God the first-born of every Creature For by him were all things created that are in Heaven and that are in Earth visible and invisible whether they be Thrones or Dominions or Principalities or Powers All things were created by him and for him And he is before all things and by him all things consist And he is the Head of the Body the Church who is the beginning the first-born from the dead that in all things he might have the Preheminence For it pleased the Father that in him all Fulness should dwell And having made Peace through the Blood of his Cross by him to reconcile all things unto himself whether things in Earth or things in Heaven God who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the Fathers by the Prophets hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son whom he hath appointed Heir of all things by whom also he made the Worlds Who being the Brightness of his Glory and the express Image of his Person and upholding all things by the Word of his Power when he had by himself purged our Sins sat down on the Right-hand of the Majesty on high For unto the Son he saith Thy Throne O God is for ever and ever a Scepter of Righteousness is the Scepter of thy Kingdom Because God hath appointed a Day in the which he will judg the World in Righteousness by that Man whom he hath ordained whereof he hath given Assurance unto all Men in that he hath raised him from the dead Now it is easier for Heaven and Earth to pass than one tittle of the Law to fail The Son of Man shall come in his Glory and all the holy Angels with him then shall he sit upon the Throne of his Glory and before him shall all Nations be gathered Then the foolish Virgins that neglected opportunity to provide Oil shall be excluded Heaven They that in divers Instances agreed in one Consent to prefer and over-value present Animal Enjoyments before the Lord's Invitation to his Marriage-Supper shall never taste of Eternal Life They that thought it a hard Saying and not to be born the Command of our Lord to crucify the Flesh with the Affections and Lusts to renounce a vain Conversation and a Conformity to the Fashion of the World which passeth away that refuse to deny self to take up the Cross to cut off right Hand and Foot and pluck out right Eye and cast them away All such must hear and perish for ever under that dreadful Word Depart from me ye cursed into everlasting Fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels But on the other side to those who believed the Truth as it is in Jesus without contradicting or blaspheming received it in Love and the Obedience of Faith not holding it in Unrighteousness the King shall say Come ye blessed of my Father inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the Foundation of the World But where shall ungodly Sinners appear that send after the Lord Jesus into Heaven this Rebel Message We will not have this Man to reign over us That renounce the Satisfaction and Redemption of Christ that blasphemously deny the Deity of Jesus Christ the Lord of Glory they shall say to the Mountains and Rocks Fall on us and hide us from the Face of him that sitteth on the Throne and from the Wrath of the Lamb For the great Day of his Wrath is come and who shall be able to stand Few Men have been found in any Age or Country to have filled their Hearts with such profligate Madness to deny God Indeed Cicero saith that Epicurus while in words he allowed a Deity he did really and by pretended Notions utterly disavow the Providence of God without which the Name of God must be an empty and contemptible Sound For as Cicero observes if the Fear of God and Reverential Regard to the actual Providence of God be denied or weakened thereby also the common Faith and Security of human Society and the Ground and Foundation of universal commutative and distributive Justice is altogether subverted The Psalmist affirms that the Fool hath said in his Heart there is no God That is the Disposition and working of his Heart in the desperate Wickedness and unexpressible Deceitfulness of all its Purposes and vain Imagination to avow the casting off the regard of God Therefore the Psalmist immediately adds They have done abominable Works there is none that doth good Accordingly the Psalmist again expresses The Transgression of the wicked saith within my Heart that there is no Fear of God before his Eyes For he flattereth himself in his own Eyes until his Iniquity be found to be hateful It is therefore most irrational Dementation to detract from the infinite Perfections of the Eternal God for thereby Man is left in a wretched Condition more abject than that of the Beast which perishes liable to the Miseries of this Life without the help of the Awe and Encouragement of future Punishments and Rewards There needs not any Foreign Topick of Argumentation to prove the Existence of God and his absolute Soveraignty over all Beings For the Conscience of Good and Evil radicated in every human Intelligence is a continual and unanswerable Evidence of the infinite Perfections of the Eternal God blessed for ever It is most absurd Folly and Contradiction to own a Nominal God and to deny the Essential Attributes of the infinite Perfection of the Deity Eternal Being Truth and Goodness are the infinite Perfections of one Almighty All-sufficient God Eternity of Being implies Original Essential Existence absolutely simple altogether independent wholly immutable universally powerful every-where present From whence flows Almighty Power to create and uphold all things according to his Will to be the only Cause of all other Beings and of all Causes of their Life with all distinct and proper Abilities thereof of their Operation with all the Powers of Exercise Rules or Limits to direct and govern and End of Performance Of their Subsistence with all Circumstances of Time and Place for the Beginning Continuance or Progress and finishing their Course with all diversity and alterations of Condition therein Sustentation and Regulation as necessarily flowing from and depending upon God as Origination Truth is original eternal infinite Righteousness and Holiness and Knowledg the Perfection of excellent Eminence whereby the Divine Majesty and Essence is infinitely exalted above and separated from all possibility of Communion with or Respect unto Vanity Impurity Unrighteousness or Wickedness and doth satisfyingly rest in his own All-sufficient Soveraignty Thence derives and dispenses to all Creatures the Law of Truth to guide and direct inherently the Sustentation Operation and final Determination of all Beings according to their several respective Natures for the mutual Support Preservation and Comfort of the Universe all in subordinate necessary Subjection to the supreme Obedience unto the Will of God and ultimate
Man concerning his Justification but only a true and lively Faith which nevertheless is the Gift of God and not Man's only Work without God And yet that Faith does not shut out Repentance Hope Love Dread and the Fear of God to be joined with Faith in every Man that is justified but it shutteth them out from the Office of justifying So that altho they be all present together in him that is justified yet they justify not altogether Nor the Faith also doth not shut out the Justice of our good Works necessarily to be done afterwards of Duty towards God for we are most bounden to serve God in doing good Deeds commanded by him in his holy Scripture all the days of our Life but it excludeth them so that we may not do them to this intent to be made good by doing of them For all the good Works that we can do be unperfect and therefore not able to deserve for our Justification But our Justification doth come freely by the meer Mercy of God and of so great and free Mercy that whereas all the World was not able of themselves to pay any part towards their Ransom it pleased our Heavenly Father of his insinite Mercy without any our desert or deserving to prepare for us the most precious Jewels of Christ's Body and Blood whereby our Ransom might be fully paid the Law fulfilled and his Justice fully satisfied So that now Christ is the Righteousness of all them that truly do believe in him He for them paid their Ransom by his Death he for them fulfilled the Law in his Life So that now in and by him every true Christian Man may be called a Fulfiller of the Law forasmuch as that which their Infirmity lacked Christ's Justice hath supplied Now that the most important Truths which have been represented in this small Treatise may appear in right Light let the following Propositions be duly considered according to Reason enlightned and directed by the Word of God God having given to Man an Intellectual Faculty to judg and discern of the Nature Use and Excellency of Things a Conscience of the Laws of things morally good or evil and the certain inseparable Appendixes of Rewards and Punishments are imprinted upon the Mind with inward experimental Assurances as certain as that we know that we are and have a Being The Demonstrations of which Truths are clearly manifested in the Word of God the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament which do not only move and perswade but effectually constrain and inforce an enlightened Soul to yield Obedience to the incomparable and undeniable Divine Authority thereof as to the Fountain of all saying Knowledg and the Standard and Rule of all holy Practice in order to everlasting Blessedness the supreme End and Felicity of Man Now as Mathematical Theorems tho equally demonstrable yet are not alike perceived and apprehended by every Human Mind the Faculty not being rightly disposed to the Object as in species visible it is not sufficient that the Object and Medium be duly disposed unless the Organ be suifficiently enabled and not disturbed For neither a blind Eye nor a Jaundice Sight can judg of Colours Accordingly the holy Scriptures which are the lively Oracles of God full of Lights and Perfections do fully demonstrate the great Mysteries of Godliness concerning the eternal invisible yet certain and necessary Felicities and Duties of Rational Intelligent Beings whose Immortality also is therein undeniably proved Yet notwithstanding all these glorious and excellent Truths of the Spirit of God are not received by Animal Minds to whom they are Foolishness as all sort of Wisdom is to Fools because of the Blindness and Ignorance of the Understanding the Mind it self the governing Power in Man being vitiated with the sussusion of Vanity and the deceitfulness of Sin until the Power of the Spirit come into the Soul with a quickning renewing restoring Demonstration upon the Intellectual Faculty to make it receive in Love the benign Influences of eternal Truth and Goodness Accordingly consider duly 1. That from everlasting to everlasting God is Infinite in his Perfection of all Divine Incomprehensible Attributes whose Essence is eternally in and of himself and gives and preserves all Beings which were made for his Pleasure and Glory according to his own Will not out of any necessity of Nature his Majesty being exalted above all Blessings and Praise so that his infinite Essential Glory cannot be liable to any Addition or Detraction from any Creature 2. That in the beginning of Time God condescended to manifest his immense Wisdom Power and Goodness in the Creation of the World and all Beings therein by the Word of his Power by which all things are upheld and do consist All being made and preserved for the Glory of God according to the Original Law of the Will of God respectively dispensed to every Being 3. That all things were made for distinct final Causes appointed by the Law of God to be the Rule for the Operation of Life conferr'd upon every Being 4. That the Providence of God doth actually effectually continually govern and over-rule all the Actions and Operations of all Beings to his Glory according to his determinate Counsels For known unto God are all his Works from the beginning of the World so that all contingent Effects and Actions of all created Beings are not only futurely turned and disposed but primarily decreed and ordered to be infallibly subservient for the Glory of God's eternal Truth Justice and Goodness 5. That as Activity and Operation is the necessary Expression of Life it is also necessary that there be an universal Law to direct regulate and judg the Affections and Actions of all Intelligent Beings Which Law can only be the holy and righteous Will of God the Creator of all Beings who only can righteously reward and punish all Actions 6. God made Man upright in his Divine Image 〈◊〉 Righteousness Knowledg and Holiness with Freedom of Will but under a Covenant of Life upon Obedience and of Death upon Disobedience which is Sin For Sin is the rebellious Transgression of the Law 7. Man tho made upright being left to the Freedom of his Will rebelled against and renounced God his Creator in his all-sufficient Truth and Goodness and sought out and embraced the Vanity and Iniquity of the Devil's Lie by which Apostacy and Rebellion Mankind fell into a state of the Condemnation and Corruption of Death which is endless Misery according to the righteous Judgment of God 8. The first Parents of Mankind were not only Persons individual but common Representatives of all their Posterity The Evidence whereof necessarily flows form the Consideration of the Covenant of Life which God made with Man when created and placed in Paradise The eating of the Tree of Knowledg of Good and Evil being threatned with Death which passed upon all Mankind both Infants and Adult according to the righteous Denunciation of God and the Consent of
Aim and Regard to the Glory of God The Effect of this eternal Truth is the Stream of Truth the Law of universal Justice Righteousness Equity by God implanted in the Nature of all Rational Creatures to direct and judg all their Affections and Actions This is Truth scoffed by the Profane vainly discoursed by Morosophists found possessed and enjoyed as the Happiness of all that fear and love God This assigns the End to all Controversy is the Standard of Conscience and the Basis of all Rational Conversation The Manifestation of this Truth is the revealed Will of God For Knowledg in God both satisfyingly comprehends the All-sufficient Perfection of the Divine Essence and effectually determines and appoints the Nature Operation Use and End of all Beings to his Glory According to the Conformity to or Alienation from this Eternal Truth is the Result of Happiness or Misery to every Rational Being For Divine Truth and Goodness are convertible and inseparable God only is good originally essentially infinitely eternally all-sufficiently Goodness is the Root the Branches are Love God is Love Mercy God is the Father of Mercies Consolation God is the God of all Comfort Patience and Long-suffering God is the God of Patience and his Long-suffering is Salvation his Loving-kindness is better than Life Forgiveness is with the Lord that he may be feared Let Israel hope in the Lord for with the Lord there is Mercy and with him is plenteous Redemption But this abundant Mercy is not in any respect Encouragement to Presumption or continuance in Sin for that is to despise the Riches of his Goodness and Forbearance and Long-suffering not knowing that the Goodness of God leadeth to Repentance but after the Hardness and Impenitency of Heart treasureth unto it self Wrath against the day of Wrath and Revelation of the righteous Judgment of God God that dwells in Light inaccessible cannot be perceived and apprehended in any other Manifestation than as he is pleased to reveal himself which can only be in his Word wherein tho there be sufficient Evidence to satisfy a created Intelligence what is the infinite Excellence of the Divine Object of Worship yet it remains absolutely impossible for the most exalted created Mind fully to comprehend the Perfection of the Divine Essence Notwithstanding what is revealed thereof as the Object of Faith is replenished with immense Goodness and Beauty to be the all-sufficient and necessary Felicity of an immortal Rational Creature Thus the highest and deepest Mystery concerning the Deity tho not possible to be investigated by human Capacity yet being revealed by the Word of Divine Truth necessarily constrains the Understanding Will and Affections to adore believe and receive in Love the Truth of this glorious Mystery The Manifestation of the Divine Essence cannot possibly be arrived at but by such Revelation as God is pleased to make of himself No Man knoweth the Son but the Father neither knoweth any Man the Father save the Son and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him Neither can any Man say that Jesus is the Lord but by the Holy Ghost The Ladder of Divine Knowledge by which the Mind ascends to God the Top whereof reacheth to Heaven is yet set upon the Earth For altho the very Light is a Covering to the Glory of God yet things material visible and humanly intelligible present the Shadows of excellent Evidence subservient unto the incomprehensible Perfection of Light and Truth of the Trinity in Unity of God the Father Son and Holy Ghost the only and true God blessed for ever There are Signatures in the Nature of created Beings to assist the Mind in its Ascent of approach to behold the Goodness of the glorious Mystery of the Trinity of Persons in the Unity of the Divine Essence The Doctrine of the blessed Trinity is shadowed in all Beings viz. a Trinity of Subsistences in Unity of Essence In every individual material Substance there is Height Length and Breadth In every the same Luminary Orb there is Light Heat fructifying Influence In every Man Understanding Will Affection yet the same univocal Soul In the Godhead was always acknowledged Entity Truth Goodness subsisting in Unity always from the Foundation of the World declared to be eternal Truth of God The holy Scripture declares in the Trinity of the Godhead distinct Properties yet one and the same Infinite Essence and in every Person of the Godhead Attributes incommunicable to any but God Creation of all things is assigned to the Son of God to the eternal Word of God John 1.1 2 3. In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God The same was in the beginning with God All things were made by him and without him was not any thing made that was made Both the Creation and the Sustentation of all things are assigned to the Son of God Heb. 1.1 2 3. God who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in times past unto the Fathers by the Prophets Hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son whom he hath appointed Heir of all things by whom also he made the Worlds Who being the Brightness of his Glory and the express Image of his Person and upholding all things by the Word of his Power when he had by himself purged our Sins sat down on the Right-hand of the Majesty on high The Knowledg of the Heart of every Man is assigned to the Son of God Joh. 2.25 Who needed not that any should testify of Man for he knew what was in Man Compared with I Kings 8.39 For thou even thou only knowest the Hearts of all the Children of Men. Isa 6.1 5. the Prophet saith I saw also the Lord sitting upon a Throne high and lifted up Then said I Wo is me for mine Eyes have seen the King the Lord of Hosts This Vision of Jehova is expresly applied to our Lord Jesus Christ Joh. 12.41 These things said Esaias when he saw his Glory and spake of him Also Joh. 2.24 25. But Jesus did not commit himself to them because he knew all Men And needed not that any should testify of Man for he knew what was in Man I Joh. 5.20 speaking of Jesus Christ This is the true God and Eternal Life Also to the Holy Ghost the Scripture assigns the Creation of the World Gen. 1.2 And the Earth was without Form and void and Darkness was upon the Face of the Deep and the Spirit of God moved upon the Face of the Waters And God said Let there be Light and there was Light Likewise the Works of Divine Providence Isa 63.10 But they rebelled and vexed his holy Spirit Where is he that put his holy Spirit within him The Spirit of the Lord caused him to rest so didst thou lead thy People to make thy self a glorious Name The Work of Regeneration is ascribed to the Holy Ghost John 3.5 Except a Man be born of the Water and of the