SERMON XIII. The Eternity of God. PSALM XC. 2. Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting thou art God. T HE Immenfity, and Eter- ner of Being. Having spoken of Vol. VII, Vol. VII. The Title of this Pfalm is the Prayer of Moles, the man of God. He begins his Prayer with the ac, knowledgment of God's Providence to his people from the beginning of the World; Lord, thou hast been our dwelling place from all generations; in generation and generation; fo the Hebrew. He was well acquainted with the Hiftory of the World, and the Providence of God from the beginning of it, and as if he had spoken too little of God, in faying, that his Providence had been exercised in all the Ages of the World, he tells us here in the Text, that he was before the World, and he made it, he was from all Eternity, and fhould continue to all Eternity the fame. Before the mountains were brought forth; the moft firm and durable parts of the World, the moft eminent and confpicuous; Or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world; before any thing was created; from everlasting to everlasting thou art art God. In fpeaking of this Attribute, I fhall, First, Give you the Explication of it. Secondly, Endeavour to prove that it doth belong to God, and ought to be attributed to the Divine Nature. Thirdly, Draw fome Corollaries from the whole. First, For the Explication of it. Eternity is a duration without bounds or limits: Now there are two limits of duration, beginning and ending; that which hath always been is without beginning; that which always fhall be is without ending. Now we may conceive of a thing always to have been, and the continuance of its being now to ceale, tho' there be no fuch thing in the World: and there are fome things which have had a beginning of their Being, but fhall have no Vol. VII. end, fhall always continue, as the Vol. VII. Angels, and Spirits of Men. The firft of these the Schoolmen call Eternity, a parte ante, that is duration without beginning; the latter Eternity & parte poft, a duration without ending: but Eternity abfolutely taken comprehends both thefe, and fignifies an infinite duration which had no beginning, nor Shall have any end; fo that when we fay God is Eternal, we mean that he always was, and fhall be for ever; that he had no beginning of Life, nor fhall have any end of Days; but that he is from everlafting to everlasting, as it is here in the Text. 'Tis true indeed, that as to God's Eternity, a parte ante, as to his having always been, the Scripture doth not give us any folicitous account of it, it only tells us in general, that God was before the world was, and that he created it; it doth not defcend to gratifie our curiofity, in giving us any account of what God did before he 1 he made the World, or how he entertaind himself from all Eterni. Vol. VII. nity; it doth not give us any diftinct account of his infinite duration; for that had been impoffible for our finite understandings to comprehend; if we fhould have afcended upward millions of Ages, yet we should never have afcended to the top, never have arri ved at the beginning of infinity; therefore the Scripture, which was wrote to inftruct us in what was neceffary, and not to fatisfie our curiofity, tells us this, that God was from everlasting, before the world was made, and that he laid the foundations of it. So that by the Eternity of God,' you are to understand the perpetual continuance of his Being, without beginning or ending. I fhall not trouble you with the inconfiftent and unintelligible notions of the Schoolmen; that it is duratio tota fimul, in which we are not to conceive any fucc ffion,but to A a. 4 ima |