II.

phemy or atheism, in the concrete. One may say a man's DISCOURSE opinions are blasphemous and atheistical in the abstract, without charging the person with formal atheism or blasphemy. The reason is evident;-because it may be, that through prejudice he doth not see the consequences, which other men, whose eyes are not blinded with that mist, do see, and if he did see them, would abhor them as well as they. For this reason, he who chargeth one with speaking or writing implicit contradictions, or things inconsistent one with another, doth not presently accuse him of lying, although one part of a contradiction must needs be false, because it may be the force of the consequence is not evident to him.

know a

not know

ner.

A man may know a truth certainly, and yet not know the A man may formal reason or the manner of it so certainly. I know that truth cerI see, and I judge probably how I see; yet the manner how tainly, yet I see, whether by sending out beams, or by receiving in the the manspecies, is not so evident as the thing itself, that I do see. They who do not agree about the manner of vision, do all agree about the truth of vision. Every man knoweth certainly, that he can cast a stone up into the air; but the manner how the stone is moved after it is separated from the hand,whether it be by some force or form or quality impressed into the stone by the casters or by the air; and if it be by the air, whether it be by the pulsion of the air following or by the cession of the former air,-is obscure enough; and not one of a thousand who knoweth the certainty of the thing, knoweth the manner how it cometh to pass. If this be true in natural actions, how much more in the actions of God, Who is an infinite Being, and not comprehensible by the finite wit of man? The water can rise no higher than the fountain's head. A looking-glass can represent the body, because there is some proportion between bodies; but it cannot represent the soul, because there is no proportion between that which is material and that which is immaterial. This is the reason why we can in some sort apprehend what shall be after the end of the world,-because the soul is eternal that way; but if we do but think of what was before the beginning of the world, we are as it were presently swallowed up into an abyss, because the soul is not eternal that way. So I know, that there is true liberty from necessity, both by Divine revelation,

III.

PART and by reason, and by experience. I know likewise, that God knoweth all events from eternity. The difficulty is not about the thing, but about the manner,-how God doth certainly know things free or contingent, which are to come in respect of us, seeing they are neither determined in the event itself, nor in the causes thereof. The not knowing of the manner, which may be incomprehensible to us, doth not at all diminish the certain truth of the thing. Yet even for the manner sundry ways are proposed, to satisfy the curiosities rather than the consciences of men; of which this is one way which I mentioned m. It were a great madness to reject a certain truth, because there may be some remote difficulty about the manner; and yet a greater madness, for avoiding a needless scruple, to destroy all the attributes of God, which 828 is by consequence to deny God Himself. His proof of necessity drawn from God's eternal knowledge of all events, hath been sufficiently discussed and satisfied over and over.

The doctrine of liberty an ancient truth.

I pleaded, that my doctrine of liberty is an ancient truth generally received; his opinion of universal necessity, an upstart paradox, and all who own it may be written in a ring; so I am an "old possessor," he is but "a new pretender"." He answereth, that he is "in possession of a truth derived" to him "from the light of reason," and "it is an unhandsome thing for a man to derive his opinion concerning truth by succession from his ancestor." I answer, that just possession is either by law or by prescription. I have all laws, Divine and human, ecclesiastical and civil, and a prescription of two thousand years, or at least, ever since Christianity came into the world, for liberty. His opinion of universal destiny by reason of a necessary connection of the second causes, was never the general, nor the common, nor the current opinion of the world; and hath been in a manner wholly buried for sixteen hundred years, and now is first conjured out of its grave by him, to disturb the world. If this be just possession, a highway-robber may plead possession so soon as ever he hath stripped an honest traveller. is not only no "unhandsome thing," but it is a most comely

m [See the Defence, Numb. xxiv. above pp. 156, 157; Disc. i. Pt. iii.]

It

II.

and commendable thing, for a man to derive his religion by DISCOURSE the universal approbation of the Christian world from the purest primitive times throughout all ages, and never to deviate further from the steps of his ancestors than they had first degenerated from their predecessors. And where he telleth us, that "the first Christians did not derive" Christianity "from their ancestors P," it is very true, but very impertinent. For they had not their religion from their own invention or presumption, as he hath his opinions, but by Divine revelation, confirmed with miracles. When he is able to produce as authentic proof for his paradoxes, as they did for their religion, he saith something.

That which he calleth my "scurrilous argumentation",""he that drinks well, sleeps well," &c.-is none of mine, but a common example used in logic, to shew the weakness of such forms of arguings as his is, when the dependance is not necessary and essential but contingent and accidental; as it is in his argument here. All actions are from God by a general power, but not determinately. The like contingent connection there is between "action" and 66 sense," sense and "memory," memory and "election"." This is enough to shew the weakness of his argument. But he hath one main fault more, he hath put more in the conclusion than there was in the premisses.

will more

to do.

He sayeth, "If by liberty" I had understood only "liberty Liberty to of action," and not "liberty of will," it "had been an easy mat- reconcileter to reconcile it with prescience and the decrees of Gods." I able with prescience answer, first, that "liberty of action" without "liberty of will" than liberty is but a mock liberty, and a new nothing, like an empty bottle given to a child to satisfy his thirst. Where there is no liberty to will, there is no liberty to act; as hath been formerly demonstrated. Secondly, the liberty to will, is as reconcileable with the prescience and decrees of God as the liberty to act. God's decrees do extend at least as much to acting as to willing. Thirdly, this liberty of acting without a liberty of willing is irreconcileable with all the other attributes of God, His truth, His justice, His goodness, and His

P [Qu., Animadv. upon Numb. xxiv. p. 263.]

Ibid., p. 264.]

III.

PART power; and setteth the decrees of God in opposition one with another. How should a man have a liberty to act, and have no liberty to will, when he cannot act freely except he will freely, because willing is a necessary cause or means of acting? That which followeth about "God's aspect" and "intuition"," is merely a contention about words, and such words as are received and approved by all authors. God's intuition is not of the same nature with ours. We poor creatures do stand in need of organs; but God, Who is a pure simple infinite essence, cannot be made perfecter by organs, or accidents. Whatsoever He seeth or knoweth, He seeth or knoweth by His essence. The less T. H. understood the terms of " aspect" and "intuition," the more apt he was to blunder them.

How the will of God is the ne

cessity of

He pleadeth, "If liberty cannot stand with necessity, it cannot stand with the decrees of God, of which decrees all things. necessity is a consequent ;" and he citeth somebody without name, who said, "The will of God is the necessity of all things." I deny his consequence. Liberty is consistent with God's decrees, though it be not consistent with universal necessity. The reason is plain;-because liberty is a con- 829 sequent of God's decrees as well as necessity. He who said, that "the will of God was the necessity of all things," was St. Austin. I wish he would stand to his judgment, or to his sense of those words. The meaning of those words is not, that God doth will that all things should be necessary, but that whatsoever God doth will, that must necessarily be. If He will have all things necessary, then all things must be necessary. If He will have all things free, then all things must be free. If He will have some things necessary, and some things free, then some things must be necessary, and some things free. When God formed man of the dust of the earth, He might have formed him either a child or a man; but whether he should be formed the one or the other, "it was not in the condition of the creature, but in the pleasure of the Creator, Whose will is the necessity of all things"." What

cessitas rerum.'"]

* De Genesi ad Litteram, lib. vi. c. 15. [§ 26; Op. tom. iii. P. i. p. 207. B.]

II.

doth this concern the liberty of man? Nothing. It con- DISCOURSE cerned him more to have understood St. Austin's distinction between God's will and His prescience in the same place,"What God willeth, shall necessarily be" (that is, according to an absolute antecedent necessity); "what God foreknows, shall truly bez" (that is, only by a necessity of infallibility). I might produce the whole world against him in this cause; but because he renounced human authorities, I have been sparing to allege one testimony against him. But to free St. Austin from all suspicion of concurring in such a desperate cause, I will only cite one place of a hundred ;-" Neither is that necessity to be feared, which the Stoics fearing, were careful to distinguish the causes of things so, that some they substracted from necessity, some they subjected to necessity; and in those which they would not have to be under necessity, they placed our wills, lest they should not be free if they were subjected to necessity; for if that be to be called our necessity, which is not in our power, but effecteth what it can although we will not, such as is the necessity of death, it is manifest, that our wills, whereby we live well or ill, are not under such a necessity," &c. Here he may find the two sorts of necessity, which we have had so much contention about; the one in our power, which is not opposed to liberty; the other not in our power, that is, an antecedent extrinsecal necessity, which destroyeth liberty: but he saith, [i. e. St. Augustin.] that "it is manifest, that our wills are not subject" to such antecedent "necessity." Here he may see, that his friends the Stoics, the great patrons of necessity, were not for universal necessity as he is, nor did countenance necessity to the prejudice of the liberty of the will.

"Only to permit," and, "to permit [barely"]," do not signify the same thing in this place". "Only to permit," is op

Creatoris, Cujus voluntas rerum necessitas est."]

vere futurum erat), tunc erat finiturus
vitam quando finivit vitam. Ideo
quod præsciebat" (Deus), "necessario
futurum erat."]

What it is only and

to permit

to permit barely.