A26883:2245
Richard Baxter's Catholic theology plain, pure, peaceable, for pacification of the dogmatical word-warriors who,…Richard Baxter's Catholick theologie plain, pure, peaceable, for pacification of the dogmatical word-warriours who,…
Richard Baxter's Catholic theology plain, pure, peaceable, for pacification of the dogmatical word-warriors who, 1. by contending about things unrevealed or not understood, 2. and by taking verbal differences for real,Richard Baxter's Catholick theologie plain, pure, peaceable, for pacification of the dogmatical word-warriours who, 1. by contending about things unrevealed or not understood, 2. and by taking verbal differences for real,
London: printed by Robert White for Nevill Simmons, 1675
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
§. 2. Therefore as Natural Being (substance and faculties) and Natural Motion are antecedent to Morality; so Gods causation of both these is antecedent: and therefore to be Creator, Preserver and Motor is not to be the Cause of sin, or of Virtuous acts, as such.
§. 3. God as Creator was not pleased to make all his creatures of one kind, nor of one degree of excellence: but in such variety as is wonderful to our observation. Besides the innumerable species of beings, and the innumerable parts of every compound being, the dissimilitude of individuals of the same species is admirable: so that no two faces are perfectly like, no nor no two Stones in the Street, no two Trees, Birds, Beasts, &c. ⟨p. 58⟩And therefore it is but consonant to the rest of his works, that MAN is neither perfectly like to Angels nor to Brutes: For as God made one sort of creatures naturally determined to things sensible, and another sort necessarily (though freely) determined to things spiritual; so it pleased him to make a middle sort, endued with Reason and free-will, undetermined as to their choice, and able freely to determine their own Volitions, without any predetermining premotion of their Creator or any other. That so they might be fit subjects to be governed in this Life, by Laws and other moral means.
§. 3. God as Creator was not pleased to make all his creatures of one kind, nor of one degree of excellence: but in such variety as is wonderful to our observation. Besides the innumerable species of beings, and the innumerable parts of every compound being, the dissimilitude of indviduals of the same species is admirable: so that no two faces are perfectly like, no nor no two Stones in the Street, no two Trees, Birds, Beasts, &c. ⟨p. 58⟩And therefore it is but consonant to the rest of his works, that MAN is neither perfectly like to Angels nor to Brutes: For as God made one sort of creatures naturally determined to things sensible, and another sort necessarily (though freely) determined to things spiritual; so it pleased him to make a middle sort, endued with Reason and free-will, undetermined as to their choice, and able freely to determine their own Volitions, without any predetermining premotion of their Creator or any other. That so they might be fit subjects to be governed in this Life, by Laws and other moral means.