A DISCOURSE Concerning the Divine Providence By WILLIAM SHERLOCK D. D. Dean of St. Paul's Master of the Temple and Chaplain in Ordinary to Their Majesties IMPRIMATUR Maii 9. 1693. Carolus Alston R. P. D. Hen. Episc. Lond. Ã Sacris LONDON Printed for William Rogers at the Sun over-against St. Dunstan's Church in Fleet street MDCXCIV TO THE QUEEN's Most Excellent Majesty May it please Your Majesty TO Accept this Treatise which did the Composition answer the Subject would recommend it self to the Perusal of Princes who are the peculiar Care and the great Ministers of Providence For it is this Good Providence which is the Security of the Royal Throne and the most perfect Patern of a Just and Equal Government without Contempt of the meanest or Partiality to the greatest That Experience YOUR MAJESTY has had of a Kind and Watchful Providence and that constant dependence the most Potent Monarchs have on the Divine Protection especially in the great Shakings and Convulsions of the World I hope may excuse this Dedication as neither improper nor unseasonable And may the same Good Providence which has advanced YOUR MAJESTIES to the Throne and so signally preserved the King from the greatest Dangers still preserve Your Sacred Persons establish Your Throne and deliver You from all Your Enemies Which is the hearty and daily Prayer of YOUR MAJESTIES Most Humble most Obedient and most Dutiful Subject and Servant WILLIAM SHERLOCK The CONTENTS THE Introduction Page 1 Chap. 1. THE necessary Connexion between the belief of a God and of a Providence 3 The World can be no more governed than made by chance Ibid. An Infinite and Eternal Mind which sees and knows all things must govern the Word 5 He who made the World cannot be unconcerned for his Creatures 7 No Philosophers except the Epicureans who acknowledged a Deity denied a Providence 8 The same Arguments which prove the Being of a God prove a Providence 9 The strength of Atheism consists in contradicting the Vniversal Reason of Mankind 11 Chap. 2. THE general Notion of Providence and particularly concerning a preserving Providence 16 The Nature of Preservation as distinguisht from a governing Providence Ibid. The first Act of Preservation in upholding and preserving the Being and Natures of all things 17 The second Act of Preservation God's Co-operation and Concourse with Creatures in all their Actions 21 Some difficulties of Providence answered as God's Concourse with Creatures in sinful Actions 25 Concerning the Eternity of Punishments 28 Some Practical Inferences 31 Chap. 3. COncerning God's Governing Providence 33 God's Government of Causes and of Events 34 God's Government of Natural Causes and wherein it consists Ib. God's Government of Accidental Causes or what we call Chance and Accident 39 God's Government of Moral Causes or Free Agents 47 The difference between God's Government of Men considered as reasonable Creatures and as Instruments of Providence 48 Concerning God's Government of mens Minds their Wills and Passions Page 51 Concerning God's Government of mens Actions 54 God's Government of Good and Bad men more particularly considered 57 God's Government of Events 59 What is meant by Events in this Question 60 Wherein God's Government of Events consists 61 Concerning Gods Permission Ibid The difference between God's Government of all Events and Necessity and Fate 66 That the Exercise of a particular Providence consists in the Government of all Events 68 Chap. 4. COncerning the Sovereignty of Providence 73 Concerning God's Absolute Power 75 That true Absolute Power can do no wrong explained at large Ib. The Vnsearchable Wisdom of Providence 85 Infinite Wisdom can do no wrong 88 That the Wisdom of Providence must be as unaccountable as the Wisdom of the Creation 91 That the wise Government of the Word requires secret and hidden Methods of Providence 97 That we are ignorant of a great many things without the knowledg of which it is impossible to understand the reasons of Providence 110 In what cases the Vnsearchable Wisdom of God is a reasonable Answer to the Difficulties of Providence 123 Chap. 5. THe Iustice and Righteousness of Providence 137 That the Iustice of Providence does not consist in hindring all Acts of Injustice and Violence 138 God may do that very justly which men cannot do without great Injustie 139 What the Nature and Exercise of God's Iustice requires 141 What Acts of Iustice the present Government of this World requires Page 147 The Account the Scripture gives us of God's Iustice and Righteousness 150 Chap. 6. THE Holiness of Providence 161 What the Holiness of Government requires Ib. What the Holiness of God's Providence does not require of him 168 God is not the Cause and Author of Sin 175 The Divine Prescience does not destroy the Liberty of Human Actions 178 God decrees no mens sins 181 Some Texts of Scripture considered which seem to make God the Author of sin 183 Concerning God's hardning Pharaoh's heart Ib. Some other Texts considered which seem to charge God with the sins of men 200 Chap. 7. THE Goodness of Providence 214 Mistakes concerning the Nature of God's Goodness 216 The difference between Absolute Goodness and Iustice and the Goodness and Iustice of Discipline 220 That God exercises all Acts of Goodness which a state of Trial and Discipline will admit 221 Another Mistake concerning the Nature of Good and Evil and what Good and Evil is in a state of Discipline 226 Another Mistake about the Nature of Government and what Goodness is required in the Government of the World 233 Two Objections against the Goodness of Providence answered 1. From the many Miseries which are in the world 238 A second Objection is God's partial and unequal Care of his creatures 265 Chap. 8. THE Wisdom of Providence 269 The Wisdom of Providence considered in some great Events recorded in Scripture 270 The Destruction of the World by Noah's Flood Page 271 Concerning the Confusion of Languages and the Dispersion of Mankind over all the earth 285 God's chusing Abraham and his Posterity for his peculiar People 289 Concerning the removal of Jacob and his Family into Egypt 299 The Oppression of Israel in Egypt 300 The Miracles wrought by Moses in Egypt 302 God's delivering the Law from Mount Sinai 309 All that came out of Egypt excepting Joshua and Caleb died in the Wilderness 311 The frequent Relapses of Israel into Idolatry 313 Concerning the Captivities and Dispersions of Israel especially their Captivity in Babylon 319 In what sense Christ came in the Fulness of Time 326 The Destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans 328 The Wisdom of Providence in some more common and ordinary Events 331 That God rewards or punishes men in their Posterity 332 God's punishing sin with sin 339 God's disappointing both our Hopes and Fears 340 God's deferring the deliverance of good men and the punishment of the wicked to the utmost extremity 341 Concerning sudden Changes and Revolutions 343 The wise mixture of Mercy and Iudgment 344 Chap. 9. THE Duties
to conclude that it is only our ignorance of the Eastern Language and Phrase which makes them obscure and difficult to us than to expound them to such a sense as contradicts all the rest of the Bible But I do not intend this for an Answer or as some will call it an Evasion but shall consider these Texts particularly And the first place relates to God's hardening Pharaoh's heart that he should not let the People of Israel go notwithstanding all the signs and wonders which Moses wrought in Egypt 4. Exod. 21. Where God expresly tells Moses that he would harden Pharaoh's heart and in the Story it self it is several times expressed that God did harden Pharaoh's heart and he who hardens the heart seems to be the efficient Cause of all those Sins which such a hard heart commits Now rightly to understand this which has given so much trouble to Divines there are many things to be considered Hardness of heart is a Metaphorical expression and signifies such a firmness and obstinacy of temper or resolution as will yield to no motives or perswasions that will no more receive any impressions than a hard and impenetrable Rock And therefore to harden the heart is to give it such a stiffness and obstinacy as will not yield But then there are several ways of hardening mens hearts and some of them very Innocent and Holy as well as Just and before we charge the Divine Providence upon this account we must know in what way God hardens immediately to infuse into mens hearts an unrelenting hardness and obstinacy in a sinful course is inconsistent with the Holiness of Providence and would in the most proper sense make God the Author of Sin but though God says he would harden Pharaoh he does not say that he would infuse hardness into Pharaoh's heart For we may observe That men who have first hardened themselves take the most innocent occasions to grow harder nay are hardened by such usage as would either break or soften other men And those who treat them in such a manner as their wicked hearts abuse to harden themselves may be said to harden them as in common speech we charge those with undoing and hardening their Children and Servants who have spoiled them by too much indulgence or by too great severity and this is the account that Origen gives of it And indeed when men are said to harden themselves as Pharaoh is often said to harden his own heart and yet God is said to harden them there can be no other account given of it but this that men take occasion from what God does take occasion where no occasion was given to harden themselves as St. Paul observes the Iews did from God's patience and long-suffering 2. Rom 4 5. Or despisest thou the riches of his goodness and forbearance and long suffering not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance i.e. should lead thee to repentance not harden thee in Sin though it have another effect through thy own wickedness But after thy hardness and impenitent heart growest more hard and impenitent by God's forbearance and treasurest up unto thy self wrath against the day of wrath and the revelation of the righteous judgment of God And thus God hardened Pharaoh or thus Pharaoh took occasion to harden himself from those Judgments which ought to have softened him and God foreseeing that this would be the effect of it says I will harden Pharaoh's heart not I will infuse hardness into him but I will do such things as I certainly know his hard and wicked heart will improve into new occasions and new degrees of hardness For it is no reason either for God or men to forbear doing what Wisdom and Justice and Goodness direct to be done because hardened Sinners will harden themselves the more by it And that this is the truth of the case appears from the whole Story That which hardened Pharaoh and made him so resolved not to part with Israel was the great advantage he made of their Service and Bondage which made him impatient to think of sending away a people which were so useful to him To conquer this obstinate humour God sends Moses to deliver Israel with a mighty arm and out-stretched hand Moses wrought such mighty Wonders and inflicted such miraculous and terrible Judgments on Egypt as any one would have thought the most proper means not to have hardened but to have broken and subdued the most hardened hearts but this had a contrary effect upon a hardened Pharaoh and it is visible what it was that hardened him Some of these Signs and Wonders were imitated by the Magicians as turning their Rods into Serpents and Water into Blood and bringing Frogs upon the Land and upon this he hardened his heart though the Plague of Frogs was so grievous that it made him somewhat relent and promise to let the People go and Sacrifice unto the Lord if the Frogs might be removed but then God's goodness in removing this Plague hardened him as it is expresly observed That when Pharaoh saw there was respite he hardened his heart 8. Exod. 15. And thus it was in the succeeding Judgments while any judgment was upon him he yielded and promised fair to let the people go that had any one of those Judgments continued on him till he had parted with Israel he had certainly sent them away long before but when he saw one Judgment removed after another he thought there would be an end of them at last and it were better to endure a while than to part with Israel and thus God hardened his heart and he hardened his own heart till the Death of all the First-born put him and his Servants and all the People into such a terrible fright that they were glad to get rid of Israel to save their own Lives And to compleat all God still hardened Pharaoh's heart to pursue after Israel that he might overthrow him and all his Host in the Red Sea And for that end God led the people about through the way of the wilderness of the red sea that Pharaoh might say They are intangled in the land the wilderness hath shut them in and it was told the king of Egypt that the people fled and the heart of Pharaoh and of his servants was turned against the people and they said Why have we done this that we have let Israel go from serving us 14. Exod. 2 3 4 5. The report of their flying and the apprehension of their being intangled in the Wilderness made Pharaoh and his Servants quickly forget what they had suffered in Egypt and think of nothing but the loss of the Service of Israel which hardened them to a new pursuit and was ordered by God to that end that he might be honoured upon Pharaoh and upon all his Host. This is the account the Scripture gives us of God's hardening Pharaoh's heart which contains nothing that unbecomes a Wise and a Holy Being For though it can
never become a Holy God to infuse hardness into mens hearts yet when men have hardened themselves and will abuse all the Wise methods of Providence to harden themselves and are now ripe for destruction it very much becomes a Just and Righteous God to exercise them with such Providences as he knows will still harden them till they make themselves such infamous examples of Wickedness as may deserve a more glorious and exemplary Vengeance Which is another thing to be considered in the case of Pharaoh and very necessary to the full understanding this difficult case of God's hardening mens hearts God had peremptorily decreed not only to deliver Israel but to punish Egypt both King and People for the cruel oppression of Israel And therefore he might without any more solemnity have destroyed Pharaoh his People and Land and have carried Israel out of Egypt with a mighty hand But when they had deserved to be Punished and Destroyed and God had resolved to Punish them the manner of their Punishment was at the free disposal of the Divine Wisdom and therefore he chose to Punish them in such a way as might make the Glory and Power of the God of Israel known to the World And this is the very account which God himself gives why he took such a course with Pharaoh as he foresaw would harden and confirm him in his resolutions of not parting with Israel when he could have forced him at the expence of fewer Miracles to have sent them away if he had so pleased I will harden Pharaoh's heart and multiply my signs and wonders in the land of Egypt But Pharaoh shall not hearken unto you that I may lay my hand upon Egypt and bring forth mine armies and my people the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt by great judgments And the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord when I stretch forth my hand upon Egypt and bring out the children of Israel from among them 7. Exod. 3 4 5. The same thing he tells Pharaoh I will at this time send all my plagues upon thy heart and upon thy servants and upon thy people that thou mayest know that there is none like me in all the earth For now I will stretch out my hand that I may smite thee and thy people with pestilence and thou shalt be cut off from the earth And in very deed for this cause have I raised thee up have all this time preserved thee and not cut thee off for to shew in thee my power and that my name may be declared throughout all the earth 9. Exod. 14 15 16. And this reason God gives why he hardened Pharaoh's heart to pursue Israel I will be honoured upon Pharaoh and upon all his host that the Egyptians may know that I am the Lord 14. Exod. 4. This is diligently to be observed to vindicate the Holiness and Justice of Providence For though God infuses no hardness into mens hearts yet if he exercise them with such Providences as he foresees will harden them and does this with an intention and design to harden them this signifies his Will to harden them and such a moral Efficiency in using hardening Providences as will as certainly harden them as if he had infused hardness into them And this makes little difference whether God hardens men by external Providences or by an internal Operation on their minds when he intends such Providences to harden them and knows that they will effectually do it Now I readily grant that tho God infused no hardness into Pharaoh's heart nor did any thing which unbecomes a holy God to do yet he did intend to harden him and did intend to harden him on purpose to multiply his Judgments on Egypt and to destroy him and all his Host in the Red Sea for this is so plainly expressed that we cannot deny it Nay I readily grant that the Providence of God would be justly chargeable with mens Sins did he without any respect to the merit and desert of the Persons by such insensible methods betray them into sin with an intention to harden them For what man is there of such a firm and constant vertue as to be able to resist all Temptations which a long series of Providences chosen and directed for that purpose by a Divine Wisdom could bring him into But yet when men have sinned themselves into such a hardened state as to deserve to be destroyed and when God is so far provoked by their Sins as to resolve to destroy them it becomes the Wisdom and the Justice of God without any impeachment of his Holiness to harden men by external Events and Appearances not in Sin which can never become a Holy God but in such ruinous Courses as their own wicked hearts betray them to and as will bring inevitable ruin on them And this is the true resolution on this Case 1. That God never hardens any men till they have deserved and he is resolved to destroy them 2. That then he does not harden them in Sin but in such Ruinous Counsels as their own Sins betray them to 3. That all this is done not by the natural or moral efficacy but by their own wicked abuse of the Divine Providence 4. To compleat all When God has thus determined to destroy any Person or People he many times inflicts on them a penal blindness and infatuation not to see the things which concern their peace These four Particulars contain a full and easy account of this perplext Doctrine of God's hardening mens hearts and therefore I shall speak distinctly but briefly to them 1. That God never hardens men till they have deserved and he is resolved to destroy them This must be laid as the foundation of all for by what means soever God hardens men how innocent soever they may appear if he intends to harden them not because they deserve and he has determined to destroy them but only that they may deserve to be destroyed and that he may with some fair appearance of Justice destroy them it would be impossible to satisfy equal and impartial Judges of the Justice and Holiness of Providence But if men have hardened themselves in Sin beyond all the ordinary methods of recovery and have so provoked a good and merciful God that he gives them over to ruin and destruction then by what means soever they are hardened which are not directly sinful there can be no just reason to question either the Justice or Goodness or Holiness of God upon this account For when men have sinned to that degree as to deserve immediate destruction and to provoke God to pass a final Sentence on them God may either immediately destroy them or keep them in that hardened state like condemned Malefactors reserved in Chains for a more publick and solemn Execution And this is all that is meant by God's hardening men and this all mankind must allow to be just and holy This was the case of Pharaoh and the Egyptians who