me Seventhly Quem perdere vult Deus hunc dementat p. 112. These are his general Answers thrust up together into one Paragraâ—h Before I come to his particular Answers which are infinitely worse I will intreat my Reader to comâ—are my seventeen particulars with Mr. B's seven and with what I shall now say from the express words of S. James who saith that * Jam. 1.15 lust having conceived bringeth forth sin The conception of lust is before expressed by a mans being drawn away and enticed by his lust v. 14. The Spirit solicitâ— the Will on one side lust on the other If lust prevailes and carries away the wills consent then lust conceives or which is all one in effect the Will is †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 drawn away and * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 deceived or overreached by Lust not onely invited but insnared and wrought upon by the invitation so as to give up its consent Lust by this doth conceive and then bringeth forth sin as the Parent the Child VVhat is sin therefore but the production of the will consenting to Lust or drawn away by it The production I mean of the evil will which by thus consenting becomes evil Now this being the upshot of what I mean by the efficient cause and positive entity of sin against whom hath Mr. B. spent the expressions of his Pet against we onely who spake from S. James or against S. James also from whom I spake * Note how the bitterest of his censures do hit himself and his party Nay hath he not spent them upon himself who hath confessed even in Print the very same things which here he railes at He hath openly affirmed both that the sinning Creature is the efficient cause of his sin Corrept p. 79. and that there ☞ may be something of positive in a privation Ibid. p. 111. Nay are not all his railings against all his own party who say that God doth †Look back on ch 2. p. 90. efficere peccata and not onely will but ** M.W's. own words p. 26. of which I
by him who doth not cite so much as one in this place who can help it 3. S. Austin might erre as well in this as in many other things wherein Mr. B. will say he erred 3. S. Austin August lib. 12. De Civit. Dei cap. 7. ubi de causâ malae voluntatis agit conferatâ—r um ejusdem lib. 21. de Civitate Dei cap. 24. ubi paâ—um inquit veraciter dicitur quod dicitur Mat. 12.32 nisi essent quibus etsi non in isto tamen remâ—tteretur in futuro saeculo His new degree of Arminianism and in the very same book which here he cites I say he might not that he does For Mr. B. understood not his own citation which being seemingly for him doth make against him in reality For Austin's speech belongs onely to the cause of the evil will not of every evil act of which the will is the cause Again it onely belongs to the causes that are without the man and this is that which I would have that God is far from being the efficient cause of an evil will he is not so much as the deficient because he is not wanting in those things that are necessary to make an evil will good so far is Austin from pleading that sin hath no efficient cause Notwithstanding all that he hath spoken the impious man 's own will is the efficient cause of his impiety 4. Whereas he saith that my opinion is most contrary to Arminius he contradicts a good part of both his books wherein he saith that my opinions are †c. 3. p. 25. all derived from Arminius I had formerly proved by many * Div Phi. def c. 1. p. 12 13 c. instances how far himself was an Arminian and how impossible it was that I should be so Now he lends me another instance wherein Himself and Mr. Hick are at agreement with Arminius and I am contrary to all three But I am of opinion he wrongs Arminius and makes him more Presbyterian then indeed he was had he read any such thing he would in all probability have set down the â—lace His case is sad whether he pretends to Truth or Falshood If to the first he hurts himself and Mr. Hick If to the second he slanders Arminius and stabbs himself Sect. 25. Having made this way for his own unhappinesse Mr. Hick's heathenish expression of sins 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 commended by Mr. B. for 1. learned 2. witty and 3. well written by that variety of attempts to which Mr. Hick it seems betray'd him he acts the well-natur'd man and even blesseth the Author of his unhappinesse He declares that Mr. Hick is his cordial friend who wrote well to him told him learnedly and wittily that Mr. T. P. is the first who gave sin this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an extraordinary invention p. 114. Here is his tragical Exit for many reasons 1. Mr. Hick.'s saying that my invention is extraordinary is no proof that Arminius doth say the contrary or that Mr. Hick did write well or that his saying was both learned and witty Each of these I deny and have sufficiently disproved in my eighteenth Section 2. He knowes that I had never mentioned any such Heathenish expression as sins 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nor was it ever to be found in any Author but Mr. Hick And he knowes that it was clearly his own invention either arising from his opinion that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was derived from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 pono and signified the posicive entity of sin which though a sad miscarriage of the Scholar is yet the very best that his friends can make of it or from his sadder apprehension that sin must needs have a Godhead if it is none of God's creatures and yet a positive thing To believe the former were a huge act of charity but there is no place for it with Mr. Hick who hath forced me to the severity of believing the later 3. All Mr. Hick hath displayed is his being overflown with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which could its banks have contained it would not thus have gushed over on no occasion when 't is plain that the effect could be nothing else but to drown his credit with a yellow as well as his cause with a blacker Jaundise But evenit malo male and * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Erynnis as they say still pâ—oves a virgin for poor Perillus is the first who is likely to be tortured with his invention and believe me the brazen Bull was a lesser miserie then to be found in the imâ—iety of making the foulest actions to be the Rivulets issuing out by a necessity from God the Source What Spirit but an unclean one can be the cause of uacleannesse that is of sin Who are they whom I have proved to have printed in plain terms that God is the cause of that uncleannesse When the Pharisees heretofore who were the Jewish Puritans or Preciâ—ans and recâ—oned themselves the godly party of the land had slandered our Saviour with having an unclean Spirit who although he was God did appear to them as he was man too our Saviour told them on that occaâ—â—on the danger of blaspheming against the holy Ghost Let them who love the Lord Jesus in sâ—ncerity and tender the safety of their own as well as of other mens soules not onely read but consider and then apply what is spoken Mar. 3.28 29 30. I now dismisse the signal Paragraph which Mr. Hick suggested to Mr. Barlee and Mr. Barlee hath vented to all the People which yet I should not have dismissed so soon but that my Reader may be referred to several Sections for an enlargement as ch 1. sect 2. from p. 7. to p. 13. ch 2. sect 5. p. 69 70. sect 10. p. 79 80 81. sect 14. p. 88 90. All which being considered Mr. B. doth fitly dislike the stile of Unfortunate Writer for if it ever belonged to any it doth to him and Mr. Hick Sect. 26. Mr. B. having thus far miscarried by the help of Mr. Hick proceeds to plead for himself A short speciâ—â—â— of M. B's remâ—â—nt of Abst rsions in ord r to the Readers and Pâ—inrs â—ase and his guilty Mâ—sters in such a treacherous manner both to them and himself that to give my Readers an account of such numerous failings were to draw out the man's unhappinesse to an intolerable length And because a Pigmy as well as Hercules may be judged of by a foot I will leave the Reader by that which followes to guesse at the body of his abstersions 1. What I had cited out of Calvin's Institutions he affirmed to have been fetched from Calvin's Book De Providentiâ and said I did as good as name it I * Div. Philaâ— def ch 3. p. 127 c. shew'd him the grosseness of his mistake and prov'd the wilfulness of it which raised the error into a sin Now by way of abstersion he confesseth the fact p.
are good 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 all things vvhich become him All the rest are the †1 Joh. 3.8 works of the Devil and of his genuine Children vvho are resolved to do their * Job 8.41 44. Fathers works This vvas Christs Doctrine this vvas Saint Johns and Saint John believe me vvas a Christian All Gods works are done in (a) Psal 33.4 Truth therefore lyes are none of his and so * Piscat loco paulo superius citato Piscator vvas out The Lord is (b) Psal 145.17 holy in all his works Adultery and Murder are therefore none of Gods vvorks * Zuing. loc jam citat Zuinglius therefore vvas deceived by his Doctrine of Decrees and Mr. W. by Zuinglius The Lord shall (c) Psal 104.31 rejoyce in his works but hath (d) Psal 5.4 no pleasure in wickedness therefore Martin Borrhaus spake very madly when he dared to say that * Borrhaus in Exod. cap. 4. p. 448. sins do please God and Mr. Wh. more madly when he saith that God doth will sin with a perfect will p. 22. We see what must follow if Mr. W. shall answer yes to my Dilemma But if his answer shall be No then he must burn his own Books and all those Books from whence he made up his Cento and publickly subscribe to the truth of mine If he shall say his meaning is p. 22. that Gods will of which he speaks is onely objected on the wise permission or patient suffering of all sins and not upon the sins themselves why then did he entitle his book against me and not against Mr. Barlee or against his unconverted self He and I will shake hands if he will say he meant thus and not as Doctor Twisse who * See the place cited Correct Copy p. 10. saith that the will of God doth pass not onely into the permission of the sin but into the sin it self which is permitted Utrum horum mavelit accipiat Let him now take his choice and speaking distinctly to my Dilemma let the world know what he is for without any Tricks or Tergiversations But I will tell him for his security that he were better be tryed by the waters of jealousie if his meaning shal be found in the former part of the Dilemma by how much a lesser evil it is for * Num. 5.21 the thigh to rot and the belly to swell then for a man but to mean or say in his †Psal 14.1 heart that adultery and murder are the works of God And therefore timely let me advise him to use the * Num. 19.13 waters of separation that the uncleanness of such Doctrines may not be on him 5. The Determination of mans will to wicked actions is not Gods work 5. In the next place let us consider what he means by those words God worketh most determinately certainly and infallibly in the various and mutable motions of mans will I do but passingly take notice of his unscholar-like use of the word Infallible as if he knew not its meaning or did not consider its Derivation the fault is too small to be observed in a Writer of his bredth and thickness I will rather try him by another Dilemma Doth he mean that God doth so work on the wills of men as to determin them of necessity to all their objects and actions both good and evil or doth he not mean this but rather grant that mans will doth determine it self If the later all is well he hath no more to do next but to abandon his * Especially Mr. Barlee and his brother Hickman who say that whatsoever positive thing is not from God is God c. 3. p. 112. The apex of Blasphemy as shall be shewed hereafter party and burn his books whereas if the former is his meaning as hitherto it hath been I know not what to do for him to lighten the weight of his calamities which will press him down deeply do what I can For first he implyes a contradiction as I demonstrated to a person of greater worth And therefore here I repeat it not but refer him to the * See The Divine Purity defended ch 8. sect 2. p. 80 81 82. sect 5. p. 86 87. place where he cannot fail of it Next it inferreth unavoidably that God is the natural cause of all the wickedness in the world For example suppose a wicked man hath conceived Adultery in his mind or committed it in his Heart as our †Mat. 5.28 Saviour speaks If God did predetermin that wicked man to that physical Act of Concupiscence and the will of that man to a consent as well as the appetite to a complacency he was not onely the cause but the sole cause of the Adultery Nay farther yet if the inward intention of the end is the determination of the will to the first act of sin as the subtilest of them do say and if that Intenâ—ion or whatever else is the Determination of the will and the Determination it self is a positive act which none can deny and if God is the Creator or Maker or proper cause of whatsoever thing is positive as these precious ones do affirm He is not onely concluded the sole cause of the Adultry in his Creature Verum etiam id ipsum quod dicere nolo but also that which is worse and ineffably blasphemous And here I ask Mr. Wh. was that adulterous thought or intention so determined to its object in that respect evil or was it not If in that respect evil he accuseth God if not evil in that respect he acquitteth the wicked man and unavoidably inferreth that there was never any Adulterer Murderer or the like but was carried to the doing of all his wickedness with a good intention a good desire a very good determination of his will And reason good too For the Determination of mans will they say is Gods work or Gods share in the procurement and accomplishment of sins And Gods part in the business they say is good But then they leave man no share at all in his impieties if they do let them name it which they never yet did Indeed they talk in the general that God is the * Note this distinction which Mr. Barlee makes ch 3. p. 55. natural cause of the meer Act of sin and a meer Accidental Cause of the obliquity of the act of sin But bid them instance in some particular then they see that they are blind and quickly speak themselves speechless VVhen a man hates God or †Leviâ— 24.15 curseth God or any otherwise blasphemes against him let Mr. Wh. or Mr. B. or Mr. Hick be asked which is the act of that sin and which is the obliquity of the act of that sin you shall have them as mute as three dead Fishes If the cursing of God is a whole sin it is an act of sin or an obliquity of an Act or both together and that
among whom * Libert Necess p. 23. where note that Mr. Hobbs seems to have borrowed his Argument which proves his own doctrine blasphemous from Doctor Jackson l. 10. c. 6. fol. 3013. Mr. W. specks purposely beside the purpose by which he tacitely confesseth his cause is desperate Mr. Hobs hath no low place have not onely professed that they cannot discern any difference betwixt the sin and the sinful action but they have clearly discerned there can be none Nay Mr. VV. doth here demonstrate that he cannot discern the least difference whilest he tells me that if I please I can discern it For mark how strangely he speaks to my similitude Sect. 13. The roundness may be separaâ—ed from the Globe and yet the matter of it remain still when it is put into another Form p. 25 26. Hence he discovers that he knew his cause desperate and did wilfully mistake his proper Task because he saw it impossible to be performed For first he leaves out the later end of my sentence by which the sense is to be governed and the scope of it to be taken which had he not wilfully omitted he could not certainly have said what here he saith My words were far from being thus A Globe may be destroyed and so its roundness be taken away or the roundness may be separated from the Globe by the Globes ceasing to be a Globe and its matter cast into some other form but on the contrary thus * See the Div. Philanth def ch 4. p. 42. The roundness cannot be seâ—arated from the Globe which is round Which last words I did adde on purpose to note the continuance of the subject of the roundness spoken of and to preserve my simplest Reader from the very possibility of that mistake which Mr. W. out of subtilty hath here most resolutely committed Having mentioned a Globe I needed not have added round had it not been for such Readers as do not know or conâ—ider that nothing not round can be a Globe Nor did I imagine that Mr. W. could have been of their number who not considering a Globe is round or else not a Globe which is a loathsom contradiction can dream that roundness may be separated from the Globe because the Globe with the roundness may be separated from the matter in which it was to wit the brass or the wood which may be cast or shap't into several figures To separate roundness from the Globe is neither more nor less impossible then to separate roundness from roundness which is so much more then to square the Circle that many have ventured upon the one as well as M. Hobbs whereas none but M. Whitfield hath ever thought of doing the other And yet his way of attempting it is at least as admirable as his attempt For instead of proving against my words that the roundness may be separated from the Globe which is round so as it still may remain a Globe he saith the Globe may be cast as to the matter of it into another form and what is this but to say the Globe is not immutable but may cease to be a Globe by being turned into a conical or a cubical Figure But Mr. W. knew that this was contrary to the subject of which I spake and inconsistent with the case of which we are speaking for it is not our Question whether a sinner can be converted and become a Saint or whether his sin can be done away and destroyed and his actions which were wont to be very evil be very much altered unto the better But whether the sin can be separated from the sinful action so as the action shall remain when the sin is gone from it As whether Davidâ—s sin can be parted from his adultery or his adultery from his lying with Bathshebah it being supposed and granted that he is lying with Bathshebah and that the doing so is adultery and that adultery is a sin This being the Case and Mr. VV. speaking not of it but of quite another thing I therefore condemn him out of his own mouth for having spoken against a truth even whilest he saw it was unresistible For he who sits beside the Cushion no less the twenty yards wide even after he took it into his hands as if he meant to sit on it cannot be thought to sit beside it because it is not conspicuous but because it is conspicuously so full of prickles or any otherwise so frightful as that he dares not adventure on it 2. His wonderful attempt to wash wet from water 2. To shew Mr. W. both his danger and his dishonour in such his dealings let him name any one thing in any part of his doctrines wherein he will affirm an inseparability and I will presently enforce him to confute himself out of himself I will prove by an argument ad hominem which he at least will not resist that Mr. W. may be separated from Mr. W. nay I will prove with more colour that the difference is wide betwixt twenty and twice ten because that is but one number but this is two I will prove the separability of his proper passion from his formal reason and again of his formal reason from that essential whole to which it gives its specification I will prove that a disease however incurable may be cur'd because it is possible to kill the Patient There is nothing so impossible but may be proved to Mr. W. to be the contrary if he will but take his own coin for current which here he puts off to others without a blush If his marvellous error hath been through ignorance or inadvertency which yet I cannot conceive he shall do well to study the nature of conjugates and denominatives of adjuncts and subjects of common and proper accidents and if he will trie but to put his present sense into a Syllogisme he shall find four terms in the Premisses or Ignoratio Elenchi in the conclusion he shall not escape one of the two let him go which way he will 3. The three lines of his present Section which shut it up p. 26. are cabbage not onely twice but twenty times boyl'd and from the first to the last is gratis dictum Sect. 14. Mr. W. affirms God to will and work sin and to have a hand in effecting of it upon his supposal that sin makes for Gods glory Mr. W's five Essayes instead of Answers to my Objection being now at an end he proceeds to a fourth Argument as he calls it in the Margin whereby to prove his beloved Doctrine of God's efficiency in sin And thus it runs So far as sin makes for the glory of God so far he may both will and work it for if he neither intends it nor hath any hand at all in effecting it how shall it make for his glory p. 26. First he layes for his foundation a most palpable falshood That sin doth make for God's glory This is his postulatum he will
Gods glory or that God may get himself glory by it and be apt to plead upon his committing of adultery or incest that he did not do it as 't was forbidden by the word which is * This is the Doctrine of Dr. Twisse others particularly owned by Mr. W. p. 47. improperly called the will of God say they but as God did secretly will it as it made for Gods glory or to the end that God might get himself some glory by it He did it not out of lust or as a sin but to procreate a Saint and increase the number of the godly and withal to glorifie that discriminating mercy which could not be exercised in the pardoning of such sins if they were not committed by them in whom they are capable of being pardoned that is to say by the Elect. I put this Case to fright men out of those premisses from which if God restrain them not they have been known by experience to draw such horrible conclusions And had I not been able to give examples I should not have thought this method needful Mr. W. tells us plain enough both p. 26. and here too that so far as sin makes for Gods glory God may both **** Note that all are his own expressions â— 26 28. which must be compared to which purpose look on what I hâ—ve said sect 14. of this Chapter will and * work it and have a hand in 〈◊〉 effecting or * working of it And though sin be in it self evil yet it may have some respect of * good As for that which he calls a true Rule and what he hath out of Austin against himself I will not exagitate his unhappinesse therein as I must also forbear to do it in many other particulars meerly for fear I should be endless Sect. 20. Mr. W. proceeds to a sixth Argument wherby he proves his great willingness to prove that God hath efficiency and hand in sin Mr. W's dangerous mis-apprehension of that figurative Sentence That God doth punish sin with sia but more then his willingness to prove it he proveth not For his Argument is but this That God punisheth one sin with another and punishment is more then a bare permission It were ridiculous to say that a Judge onely permitteth a malefactor to be arraigned condemned and executed p. 28. lin ult p. 29. lin 1 2 3 4. First it is not any where said in Scripture that God doth punish one sin with another but 't is a sentence of the Schoolmen as commonly known to be catachrestical as any beggar knowes his own dish and hath neither truth nor sense in it unless it be figuratively meant For God punisheth the sinner and not the sin Nor doth he imprint sin on him as the Lictor doth stripes but withdraws his grace and leaves the sinner to himself whereupon he sinneth without restraint But I have spoken of this in * See the Sinner Impleaded c. 1. p. 9. another place where I have also recorded S. Austins suffrage for the truth 2. His making God the proper cause of the greatest sins 2. But Mr. W. hath so prodigiously misunderstood that sentence or else so guiltily dissembled his understanding as to express Gods punishing of sin with sin by the positive actions of a Judge in his arraigning condemning and execution of malefactors which is to make God the Author and proper cause of the greatest sins in the world such as are the later sins which are called the punishments of the former It being frequently the Doctrine of Mr. W. that of all positive actions God is the Author and †Ext. of Gods Prov. c. 4. p. 11. proper cause But Idolatries and Adulteries Blasphemies and Murders and the sins not to be named Rom. 1.26 are positive actions and punishments in the Schoolmens sense and so according to Mr. W. God is blasphemously inferred to be their Author and proper cause 3. Which he also extends to the very sin of the act 3. Now we see what moved him to say in print That God must * Ibid. p. 12. Iin. 1 2. needs some way both will and work in the sin of the Act. Mark well good Reader He doth not say as at other times the act of sin or the sinful act but the sin of the act meaning the pravity and deformity and obliquity it self as he explains himself in the next two lines wherein he saith that God gets glory to himself by that very pravity and deformity 4. He treads a step beyond Calvins worst 4. Mr. W. in this doth tread a step beyond Calvin not onely †Calv. Instit l. 1. c. 18. sect 1. fol. 68. followes him through thick and thin For though Mr. Calvin speaks broadly that the wicked man whilest he acteth is * Id. ib. sect 2. fol. 69. Apparet cer â destinatione Dei fuisse impulsos Fateor quidem interpositâ Satanae operâ saepe Deum agere in Reprebis sed ut e jus impulsu Satan ipse suas partes agat unde hoc nisi quod à Deo manat efficacia erroris ut mendacium credant c. Ibid. Summa haec sit quum Dei voluntas dicitur rerum omnium esse cause ut non tantùm vim suam exerat in electis sed etiam reprobos in obsequium cogat Ibid. Et jam satis apertè ostendi Deum vocari eorum omnium Authorem quae isti censores volunt otioso tantum ejus permissu contingere Id. ib. sect 3. p. 7. acted by God and that the Assyrians were thrust on to rob and plunder by the sure destination of God and that God doth act in the reprobates by the interposition of Satan's help that Satan by God's impulse may act his own part also and that the efficacy of error proceeds from God and that when he casts men into filthy desires he is the chief Author of his just vengeance that is of sin in Mr. W's sense and Satan onely the Minister and that the will of God is the cause of all things and that his providence doth not onely exert its force in the elect who are ruled by his holy Spirit but doth also compell the reprobates to be obsequious and that God is called the Author of all those things which the censorious will have to happen by his idle permission onely though these are frightful expressions and applied in such a manner as not to be capable of excuse yet Mr. VV. as I shewed hath stept beyond him 5. The †Veteres religiosiù interdum simplicem veritatis confessionem in hac parte reformidant Ne Augustinus quidem illâ superstâ—tione interdum solutus est quemadmodum ubi dicit indurationem excaecationem non ad operationem Dei sed ad praescientiam spectare Calv. Inst l. 2. c. 4. Sect. 3. fol. 95. Ancient Fathers were afraid to ascribe that to God's working which they saw could onely be the object of his praescience and his permission
and this by the confession of Mr. Calvin himself who as he calls it their superstition so he confesseth that S. Austin was not alwayes free from it But Mr. Calvin in despight of the Fathers piety which he brands with the Title of Superstition doth very dogmatically pronounce of those later sins of men which are called the punishments of the former that as they are punishments God is * Idem l. 1. c. 18. Sect. 2. Author praecipuus the prime or chief Author and that the Devil is onely subservient to him Satan verò tantù Minister And though he saith that the Ancients were somewhat too religious in their fear of speaking the simple truth as he calls it yet he confesseth their fear was very sober because the thing which they feared was the * Idem ib. l. 2. c. 4. Sect. 3. fol. 95. opening a passage unto impiety of irreverently defaming the works of God Now what it was which misled Mr. VV. and Mr. B. from that holy fear of those Fathers to speak of God in such a fearless and frightful manner as I have partly already shewed and am partly to shew in my following Chapter I believe most Readers do judge as I do Sect. 21. 1. The desperate nature of Mr. u's Salvo's and the hardness of his very emollients Mr. W. having now done with the prime part of his enterprise wherein he hath often made God to be the Author of sin and often very much worse goes on talking to himself from p. 29. to p. 35. in an indeavoured excuse of what he hath hitherto delivered And in the very entrance on that attempt he makes himselef unexcusable by dropping out such excuses as stand in need of an excuse but cannot find one 1. Though Gods permission of sin is an operative permission saith Mr. W. yet he is not the Author of the evil permitted His reason is because what the wicked do wickedly God doth holily p. 29. Which is only to say that God is not the Author of sin in Himself not that he is not the Author of sin in others The Question is not whether God is a Transgressor but whether he makes men Transgressors as Zuinglius publickly affirmeth Not whether David's lying with Bathshebah was a good Adultery and so no sin in as much as it was the work of God and in as much as God did impel him to it as Zuinglius also speaks This is not the Question but the sordid begging of the Question and a taking that for granted which we deny and abominate with all our might as most blasphemous and irrational The Question is whether God impelled David to that Adultery or did work in the sin of that act as Mr. W. speaks which whilest I deny as a most impious and a most senseless proposition he must first of all prove and make apparent before he comes to infer upon it that the very same thing which man doth wickedly God doth holily and justly For God doth it not at all nor can he do it because he is God 2. What he saith of the Physicians occasioning the sickness yea the death of the Patient 2. by giving Physick which meets wi ha malignant Humour who yet cannot be said to be the Author of those effects p. 29 30. is as impertinent a similitude as he could easily have chosen and shews he considers not of what he speaks or understands not any thing of the word Author or seeks to amuse his illiterate Reader 3. He hopes to excuse himself by uttering these following Aphorismes 3. which pass with him for fan and soft and suppling speeches 1. God may be said to administer occasions of sinning and so to have some kind of hand in it The mollifying expressions of the harsh speaker by his word and by his works p. 30. 2. The Law hath an efficacy in stirring up sinful motions p. 30. 3. The good word of God doth accidentally stir up the corruption that is in mens wicked hearts p. 31. 4. Christs preaching and Stephens preaching had an EFFICIENCY in stirring up the wrath of their Hearers p. 31. 5. The good word of God doth stir up evil affections in the hearts of wicked men p. 31. Thus he puts upon himself that thick and palpable Fallacy non causae pro causâ Because when the word of God is preached the evil affections of the wicked are stirred up he concludes that Gods word doth stir them up As if my writing were the cause of those things which come to pass when I am writing Again he doth not distinguish betwixt the giving of occasions and taking occasions when none are given God hath spoken and done those exceeding good things from which men have snatched an occasion of evil but to administer or give occasions of doing wickedly is so ill a phrase that it is very unskilfully applyed to God to say no worse And I had hoped that these times had taught the unlearnedst to distinguish betwixt Scandalum datum acceptum Acceptum sed non datum Though David was pardoned his sin of Adultery yet because by that deed he had given great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme his Infant Child did surely dye 2 Sam. 12.13 14. If Mr. W. did not consider that there is such a thing as the sin of scandal or did not know what scandal is and wherein it stands he may both know and consider it another time He who in doing what is lawful intends to make another man sin as well as he who doth it by doing what is unlawful without out intending any such thing is properly said to give occasion to scandalize to lay a snare in his Brothers way 4. His open profession that Gods secret wil is contrary to his revealed will in respect of the very same objects 4. I am urged to enlarge upon another passage in Mr. W. where he saith that the wicked in their evil actions doe that which is contrary to the revealed will of God though the same things which he wills viz. by his secret will which they know not p. 34. But I count the number of my pages and am exhorted to spend but little time against a man of no greater strength and have already acquainted him with enough of his unhappiness and whatsoever I shall omit of his other misadventures I shall abundantly meet with in my Account of Mr. Barlee and Mr. Hick whom I intend for the Subjects of the following Chapter CHAP. III. Of Mr. Barlee's forging God to be the Author of Sin and very much worse then so too in his very endeavours to speak as warily as his Principles will suffer him Sect. 1. BEing now to consider the Doctrinal part of Mr. Barlee's Book which he Intitles A Necessary Vindication or full Abstersion I must begin with his Third Chapter where omitting his Buffonery as that which serves to no end but to proclaim him to the world for the most lantentable Zanie
of it as the sinner himself and as much as Satan who tempts him to sin and in some respects much more then both VVhich before I come to demonstrate I will name the Cause of this Disease which being premised must needs be followed by its effects 3. The original cause of the disease 3. The Cause of it is this That they believe Gods praescience or fore-knowledge of all things and events to be neither praevious to nor simultaneous with but directly after his praedetermination of them Mr. Calvin expressed it thus * See the Divine purity defended ch 7. sect 8. p. 74. that God did therefore fore-know all things because he fore-ordained all things of which I have spoken on another occasion And now Mr. Barlee expresseth it thus Gods praescience of a thing future must needs praesuppose a praedestination or a praedetermination of it 4. The Patient proved extrembly sick of the disease by his own acknowledgment of the cause Look sorward on the tenth Section of this Chapter 4. That Mr. B. is sick of the disease I mentioned I now prove out of his words which declare the Cause to be reigning in him And to make the shorter work of it I shall proceed to conviction by this Dilemma Doth he believe Gods praescience of sin or not If he doth not then all his own party will send him packing to the Anticyrae every mouth will be opened full wide against him he will not therefore dare to say No to my Dilemma And if he saith Yes his calamity will be greater for adhering to his Maxime he must confess his Doctrine to be this That God did praedetermine sin antecedently to his praescience or fore-knowledge of sin To make it plain by Syllogism 1. He who holds that Gods praescience of what is future must needs p esuppose his praedetermination of it holds that the praedetermination praecedes the praescience 2. But Mr. B. doth declaredly hold the former 3. Therefore he also doth hold the later This being made thus evident to the most ignorant of his Favourers and undeniable to the most obstinate I will now go on to prove my Necessary Assertion That Mr. B. is sick of the most loathsome and the most dangerous Disease of making God to be the Author and Cause of sin 5. Four short arguments to confirm it left for every Reader to enlarge upon in his thoughts 1. If God foresaw nothing but as being first fore-appointed or predetermined by himself then he foresaw not any mans determination of his will to sin until himself had predetermined that mans determination of his will to sin Now if the Devil is the cause of another mans sinning by meerly inclining his will to sin and if the sinner himself is another cause of his sin by meerly determining his will to sin though not as sin but under the notion and appearance at least of good how can God be thought less if from all Eternity before the Man or the Devil had any existence he had predetermined doth the temptation of the one which is the sin of the Devil and the sin of the other who yields himself captive to that temptation yea the determination of both their wills to both their sins Yet thus he did saith Mr. B. at least in signo rationis before he could be able to foresee the one or the other 2. If he who shall command or advise a man to do a thing which he knows to be forbidden and so a sin cannot possibly be conceived to be less then a concause and coadjutor what then must he be concluded who doth absolutely and irresistibly predetermine and tye up the will to sin 3. God in his Law doth forbid the whole moral act to wit Adultery or Murder and the liberty of the Agent to commit it Thou shalt not do this or that he doth not onely forbid the obliquity of the Act abstracted from the Act as the repugnance of killing an innocent with the Law which saith Thou shalt not kill abstracted from killing for this last is impossible to be so much as conceived much less to be ex parte rei and implies a gross contradiction God forbids us to blaspheme he doth not forbid us to blaspheme amiss implying it possible to blaspheme aright So that if he predetermines the will of man or man as a voluntary Agent to the positive Act of blaspheming he predetermines to that which he forbids that is to sin And if the union of the pravity with the Act doth move God to forbid that the Act it self be freely done how can he then predetermine that it shall be done freely or admitting that he can who is then the Author of sin It is hard to say whether the impossibility on one hand or the absurdity on the other is more observable in the Case Impossibilium nulla est obligatio 4. If God is not by his predetermination of sin the Author of sin who is then the Author of it Man cannot be for in that case he cannot sin For can he possibly hinder the for bidden Act from having a pravity or filth on supposition that it be free and known to be forbidden Or can he so order the matter that there shall not be an Entity of the Act a wilfulness of the Agent nor a testimony of conscience against the thing done No this is impossible the predetermination being supposed or else it is a being too strong for God which is blasphemous as well as impossible How then can God be conceived to exact any thing of his Creature who doth the thing that is forbid being predetermined to the Act which is forbidden and to every circumstance of the Act What is said of man may be repeated of the Devil and if neither of them can be the Author of sin according to Mr. B's Maximes the Reader knowes what to think of Him and Them Sect. 9. To remove the cause of this Noysom and Inveterate Disease and to keep it from being Desperate 1. The easie and infallible means of cure to all who are not resolved to contine sick at least from being Epidemical I must clear the point of Gods Praescience to my less instructed and common Readers such as Mr. W. and Mr. B. appear to be And because they are reckoned as chief men of their party there must needs be great numbers who partake with them in their greatest wants First they seem not to consider that Praescience is nothing else but the Latine word for foreknowledge or else not to know what knowledge naturally importeth and so discern not precisely wherein Gods Knowledge doth differ from his Decree How else could they imagin with * Mr. W. discovers his opinion that whatever God foreknowes must necessarily come to pass and so all sins as well as whatever he decrees doth the like Mr. W. that Gods foreknowledge doth necessitate as well as his decree or how could they dream with Mr. B. that Gods foreknowledge
with that natural liberty that is neither forced nor by any absolute necessity of nature determined to do good or evil From whence it followes that Adam's determination of his free will to the eating of forbidden fruit which was a positive entity was meerly from Adam and not from God Unlesse they will say he had a necessity supernatural though not from nature which if they say it will be at their perill Again 't is granted by all that man since the fall hath a liberty of will in things not moral and in many things which are meerly moral which inferres them to be the Authors of many positive Acts. 5. They are farther uncovered by being supposed to be catcchized 5. If Mr. B. and Mr. Hick were to be publickly Catechized and first asked who made them men 2. who made them sinners 3. who made them Priests 4. who made their Dublets either long or short-wasted 5. who is wont to wash their cloaths to cleanse their hands and their feet and to do some other much viler offices they would not say for shame that God did make or do those things which they know to be positive and real Entities but to each of those Questions they would certainly return a severe Answer Again if they are askt who made the short-wastedness of the Dublet aforesaid they will say the same Taylor who made it a short-wasted Dublet Ask them then who made the sinfulness of the sinful Action to wit Davids lying with Bathshebah they will say the same Agent who made the sinful Action that positive Entity David's lying with Bathshebah against the Law Who made that positive Entity or sinful action Even God say * Mr. W. saith that of every positive act God is the proper efficient cause p. 24. Mr. B. and Mr. H. the same and wors as hath been shewed they but say I the Adulterer against the precept and will of God and against that measure of his grace which had been sufficient to prevent it if David had not been a resolute and wilful sinner I conclude this Section with the confession of Mr. W. That he who is the Author of the Action must needs be the Author of the sin also which is unseparable from it p. 25. But both himself and Mr. Hick and Mr. B. do say that God is the Author and maker of the action as being a positive and real thing therefore according to their concessions they do all make God the Author of sin Sect. 20. Mr. B's second chip of the old block Mr. B. hews out his second chip thus He must hold that there be myriads of myriads of actions in the world which are not wrought by God c. p. 113. This second chip is wonderful if compared with the first 1. His inconsistency with himself and his inferring all sinful actions to be wrought by God for there he would have me bound up by my Thesis to maintain that God is the Author of sin though here he makes me to hold that there are 100000. of Actions not wrought by God if the first were swallowed there is no place for the second and if the second then no place for the first For if I hold as I do that there are myriads of sins or sinful actions whereof not one can by any possibility be wrought by God then by no possibility can I make God the Author of sin But now Mr. B. declares his Tenet that all the actions in the world however filthy and noysome are wrought by God I say the contrary that there is a world of wickedness which is none of Gods making but of the Devils and his party whether in Hell or in Earth 2. His unsuccesful reliance on the Jesuites 2. Whilest I deny that any sinful actions are wrought by God I do not deny that he permits them and I have often shewed how the sinner depends on God both for his power to live and move What he saith of the sesuites may well be true for they are kinsmen in these affaires The Jesuites in waggery did purposely propagate many blasphemies arising from the Tenet of unconditional Reprobation in many Protestant parts of the Christian world that by making them odious they might fright men from thence into the Church of Rome I find the observation in the Renowned and Judicious * Exact Coll. l. 10. ch 39. sect 6. p. 3189. Dr. Jackson whom Mr. B. put me upon reading by his saying that I had read him when indeed I had not And since the Jesuite Suarez is of so much Authority with his Cousin of the Kirk I will observe out of †Proprio reali influxu concurrit Deus ad actus liberi Arbitrii ut reales actus sunt etiamsi saepissimè intrinsecè mali sint nam cùm hi actus sint verè res effectus reales necesse est ut saltem illam dopendentiam à Deo habeant quae omnibus causarum secundarum effect bus generalis omnino necessaria est Suarez de concursu motione auxiliis Dei lib. 2. Suarez that the acts of Free-will are real acts though evil and the real effects of second causes which Mr. Hick and Mr. B. are both intreated to chew upon And again I will observe that Suarez gives those acts but a general dependance upon God whereas Doctor Twisse as I lately cited him makes God to be causa particularis uniuscujusque actus which is worse then the Jesuite though the Jesuites and Dominicans are too too bad in their Assertions Sect. 21. Mr. B's 3d. chip more pitiful then the former Mr. B. saith farther It will follow that the more sinful acts any commits the more he is a Creator and a kind of an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a God of himselfe p. 13. Still a chip of the same block But 1. what pretence hath he for this when I have said so often that though the sinner in some sort may be called the Creator of his sins yet the evil which he doth he doth by that power and freedom of will which he had from God How then 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in any sense 2. To be a God of evil is a very sad priviledge And the word God is so far from signifying Him onely who is the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that * Exod. 22.28 men and †1 Cor. 8.5 Idols are called Gods in Scripture and Satan himself the * 2 Cor. 4.4 God of this world And so the summe of Mr. B's acumen is but this That the more sins a man commits of the more sins he is the Author The more evil the Devil invents the works of the Devil are so much the more Very pretty Look back on Sect. 18. 19. Num. 5. Sect. 22. Mr. B's fourth chip the most lamentable of all Mr. B. begins to be more extravagant then himself not onely more then other men by arguing from the supposal of sins being a thing