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tion in his nature, to desire and expect what he knows shall never come to pass; or else he did not know but it might, which overthrows his prescience. Yea, and say they expressly, 1" That the hope and expectation of God is deceived by man;" and confess, "that the strength of their strongest argument lies in this, that God hoped and expected obedience from Israel." Secondly, That he complaineth that his hope is deluded, which, being taken properly, and as they urge it, cannot consist with his eternal prescience; for they disesteem the usual answer of divines, that hope, expectation, and such like passions, which include in them any imperfection, are ascribed unto God per aveρwTOTάesiav,-in regard of that analogy his actions hold with such of ours as we perform having those passions.

Thirdly, "They teach that God hath determined nothing concerning such things as these in question. "That God hath determined future contingent things unto either part (I mean such as issue from the free-will of the creature), I abominate, hate, and curse, as false, absurd, and leading us on unto blasphemy," saith Arminius. To determine of them to either part is to determine and ordain whether they shall be, or whether they shall not be; as, that David shall or shall not go up to-morrow against the Philistines, and prevail. Now, the infallibility of God's foreknowing of such things depending on the certainty of his decree and determination, if there be no such thing as this, that also must needs fall to the ground.

Fourthly, 'See what positively they write concerning this everlasting foreknowledge of God:-First, They call it a troublesome question; secondly, They make it a thing disputable whether there be any such thing or no; and though haply it may be ascribed unto God, yet, thirdly, They think it no motive to the worship of him ; fourthly, They say, better it were quite exploded, because the difficulties that attend it can scarcely be reconciled with man's liberty, God's threatenings and promises; yea, fifthly, It seems rather to be invented to crucify poor mortals than to be of any moment in religion. So Episcopius. It may be excepted that this is but one

1 66 Dei spes et expectatio est ab hominibus elusa."--Rem. Scrip. Syn. in cap. v., Isa. v. 1. "In eo vis argumenti est, quod Deus ab Israele obedientiam et sperarit, et expectarit." -Idem, ibid. "Quod Deus de elusa spe sua conqueratur."-Idem, ubi supra.

"Deum futura contingentia, decreto suo determinasse ad alterutram partem (intellige quæ a libera creaturæ voluntate patrantur), falsum, absurdum, et multiplicis blasphemiæ prævium abominor et exsecror."-Armin. Declarat. Senten.

3 "Disquiri permittimus:-1. Operosam illam quæstionem, de scientia futurorum contingentium absoluta et conditionata; 2. Etsi non negemus Deo illam scientiam attribui posse; 3. Tamen an necessarium saluti sit ad hoc ut Deus recte colatur examinari permittimus; 4. Tum merito facessere debent a scholis et ecclesiis, intricatæ et spinosa istæ quæstiones quæ de ea agitari solent,-quomodo illa cum libertate arbitrii, cum seriis Dei comminationibus, aliisque actionibus, consistere possit: quæ omnia crucem potius miseris mortalibus fixerunt, quam ad religionem cultumque divinum, momenti aliquid inquisitoribus suis attulerunt."-Episcopius, Disput. iv. sect. 10.; Rem. Apol., pp. 43, 44.

doctor's opinion. It is true, they are one man's words; but the thing itself is countenanced by the whole sect. As, first, in the large prolix declaration of their opinions, they speak not one word of it; and being taxed for this omission by the professors of Leyden, they vindicate themselves so coldly in their Apology, that some learned men do from hence conclude,' that certainly, in their most secret judgments, all the Arminians do consent with Socinus in ascribing unto God only a conjectural foreknowledge. And one great prophet of their own affirms roundly, " That God, after his manner, oftentimes feareth, that is, suspecteth, and that not without cause, and prudently conjectureth, that this or that evil may arise," Vorstius. And their chiefest patriarchs, " That God doth often intend what he doth not foresee will come to pass," Armin., Corv. Now, whether this kind of atheism be tolerable among Christians or no, let all men judge who have their senses exercised in the word of God; which, I am sure, teaches us another lesson. For,

First, It is laid down as a firm foundation, that "known unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world," Acts xv. 18. Every thing, then, that in any respect may be called his work, is known unto him from all eternity. Now, what in the world, if we may speak as he hath taught us, can be exempted from this denomination? Even actions in themselves sinful are not; though not as sinful, yet in some other regard, as punishments of others. "Behold," saith Nathan to David, in the name of God, "I will take thy wives before thine eyes, and give them unto thy neighbour, and he shall lie with thy wives in the sight of this sun; for thou didst it secretly, but I will do this thing before all Israel," 2 Sam. xii. 11, 12. So, also, when wicked robbers had nefariously spoiled Job of all his substance, the holy man concludeth, "The LORD gave, and the LORD hath taken away," chap. i. 21. Now, if the working of God's providence be so mighty and effectual, even in and over those actions wherein the devil and men do most maliciously offend, as did Absalom and the Sabean with the Chaldean thieves, that it may be said to be his work, and he may be said to "do it" (I crave liberty to use the Scripture phrase), then certainly nothing in the world, in some respect or other, is independent of his all-disposing hand; yea, Judas himself betraying our Saviour did nothing but "what his hand and counsel determined before should be done," Acts iv. 28, in respect of the 1 Ames. Antisynod, p. 10.

2 "Deus suo modo aliquando metuit, hoc est, merito suspicatur et prudenter conjicit, hoc vel illud malum oriturum."-Vorsti. de Deo, p. 451.

3 "Deus non semper ex præscientia finem intendit."-Armin., Antip., p. 667; Corv. ad Molin., cap. v. sect. 5.

"Cum et pater tradiderit filium suum, et ipse Christus corpus suum: et Judas dominum suum: cur in hac traditione Deus est pius, et homo reus, nisi quia in re una quam fecerunt, causa non fuit una propter quam fecerunt."-Aug., Epist. xlviii.

event of the thing itself. And if these actions, notwithstanding these two hinderances,-first, that they were contingent, wrought by free agents, working according to election and choice; secondly, that they were sinful and wicked in the agents,--had yet their dependence on his purpose and determinate counsel, surely he hath an interest of operation in the acts of every creature. But his works, as it appears before, are all known unto him from the beginning, for he worketh nothing by chance or accidentally, but all things determinately, according to his own decree, or "the counsel of his own will," Eph. i. 11.

Secondly, The manner of God's knowing of things doth evidently show that nothing that is, or may be, can be hid from him; 1which is not by discourse and collection of one thing out of another, conclusions out of principles, but altogether and at once, evidently, clearly, and distinctly, both in respect rov öri and roũ dióri. By one most pure act of his own essence he discerneth all things: for there is " no creature that is not manifest in his sight, but all are naked and opened unto his eyes," Heb. iv. 13. So that those things concerning which we treat 'he knoweth three ways:-First, In himself and his own decree, as the first cause; in which respect they may be said to be necessary, in respect of the certainty of their event. Secondly, In their immediate causes, wherein their contingency doth properly consist. Thirdly, In their own nature as future, but to his infinite knowledge ever present.

Thirdly, The Scripture is full of expressions to this purpose, to wit, "That God knoweth all secrets, and revealeth hidden things.

he searcheth the reins and the heart: he knoweth the number of the stars, and the birds of the air, the lilies of the field, the falling of sparrows, the number of the hairs of our heads." Some places are most remarkable, as that of the Psalmist, "He knoweth my thoughts long before;" even before ever they come into our minds, before their first rising. And yet many actions that are most contingent depend upon those thoughts known unto God from eternity; nay,which breaketh the very neck of the goddess contingency,-those things wherein her greatest power is imagined to consist are directly ascribed unto God, as our words, "the answer of the tongue," Prov. xvi. 1; and the directing of an arrow, shot by chance, to a mark not aimed at, 1 Kings xxii. 34. Surely God must needs foreknow the event of that contingent action; he must needs know the man would so

"Deus non particulatim, vel singillatim omnia videt, velut alternanter concepta, hine illuc, inde huc, sed omnia videt simul."-Aug., lib. xv. de Trinit., cap. 14. "In scientia divina nullus est discursus, sed omnia perfecte intelligit."-Tho., p. q. 14, a. 7. c.

Tilen. Syntag. de Attrib. Dei, thes. 22; Zanch. de Nat. Dei. Unumquodque quod est, dum est, necesse est, ut sit.

3 Ps. xliv. 21; Job xi. 11; Dan. ii. 47; Ps. vii. 9, xxvi. 2, cxlvii. 4; Luke xii. 27; Matt. x. 29, 30; Ps. cxxxix. 2.

shoot who had determined his arrow should be the death of a king. He maketh men poor and rich, Prov. xxii. 2; He lifteth up one, and pulleth down another, Ps. lxxv. 7. How many contingencies did γοργὸν ὄμμα τοῦ δεσπότου, his piercing eye run through to foresee the crowning of Esther for the deliverance of his people! In a word, "Known unto God are all his works." Now, what can possibly be imagined to be more contingent than the killing of a man by the fall of an axe from out of his hand who intended no such thing? Yet this God assumeth as his own work, Deut. xix. 5, Exod. xxi. 13; and so surely was by him foreknown.

Fourthly, Do but consider the prophecies in Scripture, especially those concerning our Saviour, how many free and contingent actions did concur for the fulfilling of them; as Isa. vii. 14, ix. 6, liii.; Gen. iii. 15, etc. The like may be said of other predictions; as of the wasting of Jerusalem by the Babylonians, which though, in regard of God's prescience, it was certainly to come to pass, yet they did it most freely, not only following the counsel of their own wills, but also using divination, or chanceable lots, for their direction, Ezek. xxi. 21. Yet he who made the eye seeth all these things, Ps. xciv. 9.

Divers other reasons and testimonies might be produced to confirm our doctrine of God's everlasting prescience; which, notwithstanding Episcopius' blasphemy, that it serves for nought but to cruciate poor mortals, we believe to be a good part of the foundation of all that consolation which God is pleased to afford us in this vale of tears. Amidst all our afflictions and temptations, under whose pressure we should else faint and despair, it is no small comfort to be assured that we do nor can suffer nothing but what his hand and counsel guides unto us, what is open and naked before his eyes, and whose end and issue he knoweth long before; which is a strong motive to patience, a sure anchor of hope, a firm ground of consolation. Now, to present in one view how opposite the opinions of the worshippers of the great goddess contingency are to this sacred truth, take this short antithesis:

S. S. "He that formed the eye, shall he not see?" Ps. xciv. 9. "When a man goeth into the wood with his neighbour to hew wood, and his hand fetcheth a stroke with the axe to cut down the tree, and the head slippeth from the helve, and lighteth upon his neighbour, that he die," Deut. xix. 5. "God delivers him into his hand," Exod. xxi. 13.

"Take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed? for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things,” Matt. vi. 31,32. "Take away God's prescience and you overthrow his deity,"

Jerome.

Lib. Arbit.

"Future contingencies are not determined unto either part," Armin. That is, God hath not determined, and so, consequently, doth not foreknow, whether they shall come to pass or no.

"God hopeth and expecteth divers things that shall never come to pass," Rem.

"The doctrine of prescience seems to be invented only to vex and cruciate poor mortal men," Episcop.

CHAPTER IV.

Of the providence of God in governing the world diversely, thrust from this pre-eminence by the Arminian idol of free-will.

I COME now to treat of that betwixt which and the Pelagian idol there is bellum äorovdov, implacable war and immortal hatred, absolutely destructive to the one side,-to wit, the providence of God. For this, in that notion Christianity hath hitherto embraced it, and that, in such a sense as the Arminians maintain it, can no more consist together than fire and water, light and darkness, Christ and Belial, and he that shall go to conjoin them ploughs with an ox and an ass; they must be tied together with the same ligament" quo ille mortua jungebat corpora vivis,"-wherewith the tyrant tied dead bodies to living men. This strange advancement of the clay against the potter, not by the way of repining, and to say, "Why hast thou made me thus?" but by the way of emulation, "I will not be so, I will advance myself to the sky, to the sides of thy throne," was heretofore unknown to the more refined Paganism.' As these of contingency, so 1 Η θεία πάντων ἀρχὴ δὶ ἧς ἅπαντα καὶ ἔστι καὶ διαμένει.”_Theophrastus, apud Picum. Vid. Senecam de Provid. et Plotinum.