The Grounds of the Christian Faith, Book 3 · Chapter 3

The Grounds of the Christian Faith · Book 3 · Chapter 3

p. 470CHAP. III. Of the Origine of Evil.

Of the Being of Providence. Epieurus his arguments against it refuted. The nec…ssity of the belief of Providence in order to Religion. Providence proved from a consideration of the nature of God and the things of the world. Of the Spirit of nature. The great objections against Providence propounded. The first concerns the Origine of evil. God cannot be the author of sin if the Scriptures be true. The account which the Scriptures give of the fall of man, doth not charge God with mans fault. Gods power to govern man by Laws, though he gives no particular reason of every Positive precept. The reason of Gods creating man with freedom of will, largely shewed from Simplicius; and the true account of the Origine of evil. Gods permitting the fall makes him not the author of it. The account which the Scriptures give of the Origine of evil, compared with that of Heathen Philosophers. The antiquity of the opinion of ascribing the Origine of evil to an evil principle. Of the judgment of the Per…ans, Aegyptians and others about it. Of Manichaism. The opinion of the ancient Greek Philosophers; of Pythagoras, Plato, the Stoicks; the Origine of evil not from the necessity of matter. The remainders of the history of the fall among the Heathens Of the malignity of Daemon…. Providence vindicated as to the sufferings of the good, and impunity of bad men. An account of both from natural light, manifested by Senec…, Plutarch, and others.

IT being now manifest not only that there is a God, but Sect. 1.that the world had its Being from him; it thence follows by an easie and rational deduction, that there is a particular band of Divine providence, which upholds the world in its Being, and wisely disposeth all events in it. For it is a most p. 471irrational and absurd opinion to assert a Deity and deny providence: and in nothing did Epicurus more discover the weakness and puerility of his judgment then in this. Indeed, if Epicurus had no other design in asserting a Deity, then (as many ancient Philosophers imagined) to avoid the imputation of direct Atheism; and yet to take away all foundations of Religion, he must needs be said to serve his Hypothesis well, though he did assert the Being of an excellent nature which he called God; while yet he made him sit as it were with his …lbows folded up in the heavens, and taking no …gniz…nce of humane actions. For he well knew, that if the belief of Divine providence were once rooted out of mens minds, the thoughts of an excellent Being above the He…vens, would have no more aw or power upon the hearts and lives of men, then the telling men that there are I…wels of inestimable value in the Indies, makes them more ready to pay taxes to their Princes. For that Philosopher could not be ignorant, that it is not worth but power, nor speculation but interest that rules the world. The poor Tenant more regards his petty Landlord, then the greatest Prince in the world that hath nothing to do with him; and he thinks he hath great reason for it; for he neither fears punishment nor hopes for reward from him; whereas his Landlord may dispossess him of all he hath upon displeasure, and may advantage him the most if he gains his favour: Supposing then that there were such an excellent Being in the world which was compleatly happy in himself, and thought it an impairing of his happiness to trouble himself with an inspection of the world; Religion might then be indeed derived à relegendo, but not à religando; there might be some pleasure in contemplating his nature, but there could be no obligation to obedience. So that Epicurus was the first sounder of a kind of Philosophical Antinomianism, placing all Religion in a veneration of the Deity purely for its own ex…llency without any such mercenary eye (as those who serve God for their own ends, as they say, are apt to have) to reward and punishment. And I much doubt that good woman whom the story goes of, who in an Enthusiastick posture ran up and down the strects with emblems in her hands, fire in the one p. 472as she said to burn up Heaven, and water in the other to quench Hell, that men might serve God purely for himself, would if she had compassed her design, soon brought Proselites enough to Epicurus, and by burning Heaven would have burnt up the cords of Religion, and in quenching Hell would have extinguished the aw and fear of a Deity in the world. Indeed the incomparable excellency and perfection which is in the Divine nature, to spirits advanced to a noble and generous height in Religion, makes them exceedingly value their choice, while they disregard what ever rivals with God for it; but were it not for those Magnetical hooks of obedience and eternal interest, there are few would be drawn to a due consideration of, much less a delight in so amiable and excell…nt a nature. And it is impossible to conceive, why God in the revelation of his Will should ever so much as mention a future punishment, or promise an eternal reward, were not the consideration of these things the sinews of Religion.

Which they whose design was to undermine the very foundations on which all Religion was built, understood far Sect. 2.better, then those weak pretended advancers of Religion, who while in such a way they pretend to advance it, do only blow it up. For if men ought not to have an eye and respect to their own future condition, nor serve God on the account of his power to make our souls miserable or happy, much less ought men to serve God with any regard to his Providence, since the matters which Providence is employed about in this world are of infinitely less moment, then those which concern our future state. And if we are to have no eye on Divine providence in the exercise of Religion, we shall scarce be able to understand for what end God should take so much care of mankind, and manifest so much of his goodness to them, were it not to quicken them in their search after him, and excite them to the more chearful obedience to him. And when once we question to what end God troubles himself with the world, we are come next door to Epicurus, and may in few steps more delight in the flowers of his Garden. For this was his strongest plea against Providence, that it was beneath the Majesty and excellency of the Divine nature to stoop so low p. 473and trouble himself so far, as to regard what was done on earth. This being one of his Ratae Sententiae or undoubted Diog. Laer. l. 10.maximes, foreign, The Blessed and Immortal Being, neither hath any imployment himself, nor troubles himself with others. Which as Maximus Tyrius well observes, is rather a description of a Sardanapalus then a Deity; nay of a worse then a Sardanapalus; for he in the midst of all his softness and effeminacy Disserl. 29.would yet entertain some counsels for the safety and good of his Empire; but Epicurus his D…ity is of so tender a nature, that the least thought of business would quite spoile his happiness. This opinion of Epicurus made the more raisedspirited Moralists so far contemn the unworthy apprehensions which he entertained of the Divine nature, that they degraded him from the very title of a Philosopher in it, and ranked him beneath the most fabulous Poets, who had writ such unworthy things of their Gods, as is evident by the censures T…lly de F…aib. l. 1. De nat. D. or…. 2. …lutarch advers. Co…t.which Tully, Plutarch and others pass upon him for this very opinion. And they tell him that some of their own men were of a more noble and excellent spirit then Epicurus his Deity, who abhorred softness and idleness, and made it their greatest delight to do good to their Countrys. But Epicurus must needs make his God of his own humour (the usual flattery which men bear to themselves, to think that most excellent which they delight in most) as Xenophanes was wont to say of his horse, if he were to describe a God, it would be with a curled main, a broad chest, &c. and in every thing like himself. Had E icurus himself so little of an Athenian in him, as not to make it some part of his delight to understand the affairs of the world? or at least did he take no pleasure in the walks of his famous garden, nor to order his trees, and set his flowers, and contrive every thing for his own delight? Woul… Epicurus then count this a part of his happiness? and is it inconsistent with the happiness of the Deity to take notice of the world and order all things in it for his own glory? Must so excellent a nature as Gods was, by his own acknowledgment, be presently tired with business, when the more excellent any nature is, the more active and vigorous it is, the more able to comprehend and dspatch p. 474matters of moment with the least disturbance to its self? Is it pleasure to a Nurse to fill the child with her milk? doth the Sun rejoyce to help the world with his constant light? and doth a Fountain murmur till it be delivered of its streams which may refresh the ground? and is it no delight to the Divine nature to behold the effects of his goodness upon the world? We see here then the foundation on which Epicurus went, viz. that his God must be like himself, or there must be none; and truly he might more suitably to his principles question his existence, then supposing his existence deny his Providence on such miserable accounts as these are, which yet are the chief which either Epicurus or Lucretius could bring against it, from the consideration of the Divine nature.

The which to any one who considers it, doth necessarily infer a peculiar eye and hand of Providence in the world. Sect. 3.For can we imagine that a Being of Infinite knowledge should be ignorant of what is done in the world? and of Infinite power, should stand by and leave things to chance and fertune? which were at first, contrived and brought into Being by the contrivance of his Wisdom, and exercise of his Power. And where the foundation of existence lies wholly and solely in the power of an Infinite Being producing, the ground of continuance of that existence must lye in the same power conserving. When men indeed effect any thing, the work may continue, whatever become of him that did it; but the reason of that is, because what man doth, is out of matter already existent, and his work is only setting materials together; but now what God effects he absolutely gives a Being to, and therefore its duration depends on his conservation. What is once in its Being, I grant, will continue till some greater force then its self put it out of Being; but withall I add, that Gods withdrawing his Conservation is so great a force, as must needs put that Being which had its existence from his power, out of the condition it was in by it. The Light of the Sun continues in the air, and as long as the Sun communicates it, nothing can extinguish the light, but what will put out the Sun; but could we suppose the Sun to withdraw his beams, what becomes of the light then? p. 475This is the case of all Beings, which come from an Infinite power; their subsistence depends on a continual emanation of the same power which gave them Being; and when once this is withdrawn, all those Beings which were produced by this power must needs relapse into nothing. Besides, what dependence is there upon each other in the moments of the duration of any created Being? The mode of existence in a creature is but contingent and possible, and nothing is implyed in the notion of an existent creature, beyond meer possibility of existence; what is it then which gives actual existence to it? that cannot be its self, for it would be necessarily existent; if another then give existence, this existence must wholly depend upon him who gave it; for nothing can continue existence to its self, but what may give it to its self, (for it gives it for the moment it continues it) and what gives existence to its self, must necessarily exist, which is repugnant to the very notion of a created Being: So that either we must deny a possibility of non-existence, or annihilation in a creature, which follows upon necessity of existence, or else we must assert that the duration or continuance of a creature in its Being doth immediatly depend on Divine providence and Conservation, which is with as much reason as frequency said to be a continued Creation. But yet further; was an Infinite Wisdom, and power necessary to put things into that order they are in? and is not the same necessary for the Governing of them? I cannot see any reason to think that the power of matter when set in motion, should either bring things into that exquisite order and dependence which the parts of the world have upon each other; much less that by the meer force of that first motion all things should continue in the state they are in. Perpetual motion is yet one of the desiderata of the world; the most exquisite Mechanism cannot put an engine beyond the necessity of being looked after; can we then think this dull, unactive matter, meerly by the force of its first motion should be able still to produce the effects which are seen in the world, and to keep it from tumbling, at least by degrees, into its pristine Chaos? It was an Infinite Power, I grant, which gave that first mo…ion; but that it gave power to continue that motion till the Constagration p. 476of the world, remains yet to be proved. Some therefore finding that in the present state of the world, matter will not serve for all the noted and common Phoenomena of the world, have called in the help of a Spirit of Nature, which may serve instead of a Man-midwife to Matter, to help her in her productions of things. Or, as though God had a Plurality of worlds to look after, they have taken care to substitute him a Vicar in this, which is this Spirit of Nature. But we had rather believe God himself to be perpetually Resident in the world, and that the power which gives life, and being and motion to every thing in the world, is nothing else but his own providence; especially since we have learnt from himself, that it is in him we live and move and have our being.Act. 17. 28Acts 17:28

Thus then we see a necessity of asserting Divine Providence, Sect. 4.whether we consider the Divine nature, or the Phaenomena of the world; but yet the case is not so clear but there are two grand objections behind, which have been the continual exercise of the wits of inquisitive men almost in all Ages of the world. The one concerns the first Origine of evil; the other concerns the dispensations of providence, whence it comes to pass that good men fare so hard in the world, when the bad triumph and flourish; if these two can be cleared with any satisfaction to reason, it will be the highest vindication of Divine Providence, and a great evidence of the Divinity of the Scriptures, which gives us such clear light and direction in these profound speculations, which the dim reason of man was so much to seek in.

I begin with the Origine of evil; for, if there be a hand of providence which orders all things in the world, how comes evil then into it, without Gods being the Author of it? Which is a speculation of as great depth as necessity, it highly concerning us to entertain the highest apprehensions of Gods holiness, and how far he is from being the author of sin; and it is likewise a matter of some difficulty so to explain the Origine of evil as to make it appear that God is not the author of it. I easily then assent to what Origen saith on this …g. c. Cels. l. 4. p. 207.subject, when Celsus upon some mistaken places of Scripture had charged the Scripture with laying the Origine of p. 477evil upon God; foreign. If any thing which calls for our enquiry be of difficult investigation, that which concerns the Origine of evils is such a thing; and as Simplicius well begins his discourse on this subject; foreign. Comment. in Epictet. c. 34.The Dispute concerning the nature and origine of evil, not being well stated, is the cause of great impiety towards God, and perverts the principles of good life, an… involves them in innumerable perplexities who are not able to give a rational account of it. So much then is it our great concernment to fix on sure grounds in the resolution of this important question, in which I intend not to lanch out into the depth and intricacyes of it, as it relates to any internal purposes of Gods will, (which is beyond our present scope) but I shall only take that account of it which the Scripture plainly gives in relating the fall of the first man. For the clearing of which I shall proceed in this method:

1. That if the Scriptures be true, God cannot be the author of sin.

2. That the account which the Scripture gives of the Origine of evil, doth not charge it upon God.

3. That no account given by Philosophers of the Origine of evil, is so clear and rational as this is.

4. That the most material circumstances of this account are attested by the Heathens themselves.

1. That if the Scriptures be true, God cannot be the author of sin. For if the Scriptures be true, we are bound without hesitation to yeild our assent to them in their plain and direct affirmations, and there can be no ground of suspending assent, as to any thing which pretends to be a Divine Truth, but the want of certain evidence, whether it be of Divine Revelation or no. No doubt it would be one of the most effectual wayes to put an end to the numerous controversies of the Christian world (especially to those bold disputes concerning the method and order of Gods decrees) if the plain p. 478and undoubted assertions of Scripture were made the Rule and Standard, whereby we ought to judge of such things as are more obscure and ambiguous. And could men but rest contented with those things which concern their eternal happiness, and the means in order to it (which on that account are written with all imaginable perspicuity in Scripture) and the moment of all other controversies be judged by their reference to these, there would be fewer controversies and more Christians in the world. Now there are two grand principles which concern mens eternal condition, of which we have the greatest certainty from Scripture, and on which we may with safety rely, without perplexing our minds about those more nice and subtile speculations (which it may be are uncapable of full and particular resolution) and those are, That the ruine and destruction of man is wholly from himself; and that his salvation is from God alone. If then mans ruine and misery be from himself, which the Scripture doth so much inculcate on all occasions; then without controversie that which is the cause of all the misery of humane nature, is wholly from himself too, which is, sin. So that if the main scope and design of the Scripture be true, God cannot be the author of that, by which (without the intervention of the mercy of God) mans misery unavoidably falls upon him. For with what authority and Majesty doth God in the Scripture forbid all manner of sin? with what earnestness and importunity doth he woo the sinner to forsake his sin? with what loathing and detestation doth he mention sin? with what justice and severity doth he punish sin? with what wrath and indignation doth he threaten contumacious sinners? And is it possible, (after all this and much more, recorded in the Scriptures, to express the holiness of Gods nature, his hatred of sin, and his appointing a day of judgement for the solemn punishment of sinners,) to imagine that the Scriptures do in the least ascribe the Origine of evil to God, or make him the Author of Sin? Shall not the judge of all the world do right? will a God of Infinite Iustice, Purity, and Holiness, punish the sinner for that which himself was the cause of? Far be such unworthy thoughts from our apprehensions of a Deity, much more of that God whom we believe p. 479to have declared his mind so much to the contrary, that we cannot believe that and the Scriptures to be true together.

Taking it then for granted in the general, that God cannot be the author of sin, we come to enquire, whether the account Sect. 5. 2.which the Scripture gives of the Origine of evil, doth any way charge it upon God? There are only two wayes, which according to the history of the fall of man recorded in Scripture, whereby men may have any ground to question whether God were the cause of mans fall? either first, by the giving him that positive Law, which was the occasion of his fall; or secondly, by leaving him to the liberty of his own will. First, The giving of that positive Law cannot be the least ground of laying mans fault on God; because, 1. It was most suitable to the nature of a rational creature to be governed by Laws, or declarations of the Will of his Maker; For considering man as a free agent, there can be no way imagined so consonant to the nature of man as this was, because thereby he might declare his obedience to God to be the matter of his free choice. For where there is a capacity of reward, and punishment, and acting in the consideration of them, there must be a declaration of the will of the Law-giver, according to which man may expect either his reward or punishment. If it were suitable to Gods nature to promise life to man upon obedience, it was not unsuitable to it to expect obedience to every declaration of his will; considering the absolute soveraignty and Dominion which God had over man as being his creature, and the indispensable obligation which was in the nature of man to obey whatever his M…ker did command him. So that God had full and absolute right to require from man, what he did as to the Law which he gave him to obey; and in the general we cannot conceive, how there should be a testimony of mans obedience towards h…s Creator, without some declaration of his Creators Will. Secondly, God had full power and authority, not only to govern man by Laws, but to determine mans general obligation to obedience to that particular positive precept by the breach of which man fell. If Gods power over man was universal and unlimited, what reason can there be to imagine it should not extend to p. 480such a positive Law? Was it, because the matter of this Law seemed too low for God to command his creature? but whatever the matter of the Law was, obedience to God was the great end of it, which man had testified as much in that Instance of it as in any other whatsoever; and in the violation of it were implyed the highest aggravations of disobedience; for Gods power and authority was as much contemned, his goodness slighted, his Truth and faithfulness questioned, his Name dishonoured, his Maj…sty affronted in the breach of that as of any other Law whatsoever it had been. If the Law were easie to be observed, the greater was the sin of disobedience; if the weight of the matter was not so great in its self, yet Gods authority added the greatest weight to it; and the ground of obedience is not to be fetched from the nature of the thing required, but from the authority of the Legislator. Or was it then because God concealed from man his counsel in giving of that positive precept? Hath not then a Legislator power to require any thing, but what he satisfies every one of his reason in commanding it? if so, what becomes of obedience and subjection? it will be impossible to make any probative precepts on this account; and the Legislator must be charged with the disobedience of his subjects, where he doth not give a particular account of every thing which he requires; which as it concerns humane Legislators (who have not that absolute power and authority which God hath) is contrary to all Laws of Policy and the general sense of the world. This Plutarch gives a good account of, De his qui sero puniuntur a numine.when he discourseth …o rationally of the sobriety which men ought to use in their inquiries into the grounds and reasons of Gods actions; for, saith he, Physitians will give prescriptions without giving the patient a particular reason of every circumstance in them: foreign. Neither have humane Laws alwayes apparent reason for them, nay some of them are to appearance ridiculous; for which he instanceth in that Law of the Lacedaemonian Ephori foreign, to which no other reason was annexed but this, foreign: they commanded every Magistrate at the entrance of his office p. 481to …have himself, and gave this reason for it, that they might learn to obey Laws themselves. He further instanceth, in the Roman custom of manumission, their Laws about testaments, Solons Law against neutrality in seditions, and concludes thence foreign. Any one would easily find many absurdities in Laws, who doth not consider the intention of the Legislator, or the ground of what he requires. foreign, saith he, foreign. What wonder is it if we are so puzled to give an account of the actions of men, that we should be to seek as to those of the Deity? This cannot be then any ground on the account of meer reason, to lay the charge of mans disobedience upon God, because he required from him the observance of that positive command of not eating of the forbidden fruit.

The only thing then left is, whether God be not lyable to this Sect. 6.charge as he left man to the liberty of his will: And that may be grounded on two things, either that God did not create man in such a condition, in which it had been impossible for him to have sinned, or that knowing his temptation he did not give him power to resist it. If neither of these will lay any Imputation of the Origine of evil upon God, then God will appear to be wholly free from it. First, concerning mans being created a free agent; if the determination of the Schools be good that possibility of …inning is implyed in the very notion of a creature, and consequently that impeccability is repugnant to the nature of a created Being; then we see a Vid. Thom. 1. p. q. 63. art. 1. Estium in sentent. l. 2, dist. 7. Sect. 9.necessary reason, why man was created in a state of liberty; but endeavouring to shew that the grounds of our Religion are not repugnant to natural reason, I shall rather make use of the Testimony of such who professed to be followers of nothing else but reason and Philosophy. Among whom I shall make choice of Simplicius both …or the reason he produce…h, and because he is farthest from any suspicion of partiality, by reason of his known opposition to the Mosaick history of the Creation. He then in his Commentaries on Com. in Epict. cap… 34. p. 175.Epictetus professedly disputes this very subject of the Origine p. 482of evil, and after having rejected that sond opinion of two principles, one of good, and the other of evil, undertakes to give an account whence evil came into the world, which because it tends so much to the illustrating our present subject I shall give an account of. God, saith he, who is the …ountain and principle of all good, not only produced things which were in themselves good, nor only those things which were of a middle nature, but the extreams too, which were such things which were apt to be perverted from that which is according to n…ture, to that which we call evil. And that after those bodyes which were (as he supposeth) incorruptible, others were produced which are subject to mutation and corruption; and so after those souls which were immutably fixed in good, others were produced which were lyable to be perverted from it; that so the riches of Gods goodness might be displayed in making to exist all beings which were capable of it; and that the Universe might be perfect in having all sorts of Beings in it. Now, he supposeth, that all these Beings which are above this sublunary world are such as are immutably good, and that the lowest sort of Beings which are lyable to be perverted to evil, are such which are here below. Therefore, saith he, the soul being of a more noble and immutable nature, while it is by its self, doth not partake of evil; but it being of a nature apt to be joyned with these terrestrial bodyes (by the provid…nce of the author of the Universe who produced such souls, that so both extreams might be joyned by the bonds of vital union) thereby it becomes sensible of those evils and pains which the body is subject to; but th…se things are not properly evils but rather good, considering our terrestrial bodyes as parts of the Universe which is upheld by the changes and vicissitudes which are in this lower world; W…ch he largely discourses on to shew that those particular alterations which are in bodyes, do conduce rather to the perfection and beauty of the Universe, then are any real evils in it. But now, saith he, for the origine of those things which are properly evils, viz. moral evils, which are foreign t…e lapses and errors of the humane soul, we are to consider, that there are souls of a more excellent nature then ours are, which are immutally good; …nd the souls of brutes are of a lower kinde then p. 483ours are, and yet are middle between the rational and vegetative, having something in them parallel both to the appetites and evils which are in men, which will therefore be understood by an account of the other. foreign. Pag. 180. ed. Salonasii.The soul of man is nexus utrius que mundi, in the middle between those more excellent Beings which perpetually remain above, with which it partakes in the sublimity of its nature and understanding, and those inferiour terrestrical Beings with which it communicates through the vital union which it hath with the body, and by reason of that freedom and indifferency which it hath, it sometimes is assimilated to the one, sometimes to the other of these extreams. So that while it approacheth to the nature of the superior Beings, it keeps it self free from evil, but because of its freedom it may sometimes sink down into these lower things; and so he calls, the cause of all evil in the soul foreign, its voluntary descent into this lower world, and immersing its self in the faeculency of terrestrial matter. foreign. For though the soul be of a kind of Amphibious nature, yet it is not forced either upwards or downwards, but acts either way according to its internal liberty. But, saith he, while the rational soul keeps that power which it hath in its hands over the body, and makes use of it only as an instrument for its own good, so long it keeps pure and free from any stain of evil; but when it once forgets the similitude it hath with the mor… excellent Being, and throws away the Scepter of its power, and drowns it self in the body and brutish affections (preferring the pleasure of sense above that of reason) when it so far degenerates below the principles of reason, that in stead of commanding the brutish faculties it becomes a slave to them, then it conceives and brings forth evil; but this it doth not through any coaction or necessity, but through the abuse of that power and liberty which it hath; For the choice is a proper action of the soul its self; which he proves from hence, because p. 484God and the Laws, and all good men, do not measure the good and evil of actions so much by the event, as by the will and intention of the person; and that punishment and reward have chiefly a respect to these. And therefore men are pardoned for what they do out of constraint and force, and the fault is ascribed, foreign, not to him that did it, but to him that forced him to the doing of it. And so from hence he concludes, that because of the freedom of the will of man, nothing else can be said to be the author of evil properly, but the soul of man; and concludes that discourse with this excellent speech, foreign. Having thus found out the true Origine of evil, let us cry out with a loud voice, that God is not the author of sin, because the soul freely doth that which is evil, and not God; for if thè soul were forced to do what it doth, one might justly lay the blame on God, who permits such a force to be offered it, neither could it be properly evil which the soul was constrained to; but since it acted freely, and out of choice, the soul must alone be accounted the author and cause of evil. Thus we see that God cannot with any shadow of reason be accounted the author of evil, because he gave the soul of man a principle of internal freedom, when the very freedom of acting which the soul had, put it into a capacity of standing as well as falling. And certainly, he can never be said to be the cause of the breaking of a person, who gave him a stock to set up with, and supposed him able to manage it when he gave it him; indeed had not man had this freedom of will, he could not have fallen; but then neither had he been a rational Agent, which supposing no corruption, doth speak freedom of action. So that while we enquire after the Origine of evil we have no other cause to assign it to but mans abuse of that free power of acting which he had; but if we will be so curious as to enquire further, why God did create man with such a freedom of will, and not rather fix his soul immutably on good; p. 485if the order of beings be no satisfactory reason for it, we can give no other then that why he made man, or the world at all, which was the good pleasure of his Will.

But secondly, supposing Gods giving man this freedom of will, doth not entitle him to be the author of evil; doth not Sect. 7.his leaving man to this liberty of his in the temptation, make him the cause of sin? I answer no, and that on these accounts.

1. Because man stood then upon such terms, that he could not fall but by his own free and voluntary act; he had a power to stand, in that there was no principle of corruption at all in his faculties, but he had a pure and undefiled soul which could not be polluted without its own consent: Now it had been repugnant to the terms on which man stood (which were the tryal of his obedience to his Creator) had he been irresistibly determined any way. Simplicius puts this question after the former discourse, Whether God may not be called the author of sin, because he permits the soul to use her liberty? but, saith he, he that says God should not have permitted this use of its freedom to the soul, must say one of these two things, …ither that the soul being of such a nature as is indifferent to good or evil, it should have been wholly kept from the choosing evil, or else that it should have been made of such a nature that it should not have had a power of choosing evil. The first is irrational and absurd; for what freedom and liberty had that been where there was no choice, and what choice could there have been where the mind was necessitated onelyonly to one part. For the second we are to consider, saith he, that no evil is in its self desirable, or to be chosen; but withall, if this power of determining its self …ither way must be taken away, it must be either as something not good, or as some great evil; and who…ver saith so, doth not consider, how many things in the world there are, which are accounted good and desirable things, yet are no ways comparable with this freedom of Will. For it excells all sublunary Beings; and there is none would rather desire to be a Brute or Plant then man; if God then shewed his goodness in giving to inferior beings such perfecti…s which are far below this, is it any ways incongruous to Gods nature and goodness to give man the freedom of his actions, and a self determining p. 486power, th…ugh he permi…ted him the free use of it. Besides, as that author reason…, had God to prevent mans sin taken away the Liberty of his will, he had likewise destroyed the foundation of all vertue, and the very nature of man; for vertue would not have been such, had there been no possibility of acting contrary; and mans nature would have been divine, because impeccable. Therefore, saith …e, though we attribute this self-determining power to God as the author of it, which was so necessary in the order of the Universe, we have no reason to attribute the Origine of that evil to God which comes by the abuse of that liberty. For, as he further adds, God doth not at all cause that aversion from Good, which is in the soul when it sins, but only gave such a power to the soul, whereby it might turn its self to evil, out of which God might afterwards produce so much good, which could not otherwise have been without it. So consonantly Pag. 186. 187…to the Scripture doth that Philosopher speak on this subject.

2. God cannot be said to be the author of sin, though he did not prevent the fall of man, because he did not withdraw before his fall any grace or assistance, which was necessary for his standing. Had there been indeed a necessity of supernatural grace to be communicated to man for every moment to continue him in his Innocency, and had God before mans fall withdrawn such assistance from him, without which it were impossible for him to …ave stood, it would be very difficult freeing God from being the cause of the Fall of man. But we are not put to such difficulties for acquitting God from being the author of sin; for there appears no necessity at all for asserting any distinction of sufficient and efficacious grace in man before his Fall; that the one should belong only to a radical power of standing, the other to every act of good which Adam did; For if God made man upright, he certainly gave him such a power as might be brought into act without the necessity of any supervenient act of grace, to elicite that habitual power into particular actions. If the other were sufficient, it was sufficient for its end; and how could it be sufficient for its end, if notwithstanding that, there were no possibility of standing, unless efficacious help were superadded to it? God would not certainly require any p. 487thing from the creature in his integrity, but what he had a power to obey; and if there were necessary further grace to bring the power into act, then the substracting of this grace must be by way of punishment to man, which it is hard to conceive for what it should be, before man had sinned, or e…se God must substract this grace on purpose that man might …all, which would necessarily follow on this supposition, in which case Man would be necessitated to fall, veluti cum subductis columnis dom us necessario corruit, as one expresseth it, as a house must needs fall when the pillars on which it stood are taken away from it. But now if God withdrew not any effectual grace from man, whereby he must necessarily fall, then though God permit man to use his liberty, yet he cannot be said to be any ways the author of evil, because man had still a posse si vellet, a power of standing, if he had made right use of his Liberty, and God never took from man his adjutorium quo potuit stare, & sine quo non potuit, as Divines call it, man enjoying still his power, though by the abuse of his Liberty he fell into sin; so that granting God …o leave man to the use of his Liberty, yet we see God cannot in the l…ast be charged with being the Author of sin, or of the Origine of evil, by the History of the fall of man in Scripture: which was the thing to be cleared.

We come now in the third place to compare that account given of the Origine of evil in Scripture, with that which Sect. 8.was embraced by Heathen Philosophers, in point of reason and evidence. There was no one inquiry whatsoever in which those who had nothing but natural light to guide them, were more to seek for satisfaction in, then this concerning the Origine of evil. They saw by continual experience how great a Torrent of both sorts of evils, of sin and punishment, did over flow the world; but they were like the Egyptians, who had sufficient evidence of the overflowing their banks by the River Nile, but could not find out the spring or the head of it. The reason was, as corruption increased in the world, so the means of instruction and knowledge decayed; and so as the Phoenomena grew greater, the reason of them was less understood; the knowledge of the History of the first Ages of the world, through which they p. 488could alone come to the full understanding of the true cause of evil, insensibly decaying in the several Nations: Insomuch that those who were not at all acquainted with that History of the world which was preserved in Sacred Records among the Iews, had nothing but their own uncertain conjectures to go by, and some kind of obscure traditions which were preserved among them, which while they sought to rectifie by their interpretations, they made them more obscure and false then they found them. They were certain of nothing but that mankind was in a low and degenerate condition, and subject to continual miseries and calamities; they who cryed up the most the foreign, or the self-determining power of the soul, could not certainly but strangely wonder, that a Principle indifferent to be carried either way, should be so almost fatally inclined to the worst of them. It was very strange that since Reason ought to have the command of Passions by their own acknowledgement, the brutish part of the soul should so master and enslave the rational, and the beast should still cast the rider in man, the sensitive appetite should throw off the power of the foreign of that faculty of the soul which was designed for the Government of all the rest. The Philosophers could not be ignorant what slaves they were themselves to this terrestrial Hyle, how easily their most mettalsom souls were mired in the dirt, how deep they were sunk into corporeal pleasures, that it was past the power of their reason to help them out. Nay when the soul begins to be fledged again, after foreign, or moulting at her entrance into the body, which Plato speaks of, and strives to raise her self above his lower world, she then feels the weight of such Plummets hanging at her feet, that they bring her down again to her former fluttering up and down in her Cage of earth. So Hierocles complains, that when reason begins to carry the soul to the perception of the most noble objects, the soul with a generous flight …ierocl: in aurea Carmina. p. 77.would soar above this world, foreign, were it not horn down to that which is evil by the force of passions, which hang like leads upon the souls feet. What a strange unaccountable thing must this needs be to those who beheld the constancy p. 489of the effect, but were to seek for the cause of it? it could not but be clear to them that the foreign they were wont to extoll so high, was (in the state man was now in) but a more noble name for slavery; when themselves could not but confess the foreign, or inclination in the soul, was so strong to the evil; and could that be an even balance, where there was so much down-weight in one of the scales? unless they made, as some of them did, the voluntary inclinations of the soul to evil, an evidence of her liberty in this most degenerate condition, as though it were any argument that the prisoner was the freer, because he delighted himself in the noise of his shackles. Neither was this disorder alone at home in the soul, where there was still a Xantippe scolding with Socrates, passion striving with reason; but when they looked abroad in the world, they could not but observe some strange irregularities in the Converse among men. What debaucheries, contentions, rapines, fightings, and destroying each other, and that with the greatest cruelty, and that frequently among Country-men, Friends, nay relations, and kindreds! and could this hostility between those of the same nature, and under the most sacred bonds of union, be the result of nature, when even beasts of prey are not such to those of their own kind? Besides all this when they summed up the life of man together, and took an account of the weaknesses and follies of Childhood, the heats and extravagancies of youth, the passions, disquietments, and disappointments of men in their strength and height of business, the inquietude, aches, and infirmities of old age, besides the miseries which through every one of these all men are subject to, and few escape, into how small a sum will the solid pleasure and contentment of the life of man be reduced? Nay if we take those things in the world which men please themselves the most in enjoyment of, and consider but with what care they are got, with what fear they are kept, and with what certainty they must be lost, and how much the possession of any thing fails of the expectation of it, and how near men are upon the top of Tenariff to fall into the depth of the Sea, how often they are precipitated from the height of prosperity into the depth of adversity, we shall finde yet much less p. 490that by the greatest Chymistrie can be extracted of real satisfaction out of these things. Whence then should it come that mens souls should so delight to seed on these husks, and to embrace these clouds and shadows instead of that real good which is the true object of the souls desire? They could easily see there was no pure, unmixed good in the world, but there was a contemperation of both together according to that of Euripides:

foreign,

foreign.

There is a kind of continual mixture of good and evil in the world, which Socrates observed upon the rubbing of his thigh where the fetters made it itch, foreign. Plat. in Pbaed.What a strange thing is that which men are wont to call pleasure, how near of kin is it to that which seems so contrary to it, pain?

Now the observing the strange and sudden vicissitudes of these things, and what near neighbours pain and pleasure Sect. 9.were to each other, (so that there is frequently a passage out of one into the other) did yet more entangle them to give a clear account of the Origine of both these. Those who believed there was a God, who produced the world and ordered all things in it, did easily attribute whatever was good in the world to the Fountain of all goodness; but that any evil should come from him they thought it repugnant to the very notion of a Deity; which they were so far right in, as it concerned the evil of sin, which we have already shewed God could not be the author of; but therein they shewed their ignorance of the true cause of evil, that they did no… look upon the miseries of life as effects of Gods Iustice upon the world for the evil of sin. And therefore that they might set the Origine of evil far enough off from God, they made two different Principles of things, the one of good, and the other of evil; this Plutarch tells us was the most ancient and universal account which he could meet with of the origine of good and evil. To which purpose we have this ample p. 491Testimony of his in his learned discourse, de Iside & Osiride, Plutarch. de Isid. & Osir. p. 369. ed. Fr.foreign. Which words I have the more largely cited because they give us the most full account of the antiquity, universality and reason of that opinion which asserts two different principles of good and evil. It is a Tradition (saith he) of great antiquity derived down from the ancient Masters of D…vine knowledge, and Formers of Commonwealths, to the Poets and Philosophers, whose first author cannot be found, and yet hath met with firm and unshaken belief, not only in ordinary discourses and reports, but was spread into the mysteries and sacrifices both of Greeks and others, that the Universe did not depend on chance, and was destitute of a mind and reason to govern it; neither was there one only reason which sate at the stern, or held the reins, whereby he did order and govern the world; but since there is so much confusion and mixture of good and evil in the world, that nature doth not produce any pure untainted good; there is not any one who like a Drawer takes the liquor out of two several vessels, and mixeth them together, and after distributes them; but there are two principles and powers contrary to each other, whereof one draoes us to the right hand, and directs us straight forward, the other pulls us back, and turns us the other way; since we see the life of man so mixed as it is; p. 492and not only that, but the world too, at least so much as is sublunary and terrestrial, which is subject to many varieties, irregularities, and changes. For if nothing he without a cause, and good cannot be the cause of evil, it necessarily follows, that as there is a peculiar nature and principle, which is the cause of good, so there must be another, which is the cause of evil.

But least we should think it was only a Sect of a kind of Heathen Manichees which held this opinion; he tells us to prevent that foreign, it was the opinion of the most, and wisest, of the Heathen. Now these two principles some (saith he) call two opposite Gods, whereof the one is the cause of good, and the other of evil; him they call foreign; this foreign: By this one would imagine that this very ancient Tradition was nothing else, but the true account of the Origine of evil, a little disguised. For the Scripture making the Devil the first author of evil himself, and the first sollicitor and tempter of man to it; who when God directed him straight forward, pull'd man back, and put him quite out of his way, by which means all the miseries of the world came into it. For while man kept close to his Maker, his integrity and obedience were to him what the vasa umbilicalia are to the child in the Womb; by them he received what ever tended to his subsistence and comfort; but sin cut those vessels asunder, and proved the Midwife of misery, bringing man forth into a world of sorrow and sufferings: Now, I say, the Scripture taking such especial notice of one, as the chief of Devils, through whose means evil came into the world, this gave occasion to the Heathens when length of time had made the original Tradition more obscure, to make these two, God and the Daemon, as two Anti-gods, and so to be the causes, the one of all good, and the other of all evil. Which at last came to that (which was the Devils great design in thus corrupting the tradition) that both these Anti-gods should have solemn worship by Sacrifices, the one by way of impetration for bestowing of good, the other by way of Deprecation for averting of evil. Such Plutarch there tells us were the Oromasdes and Arimanius of Zoroastres which were worshipped by the Persians, the one for doing good, and the other for p. 493avoiding evil; the one they resembled to light (or fire) the other to darkness and ignorance; what animals were good and usefull they ascribed to Oromasdes, and all venemous and noxious ones to Arimanius, whom Plutarch elsewhere calls foreign, the evil Daemon of the Persians. The same Diogenes Laertius relates of the Magi, the Philosophers of Persia, that they made two distinct principles, Plut. in Alex. Diog. Lac…tius pro. em. ad vit. Philosoph.foreign, a good and bad Daemon; for which he quotes Dinon, Aristotle, Hermippus, Eudoxus, and others. The same Plutarch makes to be the opinion of the ancient Greeks, who attribute the good to Iupiter Olympius, the bad to Hades; the Chald…ans, saith he, make the Planets their Gods, of which two they suppose the cause of good; two more of only a malignant influence, and other three to be indifferent to either. The same he affirms of the Egyptians, that whatever was evil, and irregular, they ascribed to Typho; what was good, comely and usefull, they attributed to Isis, and Osiris; to Isis as the passive, Osiris as the active principle.

Thus we see how large a spread this opinion of the Origine of evil had in the Gentile world; neither did it expire with Sect. 10.Heathenism; but Manes retained so much of the Religion of his Country being a Persian, that he made a strange medley of the Persian and Christian doctrine together. For that was his famous opinion of which St. Austin tells us; Is…e duo principia inter se diversa at que adversa, cade…que aeterna, & eterna hoc est, semper fuisse composuit; du…sque naturas at que substantias, boni scilicet & mali, sequens alios antiquos haereticos, opinatus est. St. Austin thinks that Manes had h…s opinion concerning two principles from the ancient …. de Heres. c. 46.Hereticks, by whom I suppose he means the Marcicnists and Valentinians; but it seems more probable that Manes had his doctrine immediately from h…s Countrymen, though it be generally thought that Scythianus and Buddas were his masters i… it. But from whomsoever it came, the opinion was me…rly Heathen, and not more contrary to Scripture then it is to reason; the former I medd… not with, that opinion being now extinct in the Christian world; I only briefly consider the unreasonableness of it, to shew what a far better p. 494account of the Origine of evil the Scriptures give us, then was discovered by the Heathen Philosophers. For on both sides that opinion is repugnant to the notion of a Deity, so that while they would make two such Gods, they make none at all. For how can the principle of good be God, if he hath not Infinite power, as well as goodness? and how can he have infinite power, if he hath not the management of things in the world? and how can he have the management of things, if they be lyable to evil, which the other God which is the principle of evil may lay upon it; from which according to this supposition, the principle of good cannot rescue it? So that they who hold this opinion cannot, as Sim…licius tells us, give God foreign, the half of that infinite power which belongs to him; for neither can he keep the good creatures which he makes from the power of the evil Daemon, and therefore, if he loves them, must be in continual fears of the power of the contrary principle, neither can he free them from the evil which the other lays upon them; for then Gods power would be far greater then the evil Daemons, and so he could be no Anti-god. And on the other side the notion or Idea of an Infinitely evil Being, is in its self an inconsistent Idea; for it is an Infinite nonentity, if we suppose his very Being to lie in Being evil, which is only a privation of goodness; and besides if he be Infinitely evil, he must be infinitely contrary to the good Principle, and how can he be infinitely contrary which enjoys several of the same perfections which the other hath, which are infinity of essence and necessity of existence? Now if this Principle of evil be absolutely contrary to the other, it must be contrary in all his perfections; for whatever is a perfection, belongs to that which is good; and now if it be contrary in every perfection, Infinity of essence, and necessity of existence, being two, it must be as contrary as is imaginable to them, by which this evil Principle must be infinitely defective in Being and existence, and so it will be an infinite non entity which yet exists, which is the height of contradiction. Again, if there be such a contrary principle, which is the cause of all evil, then all evil falls out unavoidably, and by the power of this Infinitely evil principle, p. 495by which means not only all Religion, but all vertue and goodness will be taken out of the world, if this evil principle be infinite; and if not infinite, no Anti-god: and not only so, but all difference of good and evil will be taken away (and then what need making two such contrary principles to give an account of the Origine of evil?) for when once evil becomes thus necessary, it loseth its nature as a moral evil; for a moral evil implyes in it a voluntary breach of some known Law; but how can that breach be voluntary, which was caused by an Infinite power in the most proper way of efficiency? and thus if all freedom of will be destroyed (as it is necessarily by this supposition) then no Government of the world by Laws can be supposed, and consequently no reward or punishment, which suppose liberty of action, and by this means all Religion, Laws, and Providence are banished out of the world, and so this evil Daemon will get all into his own hands, and instead of two contrary principles, there will be but one infinitely evil Demon. Which that there is not, appears by this, that notwithstanding all the evil in the world there is so much good left in it, of which there would be none, if th…s evil Daemon had Infinite power. By this we see there cannot be a principle infinitely evil; for while they go about to make two such contrary principles infinite, they make neither of them so, and so while they make two Gods, they take away any at all. So that this opinion of the Origine of evil, is manifestly absurd, irrational, and contradictions.

But all the Heathen Philosophers were not so gross as to Sect. 11.imagine two such Anti-Gods with infinitely active power; but yet those who would not in terms assert it, might be driven to it by the consequence of their opinion concerning the Origine of evil, which did suppose a necessity of it in nature, as flowing from that passive principle out of which the world was produced. Hence it was that Heraclitus as Plutarch tells us, attributed the Origine of all things to discord De Isid. & Osiride.and antipathy, and was wont to say, that when Homer wished foreign. p. 496that all contention were banished out of the world, that he did secretly curse the Origine of things and wished the ruine of the world. So Empedocles called the active principle wh…ch did good Harmony and Friendship, but the other foreign. by which he makes it to be a quarrelsome, pernicious, and bloody principle. The same Plutarch tells us of those two renowned Philosophers, Pythagoras and Plato. Thence he tells us the Pythagoreans called the principle of good foreign. Unity, finite, quiescent, straight, uneven number, square, right and splendid; the principle of evil, they called foreign. The Binary, Infinite, moving, crooked, even, long of one side, unequal, left, obscure. The opinion of Plato he tells us is very obscure, it being his purpose to conceal it; but he saith in his old age in his book de Legibus, foreign, without any if's or and's, he asserts the world to be moved by more then one principle, by two at the least, foreign. The one of a good and benigne nature, the other contrary to it both in its nature and operations. Numenius Chalcid. in Timae. p. 394.in Chalcidius thus delivers the opinions of Pythagoras and Plato de originibus as he speaks; Igitur Pythagoras quoque, inquit Numenius, fluidam & sine qualitate sylvam esse censet; nec tamen ut Stoici naturae mediae, interque malorum bonorumque viciniam, sed plane noxiam; Deum quippe esse (ut etiam Platoni videtur) initium & causam bonorum, sylvam malorum: so that according to Numenius, both Plato and Pythagoras attributed the origine of evil to the malignity of matter, and so they make evils to be necessarily consequent upon the Being of things. For thus he delivers expresly the opinion of Pythagoras; qui ait, existente providentia, mala quoque necessario substitisse; propterea quod sylva sit, & eadem sit malitia praedita: Platonemque idem Numenius laudat, quod duas mundi …mas autumet. Unam beneficentissimam; malignam alteram, sc. Sylvam. Igitur juxta Platonem p. 497mundo bona sua Dei, tanquam Patris liberalitate collata sunt; mala vero, matris sylvae vitio cohaeserunt. But Plutarch De Anim… procreat. c Timae ….will by no means admit, that Plato attributes the Origine of evil meerly to matter; but he makes the principle of evil to be something distinct from matter, which he calls foreign, a confused, infinite, self-moving, stirring principle; which (saith he) he else where calls Necessity, and in his de Legibus plainly, foreign, a disorderly and malignant Soul, which cannot be understood of meer matter, when he makes his Hyle foreign, Without form or figure, and destitute of all qualities and power of operation: and it is impossible (saith he) that that which is of its self such an inert principle as matter is, should by Plato be supposed to be the cause and principle of evil, which he elsewhere calls foreign, Necessity which often resisted God and cast off his reins. So that according to Plutarch Plato acquits both God and Hyle from being the Origine of evil, foreign, and therefore attributes it to that malignant spirit which moves the matter, and is the cause of all the disorderly motions in the world. But what this spirit should be, neither he nor any one else could ever understand; what darkness and ignorance then was there among the wisest of Philosophers concerning the Origine of evil, when they were so consused and obscure in the account which they gave of it, that their greatest admirers could not understand them!

But though Plato seemed so ambiguous in his judgment of the Origine of evil, whether he should attribute it to the Sect. 12.Hyle, or some malignant spirit in it, the Stoicks were more dogmatical, and plainly imputed the cause of evil to the perversity of matter. So Chalcidius tells us, that the Stoicks made matter not to be evil in its self as Pythagoras, but that it was indifferent to either; perrogati igitur unde mala? Chalcid. in Tim. p. 39….perversitatem seminarium malorum causati sunt: they made the perversity of matter the Origine of evil; but as he well observes, nec expediunt adhu… unde…psa perversitas cum juxta ipsos duo sint initia rerum, D… & sylva. Deus summum & p. 498praecellens bonum; sylva, ut censent, nec bonum nec malum. They give no rational account whence this perversity of matter should arise, when according to the Stoicks, there are but two principles of things, God and matter, whereof the one is perfectly good, the other neither good nor evil. But this perversity they tell us is something necessarily consequent upon the Generation of things. foreign, these are affections, (viz. the disorders in the world) which follow the Generation of things, as rust comes upon brass, and filth upon the body, as the counterfeit Trismegistus speaks; so Maximus Tyrius saith that evils in the world are foreign, not any works of art, but the affections of M…xim. Tyrius Serm. 25. Seneca de Provid c. 5.matter. Non potest artifex mutare materiam, saith Seneca, when he is giving an account why God suffers evils in the world: and elsewhere gives th…s account why evils came into he world, non quia cessat ars, sed quia id in quo exercetur Prasat. ad natur. quaest.inobsequens arti est. So that the Origine of evil by this account of it lyes wholly upon the perversity of matter, which it seems was uncapable of being put into better order by that God who produced the world out of that matter which the Stoicks supposed to be eternal. And the truth is, the avoiding the attributing the cause of evil to God, seems to have been the great reason, why they rather chose to make it matter necessary and coexistent with God, and this was the only plausible pretence which Hermogenes had for following the Platonists and Stoicks in this opinion, that he might set God far enough off from being the author of sin; but I cannot s…e what advantage comes at all by this Hypothesis, but it is chargeable with as many difficulties as any other. For, 1. It either destroyes Gods omnipotency, or else makes him the 1.approver of evil, so that if he be not auctor, he must be assentator mali, as Tertullian speaks against Hermogenes, because he suffered evil to be in matter; for, as he argues, aut Tertul. ad:. Hermog. c. 10.enim potuit emendare sed noluit. aut voluit quidem, verum non potuit infirmus Deus; si potuit & noluit, malus & ipse quia mal… savit; & fic jam habetur ejus licet non instituerit, quia tamen si noluisset illud ess…, non esset; ipse jam fecit esse, quod noluit non esse, quo quid …st …urpius? si voluit esse quod ipse p. 499noluit fecisse, adversum semetipsum egit, cum & voluit esse quod noluit fecisse, & noluit fecisse quod voluit esse. So that little advantage is gained for the clearing the true origine of evil by this opinion; for either God could have taken away evil out of matter but would not, or else would but could not; this latter destroyes Gods omnipotency, the former his good-ness; for by that means evil is in the world by his consent and approbation; for if God would not remove it when he might, the Being of it will come from him; when if he would have hindred it, it would not have been, and so God by not rooting out of evil, will be found an assertor of it; male si per voluntatem; turpiter si per necessitatem, aut famulus erit mali Deus, aut amicus; if Gods will were the cause why sin was, it reflects on his goodness; if Gods power could not hinder it, it destroyes his omnipotency. So that by this opinion God must either be a slave or a friend to evil. 2. This principle 2.overturns the foundations of Religion, and all transactions between God and mens souls in order to their welfare, because it makes evil to be necessarily existent in the world; which appears from hence in that evil doth result from the Being of matter, and so it must necessarily be, as matter is supposed to be; for whatever results from the Being of a thing, must be coexistent with it; and so what flows from what doth necessarily exist, must have the same mode of existence which the Being its self hath; as is evident in all the attributes of God, which have the same immutability with his nature: now then if evil did exist from eternity together with matter, it must necessarily exist as matter doth, and so evil will be invincible and unavoidable in the world; which if once granted, renders Religion useless, makes Gods commands unrighteous, and destroyes the foundation of Gods proceedings in the day of judgment. 3. This opinion makes God not to be the author of good, while it denyes him to be the Author of evil. 3.For either there was nothing else but evil in this eternal matter, or there was a mixture of good and evil; if nothing else but evil which did necessarily exist, it were as impossible for God to produce good out of it, as to annihilate the necessarily existent matter. If th…re were a mixture of good and evil, they were both there either necessarily or contingently; p. 500how could either of them be contingently in that which is supposed to be necessarily existent, and no free agent? If they be both there necessarily, 1. It is hard conce…ving how two such contrary things as good and evil, should both necessarily be in the same uniform matter. 2. Then God is no more the Author of good then of evil in the world; for he is said not to be the Auth…r of evil because it comes from matter; and so it appears good doth too, and so God according to this opinion, is no more the Author of good then he is of evil. But if it be said, that good is not in matter, but God produced that out of nothing: Then I reply, 1. If God did produce good out of nothi…g, why did he not produce matter out of nothing too; i… he were so powerful as to do the one, there could be no de ect of power as to the other. What insufficiency is there in Gods nature for producing all things out of nothing, if he can produce any thing out of nothing? 2. If God did produce good out of evil, why could he not have removed all evil out of matter? for good could not be produced, but by the removing of some evil which was before that good, and so God might have removed all evil out of matter. And so by not doing it when he might, this opinion gives not the least satisfaction in point of reason for acquitting God from being the Author of sin, nor for clearing the true Origine of evil.

Thus we have now compared the account given of it in Scripture, with that given by the Heathen Philosophers, and Sect. 13▪find it in every thing more clear, rational and satisfactory then theirs is. Which doubtless is the reason, why the more modern Philosophers such as Hierocles, Porphyrie, Simplicius and others, though otherwise great opposers of Christianity, did yet in this side with the Scriptures and attribute the original of evil, not to matter but to the Will of man. And whoever is seriously conversant with the writings of those Philosophers, who were foreign of the sacred succ…ssion, out of the School of Ammonius at Alexandria, such as Plotinus, Porphyrius, Iamblichus and Hierocles, will find them wri… in a higher strain concerning many weighty and importan… …, as of the degeneracy of mens souls from God, and t…e way of the souls returning to p. 501him, then the most sublime of the ancient Philosophers had done. Which speculations of theirs no doubt arose not so much from the School of Plato, and Pythagoras, as of that great restorer o… Philosophy Ammonius of Alexandria; whose S…bolars Her…nnius▪ Origen and Plotinus were. Who living and dying a …hristian, as Eusebius and Hierom assure us, whateve… Porphyrius suggests to the contrary, did Euseb. Eccles. hist. l. 6. c…p. 19. H…rony. de Script. Eccl. De vit. & Script. Porphyr. c. 6.communicate to his S…holars the sublimer mysteries of Divine rev…l…tion, toge…her w…h the speculations of the ancien… Philo…ophers: which Holstenius conceives he did with an adjuration o… secrecy, which he tells us Porphyrius himself acknowledgeth, that those three Scholars of Ammonius, Herennius, Origen and Pl…tinus were under an obligation to each other not to reveal and discover, though it were after violated by them. It is an easie matter to conceive what an excellent improvement might be made of the ancient Platonick Philosophy by the advantage of the Scriptures, by one who was so well versed in both of them as Ammonius is supposed to have been; and how agreeable and becoming would that Philosophy seem which had only its rise from Plato, but its height and improvement from those rich and truly divine Truths which were inlaid with them? The want of observing this, viz. whence it was that those excellent discourses in the later Platonists had their true original, hath given occasion to several mistakes among learned men: as first the over valuing of the Platonick Philosophy, as though in many of the discourses and notions of it, it seemed to some (who were more in Love with Philosophy then the Scriptures) to outgo what is discovered therein concerning the same things. A most groundless and unworthy censure! when it is more then probable (and might be largely manifested, were it here a fit opportunity) that whatever is truly generous and noble in the sublimist discourses of the Platonists, had not only its primitive rise, but its accession and improvement from the Scriptures, wherein it is still contained in its native lustre and beauty, without those paintings and impure mixtures which the su…mest truths are corrupted with in the Platonick writi…. The reason of which is, though these Philosophers grew …ddenly rich through the p. 502spoyles they had taken out of the Scriptures, yet they were loth to be known from whence they had them, and would seem to have had that out of their own gardens which was only transplanted from the Sacred writings. Therefore we find them not mentioning the Scriptures and the Christian doctrine without some contempt of its meanness and simplicity; & what ever improvement they had gained by them, they would have it less taken notice of by professing their opposition to the Christians, as is notorious in those great Philosophers, Porphyrius, Iamblichus, Hierocles, Simplicius and o…hers. It being their design to take so much and no more out of the Christian doctrine as they could well suite with their Plat…nick notions, by which means they so disguised the faces of the Truths they stole, that it were hard for the right owners of them to know them again. Which was the grand artifice of their great Master Plato, who doubtless by means of his abode and acquaintance in Aegypt about the time when the Iews began to flock thither, had more certain knowledge of many truths of grand importance, concerning the Deity, the nature of the soul, the Origine of the world, then many other Greek Philosophers had; but yet therein lay his great fault, that he wrapt up and disguised his notions in such a fabulous and ambiguous manner, that partly it might be less known from whence he had them, and that they might find better entertainment among the Greeks, then they were ever like to do in their plain and native dress. Which Plato himself seems somewhere to intimate, when he saith, that what the Greeks received from the Barbarians, foreign, they put it into Plato in Epinom.a better fashion, i. e. they disguise it, alter and change it as they please, and put it into a Greek habit, that it might never be suspected to have been a Forraigner. Thence Tertullian speaks with a great deal of truth and freedom of such Philosophers who did ingenii sitim de prophetarum fonte irrigare (as he expresseth it) that quenched their thirst after knowledge with the waters of Iordan (though they did not like Apol. c. 47.Naaman, cure the lepro…ic of the head by washing in them) for as Tertullian saith, the… came only ex negotio curiositatis, more to please the i tch o… their curiosity then to cure it.

p. 503And wherein they seemed most to agree with the Scriptures, their difference was beyond their agreement. Siquidem Tertul. de A…ma cap. 2.vera quaeque & consonantia Prophetis aut aliunde commendant, aut aliorsum subornant, cum maxima injuria veritatis quam efficiunt aut adjuvari falsis aut patrocinari. Whatever the Philosophers speak agreeable to the Scriptures, either they do not own whence they had it, or turn it quite another way, whereby they have done the truth a great deal of injury by mixing it with their corruptions of it, and making that little truth a plea for the rest of their errors. Neither was this only among the ancient Philosophers, but the Primitive Christians began to discern the underhand workings of such, who sought to blend Philosophy and Christianity together; for Tertullian himself takes great notice of such, who did, Veritatis dogmata ad Philosophicas sententias adulterare, suborn Christianity to maintain Philosophy; which makes him cry out, Viderint qui Stoicum & Platonicum, & Dialecticum Christianismum protulerunt; by which we see what tampering there was betimes rather to bring Christianity De Proscript. advers. haeret. cap. 7.down to Philosophy, rather then to make Philosophy truckle under the truth and simplicity of the Scriptures. Whether Ammonius himself, and some others of the School of Alexandria, might be guilty in this kind, is not here a place to enquire, though it be too evident in the writings of some, that they rather seek to accommodate the Scriptures to the Sentiments of the School of Plato, then to reform that by the Scriptures; but I say, however it were with those who were Christians, yet those who were not, but only Philosophers, made their great advantage by it. For when they found what was reconcileable with the doctrine of Plato in the Scriptures, done already to their hands, by the endeavours chiefly of Ammonius and Origen, they greedily embrace those improvements of their Philosophy, which would tend so much to the credit of it, and as contemptuously reject what they found irreconcileable with the dictates of their Philosophy. Now what an unreasonable thing is it, when what ever was noble and excellent in the Heathen Philosophy was derivative from… Scriptures, as the sacred Fount…in of it, that the meeting with such things should in p. 504the least redound to the prejudice of the Scriptures from whence it was originally derived? when on the other side it should be a great confirmation to our faith as to the Scriptures, that they who were professed Philosophers and admirers only of reason, did so readily embrace some of those grand Truths which are contained in the word of God.

For which we need no other instance, then that before Sect. 14.us, concerning the Origine of evil, the making out of which will tend to the clearing the last thing mentioned concerning it, which was that the most material things in it are attested by the Heathens themselves. And this honey which is gained out of the Lions mouth, must needs tast sweeter then any other doth. For it is a weak and groundless mistake on the other side, which is the second (which ariseth from meeting things consonant to the Scriptures in the writings of Philosophers) presently to conclude from such things that they were Christians (as it is said some have lately done in the behalf of Hierocles.) For there being such clear accounts given in Scripture of the grand difficulties and perplexities which the minds of men were troubled with, when these came to the knowledge of such who were of Philosophick and inquisitive heads, we cannot but think they would meet with acceptation among them, especially if they might be made consistent with their former speculations. Thus it was in our present case concerning the Origine of evil, we have already beheld the lamentable perplexities the ancient Philosophers were in about it, what Maeanders they were lost in for want of a clue to guide them through them; now it pleased God after the coming of Christ in the fl…sh …o declare to the world the only way for the recovery … souls and their eternal salvation, the news of which being spread so far that it soon got among the Philosophers, could not but make them more inquisitive concerning the state and condition of their souls, and when they had searched what the Philosophers had formerly discovered of it, their curiosity would presently prompt them to see what account of things concerning the souls of…delivered by the preachers of this New Doctrine. B… …they could not but presently p. 509understand that they declared all mens souls to be in a most degenerate and low condition, by being so continually under the power of the most unreasonable and unruly passions, that they were estranged from God, and prone to fix on things very unsuitable to their nature, as to all which, their own inward sense and experience could but tell them that these things were notoriously true; and therefore, they enquire further how these things came to be so; which they receive a full account of in Scripture, that mans soul was at first created pure and holy and in perfect friendship with God, that God dealt bountifully and favourably with man; only expected obedience to his Laws; that man being a free agent did abuse his liberty, and disobeyed his Maker; and thence came the true foreign, the feathers of the soul whereby it soared up to heaven, moulted away, and the soul sunk below its self into a degenerate and apostate condition, out of which it is impossible to be recovered without some extraordinary expression of Divine Favour. Now what is there in all this account, but what is hugely suitable to principles of reason, and to the general experience of the world, as to those things which were capable of being tryed by it? And those Philosophers who were any thing ingenu…us and lovers of truth, could not but confess the truth of those things which we are now speaking of, viz. That mens souls are in a very degenerate condition; That the most rational account of it is, that man by the act of his own will brought himself into it; and that in order to the happiness of mens souls, there was a necessity of recovery out of this condition.

As to the degeneracy of the souls of men; This was the common complaint of those Philosophers, who minded the Sect. 15. 1.government of themselves, and the practice of vertue, especially of the Platon…sts and Stoicks. Seneca in all his moral Discourses, especially in his Epistles, may speak sufficiently in behalf of the Stoicks, how much they lamented the degeneracy of the world. And the Platonists all complain of the slavery of the soul in the body, and that it is here by way o… punishment for something which was done before; which makes me somewhat incurable to think, that Plato knew more of the lapse of …, then he would openly p. 510discover; and for that end disguised it after his usual manner in that hypothesis of prae-existence, which taking it Cabbalistically (for I rather think the opinion of prae existence is so to be taken then the history of the Fall of man) may import only this. That mens souls might be justly supposed to be created happy, but by reason of the Apostacy of mans soul from God, all souls now come into their bodies as into a kind of prison, they being enslaved to the brutish part within them, there having been such a true foreign, the soul being now deprived of her chiefest perfections in this her low and degenerate condition. And it seems far more rational to me to interpret those persons opinions to a Cabbalistical, or an Allegorical sense, who are known to have designedly writ in a way obscure and ambiguous, then to force those mens expressions to Cabbala's, who profess to write a plain History, and that with the greatest simplicity and perspicuity; But it cannot but seem very strange that an hypothesis capable of being reconciled to the plain literal sense of the Scriptures (delivered by a person who useth great artifice and cunning to disguise his opinions, and sueh a person withall, who (by such persons themselves who make use of this opinion to that end) is supposed to have been very conversant with the writings of Moses) should be taken in its literal sense, as it really imports prae-existence of each particular soul in the g…ossest manner; and this should be made to be a part of the Philosophick Cabbala of the writings of such a person, who useth not the least artifice to disguise his sense, nor gives us anywhere the least intimation that he left behind him such plaited pictures in his History of the beginning of the world, that if you look straight forward, you may see a literal Cabbala, on the one side a Philosophical, and on the other a Moral. But now if we remove the Cabbala from Moses to Plato, we may finde no incongruity or repugnancy at all either as to Plato his way of writing, or the consonancy of the opinion so interpreted to the plain genuine sense of Moses, if by Plato his opinion of the Prae-existence and descent of souls, be understood by the former the happy state of the soul of man in conjunct… with God, and by the latter, the low and degenerate condi…on which the soul is in, after Apostacy from him. Which …he later Platonists are so large and p. 511eloquent in expressing; Porphyrie where he speaks of somethings he counsels men to do, hath these words, But if we cannot do them, let us at least do that which was so much lamented of old, foreign, which is foreign. De Abstinent. lib 3. Sect. 27.Let us at least joyn with our Fore-fathers in lamenting this, that we are compounded of such disagreeing and contrary principles, that we are not able to preserve divine, pure and unspotted Innocency. And Hierocles fully expresseth his sense of the degeneracy of mankind Hierocl. in Pythag. Carm. p. 261.in these words: foreign. The most of men in the world are bad, and under the command of their passions, and grown impotent through their propensity to earth; which great evil they have brought upon themselves, by their wilfull Apostacy from God, and withdrawing themselves from that society with him, which they once enjoyed in pure light: which departure of mens souls from God, which is so hurtfull to the minds of men, is evident by their strong inclination to the things of this world. The same Author mentions, with much approbation, that speech of Heraclitus, speaking of those souls which are foreign, which I cannot better render, then undeclinably good, he saith, foreign: We live their death, and die their life. foreign. for man is now fallen down from that blessed Region, and as Empedocles the Pythagorean speaks,

foreign

foreign.

Which words cannot be better rendred, then in the words the Scripture useth concerning Cain, and he went from the presence of the Lord, and was…fugitive in the earth, and under continual perplexiti…s. For the soul of man, having p. 512left foreign (it is Hierocles his own expression) the pleasant meadow of truth (a fit description Hierocles in Pythag. p. 254.of Paradise) foreign. Through the violence of her moulting, or deplumation, she comes into this earthly body, deprived of that blessed life, which she before enjoyed. Which he tells us is very consonant to Plato's sen…e o… the foreign, or descent of souls, that when by reason of their impotency of fixing wholly …on God they suffer foreign some great loss, and a deprivation of former perf…ctions (which I su…pose is me…nt by the foreign, the …uls impotency of flying up above this earthly world) then they lapse into these terrestrial and mortal bodies. So Hierocles concludes with this excellent and Divine speech, foreign. As therefore by Apostacy from God, and the moulting of those feathers of our souls, whereby we may be raised up above this world, we have fallen into this place of mortals which is compassed about with evils: So by the casting off carnal affections, and by the growth of vertues like new Feathers to the Soul, we shall ascend to the place of pure and perfect good, and to the enjoyment of a divine life. So much more becoming Christians do these excellent Philosophers speak of the degeneracy of mens souls, and the consequents of it, then some who would be accounted the followers of reason as well as of Christ, who make it so much of their business to extenuate the fall of man. Which we find those who were meer Philosophers, far more rational and ingenuous in, then those who pretend so highly to reason; but I think with as little of it as any, supposing the Scriptures to be of Divine authority. But it is not here our businesse to consider the opinions of those who pretend to Christianity, but only of such who pretending only to reason, have yet consented with the doctrine of the Scriptures as the … of the Souls of men, that it lyes in an Apostacy from … and have lost those perfections which they had before.

p. 513That mans will is the cause of his Apostacy; this we have already manifested at large from the testimony and reason Sect. 16. 2.of Simplicius, and Hierocles is as large and clear in it as the other, with expressions much of the same nature. foreign. In aur. Carm. p. 258.Mans nature lying between those beings which perpetually cont…mplate G…a, and those which are uncapable of it it sometimes ascends to those, and sometimes descends to these, according as it observes or rejects the dictates of reason, and so by reason of the Indiff…rency of the will is lyable to take upon it the si… ilitu…e of God or a be…st. foreign. And whoever throughly considers this, will easily understand, how men are the causes of their own evils, and become unhappy and miserable through their own choice and self wills. Which he brings in by way of explication of that truly golden Pythagorean verse,

foreign

foreign.

Men are grown miserable through their ownfault. And afterwards Hierocles excellently describes the nature of evil in these words, foreign. Both our natural and contracted pravity, is nothing els… but the unnatural motion of our free wills: according to which saith he, foreign. We dare to contradict the Laws of God …et being sensible how much we injure our selves when we …o it and only look at this that we are able to cast off the reins of…Laws from our necks. And he truly saith, that it is the greatest abuse of liberty to offend God, …en we either do what he forbids, or neglect what be… …. foreign p. 514foreign. So that on both sides men bring misery upon themselves, by transgr…ssing the divine Law, both by not doing what they are commanded, and by doing what they are forbidden. So that he tully ascribes the Origine of evil to the foreign, as he calls it, the irregular motion of the will of man, which we have already shewed to be the doctrine of the Scriptures.

As to the necessity of the souls recovery from this condition in order to her felicity, we have these Philosophers 3.expressing their consent with the Scriptures; Porphyrius as St. Austin tells us in the end of his first book De regressu August de Civit. D…i l. 10. c. 33.animae, doth acknowledge the necessity of a way of recovering souls, which should be universal. Cum autem dicit Porphyrius, nondum receptam unam quandam sectam, quae universalem viam animae contineat liberandae,—nondum que in suam notitiam eandem viam historiali cognitione perlatam, proculdubio confitetur esse aliquam, sed nondum in suam venisse notitiam. But the necessity of the purgation of the soul in order to its felicity, is so largely and fully discoursed of by all the Platonists and Pythagoreans, that it will be needless to insist upon it. Thus far then we finde the account given of the Origine of evil in Scripture to be embraced by the sublimest of the Heathen Philosophers, as most rational and satisfactory; which was the thing to be proved.

Neither do we sind only the main of this account acknowledged as rational, but we may trace some not obscure Sect. 17.footsteps of the truth of the particular circumstances which concern the fall of man: among the Heathens such as the Devils envying of mans happiness, his disguising himself under the form of a serpent, and mans being thrown out of Paradise upon his fall.

1. The Devils envying the happiness of man. It hath been truly observed by a learned man, that the original of that D. Casaubon Original of Temporal evils.very ancient opinion among the Heathen de invidia Daemonis had its rise from the history of the fall of man, which he hath made out so fully, that I shall the less need to prove it. And that there was an undoubted tradition of some malignant spirits which envyed the…of mankinde, appears by that ample Testimony of … in his Dio mentioned by p. 515the same Author; foreign. Plutarch was much troubled to give an account of the apparitions which Brutus and Dio who were learned and Philosophical men were haunted withall; and doubts he can give no just account of it, unless he embraced that very ancient tradition (which yet seemed absurd and incredible,) viz. that there are certain wicked and malignant Daemons, which envy good men, and withstand their enterprises, by raising fears and troubles to them, that so they might hinder them in their pursuit of vertue; lest if they continue stedfast and unmovable in good, they should be at last partakers of greater felicity then they enjoy. There being then so ancient a tradition of such foreign (as the learned man mentioned hath more fully shewed in his notes on this place of Plutarch,) gives a great confirmation to the truth of what the Scripture reports concerning the Devils being so great an instrument in procuring the fall of man. To him therefore I refer the inquisitive reader, and shall only add to the Testimonies of him cited, that of Xenocrates in Plutarch de I side & Osiride, where he saith that the calamities of life and misfortunes men meet with, do not Plutarch. de Isid. & Osi…. p. 361.agree with that veneration which we have for the Deity and good spirits, foreign. But that there are in the air some great and potent Beings, which are of a surly and malignant nature, and rejoyce to do men all the mischief they can. Iamblichus in his answer to Porphyrius concerning the Aegyptian mysteries, undertakes to give an account Jamblichus de myster. p. 105.of these evil Spirits or Daemons, and that from them the Origine of evil in the world is; for thus he speaks, (as he is translated by Ficinus) Si verum est quod de Idolis dicebamus, improbisque Daemonibus, hinc sane exoritur multiplex origo malorum. Simulant enim Deorum praesentiam, daemonumque bonorum, ideoque…suum jubent esse justum, ut ipsi videantur boni, sici… …Dii; quoniam vero natura p. 516sunt mali, rogati mala inferre, libenter inferunt, atque nobis ad injusta conducunt. Hi sunt omnino qui & in oraculis mentiuntur & fallunt, & turpia consulunt atque peragunt. By which we see he acknowledgeth some spirits who…e natures are wicked, and help men to do evil, and that these very spirits may sometimes command that which is good, lest they should be suspected to be what they are, of a wicked and malignant nature, which only design the ruine of men. By which we have a good account of whatever was commendable delivered by the Heathen oracles, which yet might come from the Devil still, by this confession of Iamblichus himself.

For the Devils appearing under the form of a serpent, It is very probably conjectured, that from hence it was that the Sect. 18. 2.Prince of those who contended with Saturn, was by that aenigmatical writer Pher…cydes Syrius called foreign. Celsus who had so little …kill in antiquity as to think that the history of Moses was as to many passages of it taken out of Heathen Fables, insists on this very story of Ophioneus as the groundw…rk of that relation in Genesis concerning the Fall. But Origen well answers him, foreign. Orig c. Cels. lib. 6.See therefore if this rare Antiquary who charg…h us with impi…y in corrupting and alt…ing the Heathen Fables, be not himself …er… justly chargeable with the same fault, not understanding the far greater antiquity of the writings of Mo…es, then either of Heraclitus or Pherecydes, or Homer himself which reports the story of that evil one which fell from heaven. foreign (foreign) foreign. For the Serpent (from which O hioneus in Pherecydes derived his name) which was the cause why man was cast forth of Paradise, doth intimate some such thing▪ while under a pretence of Divinity, and of a…condition…fi st deceived the woman, and by her means…man. C…lius Rhodiginus c…lls p. 517this Ophioneus Daemonicum Serpentem, qui antesignanus fu… rit Antiq. lect. l. 2. c 7. Euseb. de Praep. Evang. l. 1▪ cap. 10.agminis à Divinae mentis placito deficientis. This Pherecydes as appears by Eusebius, had much converse with the Phaenicians; where he purposely speaks concerning this Ophioneus. Now the Phaenicians as Eusebius likewise tells us, worshipped their God under the Form of a Serpent; which probably might be occasioned by the Devils ambition and Tyranny over men, that he would be worshipped among them in that very Form wherein he had done so much mischief to the world. It was very early in the world, when the Phaenicians and Aegyptians did begin to adore their Gods under the Form of Serpents, for the beginning of it is attributed to Taautus by Eusebius, foreign. Neither was this only among the Phaenicians and Aegyptians, but whereever the Devil raigned, the Serpent was had in some peculiar veneration: thence Iustin Martyr saith, foreign; the Serpent was the Symbol of Apolog. 2.adoration among them; and was the proper Indicium or note of a consecrated place as is evident by that of Persius, Pinge duos angues; pueri sacer est locus. Satyr. 1.Thence the Scholiast on Aristophanes on that place in Plutus foreign, observes foreign, so that where ever any God or Heroe was to be worshipped, there were Serpents painted to denote so much. So Orus Apollo saith of the Aegyptians, foreign, they were wont to Heins. Aristarch. p. 18. ed. 1627.put the form of a golden basilisk to their Gods. Heinsius conceives that the first worship of Apollo at Delphi was under the form of a Serpent, whether Nonnus tells us that Cadmus the Phaenician went upon his first coming into Baeotia, and from hence he derives the name Pytho from the Hebrew foreign which signifies a Serpent. Ut non dubitandum sit, saith he, quin Pythius Apollo, hoc est, Spurcus ille spiritus, quem Hebraei Ob & Abaddon, Hellenist… ad verbum foreign, caeteri foreign dixerunt, sub hac…qua miseriam humano generi p. 518invexit, primo cultus sit in Graecia. And which is further observable, the Devil was alwayes ambitious to have the world think that the knowledge of good and evil was to come by the Serpent still; thence the famous oracle of Apollo here at Delphi; thence came the use of Serpents so much in Divination, thence foreign signifies to divine from foreign a Serpent; and so among the Greeks foreign is taken in the same sense, from foreign a Serpent. So that excellent Glossographer Hesychius; foreign. The Serpent was reckoned among the pedestria auspicia by the Romans; and Homer tells in that solemn divination concerning the Greeks success at Troy there appears, foreign. …d. B.Which saith Heinsius, is an exact description of the Nachas; whom they would have so called from the marks on h…s back, which they accurately observed in divination. Thus we see how careful the Devil was to advance his honour in the world under that Form, wherein he had deceived mankind into so much folly and misery.

We meet with some remainders of mans being cast out of Paradise upon his fall among the Heathens. Origen 3.thinks that Plato by his converse with the Iews in Aegypt, Origen. c. Cels. l. 4. p. 189.did understand the history of the fall of man, which he after his way aenigmatically describes in his Symposiacks. Where he brings in Porus the God of plenty feasting with the rest of the Gods; after supper Penia comes a begging to the door; Porus being drunk with Nectar, goes into Jupiters garden, and there falls asleep; Penia observing it steals to him, and by this deceit conceived by him. In this Fable of Plato, Origen takes notice what a near resemblance the garden of Iupiter hath to Paradise, Penia to the Serpent which circumvented Adam, and Porus to man who was deceived by the Serpent. Which he conceives more probable because of Plato his custom, foreign, to wrap up tho…e excellent things he knew under some fables because of the v…gar; for which he after speaks p. 519of his custom in altering and disguising what he had from the Iews, lest he should too much displease the fabulous Greeks, if he should adhere too close to the Iews, who were so infamous among them. Some have thought the story of Paradise was preserved among the Heathens in the fable of the gardens of Adonis which comes near that of Eden; but what footsteps may be gathered of the truth of Scripture history in the Heathen Mythology, will appear afterwards. Thus much here then may serve to have manifested the account which the Scripture gives of the Origine of evil by the fall of man to be in its self rational, and attested by the consent of such persons who cannot be suspected of any partiality to the Scriptures.

We come now to consider the other grand difficulty which Sect. 20.concerns the Origine of evil and the truth of Divine providence together. Which is, that if sin be the cause of misery, and there be a God which governs the world; whence comes it to pass that the worst of men do so frequently escape sufferings, and the best do so commonly undergo them? This hath been in all ages of the world where men have been Philosophical and inquisitive, one of the great inquiries which the minds of men have been perplexed about. The true and full resolution of which question, depends much upon those grounds and principles which are discovered to us by Divine revelation in the Scriptures, concerning the grounds of Gods patience towards wicked men, the nature and end of sufferings which good men are exercised with. And certainly this should very much commend the Scriptures to all sober and inquisitive persons, that they contain in them the most clear and certain grounds of satisfaction to the minds of men, in such things, wherein they are otherwise so irresolved: But of that afterwards; Our present business is to give an account of this difficulty from natural reason, which will be most satisfactorily done by the producing those grounds, from which they have resolved this question, cur malisben…, & bonis male, who either have not had, or at least owned any thing of Divine revelation. I begin with that which doth concern the prosperity and impunity of wicked men, which men have with mo… confidence insisted on, o… p. 520this account, because all men could not but understand a general reason of sufferings, by reason there were none whose consciences could wholly acquit them of evil actions; but why persons notoriously wicked should live in impunity, when others suffer, that they were unable to give an account of. And this was the common pretence of Atheism, as Simplicius tels us, foreignComment in Epictet. c. 38. p. 223.

foreign,

foreign.

It comes to pass, that such who have no grounded belief of a Deity, when they observe the miseries of good men, and the tranquillity and felicity of bad men, they regard not the common notions they have of a Deity, and are ready to cry out with the Tragaedian (or rather of Aristophanes in his Plutus)

Shall I not dare to say there are no Gods,

When those do prosper who have injured me?

And it is observable; that the most of those who have taken occasion among the Heathens to question providence, have done it upon some remarkable injury which they have conceived to be done to themselves, and so we have ground to think that it was more passion and interest, then any clear reason which was the inducement to it. So Diagoras resolves to set up for an Atheist, because the perjured person was not struck dead in the place.

And Iason in Seneca when he sees Medea fly away after killing his children, cryes out,

Testare nullos esse qua veheris Deos.

Thou tell'st the world there are no Gods that way

Where thou dost fly.

p. 521And so Claudian, who largely reasons the case on both sides, for Providence and against it, at last tells us what it was which was the main cause of his doubts: viz. the long impunity of Rufinus,

Abstulit hunc tandem Rufini poena tumultum

Absolvitque Deos.

Rufinus death doth clear the Gods, and set

My mind at ease.

But because some carry it higher, as Cotta in Tully, who Tully l. 3. de Nat. Deor.reasons the most (as became a Statesman) in reference to such persons who had been usefull or hurtfull to Common wealths, we may suppose there might be somewhat more of reason then interest in such argumentations; and yet even in those discourses we may still find that the main original of this quarrel against Providence was an over-high esteem of themselves, that they thought they deserved better from the Gods then to receive such injuries, or undergo such calamities. Therefore Cotta cryes out on Providence, because such persons who were usefull to the Roman Commonwealth were destroyed when the enemies to it escaped, as though Providence had been only a Tutelar Deity of Rome, and had nothing to do elsewhere. Thence he cryes out, if there be Providence, why were the two Scipio's destroyed in Spain by the Carthaginians? Why was Maximus killed by Hannibal? Why were the Romans with Paulus ruined at Cannae? Why did Regulus undergo so much cruelty by the Carthaginians? Why did not Africanus die in his own bed? Nay, saith he, to come nearer home, why is my Uncle Rutilius in banishment? Why was my friend Drusus killed in his own house? On the otherside, why did Marius die in peace, and the most cruel Cinna enjoy so long tranquillity? with many other instances of both sorts. But this is it which I take notice of these for, because we hereby see how common it is for men to questi… providence, more out of Passion and Interest, then ou… of any solid grounds of reason.

p. 522Let us therefore appeal from persons who were particularly Sect. 21.engaged by some private interest in those passages, from whence they would infer that there was no providence, to such who stood by unconcerned, and made use of the free dictates of their reason in these cases. And such persons when they come to reason the case like Philosophers, and men out of passion, have given satisfactory and rational accounts why God in his wise Providence may sometimes suffer the worst of men, to go on in impunity, when good men may go through the troubles of this world. As,

1. God forbears wicked men, to propound the example of his goodnesse to their imitation, to teach them not to revenge their injuries too greedily on each other. This Plutarch, in that admirable discourse of his on this subject, insists on as Plutarch. de his qui sero pu…iuntur à numine p. 550. ed. Fr.his first reason, why God doth not presently punish wicked men. For, saith he out of Plato, God hath set forth …imself in the midst of the world for our imitation; and true vertue is nothing else but an imitation of the Divine nature. And therefore God, saith Plato, gave man the use of fight, that by the sight of the heavenly bodies, and the exact motions which are in them, men should learn foreign, that which was comely and orderly, and hate all disorderly and irregular motions; For as he excellently speaks: foreign. There is no greater benefit man can receive from God, then to attain true vertue by the imitation and pursuit of those perfections which are in him. And thence, saith Plutarch, God forbears to punish wicked men presently, not least if he should punish them he might do that he would repent of afterwards, foreign, but that he might take away the fury and violence of men in revenging their injuries on each other, that they should not do it in wrath and anger, with as much eagerness as they satisfie their hunger and thirst, whereby they do, foreign, leap upon them who have injured them, with as much sury as a wilde beast upon his prey; but men should learn to imitate foreign, Gods gentlenesse and patience, whereby he gives the offender time to p. 523consider with himself what he hath done, before he doth severely punish him. As Plato when his Boy had angred him, stood still a while without striking him, foreign, as he said, punishing himself first for his anger, before he would chastise the Boy for his fault; and Archytas when he saw how negligent his workmen had been, and began to be very angry with them, told them, foreign, It is well for you that I am angry with you. Now saith Plutarch, if the consideration of this forbearance in men should tend to moderate mens heat and violence, how much more should the consideration of the leni…y and patience of God do it foreign, and to account gentleness and forbearance to be an imitation of divine perfections. Now what can be more rational and agreeable to our apprchensions of a divine nature then this is, that he should shew his goodness to all, and by his forbearance of so many, teach the world more meekness and gentleness towards each other? For if offences rise by the quality of the person against whom they are committed, no injuries can be so great in one man to another, as those affronts are men put upon God by their continual provocations of him: And if God then be of so infinite patience to forbear such who have offended him, what justice and reason is there but that men should express more lenity and patience towards each other? So Hieroc… excellently speaks, foreign. A good man imitates God in the measures of friendship, who hates no man, and extends his loving kindnesse to all mankind. Of which Seneca likewise somewhere speaks. Ne Deos quidem immortales ab hac tam effusa benignitate sacrilegi negligentesque corum deterrent; utuntur natura sua, & cuncta, interque illa, ipsos munerum suorum malos interpretes juvant. The Divine Benignity extends its self to all, even to such as affront and dishonour them and abuse the gifts they bestow upon them. And since, there is so much truth and reason in that of Plato, foreign, It is the height of goodnesse to be like to God, we see what excellent reason there is for tha… command of our Saviour, p. 524Love your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again; and your reward shall be great, and ye shall be the Luk. 6. 35, 36.Luke 6:35Luke 6:36children of the highest; for he is kind unto the unthankful, and to the evil. Be ye therefore mercifull, as your Father is mercifull.

2. God forbears presently to punish wicked men, to give them time to become better. This the same excellent Moralist gives as another account of Gods patience, that thereby he gives them foreign, a space to repent as Plutarch. p. 551. Rev. 2. 21.Rev 2:21the Scripture calls it. For men, saith Plutarch, in their punishments look at nothing further then meer satisfying their revenge and malice, and that makes them pursue those that have offended them with so much rage and eagerness; but God, saith he, aims at the cure of those who are not utterly incurable. To such he gives, foreign, a time to reform in. Here he brings in the examples of such who were bad at first, and came afterwards to be changed from what they were; for which he instanceth in Cecrops, who was thence called foreign, because from a cruel severe Prince, he became gentle and mild; and so Gelon and Hieron of Sicily, and Pisistratus the son of Hippocrates, who from being Usurpers became excellent Princes. If Miltiades, saith he, had been cut off while he acted the part of a Tyrant, or Cimon in his Incest, or Themistocles in his debaucheries, what had become of Marathon, Eurymedon, Dianium, by which the Athenians got so great glory and liberty? and as he well observes, foreign, Great Spirits do nothing mean; foreign. That sharp and active spirit that is in them can never lye at rest by reason of its vigour, but they are tossed up and down, as it were in a Tempest, till they come to a setled composed life. But as the multitudes of weeds argues the richness and softness of the ground, though for the sake of those weeds one not skild in husbandry would not account such ground worth looking after; so, saith he, foreign; great spirits usually bring forth no commenaable fruits at first; which we considering the danger and hurtfulness of, are presently for p. 525cutting them down; but one that more wisely considers the generous nature which may lye under this ill fruit, waits time and leasure, till reason and age begins to master these headstrong passions. And therefore according to the prudent Law of the Aegyptians, the woman with child must be reprieved till the time of her delivery.

3. God spares some wicked men from punishment to make them instruments of his justice in punishing others. Ev…ol… foreign, as Plutarch goes on, God spares some from punishment that by them he might punish others. Which he supposeth to be the case of all Tyrants; and thereby Cotta's difficulty concerning Marius, Cinna, Sylla and those other cruel and Tyrannical persons, who had usurped authority among them, is clearly taken off: For Divine Providence might let those trees grow from whence he intended to take his rods to scourge others with all. God makes the same use of Tyrants (saith Plutarch) to common-wealths, that Physitians do of the gall of a Hyaena and other hurtful creatures, which may be good for curing some dangerous diseases; so may the Tyrannical severity and sharpness of such persons be continued foreign, till the diseases of the Political body be cured by these sharp Medicines. Such a one was Phalaris to the Agrigentines, and Marius to the Romans: and the Oracle told the Sicyonians in express terms, foreign; the City wanted some severe discipline. Thence Totilas, when he found what strange success he had in his enterprises, called himself Flagellum Dei, and thought God raised him up on purpose to be a scourge for the sins of the world. And no doubt those strange passages of the Roman Common-wealth (which made Cato at least dispute providence, and say res divinas multum habere caliginis, when he saw Pompey successful as long as he served his ambition, but presently overthrown when he stood for the Commonwealth) these things, I say, had a higher end then they looked at, which was to make both Pompey and Caesar the instruments of Divine justice to punish the Romans for their lusts, ambition and cruelty, which were never greater then in that age. Now then if God may justly punish offenders, p. 526why may he not spare some to make them his instruments in the punishing of others, especially since after he hath used his rods he may cast them into the fire too? as was evident in the instance of Caesar, who after all his slaughters and triumphs was murdered in the Senate, and that by some who had been as active as any for him. And herein divine justice, both as to the punishment of the persons and the means of it, hath been very remarkable in multitudes of instances, which every ones reading may afford him.

4. Therefore, another account why God may spare wicked men a great while, is, That divine providence might more remarkably be observed in the manner of their punishment afterwards. Plutarch tells us of Callippus, who was stabd by his enemies with the samd Dagger with which he had kild Dion under a pretence of friendship. And when Mitius the Argive was kild in a tumult, afterwards upon the day of a solemn shew, a brass statue in the market place fell upon his murderer and kild him there. But most remarkable is the story of Belsus recorded by the same author, who having kild his Father and a long time concealed it, goes one night to supper to some Friends, and while he was there, thrusts up his spear into a swallows nest and pulls it down and kills the young ones; his Friends asking him the reason of so strange an action: foreign; Do not you bear, saith he, how they falsly accuse me, and cry out that I have kild my Father? Which being by the persons present carried to the King, and the truth of it found out, he was executed for it. Such strange wayes doth providence sometimes use to shew how vigilant it is, even when we think it sleeps the most.

5. Though God spares the persons of wicked men, he doth not defer their punishment, when the thoughts of their evil actions is the greatest torment to them; Maxima peccat… pena est, peccasse, as Seneca speaks. Sin bears its own punishment along with it. Wickedness is foreign the most exquisite contriver of misery, which fills the minds of those who commit it with continual consternations, anxieties and perplexities of mind. But as that p. 527often and deservedly cited author on this subject, Plutarch tells us, most men are in this like Children, who when they behold malefactors in the Theatres in their cloth of gold and purple robes, with their crowns on their heads dancing about, they admire them, and imagine them to be most happy men, till they see them lashed and beaten, and fire come out from their brave apparel; so saith he, as long as men see others in their pomp and grandeur, they think them far from punishment, till they behold their execution, which saith he, is not so much the entrance of their punishment as the perfection of it. So that the longer the time of their lives is, the longer is the time of their punishment here; foreign; they are not punished when they grow old, but they are grown old in punishments. Cannot we say a person is punished while he is in prison and hath his fetters upon him, till his execution comes? nor that one that hath drunk poison, is a dying while he walks about till the cold comes to his heart and kills him? if we deny, saith he, that all the inquietudes, horrors and anxieties of mind which wicked men have, are no part of their punishment, we may as well say that a fish which bath swallowed the hook is not taken, because he is not fryed, or cut in pieces. So it is with every wicked man, he hath swallowed the hook when he hath committed an evil action (foreign) and his conscience within him, as he expresseth it, foreign. Which in the Prophets expression is, the wicked are like a troubled sea which casts forth nothing but mire and dirt. As Isa. 57. 31.Isa 57:31Apollodorus dreamt, that he was flead, and boyled by the Scythians, and that his heart spake to him out of the Cauldron, foreign, I am the cause of all this. God deals by wicked men as Caligula was wont to say of those he commanded to be executed, ferit ut sentiant se mori, he so punishes them as to make them sensible of their punishments. And as Tacitus speaks of cruel and wicked persons, quorum mentes si recludantur poss…nt aspici laniatus & ictus; p. 528quando ut corpora verberibus, ita saevitia, libidine, malis consult is animus dilaceretur. Wiekedness is the only fury which continually haunts and lashes those who delight in it, and leaves still behind it foreign, loathsome and terrible perturbations, secret gripings of conscience and self condemning thoughts for their folly and wickedness; like Lysimachus, who for extream thirst offered his Kingdom to the Getae to quench it, which when he had done, foreign. What a wretch was I (saith he) to lose such a Kingdom for so short a pleasure! And though wicked men be not sensible of the loss of a far more glorious Kingdom then this of Lysimachus, viz. that of heaven, yet they cannot but be sensible how much they have lost that Kingdom which every good man hath in the tranquillity of his spirit, and the command of his passions.

6. The time that God spares wicked men, is not so long as we think for. It is all one, as Plutarch saith, as if we should complain, that the malefactor was punished in the evening and not in the morning; Gods forbearance is but for a very little time, compared with his own duration. We measure God by the short hour-glass of our own time, when we are so ready to confine him to our measures. The time seems long to us, but it is as nothing in its self: foreign, the whole life of man compared with eternity is nothing. Besides all this time God suffers wicked men to live here, he hath them under safe custody; he doth but let them take the air within the prison-walls, or it may be they may play and sport themselves there, but there is no possibility of escaping out of the hands of Divine justice.

7. God forbears wicked men here, because the time is to come wherein God intends to punish them. This is the highest vindication of Divine Providence as to the present impunity of wicked men in the world, because this is not the proper season for the open execution of Iustice. There are but few in comparison whom Iustice causeth to be executed in the …rison, of what are reserved for the general Assizes; God reserves them for a fair and open tryal, for the greater vindication p. 529of his honour and manifestation of his Iustice to the world. And although Gods judgements even in this world be sometimes so remarkable, that we cannot but see a hand of Providence in them, yet they are but few whom God doth so remarkably punish here to make us more firmly believe a day of judgement to come. Which though it be most clearly and fully revealed in Scripture, yet the Heathens themselves from meer reason have had such a perswasion of it, that they have given this as another great reason, why God did forbear to punish wicked men here, because he did reserve them for future punishment. For as the same Moralist speaks in the same discourse concerning the soul, foreign, this present life is the place of the souls Plut. p. 561.combat, which when it hath finished, it then receives according to its performance of it. And as he before speaks, foreign. The same reason which confirms providence, doth likewise confirm the immortality of the soul; and if one be taken away, the other follows. foreign. And if the soul doth subsist after death, it stands to the greatest reason that it should there receive either reward or punishment. Thus we see how far natural light and moral reason will carry men in the vindicating Divine Providence as to the present impunity of wicked men.

The other part which concerns the sufferings of good men is not of so great difficulty, because there are none so good Sect. 22.as not to have a mixture of evil in them, and as they have a mixture of evil, so they have but a mixture of punishment; none lying under so great miseries here but withall they have some share in the comforts of this life. And therefore it is less wonder, that this part of Divine Providence which concerns the sufferings of good men, hath not wanted some among the Heathen Moralists who have made it their design to vindicate it; which setting aside what Simplicius on Epictetus and many others have done, is fully performed by Seneca in his tract on this very s…ct, …ur bonis male sit, cum sit Providentia, (as Muretu… restores the title of that p. 528duplicate page p. 529duplicate page p. 530book) wherein these following accounts are given of it.

1. God brings them up as his children under sharp discipline for their future benefit. A good man in Seneca's language, is discipulus Dei, aemulatorque, & vera progenies: which in the language of the Scripture is one taught of God, a follower of Senec. de Provid. c. 1God, and one born of him. Now saith he, Parens ille magnificus, virtutum non lenis exactor, sicut severi patres, durius educat. God who is the great Father of good men, keeps them under discipline while under age, and by hardship fits them for the practice of vertue. Thence he bids us take notice of the different indulgence of Fathers and Mothers to their Children; the Father he hastens them to school, suffers them not to be idle on their playdayes, makes them toyle and sometimes cry; the Mother she is all for holding them in her lap, keeping them out of the Sun, and from catching cold, would not willingly have them either cry or take pains. Patrium habet Deus adversus bonos animum, & illos fortius amat. God bears the indulgence of a Father towards his children and loves them with greater severity.

2. Good men receive benefit by their sufferings; quicquid evenit in suum colorem trahit, saith Seneca of a good man, which in the language of the Apostle is, every thing works together for his good. The sea loseth nothing, saith he, of its saltness by the rivers running into it, neither doth a good man by the current of his sufferings. And of all benefits which he receives, that of the exercise and tryal of his vertue and patience is most discernable. Marcet sine adversario virtus; as soon as Carthage was destroyed, Rome fell to Luxury: True wrestlers desire to have some to try their strength upon them; cui non industrio otium poena est? an active spirit hates idleness and cowardise; for etiamsi ceciderit, de genu pugnat, though his legs be cut off, he will fight on his knees.

3. It redounds to Gods honour when good men bear up under sufferings. Ecce par Deo dignum vir fortis cum mala fortuna compositus. It is a spectacle God delights to see, a good man combat with calamities. God doth in Seneca's phrase quosdam fastidio transire▪ passeth them by in a slight; an old wrestler scorns to contend with a coward, one who is vinci paratus, p. 531ready to yeild up presently. Calamitates sub jugum mittere proprium magni viri est, It argues a noble spirit to be able to subdue miseries.

4. It tends to the tryal and increase of their strength Seneca highly extols that speech of the Philosopher Demetrius, Nihil infelicius eo cui nihil unquam evenit adversi; non licuit enim illi se experiri. He is the most unhappy man who never knew what misery meant; for he could never know what he was able to bear. And, as he saith, to pass ones life away sine morsu animi, without any trouble, it is ignorare rerum naturae alteram partem, not to know what is upon the reverse of nature. Idem licet fecerint qui integri revertuntur ex acie, magis spectatur qui sancius redit. Though he that comes home sound might fight as well as he that is wounded, yet the wounded person hath the more pitty, and is most cryed up for his valour. The Pilot is seen in a tempest, a Souldier in battel, and a good man in sufferings. God doth by such, as Masters do by Scholars, qui plus laboris ab his exigunt, quibus certior spes est: who set the best wits the hardest tasks.

5. God exerciseth good men with sufferings, to discover the indifferency of those things which men value so much in the world, when he denyes them to good men. Blindness would be hateful, if none were blind but such whose eyes were put out; and therefore Appius and Metellus were blind. Riches are no good things, therefore the worst as well as the best have them. Nullo modo magis potest Deus concupita traducere, quam si illa ad turpissimos defert, ab optimis abigit. God could not traduce or defame those things more which men desire so much, then by taking them away from the best of men, and giving them to the worst.

6. That they might be examples to others of patience and constancy; For as Seneca concludes, nati sunt in exemplar, they are born to be patterns to others. If to these things we add what the Word of God discovers concerning the nature, grounds, and ends of afflictions, and that glory which shall be revealed, in comparison with which exceeding weight of glory these light and momentany afflictions are not at all to be valued, then we have a clear and full vindication of Divine p. 531Providence, as to the sufferings of good men, as well as to the Impunity of such as are wicked. But how ever from hence we see how far the meer light of reason hath carryed men in resolving these difficulties concerning Gods Providence in the world, and what a rational account may be given of them, supposing evil of punishment to arise from sin, and that there is a God in the world, who is ready to punish the wicked and to reward the good: Which was the thing to be shewed.