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A61711 Sermons and discourses upon several occasions by G. Stradling ... ; together with an account of the author. Stradling, George, 1621-1688.; Harrington, James, 1664-1693. 1692 (1692) Wing S5783; ESTC R39104 236,831 593

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up the Law of Nature each Pagan may confute an Infidel and each Sinner himself That there is a God to be worshipped is founded in that natural Dependence Rational Creatures have on their Creator and that Good and Evil are different things is the Voice and Dictate of Natural Reason too which he that contradicts unmans himself and is to be lookt on as a Monster in Nature Such there have been in all times and which is strange even in those of Divine Revelation for we find the Jews themselves upbraided here with this Impiety which was so much the grosser in them because besides the unwritten they had withall a written Law to instruct them better Both in effect the same the same Precepts in stone and in the heart The Mosaical Law being nothing else but a Digest of that of Nature where the only difference is in the Clearness of the Character For Moses did but display and enlarge the Phylacteries of Nature This was still the Text and all his Precepts but so many Commentaries on it He did but trim up that Candle of the Lord natural Reason which before burnt dim set off Vertue with a better Lustre and expose Vice in its proper shape and hue giving That all its natural Advantage to charm the Eye and painting out This in such lively Colours as might represent it in its utmost Deformity Yet such was the perverse blindness of some that they could see no difference here at all no distinction between an Angel of Light and a Fiend Good and Evil were to them both alike or rather not alike for they preferred Evil to Good did not only confound the Names and Nature of these things but in a cross manner misplace them putting Darkness for Light and Light for Darkness like those Antipodes to mankind who by their strange way of living turn Day into Night and Night into Day This is that abomination the Text takes notice of which drew this severe Imprecation from the Almighty uttered by the mouth of his Prophet Wo unto them that call Evil good c. Which words seem to point to the Jews but are indeed directly levelled at all those who remove the natural Land-marks and Boundaries of Moral Good and Evil and they present us with these three Observations 1. That there is a Real and Natural difference between Vertue and Vice called here Good and Evil. 2. That there always have been and still are such as labour to take away this Difference Men that call Good Evil and Evil Good 3. That to do so To endeavour to alter the Nature and Property of Moral Good and Evil is such a heinous provocation as will inevitably bring a Curse upon it Of these in their Order And 1. That there is a real and natural Difference between Vertue and Vice called here Good and Evil. It seems the Academician and Epicurean Sects were rife in the Prophet Esay's Days who being a loose sort of men and impatient of all natural and moral Restraints would fain perswade themselves and all others That nothing was in it self good or bad that there was no such distinction in Nature but only in the opinion of men who were pleased to make an inclosure where God and Nature had laid all in common Nec natura potest justo secernere iniquum was their fundamental Principle A Principle which because I find taken up and improved by some of the like depraved Judgment and it is the very Source and Fountain of much of that Corruption that is in the World deserves to be considered and the direct way to disprove it will be to make out a real and natural Difference between moral Good and Evil which I shall endeavour to do 1. From the Nature of a Divine Being 2. From our own Make and Constitution 3. From the natural Beauty of Good and Deformity of Evil whereof every Man's Reason is the proper Measure and Judge 4. From such contrary Effects as must of necessity argue a Contrariety in their Causes 1. The first proof of this Truth I shall fetch from God Himself in whose very Nature and Being the difference between Good and Evil is conspicuous For 't is evident that there is something simply Good and something simply Evil even to Divine Being something which God is by the Necessity of his Nature and something which by the same Necessity He cannot be For should I ask Epicurean Christians whether God can be other than what He now is or the Scripture represents Him They must needs resolve the question in the Negative unless they will deny Him to be God or which is the same thing grant him mutable Immutability being so essential to him that what he now is he ever was and what he ever was he ever shall be and cannot chuse but be so Now God from all Eternity was just mercifull good and true 'T is the Description he gives of Himself Exodus 34. 6. The Lord the Lord God merciful and gracious long suffering and abundant in Goodness and Truth And were not these his essential and unalterable Properties the Reverse of that Description might as well befit him which were the highest Blasphemy imaginable and the Manichees needed not to have invented two distinct Principles of Good and Evil when by the Epicurean Doctrine these so contrary things might well enough be reconciled to one and the same Divine Being whereas the Scripture tells us that some things are impossible for God to do As to lye and to be unjust And surely what He cannot Man ought not What is good or bad to Him must be so to us too and what is contrary to the divine can never be a part of humane Perfection If God cannot be other than good mercifull and just Man who was created after his Image must of necessity resemble his Creator and the Copy to be complete in all points answer its Original 2. As indeed it does For upon this account of a natural resemblance 't is that we are said to be Partakers of the divine Nature and God has so wrought and woven his Image into the very frame of our being that like Phidias his Picture in Minerva's Shield it can never be totally defaced without the ruine of that frame And herein also the differences of Good and Evil are apparent For our Passions Fear and Shame especially do manifestly betray them Omne malum aut timore aut pudore persudit natura Nature saith Tertullian hath dasht every Vice with Fear or Shame As for the first of these Fear The continual Frights the pale Countenances and broken Sleeps of wicked Men do plainly argue the inward dissatisfactions of natural Conscience when they doe amiss the guilt of the heart usually spreading it self over the face As on the other side Innocence is ever quiet and bold and they who act by the rules of right reason always calm and serene Of which so apparent contrary effects no better account can be given than