to the work of Redemption his notions are too floridly or ambiguously delivered for me to undertake with confidence to unriddle But this seemeth the summ 1. That God is the fountain of Being by Emanation as the Sun of light And that his eternal Wisdom is Jesus Christ in the first instant or nature 2. That the first â—reature that he made or emaneth from him is a perfect universal mind the platform of all the rest of the Creation such as the old Philosophers called the soul of the world or an universal Intelligence And that this is Jesus Christ in his second nature and notion which Arius knew but did ill deny his divine nature 3. That this Universal Spirit or Mind maketh all the world besides and is in them all And so the whole Creation else was Christs first shadowy Image or body 4. That the Angels are the noblest parts of this and that the Deity first and Christs superangelical nature next is one in them all and they one with him as the beams with the Sun and as the lower part of the Sun-beams with the parts next the Sun 5. That the soul of man is the next part of Christs shadowy Image into which he descended 6. And so into all Bodies 7. And as into a special Branch into that Body born of the Virgin Mary 8. And in that and in other Bodies he dyeth and descendeth to his lowest state and 9. Then as the Sun doth rise again and bring all back to the state of pure spirituality in his superangelical nature whence all sprang And this is their Redemption which is most floridly set forth § 13. This doctrine seemeth to reconcile Philosophy or Gentilism and Christianity For what is it almost but names that are left in difference That which a Philosopher will call an universal Intelligence or soul of the world he calleth Christ And if such a soul there be no one will deny but that it floweth into all particular souls and bodies and is united to them or is to individuals as the soul in the head to the soul in the hand and foot § 14. And if I did believe that sin death hell and holiness life Glory are in the world but as Winter and Summer Night and Day and as Origen that the wicked are but in a state of Revolution and shall come about again into a state of hope or as he here seemeth that their sin and misery is but like the dying of a flower in the fall that shall in the Spring again be as before or rather another in its stead and that it is but the retiring of Christ from the Creature as the spirit of the Tree in Autumn from the Leaves I should then be ready to receive his Necessitating Predetermination to sin and fit all the rest of my opinions hereunto § 15. There is among many others one Joh. Jessenius à Jessen Doctor Eques Hungarus who in a Tract de Anima Corpore Universi hath written much to the like purpose save as being a Peripatetick he differeth from the Platonists viz. The world is one Animal and hath one soul and body which all Creatures are parts of That Stars are Intellectuals or Angels and all intuitively know each others minds loving the good and hating the evil here and are our chief friends and Keepers That Death befalleth only us lower Creatures Mors continua singulis nulli tamen aeterna Nam post longissimum temporis excursum quem Plato triginta insuper aliquot annorum millibus determinare ausus est removebitur factâ iterum aliquâ secundùm naturam solutione redintegratione And the Intellectus Agens he describeth as Mr. Sterry doth Christ in his second or middle nature pag. 165. Intellectum agentem substantia primae atque Dei fulgorem esse Non accidens sed substantiam Intelligeâ—tem quaeprimò propriéque Intellectus dicitur agens Primae substantiae adhaerens ab ea excurrens indivisus indivisibilis non aliter ac Lumen à Lucido emanat and so in many other particulars § 16. To all this my short time will allow me to give you but these short observations following 1. The doctrine of Redemption is so much of meer supernatural Revelation as that we must not easily receive that concerning it which is not in the Scriptures And where Christs person hath such a description in Scripture as he giveth I am not satisfied e. g. in pag. 232. where he thus saith The Word made flesh is the whole Tree of Being Uncreated and Created the Root the Body with all the Branches putting forth themselves into one little top branch now withering that through its death they may renew all to a fresh and flourishing spring I am loth to say that the Universe is Christ that his Divinity is the soul and the world his body and every Man and Beast and substance part of it and that he dyeth in all that dye and that his body born of the Virgin Mary was but one top branch of the Tree which Christ thus animateth and so that all other bodies are as truly personally united to the Word as that § 17. I will not deny that the Opinion of a Threefold nature in Christ looketh very plausibly viz. that the Divine eternal word the first nature produced and united it self to the prime created superangelical Mind the second nature and that this second nature in the fulness of time produced and united it self to the humane third nature 1. There are many texts which seem to countenance it 2. It seemeth to give Christ the greatest honour as being the most excellent of all Gods Creatures which is not so easily believed of him as Man 3. It seemeth to expound those texts of the Old Testament which mention such appearances of God to Adam Abraham and others which many of the Ancients say was Christ And it seemeth to some more probable that some pre-existent created nature should assume a body than the Divine nature only and immediately 4. And it smileth on us as an opinion likely to reduce and reconcile the Arians once too great a part of the Christian World as called Christians as not only Philostorgius and Saudius shew but also Petavius de Trinit who holding the prime-created super-angelical nature and denying the Divine it 's like would the more easily be brought to acknowledge the Union of the Divine Nature with the super-angelical if the super-angelical it self were first granted them For they might the sooner be convinced that the eternal wisdom or word which made that first creature was intimately united to it I know some pious worthy persons who upon such reasons incline to this opinion of a threefold nature in Christ Though some of them think that this second nature was the humane soul assuming only a body and others that it assumed both soul and body I am not forward to take men for unsufferable Hereticks that differ from me or hold that which seemeth to me hard and
There is no Place where any Corporeal being is where some Active created Nature is not with it so that considering the proximity and the natures we may well conclude that we know of no corporal motion under the Sun which God effecteth by himself alone without any second Cause § 6. Joh. Sarisburiensis and some Schoolmen liken Gods presence with the Creature in operation to the fire in a red hot Iron where you would think all were Fire and all Iron But the similitude is too low The SUN is the most Notable Instrument in visible Nature And GOD operateth on all lower things by its virtue and influx God and the Sun do what the Sun doth and we know of nothing that God moveth here on earth that 's corporeal without it § 7. But the Sun moveth nothing as the Cartesians dream by a single Motive Influx alone but by emission of its Threefold Influx as every Active Nature doth that is Motive Illuminative and Calefactive which are One-radically in Three-effectively § 8. This Efflux of the Sun is universal and equal ex parte sui But causeth wonderful diversity of effects without diversity in God the prime Cause or in it self The same Influx causeth the Weed and Dunghill and Carrion to stink and the Flowers of the sweeter Plants to be sweet some things to live and some to dye some things to be soft and some hard c. In a word there are few changes or various actions below in bodies which the Sun is not the Cause of without difference in it self But not the specifying Cause § 9. The reason why one equal Influx causeth such wonderful diversity of motions is the DIVERSITY of RECEPTIVE DISPOSITIONS and natures Recipitur ad modum recipientis So one poise maketh various Motions in a Clock c. § 10. God operateth on second Causes as God Omnipotently but not ad ultimum potentiae but Freely as he pleaseth § 11. God worketh by second Causes according to the said Causes aptitude so that the operation of Infinite power is limited according to the quality of the second cause which God useth § 12. There is a superiority and inferiority among Spirits as well as Bodies And whether God work on all our souls by superiour Spirits as second Causes is unknown to us It is not improbable according to the order of his providence in other things But we know little of it certainly § 13. But certain we are that superiour Voluntary Agents Angels and Devils have very much to do with our souls and operate much upon them It is a wonderful power which wise observers perceive Satan hath upon the Imagination or Thinking faculty of which I could give some instances enough to convince a rational Sadducee And it is not like that good Angels have less power skill or will § 14. And we are sure that God hath ordained One Great Universal second Cause to convey his Spirit and Grace by which is JESUS CHRIST As the Sun is an Universal Cause of Motion Light and Heat to Inferiour creatures and God operateth by the Sun So is Christ set as a Sun of Righteousness by whom God will convey his spiritual Influx to mens souls and there is now no other conveyance to be expected § 15. Christs Humane Nature united personally to the Divine and Glorified is by the Office of Mediator Authorized and by Personal Union and the Fulness of the Holy Spirit enabled and fitted to this communication of Gods Spiritual Influx to mankind § 16. Object A Creature cannot be a Cause of the Operation of the Holy Ghost who is God the Creator Sending is the Act of a Superiour But Christs humanity is not superiour to the Holy Ghost Answ 1. Christ as a Creature is no Cause of any Essential or purely Immanent Act of God for that hath no Cause But 1. He is a Cause of the Spirits operation as it signifieth the effect 2. And so the cause why his Act is terminated on the soul and 3. Of the ordering of these effects why rather on this soul than on that and at this time measure c. And 2. This Christ doth not as a superiour sender of the Spirit but a Ministerial and a second cause As a Master payeth his servants as his Steward determineth § 17. It is certain that Christ is the Political Cause or Head of this spiritual Influx on souls that is As Mediator is Authorized to determine of the Persons measure time conditions of the Communication of the Spirit But whether he be a Physical Head of this Influx by proper efficiency giving the Spirit from himself as the Sun giveth us its Influx is all that is disputable That is Whether the Spirit be first given Inherently to Christ and pass from his person as his unto us as the Spirits do from the Head to the Members § 18. This question may be put either of all Natural Being and Motion or only of Spiritual Motion in the soul of man Whether Christ be so the Head of Nature as that all Nature in Heaven and Earth is sustained and actuated by him as the physical efficient Cause or whether this be true of this Lower World which was curst for sin or whether it be true at least of Humane nature or whether it be true only of Gracious operations § 19. 1. That Christ hath the Political dispose of the whole Universe contained in the words Heaven and Earth the Scripture seemeth to assert 2. That he hath the Political disposal of humane nature and of all other creatures that belong to man so far as they belong to him Angels Devils Sun Air Earth c. is past dispute 3. That the real â—hysical effects acts and habits of the Spirit on mens souls are caused by Christs Moral Causation by his Merit and his Political Mission is past dispute 4. That besides all this the Spirit it self by Baptism is in Covenant with all the members of Christ and that as they are such and is in a prior Covenant first Related to Christ himself and so by this Covenant given us in relation as we are united to Christ is past dispute 5. And that Christ himself doth make such Physical changes on our souls by Means and by the foresaid Political Mission of the Spirit by which we are made Receptive of more of the Spirits operations is past dispute 6. But whether moreover any Action of Christs own Humane soul glorified do physically reach our souls or whether the Holy Ghost may in its own essential Virtue which is every where be said to be more in Christ than elsewhere and communicated to us as from the root or the Spirits effects on the soul to come by Reflection from the first effects on Christ as Light and Heat from the Sun by a Speculum or Burning-glass are questions not for me to determine § 20. Christs spiritual Influx on souls is not single but is ever Three in One as the Sun 's aforesaid which are according to
after him and find him though he be not far from every one of us For in him we live and move and have our being For we are also his off-spring Act. 17. 25 26 27 28 29. For there is no difference between the Jew and the Greek For the same Lord over all is rich unto all that call upon him For whoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved But have they not heard Yes verily their sound went into all the earth and their words unto the ends of the world Rom. 10. 12 13 18. Despisest thou the riches of his goodness and forbearance and long suffering not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to Repentance Who will render to every man according to his deeds To them who by patient continuance in well doing seek for Glory and Honour and Immortality Eternal life Glory honour and peace and to every man that worketh Good to the Jew first and also to the Greek For there is no respect of persons with God For not the hearers of the Law are just before God but the doers of the Law shall be justified For when the Gentiles which have not the Law do by Nature the things contained in the Law these having not the Law are a Law unto themselves which shew the work of the Law written in their hearts their Consciences also bearing witness and their thoughts in the mean while accusing or else excusing one another In the day when God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ according to my Gospel If the uncircumcision keeps the righteousness of the Law shall not his uncircumcision be counted for circumcision He is a Jew which is one inwardly and circumcision is that of the heart in the spirit and not in the letter whose praise is not of men but of God Rom. 2. SECT III. Of Christ's Incarnation and our Redemption 36. In the fulness of time God sent his Son made of a Woman made under the Law to redeem them that were under the Law Rom. 4. 4. But not them only for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life Joh. 3. 16. He was made sin for us who knew no sin that we might be made the righteousness of God in him He redeemed us from the Curse of the Law being made a Curse for us For he is the Saviour of the world and the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the world He is the Propitiation for our sins and not for ours only but for the sins of the whole world 1 Joh. 2. 2. For he tasted Death for every man Heb. 2. being the Saviour of all men but especially of those that believe 1 Tim. 4. 10. For if one dyed for all then were all dead And he dyed for all that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves but unto him that dyed for them and rose again 2 Cor. 5. 14 15. 37. As the eternal Word and Wisdom of the Father in his Divine nature only was the interposing Redeemer by undertaking before his Incarnation and governed the faln world by the fore-described Law of Grace so upon his Incarnation initially and upon his performance plenarily all things are delivered into his hands even all the world so far as it was defiled and cursed by Man's sin Man as the Redeemed the Creatures as his utensils and goods and Devils as his and our Enemies All Power in Heaven and Earth was given him Matth. 26. 19. Joh. 13. 1 3. and 17. 2 3. All judgment was committed to him and the Father judgeth no man but by him But hath given him to have life in himself and to raise the dead Joh. 5. 22 23 24 25. For he hath made him Head over all things to his Church Eph. 1. 22 23. And for this end he dyed rose and revived that he might be the Lord of the dead and the living Rom. 14. 9 10. For God hath exalted him and given him a name above every name that in the name of Jesus every knee should â—ow Phil. 2. 7 8. And as in Adam all die even so in Christ shall all be made alive 1 Cor. 15. 22. 38. Christ upon his Incarnation performed but what God had Decreed before the foundations of the world and had obscurely and generally promised after the fall at the first making of the Covenant of Grace Which Decree of God is after the manner of men called by some a Covenant between the Father and the Son especially because the Prophets have sometimes as Isa 53. described it by way of prediction as a Covenant between the Father and Christ incarnate If we conceive of it properly under the notion of a Decree first and a Promise after unto the world so the Will and Mercy of God the Father and Son with the Holy Spirit are the cause of mans Redemption Pardon and Salvation even the fundamental Principal total Cause And the Promise was man's security and Christ as promised was the primary great meanâ— which was to procure us the rest by doing that upon the fore-sight and fore-decree whereof God did before-hand pardon and save Sinners But if you had rather mention it as in the form of a Covenant which before the Incarnation must be improperly taken being only of God to himself or a promise of and to Christ as to be incarnate then the undertaking of the Father and the Son herein must be carefully distinguished and described The Father giveth up to Christ as Redeemer the whole lapsed cursed reparable world the several parts to several uses and especially his chosen to be eventually and infallibly saved and promiseth to accept his Sacrifice and performance and to make him Head over all things to his Church and by him to establish the Law of Grace in its perfect Edition and to give him the Government respectively of the Church and world and to Glorifie him for this work with himself for ever And the second person undertaketh to assume man's Nature to do and suffer all that he did in perfect obedience to his Fathers Will and Law of Redemption to fulfill all Righteousness conquer Satan and the world to suffer in the flesh and be a Sacrifice for sin and to conquer Death and teach and rule and purifie and raise and justifie and glorifie all true believers 39. Before the Incarnation Christ's future death and obedience being * * * Eadem suit sides in antiquis patribus modernis qui alio modo credebant in specialia alia credibilia quam nos Immo aliquid eredebant quod nunc est salsum Alliaco in 3. q. 1. not existent were no real existent Causes in themselves of men's Justification But that Wisdom which foresaw them and that Will of God which Decreed them as such and not they without that fore-sight and Decree as existent were the cause 40. Nor were they either before
supposed in Gods Law which is the reason of our participation in his Sin and not any Will or Judgment of God without or beyond our Natural interest For else it should be God most properly who by his arbitrary imputation should either make us Sinners or repute us such when we are none But yet when we become Persons it is by Derivation from Adam and so the effect can be no better than the cause and as soon as we are Persons we are Guilty persons having Guilt with personality from him though we were not persons in him 3. So Christ is though not the Natural yet the Federal Adam or Root of Believers when he satisfied and merited we were not in him either as in Adam seminally as in a natural Generator nor as existent Persons nor did God falsly so repute us to be But he was then the Cause materially or had that Virtus effectiva which would Justifie and Sanctifie and Glorifie us in due time It was the Nature of Sinners though not a sinful Nature which he assumed But that Nature which he undertook was existent in his Individual person and no other Individual person was existent in his existent personal Nature So that when we say it was the common Nature of Man we mean only specifice that Nature which is of the same Species with all other mens but not that which existed individually in any but himself and a Species extra individuum is nothing but an ens rationis or a notion But it was individual Persons in whose stead or place Christ suffered and whom he undertook to Justifie Sanctifie and Save and gather into a holy Society to that end and to that end he undertook and performed his office and merited all this by his perfect righteousness So that hereby he made Himself a Federal Head and Root of a holy Society his Church And whenever any person doth Believe and is united federally to him he then receiveth the effects of that which was before in Christ as a Virtus effectiva The Law made to Adam or to us did not assign Christ to this office nor oblige him to suffer or merit for sinners according to it Therefore by so doing he fulfilled not the Law as it obliged us that is by that obligation nor suffered by that obligation which bound us to suffer But by the obligation of his own Consent and that Law which was peculiar to himself as to the formal obligation though materially he was bound by it to fulfill the Law of Nature and of Moses The Law of Innocency then or Works took not Christ for the Civil or Legal Person of such Sinner or Believer no more than it made him such 4. As Gods Law to the Mediator made him this office so Christ's Law of Grace doth quod jus Relationem give to every true believing Covenanter first Christ himself in union to be their federal Head and with him title to his Grace Spirit and Glory And now they are Personally and actually his federal Subjects Friends and Members and have right to all his conferred gifts 5. But this right floweth not immediately to them from what Christ did or suffered for them but from his Law or Covenant of Grace by which as his Donative and Ruling Instrument he conveyeth that title to them 6. And therefore they have no right before the Time nor any but on the Conditions and Measure specified in that Covenant or Law so that Righteousness is not theirs because it is Christs nor in the manner or measure and to the ends of the donation 7. This much containeth the matter of this Doctrine of the Collation and Imputation of Christ's righteousness still remembring that as no one till he was a Person could be a person-guilty of Adam's sin not when he was a person any sooner than he was also guilty of his own inherent pravity and none that had the use of Reason was guilty of either or both these only without the guilt of his own Actual Sin and all three together 1. Adam's sin justly imputed to us 2. And our innate Pravity 3. And our actual Sin are the parts which constitute our plenary guilt even so no one till he is a Believer is related as a Member of a Perfectly Righteous Saviour and that is done no sooner in time that he hath the Inherent Righteousness of his personal faith and federal consent and that obligeth him to the further active righteousness of a holy life and all these three conjunct though not co-ordinate make up the total Righteousness of a Saint viz. 1. Our Relation to Christ in Union as to a perfectly Righteous Head who fulfilled all righteousness for us to merâ—â— our Justification which is called Christ's Righteousness Imputed to us as being thus far reputed ours 2. And our penitent believing consent to his Covenant which is the condition of the foresaid Relation to Christ 3. And our after Sanctification and obedience to Christ's Law 8. And when we are commonly thus far agreed of the Matter if any will contend for their self-coyned phrases and words and not being content to call Christ our Redeemer Saviour Teacher King Priest Head Lord Teâ—â—ator Sponsor or Surety Ransom Price Sacrifice c. as the Scripture doth will needs plead that he is or was our Person or was holy obedient suffered in our Persons Legal or Civil or was our Substitute Delegate Instrument c. his contention will be both corrupting and dividing And yet I will acknowledge that among Lawyers the word Person hath so many senses that in some of them were they our way of speech here it might be said that Christ did in some things personate each Sinner or each believer limitedly in tantum ad hoc non simpliciter aut ad omnia And all verbal quarrel I would shun even with them that speak ineptly and dangerously and injuriously to â—he truth and Church so they will but by a sound and necessary explication vouchsafe us an Antidote against the hurtful tendency of their â—hrases 9. Obj. If Christ's person be given us then his personal Righteousness is given us with it Ans Yes as his Person is He is not given us as Proprietors and Lords to become our Own at our dispose Nor is his Person made one Person with each or any of us His Person is not turned â—nto ours nor ours into his As the Husband is not the person of the Wife nor the King of each Subject But as one that hath a Great Wise Learned Bountiful Holy King or Husband hath also his Greatness Wisdom Learning Bounty and Holiness as they have him that is As his perfections for their good as far as his Relation binds him but not as â—f his endowments were removed from him to them or falsly reputed to â—e in them or his person to be their persons so here as we have a Christ â—o we have a perfect Righteous Christ given us to be our federal Head when we believe
doctrine of faith and Law and promises of Christaâ—e the Means which the Spirit useth in operating our Faith Love and Obedience And it is not two Covenants that give these two but as soul and body make one man so the Word of Christ and his Spirit make up one total cause of our sanctification The Spirit causeth us to believe that which the Word revealeth and to love the good which it proposeth and to obey the Precepts of the Word Therefore the Gospel is Grace and the Spirit is Grace that is a free gift of God to miserable sinners for their recovery and inward holiness is the effect of both And to feign that all obedience as it is performed to Christs Law upon its proper motives is therefore not of the Spirit or is our own Righteousness opposed to Christs because our own reason and free-will is exercised in it is Phanaticism and subverteth the Gospel and the Prophetical and Kingly Office of Christ II. God never gave a Law no not to the Jews only to convince them that they could not keep it but to be the Rule of their obedience And the Just did keep it in sincerity But the Law of Moses as separated by the ignorant Jews from the promise and grace of Christ could not be kept by any to Justification To say that Christs Laws now have no higher end than to tell us that we cannot keep them is Antichristianity Are we commanded to repent believe love God only to tell us that we cannot do it It 's true that without the Spirits help we cannot But it 's as true that the Command is the Rule of our duty and all the Gospel and Covenant of Grace is the means of exciting us to our duty by which the Spirit worketh in us faith repentance love and obedience But saith Jansenius the Law of Christ is to humble men in the sense of their disability and drive them to seek to Christ for his grace I answer 1. Is not humbling men and driving them to Christ a good effect If so then his Law is the means of all that good 2. Were the Gospel and all the Apostles Epistles written only to drive men to Christ and not to edifie them and make them perfect to salvation Were not the Precepts of Love and Holiness means of working Love and Holiness in men Is not the Word the seed that begetteth men to eternal life and is not the receiving of this seed into good and honest hearts made by Christ the cause of holiness and salvation Were not the Disciples clean by the word that Christ spake to them and doth he not say that his Word was spirit and life as being the concause of the Spirits vivification He that never received more benefit by Christs Doctrine Law and Gospel than to be convinced that he cannot believe repent obey or love God hath not yet the benefit which they are principally intended for But suppose that by Law he had meant the meer penal part or threatning as some words would make a man suspect 1. It 's a strange description of a Law to exclude the precept and premiant part and include only the penal part which is the last and least 2. As it is the same Man that hath Love and Hatred Hope and Fear so it is the same Law of Christ which hath precept and prohibition promise and penalty And it is the same Holiness or New Creature which is a conformity to all together Of which more anon III. He can never prove that all unbelievers have no Power to â—â—e any means which tendeth to â—aith by a preparatory grace nor that the use of all such means is Impossible to them XIII His distinction of Natural and Moral Impotency is good But then that Moral Impotency it self must not be made the same with the Natural else there will be the same reason for excusing sin by it If mans Will had been made by God such as could not possibly love him or holiness it would not have left a man unexcusable in judgement that his enmity was Voluntary It is reason enough for a man to kill a â—oad or Serpent as malum sibi naturale because it is a hurtful creature But this is no Moral Evil in them nor is their death their punishment nor yet in any ravenous creature which preyeth on the rest that are innocent And so would it be with bad men if God had made them bad Indeed if Adam have made them all bad and God have given no Saviour Grace or Remedy they are conâ—emnable and unexcusable as they were virtually in Adam if judged only by the Law of Innocency as made to Adam But they are excuseable if judged by Christ by the Law of grace which condemneth no man meerly as not innocent or a sinner but as a rejecter of grace These things are so plain and weighty that Jaâ—senius should not joyn with the Antinomians in opposing them XIV While he confesseth that Christ so far dyed for all as to procure them all the mercy which he giveth them I have no further quarrel with him but to prove that a Condition pardon of sin and grant of Life eternal with much means and help to make men perform the Condition which is but a suitable Acceptance is indeed mercy XVI That Christs grace is Love or Complacency in good is a truth which I highly value but with all these exceptions to his doctrine 1. It is the Heart of the new Creature and that which must communicate it self to all the rest or else they are lifeless and unacceptable For the will is the man in Gods account And complacency or love or appetite is the first act of the will which is it that he calleth with Augustine Delectation Grace lyeth principally in a Placet But the man hath more parts than his Heart And all other parts of sanctification are graces of Christ in their several places and not love only 2. Though no man is to love himself as God nor instead of God nor above God nor as the noblest ultimate object of his love yet all men are necessitated by nature to love themselves and therefore to desire their own felicity in loving God next to God as the final object of that love And so our end is finis amantis vel amicitiae which includeth mutual complacency and union though not in equality And to such an end grace causeth us to use the means And Christ is proposed to us as our Saviour and all his grace as for our good and all Gods commands as necessary for our happiness and sin is described to us to be hated as our oâ—â— evil and destruction and against our good as well as against Gods will and honour And with us this is denyed scarcely by the Antinoâ—ians themselves Much less by any judicious Christians 3. It is past the reach of any of us to prove that our actual love is the first effect of the sanctifying Spirit on the soul
strange But I must say 1. That I see no cogent proof of this super-angelical nature 2. That seeming congruities and conveniences must not embolden us to take up a doctrine which is new and strange to the Church of Christ in so great a matter as the Natures and person of Christ are 3. And were it never so true if it be not sufficiently revealed to us in Gods Word it cannot be necessary to our salvation 4. Yea presuming too boldly to conclude of unrevealed things so high seemeth to me dangerous temerity curiosity and prophaneness like the Bethshemites or Uzzah's meddling with the Ark and the Sons of Aâ—râ—n offering false fire Let them therefore here thus proceed that dare For I dare not § 18. But this much I easily concede 1. That as all Being is originally from God so there is a continued divine causation of them without which they would all cease or be annihilated which some call a continued Creation and some an Emanation and some a continued Action or operation ad rerum esse And it is an intolerable errour to hold that God hath made the World or any part of it self-sufficient or Independent as to himself as to Being Action or Perfection We grant therefore that all the world is so far United to God as to depend on his continued causality And that the Beams do not more depend on the Sun or Light heat and motion on the Sun and other fire nor the branches fruit and leaves more depend on the Tree than the Creature on God § 19. 2. I grant that thus far the world may be said to be one as all things are united in one first cause from which they flow and by which they are § 20. 3. But yet all these are no parts of God as the fruit and leaves are of the Tree and as the beams are of the Sun 's But they are Creatures because Gods emanation or causation is creative causing the whole Being of the effect And it seemeth likest to the Sun or fire's causation of Motion Light and Heat as they are in the Recipient distinct ab essentia actione Agentis quà tuli § 21. 4. I grant that though as to proximity of essence God is no further from one Creature than from another being intimate to all immediatione essentiae yet he useth one Creature as a second Cause to operate on another and that the Higher and Nobler operate on the lower and more ignoble And in that sense we may conceive that some Creatures are first from God or nearest to him that is of the highest nature and use And so we deny not but that it is like that in the Creation God made one nature existent e. g. the highest Intellectual as more excellent powerful pregnant active and perfect than any of the rest that there was in the wonderful diversity some one that was Best and above the rest § 22. 5. I grant that it soundeth probably that the first and noblest Nature in specie should be found but in one Individual But of this there is not the least certainty to us mortals viz. Whether from one God first flow one perfect Created Intelligence of Spirit or ab uno plures two three or millions in the first order flow from one God Though in nature we see that from the trunk of the Tree few great members first arise and multiplicity is in the extremities And we grant that the greatest multiplicity appeareth where things dwindle to littleness or baseness One sound Sheep iâ— better than a rotten one that hath a thousand Worms in his Veins and Intestines And a man that hath a thousand Lice on his Head is not the Nobler And when the one soul hath left a Garkass it may turn to thousands of contemptible Vermine And a Looking-glass broken into an hundred pieces is not the better because it will make an hundred images of the face But yet we are strangers to Gods unseen works further than he revealeth them and therefore must confess our ignorance § 23. 6. We grant that all Gods works have some Union Concord and Harmony among themselves which yet consisteth with numerical diversity And though Men and other Animals walk about with Bodies that touch not one another and therefore the ignorant conceive of them as totally incoherent and think that though Pears Apples and other Fruit on the Tree and Trees in the Earth be both Many and Divert and yet parts of one Tree and of one Earth yet it is not so with animals because the union of spiritual beings in invisible yet indeed it is not probable that the souls of Animals have no dependant coherence with noblet supriour Spirits Though because we know of no nature above the Intellectual it is utterly uncertain to us Whether Humane souls depend on any proper superiour Cause of their Being but God alone immediately For God causeth the highest Natures without any mediate second Cause Though as to ORDER and helps of action and well being they may depend on others as the several Wheels or parts of the same Watch or Clock or as the Sheep upon the Shepherd § 24. Augustine de Anima is put to it whether he will hold 1. That souls are Many and not One 2. Or One and not Many 3. On both One and Many The two first he rejecteth The last he confesseth hard to defend but seemeth most inclined to But what Union he meant is hard to conjecture Whether that they were all the spiritual Parts of one Universal or one Greater soul if souls may be Parts or Whether distinct products of one such soul either Universitatis or hujus systematis or Whether One Relatively and Politically by making up one society or Whether one because emaning from one spring or Causa prima The two last are certain The two first are far otherwise § 25. 7. If he could prove that there is one First Best Universal created Intelligence or super-Angelical Spirit which God made the chief of all second causes by which he created and governeth all the rest and that this is Christ in his second Nature we would not deny but that Christ as the Mediator of Nature as Mr. Sterry calleth him is in all other Creatures as the Cause is in the being of the effect But it would not follow that the Essence of Christ or this Universal Intelligence is any Constitutive Cause or part of each creature For as God causeth them by Creative Emanation and not as a Constitutive part of them so we should rather hold that under God by a Power of producing Entities received from him this Universal Spirit did the same in a subordinate second place § 26. But his Opinions which I am now most concerned to renounce are those about Gods Moral Government his Laws Justice our free-will sin guilt and Gods Redemption Judgement and Punishment of man all which I think he much subverteth § 27. And I. I take the root of his error to be