and concernments, or to say that any thing comes to pass without, against, or contrary to, the counsel of his will. But we know through the goodness of God that these things have their consistency, and that God may have preserved to him the glory of his infinite perfection, and the will of man not at all abridged of its due and proper liberty. These things being premised, the proof and demonstration of the truth proposed lies ready at hand, in the ensuing particulars : 1. He who knowse all things, knows the things that are future, though contingent. In saying they are things future and contingent, you grant them to be among the number of things, as you do those which you call things past; but that God knows all things, hath already been abundantly confirmed out of Scripture. Let the reader look back on some of the many texts and places, by which I gave answer to the query, about the foreknowledge of God, and he will find abundantly enough for his satisfaction, if he be of those that would be satisfied, and dares not carelessly make bold to trample upon the perfections of God. Take some few of them to a review: 1 John iii. 20. God is greater than our hearts, and knoweth all things.' Even we know things past and present: if God knows only things of the same kind, his knowledge may be greater than ours by many degrées, but you cannot say his understanding is infinite; there is not on that supposition an infinite distance between his knowledge and ours, but they stand in some measureable proportion. Heb. iv. 13. All things are open and naked before him with whom we have to do.' Not that which is to come, not the free actions of men that are future, saith Mr. Biddle. But to distinguish thus, when the Scripture doth not distinguish, and that to the great dishonour of God, is not to interpret the Word, but to deny it. Acts xv. 18. 'Known unto God are all his works from the foundation of the world.' I ask, whether God hath any thing to do in the free actions of men? For instance; had he any thing to do in the sending of Joseph into Egypt, his exaltation there, and the entertainment of his father's household afterward g Causam quare Deus futura contingentia præsciat damus hanc, quod sit infinita ipsius intellectus perfectio omnia cognoscentis. Et sicut Deus cognoscit præterita secundum esse quod habuerunt, ita etiam cognoscit futura secundum illud esse quod habitura sunt. Dan. Clasen. Theol. Natural. cap. 22. p. 128. by him in his greatness and power? All which were brought about by innumerable contingencies, and free actions of men if he had not, why should we any longer depend on him, or regard him in the several transactions, and concernments of our lives? Nullum numen abest, si sit prudentia: noste, Nos facimus fortuna Deum.* If he had to do with it, as Joseph thought he had, when he affirmed plainly, that God sent him thither, and made him a father to Pharaoh, and his house,' then the whole was known to God before; for 'known unto God are all his works from the foundation of the world.' And if God may know any one free action beforehand, he may know all; for there is the same reason of them all Their contingency is given as the only cause, why they may not be known; now every action that is contingent, is equally interested therein; 'a quatenus ad omne valet argumentum.' That place of the psalm before recited, Psal. cxxxix. 2—6. is express, as to the knowledge of God concerning our free actions that are yet future. If any thing in the world may be reckoned amongst our free actions, surely our thoughts may; and such a close reserved treasure are they, that Mr. B. doth more than insinuate in the application of the texts of Scripture which he mentioneth, that God knoweth them not when present without search and inquiry. But these (saith the psalmist)' God knows afar of,' before we think them; before they enter into our hearts. And truly I marvel, that any man, not wholly given up to a spirit of giddiness, after he had produced this text of Scripture to prove that God knows our thoughts, should instantly subjoin a question, leading men to a persuasion, that God knows not our free actions, that are future; unless it was with a Julian design, to impair the credit of the word of God, by pretending it liable to self-contradiction; or with Lucian, to deride God, as bearing contrary testimonies concerning himself. h 2. God hath by himself and his holy prophets, which have been from the foundation of the world, foretold many Nullum Numen habes, si sit prudentia: sed te Nos facimus, Fortuna, Deam, coloque locamus. Juv. Sat. x. 365. [Editor.] h Præscientia Dei tot habet testes, quot fecit prophetas. Tertul, lib. 2 contra Marcionem. of the free actions of men, what they would do, what they should do, long before they were born who were to do them. To give a little light to this argument, which of itself will easily overwhelm all that stands before it, I shall handle it under these propositions : 1. That God hath so foretold the free actions of men. 2. That so he could not do unless he knew them, and that they would be, then when he foretold them. 3. That he proves himself to be God by these his predictions. 4. That he foretels them as the means of executing many of his judgments, which he hath purposed and threatened, and the accomplishment of many mercies, which he hath promised; so that the denial of his foresight of them, so exempts them from under his providence, as to infer, that he rules not in the world by punishments and rewards. For the first: 1. There need no great search or inquiry after witnesses to confirm the truth of it, the Scripture is full of such predictions from one end to the other. Some few instances shall suffice: Gen. xviii. 18, 19. Seeing that Abraham shall surely become a great and mighty nation, and all the nations of the earth shall be blessed in him; for I know him, that he will command his children and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of the Lord, to do justice and judgment; that the Lord may bring upon Abraham, that which he hath spoken of him.' Scarce a word but is expressive of some future contingent thing, if the free actions of men be so, before they are wrought. That Abraham should become a mighty nation; that the nations of the earth should be blessed in him; that he would command his children and household after him to keep the ways of the Lord; it was all to be brought about by the free actions of Abraham, and of others; and all this I know, saith the Lord, and accordingly declares it. By the way, if the Lord knew all this before, his following trial of Abraham was not to satisfy himself whether he feared him or no, as is pretended. So also, Gen. xv. 13, 14. And he said unto Abram, Know of a surety that thy seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not their's, and shall serve them; and they shall afflict them four hundred years; and also that nation, which they shall serve will I judge; and afterward shall they come out with great substance.' The Egyptians' affliction on the Israelites was by their free actions, if any be free; it was their sin to do it; they sinned in all that they did for the effecting of it. And doubtless if any, men's sinful actions are free; yet doth God here foretel they shall afflict them. Deut. xxxi. 16-18. you have an instance beyond all possible exception: ' And the Lord said unto Moses, Behold, thou shalt sleep with thy fathers; and this people will rise up, and go a whoring after the gods of the strangers of the land, whither they go to be among them, and will forsake me, and break my covenant which I have made with them. Then my anger shall be kindled against them in that day, and I will forsake them, and I will hide my face from them, and they shall be devoured, and many evils and troubles shall befall them; so that they will say in that day, Are not these evils come upon us, because our God is not among us?' &c. The sum of a good part of what is recorded in the book of Judges, is here foretold by God. The people's going a whoring after the gods of the strangers of the land; their forsaking of God, their breaking his covenant, the thoughts of their hearts, and their expressions, upon the consideration of the evils and afflictions that should befall them, were of their free actions; but now all these doth God here foretel; and thereby engages the honour of his truth, unto the certainty of their coming to pass. 1 Kings xiii. 2. is signal to the same purpose: 'Behold, a child shall be born unto the house of David, Josiah by name; and upon thee shall he offer the priests of the high places, that burn incense upon thee, and men's bones shall be burnt upon thee.' This prediction is given out three hundred years before the birth of Josiah. The accomplishment of it you have in the story, 2 Kings xxiii. 17. Did Josiah act freely? Was his proceeding at Bethel by free actions, or no? If not, how shall we know what actions of men are free, what not? If it was, his free actions are here foretold, and therefore, I think, foreseen. 1 Kings xxii. 28. The prophet Micaiah in the name of the Lord, having foretold a thing that was contingent, and which was accomplished by a man acting at a venture, lays the credit of his prophecy, and therein his life (for if he had proved false as to the event, he was to have suffered death by the law), at stake before all the people, upon the certainty of the issue foretold. And Micaiah said, If thou return at all in peace, the Lord hath not spoken at all by me. And he said, Hear all ye people.' Of these predictions the Scripture is full. The prophecies of Cyrus in Isaiah; of the issue of the Babylonish war and kingdom, in Jeremiah; of the several great alterations and changes in the empires of the world, in Daniel; of the kingdom of Christ in them all, are too long to be insisted on. The reader may also consult Matt. xxiv. 5. Mark xiii. 6. xiv. 30. Acts xx. 29. 2 Thess. ii. 3, 4, &c. 1 Tim. iv. 1. 2 Tim. iii. 1. 2 Pet. ii. 1. and the Revelation almost throughout. Our first proposition then is undeniably evident, that God by himself, and by his prophets, hath foretold things future, even the free actions of men. 2. The second proposition mentioned is manifest, and evident in its own light. What God foretelleth, that he perfectly foreknows. The honour and repute of his veracity and truth, yea of his being, depend on the certain accomplishment of what he absolutely foretels. If his predictions of things future are not bottomed on his certain prescience of them, they are all but like Satan's oracles, conjectures and guesses of what may be accomplished or not; a supposition whereof, is as high a pitch of blasphemy as any creature in this world can possibly arrive unto. : 3. By this prerogative of certain predictions, in reference to things to come, God vindicates his own deity and from the want of it convinces the vanity of the idols of the gentiles, and the falseness of the prophets that pretend to speak in his name; Isa. xli. 21--24. Produce your cause, saith the Lord; bring forth your strong reasons, saith the King of Jacob. Let them bring them forth, and shew us what shall happen: let them shew the former things, what they be; or declare us things for to come; shew the things which are to come hereafter, that we may know ye are gods. Behold you are of nothing.' The Lord calling forth the idols of the Gentiles, devils, stocks, and stones, to plead for themselves, before the denunciation of the solemn sentence ensuing, ver. 24. he puts them to the plea of foreknowledge |