From whence it appears undeniably that his Will could not be determin'd to Election by any Goodness in the Creatures. For before that Election, which is declared to be the Caufe of Goodnefs in created Beings, nothing could be either Good or Bad; but when the Election is made, that only is Evil which obftructs the execution of it, and that Good which promotes it. The Goodnefs of things is therefore to be determin'd by their agreeableness to the Divine Will, and not that by the agreeableness or goodness of things. (P.) VI. Thirdly, NOTES. (P.) The Objections here are 1ft, that if this be true, before God determin'd to create the World he cou'd fee nothing bet ter in Virtue than in Vice. It were a fufficient answer to this Objection to fay there is no harm in it, if it were true; for we must confider that God from all Eternity determin'd to create the World, and therefore there neither was any thing, nor can any thing be concei+ ved before that Determination; and therefore he might always fee fomething better in Virtue than Vice. But 2dly, We ought to remember that Virtue and Vice arise from the Congruity of Things created by God, what is agreeable to a reasonable Nature is Virtue, what is contrary Vice, and that there is no other Caufe why one Nature is reasonable and another without Reason; but the Will of God, and therefore Vice and Virtue must entirely depend on that Will. The plain Reafon of Mens miftake in the Cafe is this: They first fuppofe God has willed that a Nature should be reasonable, and then forgetting that this depends entirely on his Will, they fuppofe this Nature to be of itself, and then argue that the Congruity or Incongruity of things to it, cannot depend on the Will of God, because he can't make what is congruous to it incongruous; that is in reality his Will can't be contrary to itfelf. But 2dly, 'Tis objected, that this Opinion leaves no dif ference between natural and pofitive Laws for a pofitive Law is what depends on the Will of God; and according to this pofition Natural Laws depend on the fame, and fo the dif tinction between them is taken away. But the answer to this is fo eafy, that 'tis a wonder any fhou'd fumble at it. For it is plain that the Natures of things have. IV. Thirdly, We must not therefore attend to They are not to be minded they who de clare that this Goodness determines the Will of God. NOTES. their being from the Will of God, and whilft that Will con tinues none can destroy them, and the Congruity of things to thefe Natures refults from the Natures them felves, and is included in the fame act of Will, that gave the things a Being: fo that as long as it pleafes God to continue their Beings fuch as he has made them, the Congruity and Incongruity of things neceffarily remain and refult from that act of Will, which made them what they are, infomuch that the Divine Will must be contrary to itfelf, if it went about to feparate them (i. e. the Nature from the Congruity) and therefore thefe are join'd together by a Natural Law. But when God by a new act of Will fubfequent to the Being of any thing requires fomething to be done by it which was not included in that first act of Will which gave it a Being, then that is faid to be enjoin'd by a pofitive Law, and as this was required by an act fubfequent to the Being, fo it may be again removed by another without deftroying the Being itself on which it is impofed, or without any contrariety in God's Will. Hence Natural Laws are indifpenfible, and can't be abrogated, whilft the Natures to which they belong continue, whereas the pofitive Laws are difpenfible and may be repealed. But 3dly, "Tis urg'd that this opinion leads us ftraight to Pyrrbenifm, and makes God not only free as to Virtue, fo that he may make it either good or bad; but likewife to the truth or falfhood of Things, fo that he may change their Nature and make 3 and not to be 6. 'Twere a fufficient answer to this, to fay the Cafe is not parallel for the Goodness of Things is fuppofed to arife from the Will of God, which is free; but the truth of them from his Intellect, which is a neceflary Faculty, and therefore tho' the one might be arbitrary, yet the other cannot. But the Truth is Goodness is a conformity to the Will of God, and the reafon that God can't will Evil is because it is always con trary to fome other act of his Will, and his Will can't be contrary to itfelf: and at the fame rate Truth is a conformity to his Intellect and the Reafon thata Propofition is true, is because it is fo conformable; and fince it is fo, to fuppofe it not conformable is to fuppofe a contradiction. God in making or con ceiving they are Good, as if Goodness and the greater Good which he perceives in Objects, could determine NOTES. ceiving fix, made and conceived 3 and 3; and therefore to fuppofe that 3 and 3 do not make fix, is to fuppofe a Contradi¿tion. In effect it is to fay God conceives it wrong, and to fay that his Power can make it otherwife, is to fay that his Power can falfify his Understanding. Thefe things are fo eafy that there can be no doubt about them, if Men will not be perverse. But 4thly, Is not this to make the Effence of things arbitrary, and fo fall in with fome Cartefians? I answer the Author is not concern'd with the opinions of Cartefians, or any other, farther then he thinks them true; if by making the Effence of things arbitrary, be meant that God inftead of making a Man, night have made a Stone, or planted the World with Mufhrooms inftead of Herbs and Trees; he verily believes he might. If you mean that when God has made a Man and planted the World with variety of vegetables, that the Man continuing what he is fhou'd be a Stone, or the feveral Plants con tinuing in their variety fhou'd all be Mushrooms, this he thinks impoffible. For a Man is a Creature that is not a Stone, and therefore to fay he is a Stone, or to make him one, is to make him no Man. Six is a Number confifting of 3 and 3, and to fay that a Number doth not confift of 3 and 3 is to fay that it is not fix. Man is a Creature obliged to be juft, &c. by the very Conftitution of his Nature, and to fay that he is not obliged to be fo, is to fay that he is not a Man. If it be ask'd, can't God will him to do fuch things as we reckon unjust, yet .? I answer he may, but it must be by making him fomething elfe, by causing him to cease to be a Man; in fhort by taking away his Nature from him, and then neither the notion of Manhood, nor Injustice will belong to him. The material acts that we call unjuft might still be perform'd by him, but the formal Reafon of injuftice would ceafe, because that arifes from the acts, not as confider'd in themselves, but as they proceed from a Nature to which they are unfuitable. 'Thus a Man that owes me no Money may give me 1000 / but can't be faid to pay me a Debt, because the paying a Debt fuppofes that he owes it; and therefore tho' a Debtor, and one that owes nothing may each give me 1000 . yet they differ in this, that the one is Payment of a Debt, the other a free Gift. And fo it is in all thofe Actions that we call unjuft, &. when they mine his Will. does not seem If the Matter had ftood thus, it poffible for the World to have U 2 NOTES. been they are done by a Man, they are Crimes, because against his Nature; but when another Creature that has not Reafon does them, they can't be call'd unjust, &c. For Example, if a Man kills one that no ways injures him, and rofts and eats him, he commits Murther, and is guilty of an horid Immorality; but if a Lyon unprovoked kill and eat a Man it is no Crime or Wickedness in him. But in as much as Men in their way of think ing represent to themselves a Nature with all its Parts and Properties, and find that they can't remove any of them from that Nature, they conclude that the Natures of created Beings are what they are independently on the Will of God; forgetting in the mean time that it is only the Divine Will that gave or can give a Being to any Creature with certain Parts and Properties, and that instead of that Creature he cou'd make another without them all, that should have quite different parts and attributes. 'Tis therefore merely from his Will that Creatures are what they are; but that Will having given them a Being, of being conceived to have given it, no part or property be longing to them can even in thought be taken from them: and this feems to me a full account of the certainty of those things we call Eternal Truths ||. I have infifted the longer on this Point because I fee fome Indifferent Perfons as to the main Difpute have thought the Author mistaken in his afferting the Goodness of things to depend immediately on the Will of God. Let me add farther, that the Author does not fay that the Goodness of Things depends folely on God's Will; but that his Wisdom and Power are likewife concern'd in them: we must not separate God's Will from thefe attributes; on the contrary his Will is limited by the one and executed by the other. But This Notion is advanc'd by Dr. Clarke in his Demonftration of the Divine Attributes, Prop. 12. and afterwards explained, as far as it feems capable of Explanation, in his Evidences of Natural and Reveal d Religion, Prop. 1. The fame is infifted on by Leibnitz, Grotius, Ruft, Mr. Chubb, and many others. We have enquired a little into it already in R.i. See more in Note 52. See the Impartial Enquiry, pag. 50, 5t. been made at all. For they who acknowledge God to be the Author of it, confefs alfo, that he is abfolutely NOTES. But lafly it is urged that according to thefe Principles Virtues are not good antecedently to God's Choice, and would not be good if God did not choose them, nay if he chofe Vices in their flead, they would be good both morally and phyficalJy. For Obedience to God is Good, and if God had commanded Vice it would have been Man's Duty to obey him, and perhaps Goodness might this way have been as effectually brought into the World, as by thofe Virtues that arife from the exigence of our Nature, as God has now framed it. And from hence they infer that God is as free to make his fecond Choice, as we conceive him to be in making his first. But to all this I anfwer, 1ft, I acknowledge that antecedentJy to God's Choice there can be nothing good or bad, because there can't be any thing at all: the very moment we conceive a thing to be, we must conceive and fuppofe that God wills it to be what it is, and that he wills it fhould by its Nature and Conftitution have certain parts and properties, and that as long as the thing continues what it is, God's Will continues also to preferve it fo to fuppofe therefore that he Wills at the fame time it fhou'd be without thofe parts and properties is plainly to fuppofe two contradictory Wills in God Now an Obliga-, tion to Virtue is a Property neceffarily refulting from the Nature of Man, and therefore to fuppofe God to command him not to be virtuous when he has given him fuch a Nature, is a Contradiction: If any would in earned fhew that the Goodnefs of Things doth not depend upon the Will of God, the true way of doing it is to give an inftance of fomething that is good, which doth not fuppofe an act of God's Will, or an Example of fomething Evil, that is not manifeftly contrary to forme act of it. In fhort, the Congruity of things is their Goodness, and that Congruity arifes from their Natures, and they have those Natures from the Will of God, and those Natures must have a Congruity because they proceed from one Will, which cannot be contrary to itself, because it is conducted by infinite Wisdom. All this is fufficiently laid down in the Book, and for any one to urge thefe Confequences, and take no Notice of the Solutions given them muft either proceed from not having read the Book, or a worse Reafon, which I am unwilling to believe, |