or consulting but onely of power to appoint successe unto its owne projects or devises Thus much to my apprehension is included in the wise Kings Maxime Many devises are in the heart of man but the counsell of the Lord that shall stand This freedome or liberty of mans wil in devising or projecting and the want of all liberty or power to allot successe unto his projects doth more truly argue that which the Latines call servum arbitrium that is mans servitude so misery and sinne than if he had no more liberty in the one case than in the other The more ample the spheare of his liberty in projecting or devising is or by divine permission may be the more admirable doth the Counsell of the Lord appeare in directing and ordering his free courses most infallibly unto such ends as hee appoints by meanes for their kinde ordinary and naturall And if we would diligently consider the works of God in our dayes they are as apt to establish true beleefe unto the rules of Christianity set downe in Scripture as were the Miracles of former ages wherein Gods extraordinary power was most seene yea the ordinary events of our times are more apt for this purpose in this age than use of miracles could be For the manifestations of Gods most extraordinary power cease by very frequencie to be miraculous and men such is the curiosity of corrupted nature would suspect that such events were they frequent or continuall did proceed from some alteration in the course of nature rather than from any voluntary exercise of extraordinary power in the God of nature But the continuance of these ordinary events which the all-seeing wisedome of our God daily and hourely brings to passe is most apt to confirme the faith of such as rightly consider them For by their successive variety the amplitude of his unsearchable wisdome is daily more and more discovered and by their frequency the hidden fountaine of his Counsell whence this multiplicity flowes appeares more clearly to be inexhaustible Only the right observation or live-apprehension of these his works of wisedome is not so easie and obvious unto such as minde earthly things as his workes of extraordinary power are For such works amate the sense and make entrance into the soule as it were by force whereas the effects of his Wisedome or Counsell make no impression upon the sense but upon the understanding only nor upon it save onely in quiet and deliberate thoughts For this reason true faith was first to be planted and ingrafted in the Church by Miracles but to be nourished and strengthned in succeeding ages by contemplation of his providence The limits of this present contemplation shall be by example or instance to shew in what manner the wisedome of God doth sometimes defeat the cunningest contrivances or deepest plots of Politicians and sometimes accomplish matters of greatest consequence by meanes or occurrences light and slender in the esteeme of men But how weake or slender soever they bee for their particular nature or in themselves yet the combination or contexture of them must needs be strong because it is woven by the finger of God 2 What plot could have been invented against any land or people more deadly then that of Hamans against the people of God storied Ester 3. 8 9. His information against them was bitter and easie to finde entrance into an absolute Monarchs eares whose words must be a Law to all especially to his captivate and conquered subjects And the Iewes on the other side more likely to change their lives than the lawes of their God for any Princes pleasure What hope in humane sight for Mordecai to finde any favour when as He was to execute this bloody Law whose particular spleene and revengefull mind against Mordecai had for his sake procured it in most absolute forme against the whole Iewish Nation You will say that Ester lately received to greatest favour with the King and now made consort of his bed might prevaile much And for a barbarous King to shew mercy at his Queenes entreaty unto such as had done him so good service as Mordecai had done Assuerus is but an ordinary thing I confesse as much that many occurrences which seem to conspire for Mordecai and his peoples deliverance are not extraordinary For a King in his cups to take a displeasure at his former Queene that would not consent unto his folly or for his displeasure unto the divorced to shew greater love unto his late espoused Queene is a matter neither strange nor unusuall but that Queene Vashti should bee displaced and Ester unknowne to bee of the captive Hebrewes kinde admitted to be Assuerus his mate just at that time when Haman the Iewes sworne enemy was exalted next to the King and Queene in dignity this can only be ascribed to him who as the wise sonne of Syrach speakes hath made all things double one against another Ecclus 42. v. 24. Againe that the King the very night before hee came to the banquet which Ester had prepared should take no rest this was the Keeper of Israels vigilant care over his people who neither slumbers nor sleepes whilest his enemies are a plotting mischiefe against them Againe that the King taking no rest should seeke to solace his restlesse thoughts by reading the Chronicles that reading them hee should light on that place wherein the now distressed Mordecaies faithfull service in bewraying the treason intended against his person by Bigtan and Teresh his Eunuches was registred All this doubtlesse was only from his wisedome that hath the disposition of al the lots much more of all the plots which man can cast Many other occurrences might here be considered no one of which considered apart from the rest but is ordinary and usuall and yet the entire frame or composture of them such as cannot bee referred to any but his workmanship who hath created all things in number waight and measure Yet a Politician that should have read this story in the Persian Chronicles could at the first sight have discovered a great oversight in Haman in not putting sooner in execution this his absolute commission Semper nocuit differre paratis Perhaps this conditionall proposition may bee true that if he had executed his Commission with speed the Iewes had fared worse but for this cause the Lord did not suffer him to entertaine this resolution Yet let us see whether haste in execution could accomplish the like designes against a State in like case 3 Fliscus that nobly descended and potent Genoesi with his familiar Verina had enacted as cruell a Law against the Dorian Family and the other Nobility of Genoa which they had resolved to have writen first with characters of blood upon their pretended enemies brests after their death to have condemned them by proclamation when as Fliscus through popularity should have got the Diadem Their plot for effecting their enemies death and their owne advancement was layed as exactly
of the former rule of decorum in their comparisons than the holy Prophets are Thus hath the Lord spoken unto mee saith Esaias cap. 31. vers 4. Like as the Lion and the young Lion roring on his prey when a multitude of shepheards is called forth against him hee will not bee afraid of their voice nor abase himselfe for the noise of them so shall the Lord of hosts come downe to fight for mount Sion and for the hill thereof Saint Austin hath noted three sorts of errors in setting forth the divine nature of which two go upon false grounds the other is altogether groundlesse Some saith he there be that seeke to measure things spirituall by the best knowledge which they have gotten by sence or art of things bodily Others doe fit the Deity with the nature and properties of the humane soule and from this false ground frame many deceiptfull and crooked rules whilest they endeavour to draw the picture or image of the immutable Essence A third sort there be which by too much straining to transcend every mutable creature patch up such conceipts as cannot possibly hang together either upon created or increated natures and these rove further from the truth then doe the former As to use his instance He which thinkes God to be bright or yellow is much deceived yet his errour wants not a cloke in as much as these colours have some being from God in bodies His errour againe is as great that thinkes God sometimes forgets and sometimes cals things forgotten to minde yet this vicissitude of memorie and oblivion hath place in the humane soule which in many things is like the Creator But hee which makes the Divine nature so powerfull as to produce or beget it selfe quite misseth not the marke onely but the Butt and shoots as it were out of the field for nothing possible can possibly give it selfe being or existence 5 But though in no wise wee may avouch such grosse impossibilities of him to whom nothing is impossible yet must we often use fictions or suppositions of things scarce possible to last so long till we have moulded conceipts of the Essence and Attributes incomprehensible more lively and semblable then can be taken either from the humane soule alone or from bodies naturall To maintaine it as a Philosophical truth that God is the soule of this universe is an impious errour before condemned as a grand seminary of Idolatry Yet by imagining the humane soule to be as really existent in every place whereto the cogitations of it can reach as it is in our bodies or rather to exercise the same motive power over the greatest bodily substance in this world that it doth over our fingers able to weild the Heavens or Elements with as great facility and speed as we doe our thoughts or breath We may by this fiction gaine a more true modell or shadow of Gods infinite efficacy then any one created substance can furnish us withall But whilest we thus by imagination transfuse our conceipts of the best life and motion which we know into this great Sphere which we see or which sute better to the immutable and infinite essence into bodies abstract or mathematicall we must make such a compound as Tacitus would have made of two noble Romanes Demptis utriusque vitiis solae virtutes misceantur The imperfections of both being sifted from them their perfections onely must be ingredients in this compound Yet may we not thinke that the divine nature which we seeke to expresse by them consists of perfections infinite so united or compounded We must yet use a further extraction of our conceits ere wee apply them to his incomprehensible nature CHAP. 2. Containing two philosophicall Maximes which lead us to the acknowledgement of one infinite and incompreâ—ensible Essence VNto every Student that with observance ordinary will survey any Philosophicall tract of causes two maine springs or fountaines doe in a manner discover themselves which were they as well opened and drawne as some others of lesse consequence are wee might baptize most Atheists in the one and confirme good Christians in the other The naturall current of the one directly caries us to an independant cause from whose illimited essence and nature the later affords us an ocular or visible derivation of those generall attributes whereof faith infused giveth us the true taste and relish The former wee may draw to this head Whatsoever hath limits or bounds of being hath some distinct cause or author of being As impossible it is any thing should take limits of being as beginning of being from it selfe For beginning of being is one especiall limit of being 2 This Maxime is simply convertible Whatsoever hath cause of being hath also limits of being because it hath beginning of being for Omnis causa est principium omne causatum est principiatum Every cause is the active beginning or beginner of being and an active beginning essentially includes a beginning passive as fashionable to it as the marke or impression is to the stampe Or in plainer English thus Where there is a beginning or beginner there is somewhat begunne Where the cause is praeâ—xistent in time the distinction or limits of things caused or begun are as easily seene as the divers surfaces of bodies severed in place But where the cause hath onely precedence of nature and not of time as it falleth out in things caused by concomitance or resultance the limits or confines of their being seeme confounded or as hardly distinguishable as the divers surfaces of two bodies glued together Yet as wee rightly gather that if the bodies be of severall kindes each hath its proper surface though the point of distinction bee invisible to our eyes so whatsoever we conceive to have dependance upon another wee necessarily conceive it to have proper limits of being or at least a distinct beginning of being from the other though as it were ingrafted in it But whether we conceive effects and causes distinctly as they are in nature or in grosse so long as wee acknowledge them this or that way conceived to be finite and limited wee must acknowledge some cause of their limitation which as we suppose cannot be distinct from the cause of their being 3 Why men in these dayes are not Gyants why Gyants in former were but men are two Problems which the meere naturalist could easily assoyle by this reason for substance one and the same The vigour of causes productive or conservative of vegetables of man especially from which he receiveth nutrition and augmentation is lesse now then it hath beene at least before the Flood though but finite and limited when it was greatest Why vegetables of greatest vigour ingrosse not the properties of others lesse vigorous but rest contented with a greater numericall measure of their owne specificall vertues is by the former reason as plaine For in that they have not their being from themselves they can take no more then is
given nor can the natures whence they are propagated convey them a better title of being then themselves have This as the seale communicates his fashion to the waxe so doth the limited force or vertue of causes alwayes imprint bounds and limits upon their effects If further it be demanded why the Elements having the opportunity of mutuall vicinity to wreake their naturall enmities or hostilities doe not each trespasse more grievously upon other as why the restlesse or raging water swallowes not up the dull earth which cannot flye from any wrong or violence offered or why the Heavens having so great a prerogative by height of place largenesse of compasse and indefatigable motion do not dispossesse the higher Elements of their seat The naturalist would plead the warrant of Natures Charter which had set them their distinct bounds and limits by an everlasting undispensable law Yet is nature in his language alwaies an internall or essentiall part of some bodies within which it is necessarily confined As the nature of the Heavens hath not so much as liberty of egresse into neighbour Elements nor the proper formes of these upon what exigence or assaults soever made against them in their territories so much as right of removall or flitting into lower Elements Or in case it be pretended that these particular natures have a nature more generall for their president yet this whether one above the rest or an aggregation onely of all the rest is still confined to this visible world and both so hidebound with the utmost sphere that they cannot grow greater or enlarge their strength So that nature taken in what sense the Naturalist lists cannot be said so properly to set bounds or limits to bodies naturall as to bee bounded or limited in them Or to speake more properly Nature her selfe did not make but is that very domestique law by which they are bounded and therefore in no case can dispense with it And in that she is a law for the most part but not absolutely indispensable shee necessarily supposeth a Lawgiver who if he have no Law set him by any superiour as we must of necessity come in fine to some one in this kinde supreame hee can have no such limits or bounds as he hath set to nature and things naturall He neither is any part of this visible frame which we see nor can he be inclosed within the utmost sphere And thus by following the issue of the former fountaine we are arived in the latter which fully discovered opens it selfe into a boundlesse Ocean Whatsoever hath no cause of being can have no limits or bounds of being 4 And Being may bee limited or illimited two wayes Either for number of kindes and natures contained in it or for quantity and intensive perfection of every severall kinde Of things visible we see the most perfect are but perfect in some one kinde they possesse not the entire perfection of others and that perfection whereof they have the just propriety is not actually infinite 〈◊〉 finite and limited Whatsoever thus is it was as possible for it not to have beene and is as possible for it not to be as to be but of this or that kinde not all that is or hath being Even those substances which we call immortall as the heaven of heavens with all their inhabitants be they Angels or Archangels Principalities or Thrones enjoy the perpetuall tenour of their actuall existence not from their essence but from the decree of their Maker Manent cuncta non quia aeterna sunt sed quia defenduntur curâ regentis Immortalia tutore non egent haec conservat artifex fragilitatem materiae vi sua vincens Seneca Epist 58. All things continue in being not because they are eternall but because they are defended by the providence of their Governour Things immortall need no guardian or protector But the maker of all things preserveth these things which we see continue in being overmatching the frailty of the matter by his power In this mans philosophy nothing which is made can be by nature immortall though many things be perpetually preserved from perishing Nothing which is immortall can bee made He grossely erred if hee were of the same opinion with some others of the Ancient that God had a desire to make things immortall but could not by reason of the frailty or untowardlinesse of the matter But that things made out of the matter or made at all could be immortall by nature he rightly affirmed For to be immortall in his language is to be without beginning without dependance And what so is hath an eternall necessity of existence Absolute necessity of existence or impossibility of non-existence or of not being alwayes what it is and as it is implies an absolute necessity of being or of existence infinite which cannot reside save only in the totality or absolute fulnesse of all being possible The greatest fulnesse of finite existence conceiveable cannot reach beyond al possibility of non-existence nor can possibility of non-existence and perpetuall actuall existence be indissolubly wedded in any finite nature save only by his infinite power who essentially is or whose essence is to exist or to be the inexhaustible fountaine of all being The necessary supposall or acknowledgement of such an infinite or essentially existent power cannot more strongly or more perspicuously be inferred than by the reduction of known effects unto their causes of these causative entities whose number and ranks are finite into one prime essence whence al of them are derived it self being underivable frō any cause or essence conceivable In that this prime essence hath no cause of being it can have no beginning of being And yet is beginning of being the first prime limit of being without whose precedence other bounds or limits of being cannot follow 5 If that which Philosophers suppose to be the root of incorruption in the heavens can brooke no limits of duration but must bee imagined without end or beginning why should it content it selfe with limits of extension seeing duration is but a kinde of extension seeing motion magnitude and time by their rules in other cases hold exact proportion Things caused as induction manifesteth are alwayes limited and moulded in their proper causes Nor are there two causes much lesse two causalities one of their being another of their limitation or restraint to this or that set kinde of being For whatsoever gives being to any thing gives it the beginning of being As Sophroniscus was the true cause why Socrates was in that age wherein he lived not before or after why he was a man not a beast an Athenian not a Barbarian Quicquid dat formam dat omnia consequentia formam whatsoever gives forme of being to any thing gives all the appurtenances to the forme is a Physicall Maxime which supposeth another Metaphysicall Quicquid dat esse dat proprietates esse That which gives being unto any thing gives likewise the properties of such being as
it hath Now limits of being are essentiall properties of that essence or being wherin they are found And distinct bounds or limits are included in the distinct forme of being which every thing hath from its cause Actuall essence or existence it selfe is distributed to every thing that hath cause of being as it were sealed up in its proper forme or kind of being It is as possible to put a new fashion upon nothing as for any thing that is to take limits or set forme of being from nothing That which hath nothing to give it being can have nothing to give it limits or bounds of being And as no entity can take its being or beginning of being from it selfe so neither can it take bounds or limits from it selfe but must have them from some other The prime essence or first cause of all things that are as it hath no precedent cause of existence nor can it be cause of existence to it self so neither can it have any cause of limits without it selfe nor can it be any cause of limits to it selfe It remaines then that it must bee an essence illimited and thus to be without bounds or limits is the formall effect or consequence of being it selfe or of that which truly is without any cause precedent to give it being or make it what it is 6 So essentially is the conceipt of being without bounds or limits included in our conceipt of being without cause precedent that if we should by way of supposition give any imaginary entity leave to take beginning or possession of being from it selfe without the warrant of any cause precedent to appoint or measure it out some distinct portion or forme of being thus much being once by imagination granted wee could not by any imagination possible debarre this entity from absolute necessity of being for ever after whatsoever it listed to be or from being all things rather than any one thing Of the Heathens many did hold an uncreated Chaos praeexistent to the frame of this Vniverse and Philosophers to this day maintaine an ingenerable matter which actually is not any body but indifferent to be made every body Let us but suppose First the one or other of them to be as Homogeneall in it selfe as the ayre or water Secondly to be able to actuate or Proteus-like to transforme it selfe into a better state than now it hath without the helpe of any agent or efficient and then as it could have no cause so can there bee no reason given to restraine it from taking all bodily perfection possible to it selfe And if it bee true which some teach that this prime matter hath neither proper quantity nor quality what should hinder it to take both without measure supposing it might bee its one carver of those endowments Or imagine there were such a vacuity where the world now is as we Christians beleeve there was before it was made and onely one of Democritus casuall Atoms or some meere possibility or appetite of the matter left free venire in vacuum to give it selfe full and perfect act without curbe or restraint of any superiour power or sharer to cry halfe mine with it or make claime to the nature of any actuall entity lost it being supposed to be able to take any one nature upon it what should either hinder or further it to assume the nature of earth rather than of water or of these two rather than of any other Element or of any simple bodies rather than of mixt or compounded substances or of bodily substances rather than spirituall or of all these rather than of their metaphysicall eminences and perfections Or whilst we imagine it without cause of existence or beginning no reason imaginable could confine it to any set place of residence or extension no cause could bee alledged why it should take possession of the center rather than of the circumference of this Vniverse as now it stands or of both these rather than of the whole sphere or of the whole sphere rather than of all extensive space imaginable Only the very supposition of taking beginning though without cause doth put a limit to its duration because this kinde of beginning being but imaginary depends upon our imagination as upon its true cause And yet even thus considered me thinks it should extend its existence both waies and draw a circular duration to the instant where it beginnes Or not imagining the beginning let us imagine it only to have true present being without any cause precedent to push it forward or superiour guide to appoint it a set course and it is not within the compasse of imagination why the duration of it should not reach as farre the one way as the other as farre beyond all imagination of time past as of time to come why it should not comprehend all duration imaginable by way of present possession or supereminent permanency without admission of any deflux division or succession for continuation of its existence 7 If it bee objected that any thing may follow from supposition or imagination of impossibilities the reply is easie The objection is either false or true in a sense which no way impeacheth but rather approves that kinde of arguing True it is there is almost nothing in nature so impossible as it may not be the possible consequent of some impossibility supposed or granted but of every particular impossibility supposed or imagined the possible consequences are not infinite neither such nor so many as we list to make them they are determinate by nature Now we cannot conceive it to be in nature more impossible for a meere logical possibility really and truely to take beginning of actuall being onely from it selfe then it is for that which is supposed imagined thus to take beginning to be restrained either to any determinat kind or part of being or to bee confined to any set place or residence Or if any mislike these imaginarie models let him now he hath givē us leave to make them and vouchsafed to looke upon them utterly cancell or deface them The everlasting edifice to whose erection they are destinated is this Such as we cannot cōceive that not to be which we conceive to take beginning of being from it selfe without any cause precedent such of necessity must we conceive and beleeve him to bee indeed who neither tooke beginning from himselfe nor had it given by any but is the beginning of being the sole maker of all things that bee being himselfe without beginning without dependance o◠any cause without subordination to any guide to appoint his kinde to limit his place or prescribe his time of being He is in all these and whatsoever branch or portion of being imaginable truely and really infinite the quintessence or excellency of all perfections whether numericall or specifical incident to al sorts or degrees of Beings numerable CHAP. 1. Of infinity in Beeing or of absolute infinitie and the right definition of it by the ancient
weild so high a prerogative with upright constancy But in that Holy and mighty One the reservation of such liberty as anon we intimate is a point of high perfection 6 That to be able to decree an absolute contingency as well as necessity is an essentiall branch of Omnipotency or power infinite shall by the assistance of this Power be clearly demonstrated in the Article of Creation That God did omnipotently decree a contingency in humane actions that the execution of this decree is a necessary consequent of his communicative goodnesse a consequent so necessary that unlesse this be granted we cannot acknowledge him to be truly good much lesse infinitely good shall by the favour of this his Goodness be fully declared in the Treatise of mans fall and of sinnes entrance into the World by it That which in this place wee take as granted is That Gods wisedome is no lesse infinite than his power that he perfectly foreknowes whatsoever by his omnipotency can be done that his power and wisedome are fully commensurable to his immensity and eternity that all these rules following are exactly parallell in true Divinity Gods Presence is not circumscriptible by the coexistence of his creatures He is in every one of them as a Center and all of them are in Him as in a circumference capable not of them only but of all that possibly can bee onely uncapable of Circumscription or Equality His Eternity is more than commensurable to time or any duration of created Entities It is in every duration as a permanent instant and all durations are contained in it as a fluent instant in a set time or as noonetide in the whole day His Power likewise may not be confined to effects that are have beene or shall bee the production of every thing out of nothing argues it to be truly infinite and yet the production of all is to the infinity of it not so much as a beame of light which is strained through a needles eye is to the body of the Sunne or to all the light diffused throughout the world Least of all may his infinite wisedome be comprehended within those effects which by his power have been produced or which it now doth or hereafter shall produce But looke how farre his immensity exceeds all reall or compleat space or his Eternity succession or the duration of things created or his Power all things already reduced from possibility to actuall existence so farre doth his infinite Wisedome surmount the most exact knowledge that can bee imagined of all things already ereated and their actions Nothing that is could have borne any part in the world without the light or direction of his Knowledge and yet that measure of his Knowledge which can bee gathered from the full harmony of this Vniverse is lesse in respect of it absolutely considered then skill to number digits is to the entire or exact knowledge of all proportions or other arithmeticall rules or affections that can arise from their multiplications or divisions The causes properties hidden vertues of each thing created are better knowne to Him than so much of them as we see or perceive by any other sense is to us and yet He knowes whatsoever by infinite power possibly might have beene but now is not whatsoever hereafter may be though it never shall be as perfectly as he doth the things which at this instant are heretofore have beene or hereafter must be 7 The subject wherein this his incomprehensible wisedome exhibits the most liuely and surest apprehensions for drawing our hearts after it in admiration is the harmony or mixture of contingency with necessity And this most conspicuous in moderating the free thoughts of Men or Angells and ordaining them to the certaine and necessary accomplishment of his glory The contingent means which by his permission and donation these creatures may use for attaining their severall ends or private good may be successively infinite And yet albeit the utmost possibilities of their varieties and incōstancies were reduced to act the ends notwithstanding which his infinite wisedome hath forecast in their creation should by any course of many thousands which they may take be as inevitably brought to passe as if no choice or freedome had beene left them or as if every succeeding thought had been drawne on by the former and al linked to that which hee first inspired or by his irresistible power produced with indissoluble chains of Adamantine Fate We would esteeme it great wisdome or cunning to use S. Austines illustratiō in a Fowler to be able to catch againe all the Birds which he had formerly caught after he had permitted every one of them to take wings and flye which way they listed God hath nets every where spred for catching such as his wisedome suffers to flye farthest from him or most to decline the wayes which in his goodnesse he had appointed for thē and which is most of all to be admired the very freedome or variety of mens thoughts so they be permitted to imploy them according to their owne liking becomes their most inevitable and most inextricable snare For all their thoughts are actually numbred in his infinite wisedome and the award of every thought determinately measured or defined by his Eternall Decree So farre is freedome of choice or contingency from being incompatible with the immutability of Gods will that without this infinite variety of choice or freedome of thought in man and Angels wee cannot rightly conceive him to be as infinitely wise as his decree is immutable 8 Free it was for mee to have thought or done somewhat in every minute of the last yeare whereby the whole frame of my cogitations or actions for this yeare following might have beene altered and yet should God have beene as true and principall a cause of this alteration and of every thought and deed thus altered as he is of those that de facto are past or of that which I now thinke or doe Nor should his will or pleasure as some object depend on mine but mine though contingently free necessarily subject unto his For unto every cogitation possible to man or Angell he hath everlastingly decreed a proportionate end to every antecedent possible a correspondent consequent which needs no other cause or meanes to produce it but onely the reducing of possibility granted by his decree into Act. For what way soever of many equally possible mans will doth encline Gods decree is a like necessary cause of all the good or evill that befalls him for it Did we that which we doe not but might doe many things would inevitably follow which now doe not Nor doe the things which at this instant befall me come to passe because he absolutely decreed them and none but them as we say in the first place But because hee decreed them as the inevitable consequents of some things which hee knew I would doe which notwithstanding hee both knew and had decreed that I might not have done For
built unlesse the Lord doe afford not onely his concurrence but his blessing to the labours of the one and to the watchfulnesse of the other But in this argument wee may expatiate without impeachment of digression from the matter or of diversion from our ayme in the following Treatise of divine providence 6. This present Treatise requires an induction sufficient to prove that every visible or sublunarie substance aswell the common matter whereof all such things are made as the severall formes which are produced out of it have an efficient cause precedent to their making or production For the seuerall formes or bodies generable which are constituted by them the induction is as cleare to every mans sense or understanding as any mathematicall induction can bee The naturalist is neither able nor disposed to except against the universalitie of it or to instance in any sublunarie bodie which hath not a true efficient cause or an agent precedent from whose efficacie its physicall or essentiall forme was either made or did result The question onely remaines about the efficiencie or production of the prime or common matter Seeing it is the mother of generation wee will not vexe the Naturalist by demanding a generative cause efficient of its beeing but that it must have some cause efficient wee shall enforce him to grant from a generall Maxime most in request with men of his profession The Maxime is That the philosophicall progresse from effects to their causes or from inferiour to superiour causes is not like Arithmeticall or geometricall progressions it cannot bee infinite Wee must at length come to one supreme cause efficient which in that it is supreame is a cause of causes but no effect and being no effect nor cause subordinate to any other Agent it can have no limit of Beeing it can admit no restraint in working Whatsoever we can conceive as possible to have limited Beeing or beginning of such Beeing must haue both frō it by it Now if the perfect workes of nature bodies sublunarie of what kind soever suppose a possibilitie physicall included in the prime and common matter before they have actuall Being if it imply no contradiction for them to have beginning of Beeing it will imply no contradiction that the prime mater it selfe or imperfect masse whereof they are made should have a beginning of its imperfect beeing That Physicall beeing which it hath doth presuppose a logicall possibilitie of beeing as it is that is no contradiction for it sometimes to be and sometimes not to haue beene This supreame cause or agent which as we suppose did reduce the logicall possibilitie of the prime matter of sublunary bodies into Act cannot be the heavens or any part of the hoast of heavē neither the sun moon nor stars For albeit the Sun be the efficient cause by which most workes of nature in this sublunarie part of the world are brought to perfection yet is it no cause at all of that imperfect masse or part of nature on which it workes Vnlesse it had some matter to worke upon it could produce no reall or solid effect by its influence light or motion how ever assisted with the influence of other stars or planets Yet must this prime matter have some cause otherwise it should be more perfect than the bodily substances which are made of it For they all stand in neede both of this prime matter as a cause in it kinde concurrent to their production and of the efficiencie of the Sunne or other coelestiall Agents to worke or fashion the materialls or Ingredients of which they are made If either this common matter of sublunary substances or the Sunne which workes upon it had no superiour cause to limit their beeing or distinguish their offices both of them should bee infinite in Beeing both infinite in operation Now if the matter were infinite in beeing the Sunne or other coelestiall Agents could have no beeing but in it or from it For if the Sunne were infinite in operation the matter it selfe could bee nothing at all no part of nature unlesse it were a worke or effect of the Sunne Infinitie in beeing excludes all possibilitie of other Beeing save in it and from it And infinitie in operation supposeth all things that are limited whether in beeing or operation to bee its workes or resultances of its illimited efficacie CHAP. 7. Shewing by reasons philosophicall that aswell the physicall matter of bodies sublunary as the celestiall bodies which worke upon it were of necessitie to have a beginning of their Beeing and Duration 1 FOr further demonstration that as well the Sunne which is the efficient generall as the prime matter which is the common mother of bodies sublunary had a beginning of beeing there can be no meane eyther more forcible or more plausible then another Maxime much imbraced and insisted upon by the great Philosopher to wit that as well the efficient as the materiall cause derive the necessitie of their causalitie from the end or finall cause unto which they are destinated The Sunne doth not runne its daily course from East to West or make its annuall progresse from North to South to get it selfe heate or for the increase of its native force or vigour by change of Climates but for the propagation of vegetables for the continuance of life and health in more perfect sublunary substances If then wee can demonstrate that those vegetables or more perfect sublunarie bodies for whose continuall propagation for the continuance of whose life and well-fare the Sunne becomes so indefatigable in its course had a true beginning of beeing that the propagation is not infinitely circular the cause will be concluded that as well the common matter whereof they are made as the Sunne it selfe which produceth them had a beginning of beeing and operation from the same supreame cause which appointed the Sunne thus to dispense its heate and influence for the reliefe and comfort of this inferiour world To prove that these sublunarie more perfect bodies as vegetables c had a beginning of beeing or propagation no Argument can be more effectuall to the Naturalist or others that will take it into serious consideration than the discussion of that probleme which Plutarch hath propounded Whether the Egg were before the Hen or the Hen before the Egg. The state of the question will be the same in all more perfect vegetables or living Creatures which usually grow from an imperfect or weake estate to a more perfect and stronger Whether the Acorne were before the Oake or the Oake before the Acorne Whether the Lyon had precedencie of nature to the Lyons whelp or the Lyons whelp unto the Lyon The induction may be for eyther part most compleate in respect of all times and of all places if with the Naturalist wee imagine the world to have beene without beginning or without ending No Naturalist can ever instance in any more perfect feathered fowle which was not first covered with a shell or contained in
the earth and in the waters are as immediately and as intirely ascribed unto the operative power of the Creator as their first Creation out of nothing was Yet the reason of their ascribing all this unto the immediate and sole power of God will no way warrant the truth of their criticisme who teach that neither the fire doth truly heat or burne or the water really coole or moisten or that no visible creature hath any reall operation upon another but that our assigning of their motions or operations as true causes in their kind of the effects which we see daily produced is but a solaecisme of vaine Philosophy or of sciences falsly so called whereas the right resolution of this solaecisme into distinct and Christian phrase is but this God doth produce heat cold moisture vegetables and other living things ad praesentiam creaturarum the Fire Water Sunne Earth c. being but bare witnesses of the Creators power which is manifested in them or of its operation in their presence by which operation alone all those effects are produced which the Philosophers ascribe unto the Creatures And most true it is that the Creator doth daily worke all those effects which we attribute to naturall agents yet doth hee not worke such effects onely in them or where they are present but he truly worketh by them and with them And if the Omnipotent power be truly said to worke by and with natural meanes or causes they must truly worke with him in their kinde When the Apostle saith in him wee live and move and have our beeing this necessarily implies that wee have a life in its kinde distinct from his life a motive power different in its kinde from his power a kinde of beeing likewise distinct from his infinite Essence or from being-it-selfe But in as much as the life of all things living the motions of every thing that moveth the being of every numerable thing that is hath such an absolute dependance as hath been declared upon his creative power hence it is that the Prophets and Divine Philosophers ascribe all the visible effects or events which time presents or place accompanieth no lesse intirely to the Creator than the first production of their visible and naturall causes As for the former Critickes in whose language God onely worketh in his creatures or his creatures being present they might with as good reason affirme that the Sunne did not really move but that God did move the Sun being present yet could he not move or create motion ad praesentiam Solis unlesse the Sunne did truly move The truth is the Sunne doth move or is moved by Gods presence in it but he doth not move with it or by it But with the Sunne or other Creatures he truly worketh as they truly worke with him And by this concession of some true power and property of working unto naturall Agents more is ascribed to the Creator of all things than can bee ascribed by the contrary opinion which utterly denies al power or property of working to the Creatures For he that denyes any effects to be truly wrought by them cannot ascribe their abilities or operative force which in his opinion is none unto their Creator But Moses taugh the Israelites that it was God which gave them power to gather substance Nor were they more bound to praise God for the substance which they gathered or for the Manna which by miracle hee sent unto them than for the 〈◊〉 which he gave them to gather the one or other 2 Yeâ— is not this absolute and immediate dependance which every creature as well or its being as for its power or exercise of it hath oâ— the Almighty Creator the intire ground or reason why the effects which are in their kinde produced by the Creatures are by the Prophets wholly ascribed unto power Almighty For this dependance or the reason of ascribing all things to God which is grounded on it being for the present â—questred he hath a peculiar title to all the works or effects especially to all of greater and more publique consequence which the Creatures produce from his skill or wisedome in contriving the combination of second causes with their severall operations for the assequution of their last or utmost end Nor was the entitative goodnesse of every creature in his kinde albeit considered in that perfection wherein God made it the ground or reason of that approbation which hee bestowed upon them as they severally began to bee or after hee had accomplished them all God saith Moses saw all that he had made and loe it was exceeding good What goodnesse then was this which hee thus commends the goodnesse of order or of harmony betwixt them as they were parts of this Vniverse This harmony was the accomplishment of his severall workes the ground of his praises and the complete object of our beleefe of this Article of Creation Hence saith the Apostle Heb. 11 By faith we beleeve What Secula facta esse nay more then so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that the worlds were harmonically made It was a double over-sight in some good Divines from one or both of these two principles Omne ens quâ—â—ens est bonum What soever hath being is good whatsoever is was made by God and all things which God made were good to infer that sinne or morall evill could have no positive entitie For the greater the entitative goodnesse of any creature is the greater measure of morall evill it alwayes includes unlesse its entitative goodnesse hold such harmony or correspondency with the rest as may helpe to make up or support that goodnesse of order that is that goodnesse of coordination amongst themselves or of that joint subordination unto their Creator which he first framed and placed in this Vniverse as it was his worke Vnlesse sinne or morall evill had some positive entitie or some positive degrees or measure all sinnes should be equall there could bee no different kinds of sinne no numericall difference or degrees betwixt particular sinnes of the same kind But of the nature of sinne or morall evill and how compatible this evill is with goodnes entitative more at large by Gods assistance in the Treatise of Originall sinne or the estate or condition of the sons of wrath which estate every child of Adam by participation of this first sinne doth inherit The peculiar title which the Almighty Creator by right of Creation or by the combination or contrivance of naturall and intellectuall agents hath to all the praises which either the Souldier or Statesman the Landlord the Husbandman or such as live by Merchandizing daily rob him of will come more fitly to be declared in some following Treatises of Divine speciall providence 3 If the Reader desire a briefe abstract or summe of what hath beene said of Gods power in creating the world or of the reservation of this free power unto himselfe to alter to innovate or amend the estate wherein he hath hitherto
to forewarne great Subjects or inferiour Princes not to interpose as Arbitrators or Vmpires upon advantage when their betters fall at variance The advice I confesse is very good and ignorance hereof or want of like conâ—ideration it may be was some part of this great Earles folly not his principall fault some occasion no tue or prime cause of these two great Princes combination against him For besides Lewes and Charles Cominaeus a man no way inferiour to Machiavel in politique wit had espied a third principall actor in this Tragedy whose first appearance was to his apprehension in the likenesse of Lady Fortune but was discovered upon better review to be Divine Providence This good Authors Comment upon this accident is so full and lively as it will not admit any paraphrase of mine without wrong not onely to him but to the Reader Onely of one clause pertinent as well to the Discourse following as to that or the like passage of sacred Writ As every man sowes so shall he reape I must give the Reader speciall notice This Earle was alwayes delighted to sow the seeds of warre war being as he and the World thought the chiefe field or surest ground of his glory and he ends his thus honoured life with a bloody and unglorious death This was by Gods appointment the most naturall crop and proper harvest of such a seed-time as he had made Yet was not the finger of God more remarkable in knitting these two Princes which al their life times had stood as we say at the staffes end than in loosing the strict link of mutuall amity between other ancient Friends and sworne Confederates albeit the Politician seeke in this case as in the former altogether to cover or obliterate all impression of it For it is his manner or humour as was observed before to bring as much grist as he can and more then he ought to his owne Mill to entitle such partiall and subordinate meanes as fall within the compasse of his profession sole or prime causes of those effects which are immediately produced by Divine Providence 4 He spake merrily that said A man could not bestow his almes worse than on blinde men seeing they could finde in their hearts to see their best benefactors hanged But it hath beene delivered in good earnest as a cautelous rule by some politique Discoursers that the most thanklesse office any great Personage can doe to his dearest friend were to make him King It is a lesson of every dayes teaching The greater men grow the more they scorne to bee thought to be beholden unto others The very sight of such as they have beene more beholding unto than they can handsomely requite seemes to upbraid ambitious minds Hee is a meane Historian that cannot instance in divers upstart Princes which could not long suffer the heads of those men whose hands had put Crownes on theirs unto which they had no lawful title to stand where nature had given them lawfull possession â—i upon their owners shoulders Politique rules or Aphorismes grounded upon historicall observations of this kinde are not altogether without use But the doctrine inveiled in Poeticall fictions is in this and many other cases more Catholique than the Historians or Politicians observation Vsuall it is with the Poets when they represent the originall and progresse of tragicall dissentions betweene quondam friends in the first place to dispatch the Furies abroad with fire-brands in their hands to kindle or blow the coales of cruell and without the mutuall blood of the Actors unquenchable hatred And to speake the truth without fiction it seemes scarce possible that such light sparkles of humane anger as are usually the first seeds of quarrels betweene neighbour Princes or confederate States should grow unto such raging and devouring flames as they often doe unlesse some spirit more potent than the spirit or breath of man did blow them Now if by Furies the Poets meane infernall Fiends or evill Spirits their language doth not varie much from the ancient dialect of Canaan God saith the Author of the Booke of Iudges cap. 9. ver 23 24. sent an evill spirit betweene Abimelech and the men of Schechem and the men of Shechem dealt treacherously with Abimelech That the cruelty done to the threescore and ten sonnes of Ierubbaal might come and their blood be layd upon Abimelech their brother which flew them and upon the men of Shechem which ayded him in the killing of his brethren The mutuall disasters of both parties related in the verses following is but the just award of lothams imprecation vers 19 20. If yee then have dealt truly and sincerely with Ierubbaal and with his house this day then rejoyce ye in Abimelech and let him also rejoyce in you But if not let fire come out from Abimelech and devoure the men of Shechem and the house of Millo and let fire come out from the men of Shechem and from the house of Millo and devoure Abimelech 5 It would be more easie than safe out of the Histories of times ancient and moderne domestique and forraine to parallell this last instance so exactly as well for successe as practise as might be sufficient if not to perswade the irreligious Politician yet to leave him without excuse for not being perswaded that there is an immortall King of Kings and Lord of Lords from whose jurisdiction no corner of the Earth can be exempted an everlastingly wise and righteous Iudge which oversees the inventions of mans heart with a stedfast eye and measures their actions with a constant hand one that visiteth the same irregularities by the same rule or canon and fitteth like sinnes with like punishments after thousand of yeares distance in time in places distant some thousand of miles But leaving the collection of parallell examples or experiments sutable to the rule proposed unto the Readers private observation the proofe of the last mentioned conclusion will bee more apparent and concludent from the examples or instances in the last Section concerning the rule of retaliation CHAP. 30. Of Gods speciall providence in defeating cunning plots and conspiracies and in accomplishing extraordinary matters by meanes ordinary 1 WHen it is said that In God we live wee move and have our beeing this is not to be understood only of being or life naturall or of motion properly so called but is to be extended unto life and operations purely intellectuall So that the incomprehensible Nature in respect of our apprehensions is as properly an agent superartificiall as supernaturall All the skill wherewith any intelligent Creature is or can be endowed all the devises and projects of mens hearts are as essentially subordinate to his incomprehensible wisedome or counsell of his will as the life being and motions of things naturall are to his creative conservative or cooperative power Howbeit this subordination of the rationall creatures cogitations to his infinite wisedome doth no way deprive it of all liberty or freedome in projecting devising
compassionate to the oppressed that even in this life he often punisheth Kings for their sakes so evidently and so remarkably as there can be no place for doubt amongst the observant that he is a most just avenger of humane impietie But most Princes as the same Author notes are so unexperienced so inconsiderate that whiles prosperous fortune smiles upon them they feare no stormes no punishment no conviction And for want of this feare which is the beginning of wisedome God suddenly raiseth up some adversary or other when they least suspect Affliction in some kinde or other is the surest friend the most trusty Counsellor that any Prince can use for of all the rest of his retinue it onely knoweth not how to flatter And affliction or calamity of the same kinde which they have undeservedly brought upon others when that befalls them is the most sincere most powerfull Preacher that enters in at any Court gate for bringing Potentates to the knowledge of God and of his Lawes or to acknowledge him to be as well the Iudge of Iudges as Lord of Lords 2 For as Iustice cannot be done upon private offenders but by the warrant of supreame authoritie so when wee see such judgements befall supreme Magistrates themselves as to the notions of naturall reason are just and right and as it were exactly fitted to that which they have done to others this clearly argues there is a Supreme Tribunal in heaven which hath more soveraigne Authoritie over the highest Thrones and Principalities on earth than they have over the meanest subject that lives under them or filliest wretch that sojournes within their territories 3 And if the tallest Cedars be not without the reach of Divine Iustice shall it not controll the lower shrubs Never was there any man on earth I am perswaded save one who was more than man but upon a diligent survey of what hee had done suffered might have taken just occasion to repeat that lesson which the suffrance of such calamitie from the hands of men as he had procured unto others his neighbour Princes had taught Adonibezech to say by heart Threescore and ten Kings having their thumbes and their great toes cut off gathered their meat under my table as I have done so God hath requited me Iudg. 1. 7. This Tyrants offences had beene many and grosse more barbarous than many Princes in this age would perhaps commit yet an usuall practice upon the conquered in those ancient times a politique embleme of slavery in thus fitting their hands for the oar◠and disenabling them to use the Pike or other like instrument of warre However more at this day would be ready upon like provocation or custome to deale as boysterously with their vanquisht foes as Adonibezech did with his rather than to make the like ingenuous confession though God did call their sinnes to minde by such sensible remembrances as awaked him This I have generally observed that lighter touches of Gods afflicting hand did more affect the outragious people of the old world unlesse such as were delivered up into a reprobate sense than his severe blowes do many amongst us which have the reputation of moderate of civill yea of sanctified men The minds of most men are so blinded and choakt with cares of this world that they looke no further than into second causes and hence like idiots they suspect such blowes as are reached them from heaven to be given by such as are next unto them But even amongst such as look farre enough beyond second causes amongst such as see God in his word and daily heare his promises some there bee which either distinguish too nicely between Gods temporall punishments and his fatherly chastisements or else make not right application of this distinction to their owne particular From the one or other mistake perhaps from both whatsoever affliction befalls them after they have taken speciall notice of their regeneration is entertained as a meere loving correction sent for no other end than to worke for their future good not as a touch of Gods punitive justice requiring serious repentance for some particular sinnes past But whatsoever may be thought of the distinction it selfe this application of it was not in use amongst the ancient Saints and people of God 4 Few moderne Spirits of ingenuous birth and breeding but would scorne to be suspected of such rude and vast behaviour as some of Iacobs Sonnes used towards their Father others towards Ioseph or the Shechemites And yet how quickly doth the feare rather than the sufferance of lighter affliction than Ioseph suffered at their hands call their offences against him to their remembrance They knew themselves to bee as free from the crime wherewith he charged them as he was from merit of death when they put him into the pit or from desert of bondage when they sold him to the Madianites Notwithstanding his very not being so flexible to their requests as their instant occasions required though nothing so inexorable as they had been to him in his extremity when they knew him as now they do not to be their brother caused them to make this mutuall confession one to another We are verily guilty concerning our brother in that wee saw the anguish of his soule when hee besought us and we would not heare therefore is this anguish come upon us Gen. 42. 21. This speedy relentance upon this warning is an assured testimonie that the feare of God and of his just judgements did in some measure lodge in all their harts but most abundantly now in Reubens whose former sinnes against his father did equalize if not superabound his brethrens sinnes against young Ioseph of whose miscariage he was least guilty For unto the rest confessing their sinnes as was set downe before in the next verse hee thus replyes Spake I not unto you saying doe not finne against the childe and ye would not heare therefore behold also his blood is required Yet was this confession uttered thirteene yeares after the fact was committed untill that time never called in question CHAP. 32. Of the Geometricall proportion or forme of distributive justice which the supreame Iudge sometimes observes in doing to great Princes as they have done to others 1 BVt these Sonnes of Iacob were private men And God in putting them into the same feare anguish of soule into which they had put their harmlesse brother might observe the strict rule of retaliatiō or counterpassion without swerving from the rule of equitie seeing their brother was their equall but doth the righteous Lord observe the same rule betwixt parties for condition or state of life most unequall doth he mete out punishment unto Princes in just equality to the harmes which they have wrongfully done to their subjects or inferiours Surely he is no respecter of persons in cases of justice or revenge But where the blow or matter of punishment which lights on Potentates is much lesse the griese or smart may be fully as great as