Slave and also promiseth him great Possessions and Honours in a Kingdom in the East Indies or at the Antipodes if he will leave his Servitude and his Country and all that he hath there and go with him in his Ship and patiently endure the Sea-trials till he come thither Here he must 1. believe that the Prince hath paid his ransome 2. That he is a wise man and knoweth what he promised and skilful to conduct him safely through all the perils of the Seas 3. That he is an honest man and intendeth not to deceive him 4. That he is sufficient or able to perform his word 5. And if upon this belief he trust him he will let go all and venture in his Ship and follow him And here one tells him that the Ship is unsound another tells him that the Prince is a Deceiver unable to perform his Word or unskilful or dishonest and some way untrusty and another tells him that small matters in his own Country are better than greater with so much hazard and sets out the dangers and terribleness of the Seas Now if the man be ask'd Do you believe or will you trust me or will you not here every one by believing and trusting knoweth that a practical Trust is meant which lieth in such a confidence as forsaketh all and taketh the promised Kingdom for all his hope Such is our Saving Faith § 12. As many Acts and many Objects go to constitute Saving Faith so if you will logically anatomize it all these following must be taken in § 13. 1. The principal Efficient Cause is God the Father Son and Holy Ghost respectively according to their several operations § 14. 2. The Instrumental Cause is the Word of God and the Preaching and Preachers of it or Parents Friends or some that reveal the Word unto us § 15. 3. Subordinate auxiliary means are Providential Alterations by some awaking Judgments or inviting Mercies or convincing Examples c. § 16. 4. The Soul of Man in all its three Faculties Vital-active Intellective and Volitive is 1. the Recipient of the Divine Influx and then 2. the immediate Efficient or Agent of the Acts of Faith § 17. 5. Preparatory Grace and Duty is ordinarily Man's Disposition as he is the Recipient of God's Grace and the Agent of believing But God is free and can work on the unprepared but it is not to be taken for his ordinary way § 18. 6. The formal Object of the assenting Act of Faith is veracit as Dei revelantis the Veracity or Truth of God revealing his Will § 19. 7. The formal Object of the accepting and receiving Act is the Goodness of the Benefits offered us by the Covenant as offered § 20. 8. The formal Object of our Trust or Affiance is God's fides Fidelity because of his aforesaid Veracity in promising and his Power Wisdom and Benevolence as a Performer and this full Act comprehendeth all the rest It is God's Trustiness § 21. 9. The material Objects of the assenting Act in genere are all God's Assertions or Revelations More especially the Gospel or the Christian Faith objective according to the Edition of the Covenant which we are under § 22. The Essentials of our objective Christian Faith constitute the Essence of our active Saving Faith and the Integrals of it constitute the Integrity § 23. And it is of great importance to distinguish here as to the Word and Objects between 1. the signa or words 2. the signification or sence 3. the things matter or incomplex objects as distinct from words and sence viz. God Christ Grace Heaven Goodness Iustice Men c. And to hold 1. That the words are not necessary for themselves but for the sence and therefore Translations or any words which give us the same sence may serve to the being of Saving Faith 2. That the sence it self is not necessary for it self ultimately as if Holiness lay in notions but for the things which that sence revealeth viz. God to be loved and obeyed Christ to be received the Holy Ghost to be received and obeyed Holiness and all Grace to be received loved used encreased our Brethren to be loved Heaven to be desired c. All sence will not bring us to the reception of the things for all is not apt but any that doth this which must be divine and apt will constitute us true Believers § 24. 1. The material Objects of our acceptance and consent are the Word of God commanding offering and promising and the good of Duty and Benefit commanded offered and promised that is All that is given us in the baptismal Covenant God the Father and his Love the Son and his Grace and the Holy Ghost and his Communion The Father as reconciled and adopting us the Son as having redeemed us to teach rule justifie and save us the Holy Spirit to sanctifie comfort and perfect us § 25. 11. The material Object of our Trust or Affiance is God himself the prime Truth Power and Good and Christ as his Messenger and our Saviour and the Holy Ghost as the Author of the Word and the Word as being the Word of God You must pardon us as necessitated to call God a material Object analogically for want of words § 26. 12. The ultimate or final Objects of Saving Faith are 1. God himself the ultimate ultimum that is the perfect Complacency of his will in his Glory eternally shining forth in our Glory and the Glory of Christ with all the Church triumphant 2. Next to that This Glory it self which is a created thing and the Perfection of the Universe and of Christ's Church and our selves in which it consisteth And therein our own Perfection and our perfect sight love and praise of our glorious God and our Redeemer 3. And next under that the first fruits of all this in this World in the foresaid love of the Father and Grace of the Son and Communion of the Holy Spirit and the Church § 27. If therefore we were put to give a full description of Saving Faith we must be as large as this following or such-like in sence viz. The Faith which the Adult must profess in Baptism as having the Promise of Justification and Salvation is a sincere fiducial practical Assent to Divine Revelations and especially to the Gospel revealing and offering us God himself to be our God and reconciled Father Christ to be our Saviour viz. by his Incarnation meritorious Righteousness and Sacrifice Resurrection Doctrine Example Government Intercession and final Judgment and the Holy Ghost to quicken illuminate and sanctifie us that so we may live in the Love of the Father the Grace of the Son and the Communion of the Holy Spirit and of the Christian Church being saved from our Enemies Sin and Misery initially in this Life and perfectly in eternal perfect Glory With a fiducial acceptance of the Gifts of the Covenant according to their nature and a sincere federal Consent and with a sincere
Conclusion helped by Grace whereof the major only is de fide He that believeth is justified but not the Minor I believe Therefore we usually call it a fruit of Faith § 42. Some incautelous Divines in the heat of Dispute do indeed say That it is de fide divina or a Divine Word that I am a true Believer And Chamier too unhappily goeth about to prove it by saying That it is the Word of the Spirit in us which is the Word of God As if the Spirit spake in us new Articles of Faith or a new Word to be believed whose work in those that are not inspired Prophets is but 1. to cause us to believe that Word already given 2. To be a witnessing Evidence that we are God's Children by making us holy as he is holy as similitude witnesseth a Child to be his Fathers 3. And to help us to discern that Holiness or Evidence and to exercise it and to gather Comfort from such discerning it and exercise § 43. We now commonly disown all such Assertions I meet with no sober Divine that owneth them because we grant that Conclusio semper sequitur partem debiliorem But yet we find that those few that call it de fide do most of them mean no more but that it 's partly de fide because the Major Proposition is so and so they differ but about a Logical Notion § 44. Some have said indeed beyond-Sea That a man cannot believe and not know it but we know thousands may believe and yet doubt whether it be a sincere and saving sort of Faith But I have written so many Books of these matters that I here add no more CHAP. XXI Of the nature of Righteousness Iustification and Pardon § 1. THE Controversies about Justification have made a great noise but I think that those de re are few in comparison of those de nomine even among all sorts of Christians and the confounding them by unskilful Heads who have made the ignorant believe that those which are but de nomine are de re hath kindled foolish Wrath and quenched Christian Love and taken up poor Souls with a deceitful Zeal who have thought that they were contending for great and necessary Truths when it was but for Logical Notions Names and Modes of Expression over-commended to them by their several Teachers § 2. The Words Iustice Righteousness and Iustification are very ambiguous used in many sences in the Scriptures and in the Writings of Divines and in the common use of men which I have opened in so many Books and so largely as shall here excuse my breviâ—y The Sences which we are now most concerned to take notice of are these following § 3. Righteousness is considered materially or formally Materially it is 1. immediately 1. A righteous Action 2. A righteous Disposition or Habit 2. And thence a righteous Person § 4. Righteousness materially is 1. in some or other particular Action 2. Or in the main bent of Heart and Life 3. Or in Perfection The first denominateth the Person Righteous in hoc or secundum quid The second denominateth him a sincerely Righteous Man The third a perfectly Righteous Man § 5. In the notion of the material Cause is included also the Comparative or Relative State and Proportion of Actions When the Action is duly qualified and modified in its physical Nature and Circumstances it is materially just § 6. The form enquired of is Quid morale And it is the Relation of the Action and Habit and Person as congruous to the justitia mensurans or the Rule of Righteousness The Rule or Law first maketh jus vel debitum and saith This shall be your Duty and your Neighbour's Due and declareth God's Due And the jus being constituted by the Law natural or positive that which agreeth to it is jâ—stum So that Righteousness formally is a moral Relation resulting from the physical mode and relation of Actions and Habits as compared with the Law or Rule A moral Relation founded in a physical Congruity § 7. Righteousness is both materially and formally distinguishable as towards God or Man Materially as it is God or Man that we deal â—ustly or injuriously by Formally as it is God himself or Men ruling under him who give us Laws and make the debitum vel jus or dispose of Propriety § 8. Righteousness towards God being Relative to his Laws is to be distinguished according to the several Laws that men are under and according to the several parts of the Law which give the word divers Sences § 9. 1. Righteousness as related to the Precept as such is nothing but Obedience whether partial sincere or perfect He that doth righteousness is righteous § 10. 2. Righteousness related to a meer Condition of Pardon or Salvation c. is the performance of that Condition which may be the Causa judicanda § 11. 3. Righteousness as related to the premiant or donative part of the Law or Promise is our jus ad praemium our Right to that Reward or Gift § 12. 4. Righteousness as relative to the penal part is our jus ad impunitatem or when punishment is not due to us according to that Law § 13. 1. Righteousness as related to the Precept of the Law of Innocency is materially perfect personal continued Obedience to our Creator § 14. 2. Righteousness as related to the Condition of that Law is the same because nothing but the said perfect Obedience is there made the Condition of Life § 15. 3. Righteousness related to the rewarding part of that Law is right to that Life which is there promised that is to God's Love and Felicity § 16. 4. Righteousness related to the Penalty of that Law is a Right to Impunity as to the Death which it threatneth to Sinners § 17. 1. Righteousness as related to the meer preceptive part of the Law of Grace is also perfect Obedience for the future not Innocency as to the time past for even Christ maketh perfect Obedience our Duty though he pardon sin § 18. 2. Righteousness as related to the Condition of the Law of Grace is sincere Faith and Repentance as the Condition of our first Right to the present Gifts of the Covenant and also sincere Love and Obedience to the end as the Condition of our final Iustification and Glory § 19. 3. Righteousness as related to the Reward of the Law of Grace is our Right to our Relation to the Father Son and Holy Ghost and all the Gifts of the Covenant Christ Grace and Glory § 20. 4. Righteousness as related to the penal part of the Law of Grace is our Right to Impunity as to the Punishment threatned specially by that Law § 21. The meritorious Cause of both these last our Right to Impunity and to Life is the Righteousness of Christ for the sake of which the Condonation and Donations of the Covenant of Grace are given us § 22. This Righteousness of Christ is his fulfilling the Conditions
An END of Doctrinal CONTROVERSIES Which have Lately Troubled the Churches BY Reconciling Explication WITHOUT MUCH DISPUTING Written by RICHARD BAXTER Psal. 120. 6 7. My Soul hath long dwelt with him that hateth Peace I am for Peace but when I speak they are for War Luke 9. 46 49 50 54 55. There arose a reasoning among them which of them should be greatest c. LONDON Printed for Iohn Salusbury at the Rising SUN in Cornhil M. DC XCI THE PREFACE WARS are most dreaded and hated by the Country where they are but not so much by the Souldiers who by them seek their Prey and Glory as by the suffering Inhabitants that lose thereby their Prosperity and Peace who yet are forced or drawn to be siders lest they suffer for Neutrality Religious irreligious Wars are of no less dismal Consequence being about God himself his Will and Word and that which more nearly toucheth our Souls and everlasting state than our Houses and worldly Welfare does And yet because Men are more sensible of their corporal than their spiritual Concerns these Dogmatical Wars are far less feared and too commonly made the Study and Delight not only of the Military Clergy but also of the seduced and sequacious Laity Though those that have the Wisdom from above which is pure and peaceable condole the Church's Calamity hereby knowing that Envy and Strife the earthly sensual and devilish Wisdom causeth Confusion and every evil Work And it is a heinous Aggravation that the Militants being Men consecrated to Love and Peace profanely father their Mischiefs upon God and do all as for Religion and Church Having these four and forty Years at least been deeply sensible of this Sin Danger and Misery of Christians I have preach'd much and written more against it To confute those Extreams which cause Divisions and to reconcile those that think they differ where they do not sometime also using importunate Petitions and Pleas for Peace to those that have power to give it or promote it and that use either Word or Sword against it And with the Sons of Peace it hath not been in vain But with those that are engaged in Faction and malicious strife I am proclaimed to be the militant Enemy of Concord for perswading them to Concord and writing many Books for Peace and Love is taken for writing them against these Controversies I have written of but only to end them and not to make them And who can reconcile them that never mentioneth them or arbitrate in a Cause unheard and not opened But Readers I must tell you that my title An End of Doctrinal Controversies is â—ot intended as prognostick but as dedâ—ctical â—nd directive I am far from expecting an end â—f Controversies while consecrated Ignorance is â—y worldly Interest Faction and Malice mixâ—d with Pride sublimated to an envious Zeael Jam. 3. 15 16. and hath set up a Trade of slandering all those that are true Peace-ma 〈…〉 ers and concur not with them to destroy it on â—retence of defending it by their impossible perâ—icious terms He that will now be taken for a Peace-maker must be content to be so called by a few even by the Sect that he chuseth to please and be contrarily judged of by all the rest And this satisfieth some because their Faction seemeth better than others be they never so few and others because their Faction is great or rich or uppermost how noxious and unpeaceable soever For vespae habent favos saith Tertullian Marcionitae Ecclesias We could wish the Bees seldom used their stings for it is their Death but those of Wasps and Hornets that make no Honey are less sufferable It is partly for unprejudiced Students that I write and partly for the times to come when the Fruits of malignant Faction and Wars have disgraced them and made the world a weary of them I am blamed by Dissenters as coming too near by Conciliatory Explications to some things which they call dangerous Points of Popery Arminianism and Prelacy but whether it be by Truth or by Error I leave to trial Sure our English Universities and Canonists are not like to receive any hurt by it who will not read a Book that they see my Name to though the Doctrine would never so much gratifie them And others at home and Foreigners are satisfied by Knowledge and Prepossession against such seeming Danger The great blemish of this and other of my Writings is That I say oft the same thing which I have said before Much of this Book is in my Catholick Theology and my Meth. Theol. and my Treatise of Iustifying Righteousness But 1. Forgetfulness in Old Men that have written so much is no wonder 2. But it sheweth that I have not forgotten the Matter nor take it up suddenly and superficially which I so oft repeat 3. And there may be great use for such Repetitions when it is for clearer Method or for epitomizing larger Writings which many cannot or will not read but those that can may have the benefit of more Explicatory Copiousness If it profit the Reader I am not sollicitous for the Reputation of the Writer You will find here one Chapter answering Exceptions about Futurity concerning which you must know that my Catholick Theology was so bold and large an attempt to reconcile the Calvinist and Lutheran or Arminian and the Dominican and Jesuit c. that I lookt to have been sharply assaulted for it by many But after many Years expectation I have heard of nothing written or spoken against it save one MS. Paper of Objections about the Cause of Futurity and Physical Predetermination to sin by Mr. Polhill a Councellor a Man of extraordinary Knowledge and Godliness now enjoying the Fruit of it with Christ O Blessed England if its Rulers Senators and Lawyers yea or Bishops and Teachers were all such men having many Years past sent him my Answer and having no Reply as to the question I refused to answer the second having said so much to it in my Methodus Theol. and lest the quality of the Subject should make my Reply seem sharp to so good a man And I thought it meet to publish this because it is an unusual Dispute and as no one else hath called me to it so I know not where the Reader that differeth from me will find so much for him nor whither to refer him for an Answer I publish not Mr. Polhill's Paper because I recite so much of it as may tell the Reader what it was and I must not swell the Book too much The Glorious Light will soon end all our Controversies and reconcile those that by unfeigned Faith and Love are united in the Prince of Peace our Head by love dwelling in God and God in them But falsehearted malignant carnal Worldlings that live in the fire of wrath and strife will find so dying the woful maturity of their Enmity to holy Unity Love and Peace and the causeless shutting the true Servants of Christ
Miracles Therefore a Servant of Christ may most comfortably suffer Martyrdome for his testimony to the Deity Christianity the Life-to-come or Charity and Justice against Malice and Persecution and Cruelty which even a Miracle would not justifie more than for a disputable Opinion § 20. It 's a great Question How a true Prophet might be known antecedently before his Prophecy was fulfilled And it 's of great moment to consider the difference between a Legislative Prophet and a meer particular Message Moses and CHRIST the Legislators confirmed their Laws and Word by multitudes of uncontrouled Miracles For Life and Death lay upon mens Obedience or Disobedience to them And if a Prophet did reprove any Sin against that Law the Miracles that confirmed the Law did justifie them But if it were but a Prophecy about some other temporal Event as Ieremy's of the Captivity it needed no Miracle for it was but a temporal Suffering that followed the not believing them The Law of God which should here be handled I shall speak of afterward CHAP. VIII Of God's causing or not causing Sin § 1. HOw certainly the Doctrine of the necessity of immediate efficient physical predetermining Premotion doth make God the principal Cause of all Sin I have so oft shewed and so fully proved that I shall here be very short upon that Subject § 2. To say that God is the principal determining Cause of every sinful act with all its Objects and Circumstances called the materiale peccati and also the Cause of the Law that forbiddeth it and the Person that committeth it is to make him the chief Cause of Sin as far as it is capable of a Cause even of the formal Cause § 3. To say That such a Cause is the Cause only of the Act but not of the Obliquity is absurd because the obliquity is a Relation necessarily resulting from the Law and Act with all its modes and circumstances And the obliquity can have no other Cause § 4. To say That God willeth and loveth and causeth Sin not as Sin but for good ends and uses is to say no more for God than may be said for wicked men if not for Devils save only that God's Ends are better than theirs § 5. To say That God willeth not Sin but the Existence and Futurity of Sin is but as aforesaid to say that He wills not Sin as Sin or sub ratione â—ali but that it exist for better ends or else it is a contradiction For to will or cause Sin is nothing else but to will and cause the existence of Sin § 6. They that say That God willeth the Existence of Sin as it is summe conducibile to the Glory of his Justice and Mercy yea and that per se and not only per accidens do wrong the Glory of God's Holiness and Wisdom A Physician can love his own skill and compassion and the honour that cometh to him by curing a Disease without loving or willing the Disease it self but only supposing it as an Evil which he can turn to Good § 7. They that say That God is the Cause indeed of our Sin but is no Sinner himself because he is under no Law say nothing in the latter but what all grant and nothing in the former but what God's Church doth commonly abhorr excepting some few singular presumers § 8. They that hold That God doth by immediate physical efficient predetermining Premotion principally and unresistibly cause every sinful act with all its modes and circumstances do certainly deny all certainty of Faith and so subvert all Christianity For the formal Object of all Divine Faith is God's Veracity that God cannot lye if God could lye our Belief could have no certainty Now God speaketh to us but by inspired men and not by an essential voice of his own And if God cause as aforesaid all the Lyes that ever were spoken by Men or Devils in the World then no man can be sure that he doth not so by Prophets and Apostles or that ever they say true And God's Veracity then is gone § 9. They that think â—o evade this Evidence by the difference of Predetermination and Inspiration and say God inspireth no Lyes though he predetermine all by physical Premotion do labour in vain For 1. No man can ever prove that any Inspiration doth interest God more in the Act or Lye than physical Predetermination doth For how can God be more the Author of any Act than by effectual premoving the Creature to act it and that by immediate physical Predetermination What doth Inspiration do but so move the Mind Will and Tongue of a Prophet No man can name more that Man is capable of 2. But if there were a difference we are not capable of understanding that difference so well as to prove that God can cause all the Lyes in the World by predetermining Premotion and yet can cause none by Inspiration shall none believe him that know not this difference 3. And were it intelligible it would be only to inspired men themselves So that I am past doubt that we must part with all Certainty of Christianity and of all Divine Belief if we receive this Doctrine of Predetermination because the objectum formals fidei is then gone § 10. They that say that if we make not God the Predeterminer to every act in specie morali and in every comparative respect and mode we shall make Man a God by making him a Causa prima do thereby as much conclude God to be the first and principal predetermining efficient Cause of every wicked Habit as of Malignity or Hatred of God c. because a Habit hath as much Entity as an Act Therefore if it deifie Man to make him the first Cause e. g. of a Lye or Murder in specie then so it will do to make him the first Cause of the Habit. § 11. If it be as impossible for Man to do any thing but what he doth or not to do all that he doth without God's foresaid predetermining Premotion as it is to be Gods or to overcome God or make a World then if Men are counted Sinners and condemned it is for not doing such impossibilities for not doing what God alone can do or for not overcoming Almighty premoving Power § 12. â—t cannot rationally be expected that they that believe that God is the chief Cause and Willer of all Sin should think it very bad or themselves bad for it or that when God hath unresistibly made all men to sin he yet hateth it and sent his Son into the World to testifie his Hatred by dying for it and that he is serious in all that he saith against it in his word nor that such men should hate it and rather die than sin § 13. Therefore as the Church of God hath ever abhorred to make God the Cause of Sin and kept up the sence of the Evil of Sin for our hatred of it and departing from it and our Humiliation as a
know that their extraordinary production hath an answerable extraordinary use and signification of God's Will § 9. And no doubt but Nature and all its parts are absolutely in the Power and Government of God's Will And He can and doth turn things up and down as He pleaseth without making any breach in his established Order If the Husbandman can turn the course of Rivers to water his Grounds by meer Impediments and Receptivities without any alteration of the natural motion of the Water how much more must we ascribe to God in using Nature without overthrowing it § 10. It is Atheistical or absurd to set God and Nature in opposition competition or separation and to say as some Philosophers This or That natural Causes can do without calling in God as the Determiner Whereas natural Causes are nothing and do nothing but by God And there is no less of God in the effects of Nature than if He did the same himself alone In Him we Live and Move and Are. § 11. And it is no better in them that say that God doth not operate proximately and immediately where Nature or second Causes work but only remotely As immediately signifieth without any medium or second Cause so God doth not then work immediately But as it signifieth proximately He doth For an infinite being cannot be essentially distant from any Creature or Effect Nor is it possible that the second Cause can be nearer to the Effect than God who is as near as if he used no such Cause § 12. And the Dispute Whether God do proximately effect immediatione suppositi or only virtutis seemeth to have a false supposition viâ— That God's Virtue is not his suppositum and that the virtus divina may be where the suppositum is noâ— If by suppositum they mean God's Essence as Essence existing and by virtus they mean his Essence under the formal notion of Power Wisdom and Love then they are but two inadequate Conceptions of the same simple Being and therefore God thus ever operateth immediatione essentiae virtutis essentialis But if they mean that God hath â— virtus which is neither his Essence nor a Creature we believe them not § 13. The Controversie between Durandus and his Followers and the Jesuites and Dominicans about the necessity of a moving Concourse besides the support of Nature seemeth to me thus reconcileable 1. God as he is fons naturae is the Living God the prime Active Principle who by constant vital Activity is the Spring of all the Action in the World and is not to be dreamt of as one that had made the World and then left it to it self and withdrew his hand and is fallen asleep 2. But the Living God moveth not all things alike but every thing according to its nature and place for his Influx is received ad modum racipientium 3. The Nature of some Creatures is essentially Active and so inclined to act that they will act if their Nature be not by others or want of concurrent Necessaries hindered Such is every Soul or living Principle and Fire And other Creatures are naturally Passive only ex se or at least principally So that for God to continue Fire or Souls or any naturally-active Principle is to continue a nature essentially inclined to move or act 4. It is supposed that these Natures are not solitary but parts of the universe and are continued with all necessary circumstant Beings and Objects and that the whole frame of Nature and cooperating Causes are continued e. g. That the Sun doth not stand still while the Life of a Plant or Brute is continued 5. All this being supposed by Durandus Aureolus a Dola and all sober men the Question debated is Whether there be further necessary another immediate Divine Motion or Concourse to every motion of a Creature natural or free besides all this aforesaid And 1. Let it be consider'd that God's Essence being but one his Act which ex parte agentis is his Essence is not distinguishable saving ex connotatione effectus And if this be all that is meant That as ipse motus distinguitur a causis so God's Will Power and Agency may be distinctly denominated 1. As from the second Causes and 2. also from the Motion it self as more than the Causes this none can deny nor is it a Controversie But if the question be of the necessity of another distinct way of Divine Causation of the motus besides that by second Causes before mentioned they can prove no such necessity For is it mediate or immediate Causation or Efficiency which they mean we speak not of immediate as it signifieth proximate which is granted but as signifying sine causis secundis If it be mediate by second Causes that God must further concurr those are natural Causes or some other if natural it 's a contradiction to say that Besides God's moving by natural Causes which is granted he must also move by natural Causes as if Ideâ— were not Idem Unless they will say it must be by some other natural Causes which they do not nor can assign nor yet any other that are not natural But if they mean that to every motion there must be an immediate operation of God to it withoâ—â— that which he doth by second Causes even by God alone without any second Cause I then ask Doth God move any thing in the World by any second Cause or not If not then not by the Sun not the Coach by the Horses the Arrow by the Bow the Stone by the Hand the Pen by the Writer c. If yea then is it the whole or part only of that motion which is made by second Causes and God by them If the whole habetur quaesitum If part how prove you that God cannot make the whole motion himself by second Causes as well as part but must needs leave the other part of the same motion to be done without second Causes And it would follow that no second Cause no not the noblest in the World as the Sun and God as acting by it hath and exerciseth à vis adequata to the smallest motion even of a Leaf Whereas God in Nature maketh natural Power with his own as he is fons naturae adequate to its Actions And let unbyassed Reason judge Whether if a Rock should be held up in the Air if God conâ—inue the natural Gravity of it with all the rest of the frame of Nature could not that Rock fall without another motion of God which is without any second Cause to thrust it down If He continue the nature of Fire was it not a greater Miracle that it burnt not the three Witnesses Dan. 3. than to have burnt them or than its ordinary Action Why else should there need ten thousand fold more natural Power to hold up the said Rock or to quench a City on fire or to stop a River or the Winds than to move them supposing natural Causes if there need an
Infinite Power moreover to the act and none to the cessation And by this Rule it would follow that all Motion in the World is supernatural For if God cause it ut sons naturae he causeth it in the natural course if he do not it 's all supernatural and miraculous Moreover if all this satisfie not Disputes if it be worth the Cost they may try the Case thus Supposing that God hath told no man his Secrets when he will immediately move any thing without second Causes and that no second Causes nor his own Operation by them can move any thing without another immediate Motion Let them cut down the Pillars or undermine their Houses and say that by meer natural Causes the House cannot fall Let them set fire on their Houses and say that by meer natural Causes they cannot be burnt Let them drink Poison and say By meer natural Causes it cannot hurt us Or let them cut their Flesh c. For God never told them that he will immediately concurr and then there is no danger Perhaps they will say That Experience telleth us that God doth usually concurr with them I answer And is not that because he worketh by them What Experience or Reason have you that God should still work immediately with them and yet not by them We can prove that He worketh as the first Cause But if you will prove that He doth it not as the first Cause moving the second Causes but by immediate concomitancy let us hear your proofs Lastly let it be noted that when they that affirm all Motion to be by immediate concomitant Concourse or Predetermination do pretend that they do it lest God's Causality should be denied or extenuated it is a meer deceit For all are agreed that there is no less of God in the Operations done by second Causes or Nature than in immediate Operations without second Causes such as God exerciseth on the first created Motor and how else he please God is as much in one as in the other § 14. For the understanding of the nature and use of miraculous acts of Providence it must be considered 1. That God that made the World of Natural Agents and things Passive moved by the Active is not to be feigned without good proofs to alter any of the Works which he hath made which we see he continueth in the course that he made them without any mutation of their Natures § 15. God can change and cross and use as he pleaseth the Actions of Natural Agents without changing their natures and inclinations One Natural Agent or moved Passive may be resiâ—ed and turned back or overcome by another â—nd yet there may be nothing but natural motiâ—n in them all A stronger Stream may drive â—ack a weaker A Canon may cross the ordiâ—ary motion of the Air As a great Dog may â—aster a little one or a Woolf devour a Lamb â—nd a Bird a Worm or Fly and yet there be â—one but natural and sensitive motion So God â—an dry up or stop the Red Sea or Iordan and â—y Winds carry Caterpillars to and from Aegypt and such like and by one natural â—otion overcoming another It 's hard for us â—n most Miracles to say that God doth more than this § 16. But it is certain that God hath a rank of free Agents that act arbitrarily and that these have a great measure of power over natural and necessary Motions As man is a free Agent and driveth his Sheep to what Pasture he pleaseth and guideth his Horses and Oxen in their way and furrow to do his will by their natural and sensitive necessitated motion and as a Miller can make the natural course of the Wood and Water and Mill-stones and Horse all to serve his intention without changing the nature of any one of them so much more can God and free Agents under God attain their freely chosen ends by Ordering and not Changing Natural and Sensitive Movers § 17. We so little know what Arbitrary Free Agents that are invisible Spirits God hath set over this Passive World and what power he hath given them to use Natural Agents as they themselves freely will that it greatly disableth us to resolve all the Difficulties of the Cause of Sin and Misery and about the nature of Miracles But it is a clear truth that it is by such Free Arbitrary Agents primarily that natural Agency is crost and overcome in Miracles the one Natural Agent be employed to resist another as to quench the heat of Fire to stop the course of Winds and Water c. Yet it is some voluntary free Agent that thus useth natural Agents against each other Scripture tells us that God useth Angels as Rulers and Protectors of lower Agents And that there is a kind of a war between these and Devils And how far the prevalent Wills of good and bad Angels or voluntary Agents may be the Cause of Evil or be the Actors of Miracles by setting one moved Agent against another and yet all but Natural motion that is caused by these free Agents Mortals do not know and therefore should not be peremptory in judging § 18. But though we know not that in Miracles God useth not second Causes some natural and some free in waies unsearchable to us yet may we be assured by Miracles of his will and attestation when we find that things are done quite out of the way of his ordinary Providence in the uncontrouled confirmation of some prophetical Revelation For God is the Governour of the rational World and his moral Government must be by the intelligible signification of his will de debito what shall be due from us and to us And if Miracles be used to deceive us they cannot be done without him whatever second Cause there be And if he should use them tho' by second Causes to deceive us we are utterly remediless and therefore guiltless And God that 〈…〉 at h neither impotency ignorance nor badness cannot need a Lye to govern Man when he hath 〈…〉 de it part of his Image on Man and needful to Mens Justice to each other to hate Lying § 19. A Miracle controuled by contrary Evidence is no notification of God's Attestation It may be permitted for several good ends For God by controuling it giveth us sufficient remedy against Deceit And there are two waies by which a Miracle may be controuled First by greater conquering Miracles used for some contrary Doctrine or Cause so the Aegyptian Magician's Miracles were controuled by Moses Secondly when it is some unquestionable Truth or Duty or Word that is already better proved which that Miracle pretendeth to contradict As if a Miracle were done by a Deceiver to prove that there is no God no Life-to-come or against Mercy or Justice or to disprove Christianity the greater Miracles which have confirmed the Gospel and the evident Light of Nature which proveth the Deity and Life-to-come and the Duty of Love and Justice do controul such deceiving