Person Hypostasis or Subsistence of the Divine Nature It is too great Presumption for any in the State of Mortality to determine the manner of the Oneness of the Father Son and Eternal Spirit which is so clearly declared a Mystery near the close of the Canon of Scripture never unfolded after in it The Trinity hath been asserted and owned with the greatest Firmness and Forwardness in the purest State of the antient Christian Church and the least Derogation attempted against it by the Arians hath been condemned with Abhorrence by the most Eminent and Orthodox Fathers and by the Determination and Solemn Confession of Faith by the Council of Nice and it is amongst the most incontestably Catholick Doctrines of the Universal Church owned by all National Societies of Christians in the World above the course of a thousand Years Augustine and some others of the Fathers have attempted to give some Resemblances of the Trinity in Unity though he still acknowledgeth it to be a Mystery they could not fully comprehend So Augustine in his 15th Book of that Treatise he wrote upon the Trinity saith That we have a Representation of the Generation of the Son by the Father in that he is called the Word of God as all Idea's are conceived by Words of the Mind so God's Idea of himself and his Decrees is his Word essential and substantial For all that is in God is God The Son is also the Character of his Person his Image the Brightness of his Glory his Wisdom that was with him from Eternity He says also That the Procession of the Holy Ghost is his Love to Himself by his Idea of Himself with his whole Decrees and that all the Persons of the Trinity are Wise and Powerful by the same Power and Wisdom because they have but one Godhead The Generation of a Son doth not import an Imperfection or Inequality of the Nature of the Son more than of the Father much less doth the Generation of the Eternal Son imply an Inequality of the Son with the Father or a dependance of his Being from the Father as if he needed Preservation like Creatures Yea all the Persons are increated without any Cause and so Self-existent and Coeternal The Errors of Socinians are much more abominable than those of the Arians the Socinians acknowledg nothing of the Son before he was conceived in the Womb of the Virgin The Light of Nature was ever sufficient to confute the Multiplicity of Gods and to convince that there could only be one God Albeit the Multiplicity of Gods did far prevail in the World it was long before it did prevail and not until God had given Men up to their own Ways because of their Wickedness against the clear Light of Nature for they were given up to believe Lies because they did not receive the Truth which by the Light of Nature they knew in Love to live according to it The knowledg of one God was not alone among the Hebrew or Jewish Nation as the Scripture maketh evident in Job and his Friends among whom there was so much clear Knowledg of the Divine Perfections and even of a Saviour and of a Resurrection which are not deducible from any inbred Principle by the Light of Nature and therefore they could not want Revelation yet we have no ground to know any Communication between the Hebrews and them Neither were there a few Persons indued with that Light but a City and Common-wealth having Judges and Counsellors that sate at their Gates Balaam also knew and acknowledged the only true God not by Communication with the Israelites there being a vast distance and no Communication between Aram and Egypt The three Wise Men of the East that were led by a Star to come to Bethlehem when Christ was born could not possibly by Astrology have discovered the Birth of the Mediator and therefore did neither want Revelation nor a miraculous Sign Neither is there any ground to believe that they were Idolaters but that they knew and worshipped the true God and it is highly probable that they were not the only Persons of their Country that did so Yet they did not desire for ought I know to become Proselytes of the Jews Neither is there ground to doubt that Moab or Ammon the Sons of Lot or Ishmael and Abraham's other Sons by Keturah or Esau their nearest Posterity were convinced that there was but one God nor could their Posterity be soon brought to believe a Plurality of Gods So that we have no ground to doubt that the Knowledg of the one God did long and largely propagate it self in the World though through defect of History the Particulars be little known I do not hear of Idolatry before the Flood the cause of it in God's just Judgment is attributed to Mens corrupting of their Ways and the wickedness of their Works After the Flood the Notion of one God did long remain as appears by the common Name of Baal or Lord which was long almost universal and the several Nations that worshipped Baal gave him different Epithets according to their apprehension of his Attributes of which there is frequent mention in the Scripture So the Moabites God was Baal without addition the Sidonians also called their God Baal so did the Canaanites Some Nations called their God Baal Berith that is cursing Baal others Baal Gad Baal Hamon Baal Meon Baal Peor Baal Hanan Baal Hazor Baal Hermon Baal Perazin Baal Zebub the God of Ekron Places also were denominated from Baal as Baal Perazin Baal Shalisha Baal Zebub Baal Zephon and Bell of the Babylonians is but a different Dialect of Baal but that which was the Name of one God with different Epithets did easily come to be apprehended as so many Gods yet the several Nations did not worship many Gods but their own So after the Captivity of the ten Tribes those that were planted in their places being plagued conceived it was by the Anger of the God of that Place and therefore sent for the Jewish Priests to appease him The Greeks were the first that worshipped many Gods and after them the Romans for then the Souls of Men eminent upon Earth were supposed to be cooptated among the Gods in different Orders and as the Nations and Places had Interest in them they had Confidence in them and became forgetful of the true God After arose Images and the relative Honour and Worship attributed to them not only to the Images and Pictures of these Deified Men but also to those Bodies wherein the Gods were supposed to delight and to reside It is not imaginable that so many Men of Discretion and Spirit could with direct Worship adore inanimate Creatures or the meanest Brutes or Plants but that they thought they were delightful to and resided in by Deities and so the Sun the Moon Planets came to be worshipped even by those who did not believe that they had Life or Understanding or were Bodies informed by a Deity but that
first six days These Men had better quit their Grounds than keep them with such Consequences and yet it is from Consequences that they take them up which might be better misbelieved than these tho they had far more probability both from Sense and Reason but if there be Incomprehensibility in either case it ought least to be applied with so great Derogation to the Power of God This Power working immediately by the Act of the Will is an incommunicable Perfection of God and a part of that Glory which he will give to no other and therefore it is impossible that any Creature could create and no more consistent than that God should make more Gods Whatsoever is effectuate by sole Will is an Act of Creation whether it be the Production of a Substance of a Power yea or of a Mode or Accident or any thing above the Powers of Nature or Grace Therefore no Creature can be any more than the Instrument of working a Miracle and that only when God willeth the individual Act and no Creature can have a Power to work Miracles of any kind as the Creature willeth or that God should work a Miracle at the choice of the Creature which were a Dependance unbecoming his Majesty We must not think that the Faith of Miracles was an Arbitrary Habit as when Christ said to his Disciples If ye had Faith as a grain of Mustard-seed ye should say to this Mountain Be removed hence and cast into the Sea it imports no more than that God at that time for Confirmation of the Gospel would make them Instruments of some particular Acts of supernatural Power as he moved them yet not at their Desire but his own There is a groundless Imagination that hath much spread it self That God hath given a Power to all Men or to all Christians to produce Effects in Creatures by their firm and full Perswasion and Desire that these Effects should be and that they are not such Effects is because few or none attain to that Perswasion and so the very Power vanisheth and were frustraneous and inconsistent with the Wisdom of God that doth nothing in vain as well as with the incommunicable Power of God I pray God Men would advert and consider what ground there is to believe that God hath given a Power to a Priest or Minister that at his Desire so oft as he pleases to express the words of Consecration of Bread and Wine in the Eucharist the most stupendous Miracles should then arise of course or that by their Consecration the Elements should have a Power or Efficacy to confer Grace or otherwise to confirm it than that by the solemn Preparation of the Heart and the earnest Prayer of the Creature God would more readily grant their Desire than at other times or how by applying the Water in Baptism at Desire Original Sin should be forgiven or Grace should be given which incroacheth not only upon the incommunicable Power of God but upon his Wisdom that he should give Grace to all that were baptized which in the most part would prove frustraneous by being lost They do not a little derogate from the Omnipotence of God who imagine that the very Nature and Essence of a created Will doth inseparably imply that God cannot otherwise determine it but by perswading yet no Perswasion can be so strong but it can reject it and choose the contrary whereby they fancy that they can clear God from any Accession to Sin even by Permission as if his Purity could not be preserved but by the loss of his Omnipotence So that God has done all that is in his absolute Power to make every Rational Creature holy and happy Yet the Pretext is vain for it cannot be imagined that God should be so mean an Orator that he could not perswade Men to go to all Nations to preach and spread Books perswading them to embrace the true Religion which yet he hath not done and yet he hath done all that he could do not by his absolute Power but by his regulate Power by his most wise and holy Decrees They might with more Pretext have said that God in his Freedom and Wisdom had decreed that he would make no farther use of his Power but by Perswasion yet that would have incorached upon his Wisdom and Soveraignty that he hath made Creatures which he could not effectually govern so that it is without all ground in Reason or Revelation that he hath so decreed It is a very brutish Pretence that it were a brute Power and not rational to infuse Habits or Inclinations in Rational Creatures seeing these infused Powers act at the Judgment and Choice of Reason though in some cases without Hesitation or Deliberation are Creatures perswaded to desire their own Well-being or Parents perswaded to love their own Children or any to pity the injured miserable MEDITATION VII Upon the Oneness of God IT is impossible and inconsistent that there could be more Gods than one both for the Omniscience and the Omnipotence of God for God is capable of no Imperfection and therefore is impassible He knows not by any outward Impression or Manifestation but from Reflection upon his own Nature and Decrees by which he knows what will be the Effects of the Capacities he hath decreed to give to Creatures and by his own over-ruling them for his Glory Therefore there can be no more Decrees but those which are in that Omniscient view if there were any other they could only be known by extrinsick Manifestations wherein God behoved to be Passive So neither are such Decrees possible nor the Actings of them nor could they be known in a way consistent with the Divine Perfection It is as evidently inconsistent there could be more Omnipotents than one for if they were equal in Power none of them could be Omnipotent for they could resist one another and so have no effectual Power and if they were unequal in Power the weaker could not be Omnipotent The Omniscience and Omnipotence of God are his most evident Perfections even by the Light of Nature and his Oneness is fully and frequently asserted in Scripture Scripture hath also revealed the Trinity in the Divine Nature which is the Foundation of the Salvation of the Elect carried along through the whole Current and Oeconomy of the Divine Decrees and Dispensations relating to Mankind from the Beginning revealing that the Seed of the Woman should bruise the Head of the Serpent and by all that is said of the Messiah in the Old Testament and of Christ in both Testaments But it is declared to be a Mystery and the greatest Mystery ushered in with an unparallel'd note of Attention 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Great is the Mystery of Gidliness God manifested in the Flesh. Therefore the Trinity of Persons must be consistent with the Oneness of God and it must be a nearer Oneness than that of Individuals of one kind yet not such an Oneness as if there were but one Divine
A VINDICATION OF THE Divine Perfections Illustrating the Glory of God In Them By Reason and Revelation Methodically Digested into several MEDITATIONS By a Person of Honour LONDON Printed by J. D. for Brabazon Aylmer at the Three Pigeons in Cornhill M DC XC V. The PREFACE THE essential and absolute Perfections of which the Deity is possest for ever are the Object of our supream Reverence and Adoration Love and Joy Affiance and Trust. The comprehensive Knowledg of them infinitely exceeds our finite Faculties but their Discovery is of God which is of gradual Accomplishment according to our Conceptions and Capacities and in order to our transforming Contemplation of him in his imitable Excellencies The Light of Reason like the early Morning when the Shadows of the Night are mix'd with the Light of the Day affords some glimmering Notices and scattered Glances of the Divine Essence and Attributes The Light of Faith like the ascending Light of the Sun that dispels the Mists in the Air gives a more clear and extensive Discovery The Light of Glory like the Sun in its full Lustre reveals them in the most resplendent manner In the whole Frame of Nature in the Variety and Union of its Parts in their Order and Efficacy the Wisdom Power and Goodness of the Divine Maker appear or rather shine his Attributes and Excellencies are visibly signed and engraven on his Works But since the Revolt and Ruine of Man the Understanding is strangely darkned and disordered in its Operations Of this there is sad Evidence in the numberless Errors that swarm'd in the World concerning God The Heathen Notions of him were in such a degree of Deformity as infinitely blasphem'd his Nature It will be sufficient to mention one fundamental Error To the enlightned Mind the Divine Perfections carry their Evidence in a Circle one Attribute illustrates and strongly infers another yet they could not conceive the absolute Perfection of God's Nature but fancied every Attribute to be a singular Deity These portentous Mistakes did not proceed from the Defect of Visibility in the Object but of Sight in the Eye of Reason so weakned and vitiated in our lapsed State It pleased therefore the Father of Lights in his admirable Mercy to afford a new Revelation of himself to the Minds of Men. The same Heavenly Inspiration from whence the reasonable Soul proceeds was requisite to renew the true Knowledg of God in it The sacred Scripture is the Medium of this Revelation wherein are such Characters of the Deity that none but a perverse Mind can suspect it not to be the Word of God In that Glass his most Divine Perfections are revealed Wisdom Goodness Holiness Justice that are principally exercised in the Moral Government of the World The external Revelation of God's Nature and compassionate Counsels in the Gospel when productive of an inward Revelation to the Mind so powerful as to regulate the Will and Affections is of saving Efficacy The wise Men with the Direction of a miraculous Star had internal Illumination that discovered the Incarnate Son of God and Saviour of the World to them The Light of Faith is as much below the Light of Glory as 't is above the Light of Nature Now the Manifestation of God is temper'd to our frail Faculties if his transcendent Excellencies were display'd to us we should be swallowed up in Extasy and Astonishment But in the future State where the Natural Body shall be spiritualized we shall know as we are known In Heaven God shines by direct Beams the clear and uninterrupted Vision of his Glory is the Cause and Consummation of the Felicity of Angels and Saints for ever We begin our Heaven here by the attentive and transforming Contemplation of the Deity The Noble Author of the following Discourses has obliged the wise and inquiring Christians by communicating his Treasures The Clearness and Vigor of his Spirit are illustriously visible in managing a Subject so deep and difficult And as in the blessed God there is a Union of all glorious and amiable Excellencies as are perfective of our Minds and attractive of our Wills so in our Author's unfolding them there is joined with the strength of Argument that Beauty of Perswasion as may enlighten and engage all under standing Readers to be happy in the entire Choice of God for their everlasting Portion We have here an imitable and instructive Example to Great Men the Dignity of whose Stations in the World too commonly seems to plead an Exemption from a more sedulous Intention and Application of Mind to the Affairs of Religion that have final Reference to another World This Performance of the Noble Author shows it to be a thing not impracticable as it is most Praise-worthy amidst the greatest secular Employments to find Vacancy and a Disposition of Spirit to look with a very inquisitive Eye into the deep Things of God Which if it were the Author's Pleasure to be known would let it be seen the Statesman and the Divine are not Inconsistencies to a great and comprebensive Mind so as to consider them with Distinction and without confounding them or making the two Spheres intersect one another so as that in so large a Theological Work here is no mixture of Political Matters except wherein the Nature of the things themselves they are contiguous And were it not so or if this Work concern'd Policies and Governments by Men it were without our Compass to recommend it to the World Which having had some Taste of it we make so much haste to do as not to allow our selves the Pleasure of engrossing it or of perusing it alone till we have imparted it and made it possible to others to partake with us therein W. BATES J. HOWE THE CONTENTS Meditation I. INtroductory 1 II. Upon God's being a Spirit 19 III. Upon the Self-existence and Eternity of God 28 IV. Upon God's Omniscience 36 V. Upon the Will and Pleasure of God 67 VI. Upon the Power of God 78 VII Upon the Oneness of God 89 VIII Upon God's Freedom 140 IX Upon the Blessedness of God implying his Self-sufficiency Self-comprehension his infinite Love to and Delight in Himself 118 X. Upon God's Holiness or Godlikeness 126 Page XI Upon the Unchangeableness of God 141 XII Upon the Goodness of God 150 XIII Upon the Truth of God 168 XIV Upon the Justice of God 179 XV. Upon the Mercy of God 200 XVI Upon the Faithfulness of God 213 XVII Upon the Wisdom of God 224 XVIII Upon the Dominion of God and his Dispensations thereof towards his Rational Creatures especially by the Covenant of Works and the Covenant of Grace 257 MEDITATION I. Introductory The greatest Duty of Man towards God is to delight in God as in the most excellent and most amiable Object It is also the highest Accomplishment of Man's Happiness for by delighting in God he doth enjoy him Delight can only arise from the Knowledg of the lovely Object in the Perfections thereof And according to
Subject For instance tho there never had been a Triangle in the World it ever was an unquestionable Verity that every Triangle hath three Angles for the Verity consists only in the Consequence and is an hypothetical Verity no ways inferring the existence of the Triangle or any of these Angles but only if the Subject be existent the Attributes must likewise be existent and therefore that in Vacuity there must be conceived Longitude Latitude and Profundity and all the Demonstrations founded thereupon do only prove the truth of the Consequence and Connexion but neither the existence of the Subject nor of these Attributes The Implications of a Self-existent Being having been thus explicated I am fully perswaded that God and God alone is Self-existent having his Existence originally in himself and deriving the same from no efficient Cause from no constituent or component Cause and that he himself is his own last End and is not a subordinate End to any other No Creature is capable of these Qualifications jointly for tho a Creature may be without composition of Parts no Creature can be without an efficient Cause neither can any Creature have its Existence in it self and of it self Nothing but God can have it Self for its last End tho many Creatures do desire and imagine themselves to be their last End and do obey and serve God not for himself as the last End of that Service but for shunning Evil and procuring Good from him as their last End tho they may have that desire as a subordinate End yet they cannot attain it if they make it their last End and so can neither justly nor effectually design it Selfishness in Creatures is a capital Vice and the original of very many Vices for God hath printed a Principle upon every Soul that they should not prefer their own Interest to the common Interest of Mankind much less to the Honour and Pleasure of God and therefore selfish Love in Creatures is Vicious Self-Love in God is sutable and congruous to his Glorious Natural Perfections There is nothing more Excellent nor is there any thing having any Proportion of Excellency to him The Scripture hath clearly exprest that he hath made all things for Himself and that of him and for him are all things I do very much dislike the Opinion of these modern Philosophers who say that God's Existence is from Himself and his Preservation is from his own Will which do import that he is the cause of his own Being and Preservation and that by his own Will for thereby he should not be without a Cause of his Existence and Preservation In this Meditation I have joined the Eternity of God with his Self-existence not only as consequent from it but rather as implied in it for whatsoever is existent without a Cause of its Existence must necessarily have been ever existent and had never a beginning of Existence it is necessarily consequent that no other thing could have Capacity to annihilate the Self-existent Being of God and therefore his Existence must necessarily continue to Eternity The Notions and Subtilties of School-men suppose and contemplate an abstract Endurance common to God and Creatures as a real Perfection which they derive from the continued successive Mutations such as they perceive in Plants and Animals which from the first appearance of their Existence have constant Mutations whereby they grow up to their Perfection gradually and decline from it until they die Though that every Mutation is not sensibly different from the former yet they imagine it is really different which yet is not always true for there may be continuance in one Condition without Alteration and there may be unequal Advances and Recesses yet there are still notable Periods as Infancy Pupillarity Minority Majority perfect Age declining Age and old Age and their Imagination makes this Endurance as if it did consist of so many points of Time as the Body consists of so many of its most minute parts or points albeit there be not the like Reality in both In this way the Calculation of Time might have been by the Periods in the Lives of Adam's Posterity and for the most part is so calculated in the Scripture for thereby it is known who were prior concomitant and posterior of the Fathers in the Line of Scripture And therein not only their beginning to have Children at their perfect Age but their continuance of their begetting Sons and Daughters is exprest although the continuance of their Lives be more accurately exprest by the Years that is by the Revolutions of the Sun in its proper Course So the Scriptures express in what Years of the Life of the Fathers their Posterity were born and in what Year after the birth of the Predecessors they died By the Chronology of Scripture there is a clear account from the Creation of Adam to Abram and an exact AEra from the Creation of the World by the Revolutions of the Sun in the Zodiack having no other Difficulty but in what State the Earth was where Adam was created which is far more probable to have been when the Fruits of the Trees were ripe seeing God did allow Adam to make use of all the Fruits of Herbs and Trees except the Forbidden Tree So the Harvest Equinoctial is the most proper Commencement of Time But after the time of Abraham and his Sons there was no more Lineal Deduction of the Time from Fathers to Sons and so the exact Calculation of the number of Years from the Creation was no more certain but the several Nations calculated the Time from some notable Occurrence which had been most observed where they lived and so there became many different AEra's from which the Calculation of the Number of Years commenceth So the Romans calculated Time from the building of Rome and Christians from the birth of Christ and the Mahometans from the flight of Mahomet The Annual Revolution of the Sun is the most evident Succession of Motion and therefore hath been commonly made the Standard and Rule of Successive Alterations by which it 's known when they did occur yet some Nations did calculate by the Monthly Revolutions of the Moon especially the Egyptians who had a vast number of Years during the Reigns of their Dynasties which therefore must either be fabulous or calculated by the Revolutions of the Moon Albeit the constant and regular successive Motion of the Sun be properly the endurance of the Time of the Sun and so is the rule of the Time of all other regular successive Alterations yet nothing can properly be said to have the Duration of Time but what hath these Regular Vicissitudes such as Plants and Animals whose successive Alterations are calculated by the common Motion of the Sun yet only as by an extrinsick Denomination by comparing these Vicissitudes with the Motion of the Sun but their proper intrinsick Alteration is that whereby they have an endurance in Time because they have a Beginning a Progress and a
glorious Excellency of God in relation to a particular Creature and his Glory shining forth to the whole Creation and must produce a far greater measure of Love and Reverence which are much weakened by attributing any thing to him unworthy of him However none can justly blame me to clear my own Thoughts and raise them as high as I can and I do bless God for the increase of Love and Reverence he gives me thereby I am perswaded that the rise of most of God's Decrees and Dispensations are from the Congruity thereof to his natural Perfections as becoming and being worthy of such a Being I say it is a Congruity to his natural not to his moral Perfections for he is not just because he is true nor true because he is just nor gracious or merciful because he is just or true But when I consider what is congruous to worthy and becoming a Spirit omniscient omnipotent self-existent all-sufficient infinitely blessed free and independent and then put the Question to my self Must not such a Being be just exactly fulfilling all his Promises incouraging and rewarding the Good discouraging and punishing the Evil according to their Merit I am fully perswaded he must be such not by a fatal Necessity nor by meer Indifferency but by a voluntary and free Choice And when I further pose my self whether such a Being will only perform his Promises reward and punish according to Merit I am convinced it is congruous to him to be good bountiful gracious and merciful beyond what his Justice requires and that without any Bounds as in his Justice which precisely follows his Promise or what is congruous for him to do upon occasion of the good or evil Actions of his Creatures When I consider Whether such a Being will always express his Mind truly and never deceive I can have no doubt of it If again I consider Whether such a Being will ever choose fitted Means for all his Purposes and do nothing in vain I am assured that he is infinite in Wisdom and will do nothing in vain And lastly when I consider Whether such a Being will ever be constant in his Purpose and be unchangeable therein and in his Justice Bounty Truth and Wisdom I know he cannot change in these because they are all congruous to his unchangeable Nature By this Congruity I understand God's Holiness or Godlikeness that is that God acteth always like himself There is nothing more frequently inculcated in Scripture than Godliness and Holiness which are originally and principally attributed to God and in Analogy to his Rational Creatures it shall be the eternal Exclamation of all God's happy Creatures Holy Holy Holy Lord God Almighty I do not take Holiness to be as a Metaphysical Abstract from all God's Moral Perfections but that it is the precise and formal Reason why they are morally good Holiness in the Creature or Godlikeness which is the same consists chiefly in the Creatures being Godlike that is imitating the Divine Moral Perfections in being just being true prudent and constant but in other Duties of Holiness the Likeness to God is more analogical and less proper The Analogy consists in this that as God acteth always congruously to the Divine Nature so the Rational Creatures ought to act congruously to that Nature and those Principles that God hath freely imprinted in their Minds so they ought to adore God to obey him in all his Commands to trust in him and to be temperate in every thing and to subordinate Self-love to the Love of God Holiness is also taken for the Destination of things to the Service of God and separated from common Use which therefore is called Consecration I know the immediate Rule of the Creatures is the Will of God obliging them to obey not only what is congruous to the Divine Nature or to their own Nature but whatsoever positive Law or Precept God doth command tho the Matter be indifferent and that they may sufficiently be assured that he will never command any thing incongruous to himself yet it is of great use to know the difference between Moral and Positive Commands for the Glory and Amiableness of God appeareth far more in the one than in the other albeit the Positive Commands of God do indispensibly require full Obedience which is from an inbred Principle in the Mind of all Rational Creatures I am not troubled that it may be said that the Scripture Phrase is most of the Perfection of God and of his Justice Goodness Mercy and Truth for all is still mentioned as his Holiness and Godlikeness and many Cases do and may occur that we cannot so clearly refer to these particular Terms as we can know whether it be congruous for God so to do or not neither doth the Scripture express and define wherein Holiness consists but by the Expression of Godliness or Likeness to God And altho Perfection be frequently attributed to God yet Godliness is a more distinct Term for we must not explicate Godliness by Perfection or Goodness lest we should fall in the Apprehension that hath misled many that God would have shown more Goodness to have prevented all Sin and that there must be more Worlds than this at least more Species of Creatures than upon the Earth but we must explain God's Goodness with Congruity to his Nature which comprehends his Freedom whereby it is not congruous to him to communicate all the Good he can which would never terminate nor be stable but that he acteth freely and that it were impossible for us to know what Good he hath done or will do if he had not revealed it Some of the Fathers and many since have fallen into that Error that God's Goodness doth not admit that he should punish any Creature eternally and tho the Scripture says the contrary expresly they produce other places to prove that Eternity is sometimes taken for a very long Time Becomingness or Decency is vulgarly attributed to the Modes or Forms of Behaviour and so it is said by the Apostle Let all things be done decently and in order which doth neither declare nor constitute that Decency as a kind of a Christian Vertue but as a Recommendation of what is expedient The Scripture maketh an express Distinction between that which is unlawful and that which is inexpedient so that kind of Decency is a part of Civility No serious Man can imagine that every undecent Gesture or Expression is a Sin Hence it may seem that the precise Nature of Holiness cannot consist in Becomingness or Congruity to the Nature of God or of Creatures which could only amuse the Vulgar who lay too much weight upon Words and Terms as if the appropriating the Name of Decency or Comeliness to the least of Civil Vertues in which there is no Speciality did import that there were not an higher degree of Decency but if Words import those of the Learned must be of the most Importance The Greeks which were the learnedst of Nations
tho the Debitor were not able to pay it Would ever a rational Creditor exhort his Debitor to pay when he knew he were altogether insolent Hence it is that Pelagians Semi-Pelagians Lutherans Arminians and Papists have all run to a Freedom in Man's Will to perform the saving Acts and many of them have held that Freedom essential to and inseparable from the Will And others have held that Freedom as a Purchase of Christ giving that Capacity to all Mankind by their Birth or to many of them by their Baptism The Pelagians and Semi-Pelagians thought the Powers of Nature were sufficient without any Purchase of Christ as to that The Lutherans and Arminians attribute it to a general Purchase of Christ to all Mankind that they were in a Capacity to believe to be holy and to be saved by their Birth or their Baptism and the Papists hold the same by Baptism administred in that Church and do condemn all others not so baptized What can be more useful satisfying and quieting Mens Consciences in this matter or more illustrating the Wisdom and Justice of God than to extricate these Difficulties and to show the true way of reconciling these apparent Inconsistencies by the wonderful Wisdom of God Showing that by the Covenant of Grace all Men were to be in a Capacity to be saved and none under the absolute necessity of inevitable Misery but through their own deserving fault whereby the Damned shall eternally accuse themselves as the only Authors of their own Damnation and the Glorified shall attribute it wholly to God that they are saved and that it may be well consistent with the Veracity and Sincerity of God to exhort and expostulate with any whether Elect or Reprobate to repent believe and to be holy All which to me is convincingly cleared in that God sincerely offers to all that come to Discretion by their natural Conscience by his Word or by the Motions of his Spirit to give them the Grace of Repentance Faith and Holiness if they do not reject the Offer And so he doth by all Expressions possible expostulate with them why they will not hear and accept but will reject that Offer and so die and perish which is seldom or never ascribed to any other Sin but Misbelief hardning the Heart or rejecting the Counsel of God All which may well consist without any Power in the Person to whom the Offer is made to perform these Duties by themsélves either by the Powers of Nature or any universal Grace given in their Birth or Baptism This will evidently appear and the Consistency will be clear by several Examples First If a King should make a Proclamation of Pardon to all his Rebellious Subjects if they did not reject it might he not sincerely and warrantably expostulate with them if they did reject it might he not exhort them to accept it And yet nothing more evident than that they could not pardon themselves or escape Condemnation being guilty of Death without that general Pardon Secondly If a Person had in Despair drunk down Poison a Physician comes and hath in his Hand an Antidote which he offers and which the Patient continuing in Despair refuses to accept May not this Physician tho he knew the Patient were inflexible exhort him to accept the Antidote wherein he performeth a vertuous Act congruous to his Nature If this Patient continue obstinate were he not a Self-murderer Could he excuse himself from being the Author of his own Death If he should desire the Physician to put the Antidote in his own Hand and in his Choice that he might drink it or throw it upon the ground were it Prudence or Kindness in the Physician so to do Yet nothing is more evident than that this Patient could not cure himself and yet is inexcusable that he was not cured For tho it was not in his Power to cure himself yet it was in his Power not to hinder his Cure These Examples do abundantly show not only the Consistency but the Wisdom of Divine Dispensations towards Mankind All Men are poisoned with Sin yet God convinces all that have the use of Reason that they are Sinners and yet he is merciful to Penitents which is the first step to the Covenant of Grace wherein God will make farther Progress unless the first Motions be rejected which is much clearer as to those to whom the way of God's Dispensations is revealed and inculcated and the Offer of Regeneration Repentance and Faith sincerely made Can any of these pretend that they have not Power to repent or believe seeing the All-sufficient Power of God is offered if it be not rejected and tho God foreknows that the Offer will be rejected yet it is congruous to his gracious and benign Nature to exhort the Acceptance of it and to expostulate for the wilful Rejection thereof as he saith Turn ye turn ye why will ye die O House of Israel As it were not becoming the Physician to put the Antidote in the obstinate Patient's Hand knowing that he would pour it out and lose it So it is not congruous to the Divine Wisdom to give universal Grace knowing that most that were to receive it would throw it away There is indeed this difference between the Offer God the Physician of Souls makes and the Offer of the Antidote by a Physician of the Body that the Power of God is insuperable and can overcome the strongest Aversion and the most wilful Rejection of Sinners And therefore even some of these are in the Election of Grace but that it is not congruous to his glorious Nature to exercise his Power upon all This is evident because he applieth it to none who sin against the Holy Ghost who having tasted of the Powers of the World to come do Despight unto the Spirit of God Nor do any of his Divine Perfections incline him to overcome the Resistance of all other obstinate Sinners and therefore God may justly say Behold ye Rejecters and wonder and perish This way doth well quadrate with and is much confirmed by the signal Sentence of the most universally applauded of all the Fathers and the greatest Antipelagian Augustine saying Deut neminem deserit nisi à quo prius deseritur God forsaketh none but those that first forsake him This must import more than forgetting neglecting or not obeying God It must imply an Application to God and Consideration whether to cleave to Sin or endeavour to return to him with Consideration of a possibility of it and an Offer of Mercy upon Repentance and after all a rejecting of the Offer and resolving not to repent but to cleave to Sin either absolutely or for a time as most do who leave Repentance to old Age or Death-bed that in the mean time they may enjoy their beloved Sins I shall conclude with craving humble Pardon for what through the Weakness of my Capacity I have thought or said unsutably to the Infinite Perfections of my most glorious God and with this Acknowledgment and Exaltation of the Bounty Mercy and Faithfulness of God towards Mankind in the most profound Veneration adore Him saying Holy Holy Holy Lord God Almighty Heaven and Earth are full of the Glory and of thy Grace which thou freely and effectually givest to all Men capable of the Offer of Grace who do not reject that Offer by sinning against the Holy Ghost or cleaving obstinately to their other known and predominant Sins from which they refuse to be reclaimed yet thou savest some of these by thy superabundant and insuperable Grace pulling them as Firebrands out of the Fire And all by the Merits and Mediation of thy only Son our Saviour the Lord Jesus Christ. To the Father Son and Eternal Spirit consubstantial in Personal Trinity and individual Unity be Glory eternally World without end Amen FINIS ADVERTISEMENTS NEwly printed The Holy Bible containing the Old Testament and the New with Annotations and Parallel Scriptures To which is annexed the Harmony of the Gospels As also the Reduction of the Jewish Weights Coins and Measures to our English Standards And a Table of the Promises in Scripture By Samuel Clark Minister of the Gospel Printed in Folio of a very fair Letter and excellent Paper the like never besore in one Volume The four Last Things viz. Death Judgment Heaven Hell Practically consider'd and applied in several Discourses By William Bates D. D. Both printed for B. Aylmer Zanchius More