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,…

609. Pag. 194. Retorting on Aquin. he thus argueth Because God doth will his own Goodness, therefore it is necessary that God will that sin be done, he permitting it. For it is not to will his essential Goodness, which needeth no acquisition, but he willeth to manifest his Goodness. But the evil of sin is not opposite to the manifesting of Gods Goodness: Yea nothing is more ^*conducible to it than this; I say to the manifesting of Gods Goodness by way of mercy in sparing or by way of Justice in punishing.

1. *So Twiss. contr. Armin. pro Junio pag. 91. dissenteth from J•niu• that saith peceatum ad rationem universi facere per accidens, and saith Mibi vero dicendum videtur Peceatum conducibile esse per se ad bonum universi quatenus conducit ad illustrandos tales divinae majestatis radios—And if so, it must per se be Loved of God as Good. Yet contr. Corvin. he saith, that No sober man saith that sin is a medium of the execution of Reprobation, but only the Permission of sin. Reconcile them that can.

Answ. Horresco recitans, 1. Gods Volition of his Essential Goodness is his Necessary Volition. 2. God hath no End to acquire, but always hath his end, and is never without it. 3. If God had necessarily willed ⟨p. 99⟩the particular way of manifesting his Goodness, then he doth all things necessarily, and could do no otherwise, and it seems by you could not manifest it without sin. 4. Doth he not manifest his Goodness as much to the Innumerable Glorious Angels, who never sinned? And would it not have been as much manifested to us if we had been as they? 5. The very indetermination of the will, and its mediate Liberty is not the highest excellency of his Creatures: It is better than the sensitive Necessity of Brutes, and lower than the confirmed Necessity of the blessed: It is our defectibility. And the excellentest or Best of his works most honour Gods Goodness. 6. Is it not the strongest temptation that men have in this world to doubt of or dishonour the Goodness of God, to think how he permitteth the world to be drowned in wickedness, and be so like to hell? 7. Doth not Christ turn the Prayers of all Christians against your doctrine, viz. that Gods name may be hallowed, his Kingdom come, and his will done on earth as it is in Heaven (which is not by any sin?) 8. Do not your words tempt men to be indifferent to sin, if not to love it, if nothing be more conducible to honour Gods Goodness? 9. Is not that conclusion a great wrong to Christ, Scripture, Ministry and Holiness, as being no more conducible to manifest Gods Goodness than sin is? 10. It is not true that sin is any Cause, or true Means at all of glorifying God or doing any good. It is but a presupposed Evil, by delivering us from which God is glorified. As your eating poison may occasion the honour of an Antidote and Physician: It is no Cause or proper medium of it, but only an occasion, and mischief sine quo non; But if God had not saved us from sin committed, he could have glorified himself in saving us from committing it: God loveth and is glorified most in that which is most like him as his Image, which is, the Holiest sinless soul. To be a medium to Gods glory is to be good: To be as conducible to it as any thing, is to be as good as any thing save God and his glory. But sin hath no Good, much less such good.