A26923:280
An end of doctrinal controversies which have lately troubled the churches
An end of doctrinal controversies which have lately troubled the churches by reconciling explication without much disputing. Written by Richard Baxter.
London: printed for John Salusbury, 1691
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.
§. 3. Therefore where there is no effect or object of God's Will, there is no such will to be named and asserted: But so much as God effecteth in or towards Mans damnation, so much he must be said to will.
§. 4. God effecteth no mans Sin, and therefore he willed not or decreed not to effect it.
§. 5. He effecteth it not either for it self, or as a means to something better: Therefore he decreed not to do either.
§. 6. God effecteth much without which Sin could not be, (as the Life and Power of the Sinners, his abused Mercies, Objects, &c.) Therefore all this he decreed to do, even as his own Works, which Sinners make the occasions of their Sin.
§. 7. If it be said that God permitteth Sin; therefore he decreed to permit it: These things must be answered. 1. Permission is an ambiguous word: Strictly it signifieth in Physics nothing at all but a mer Negation, which is non impedire, not to hinder: But in Politics it oft signifieth a positive Licence or voluntary Concession of Leave for a man to do or possess something: And many Divines by Permission mean not bare non-impedition, but also some action that tendeth to the procuring of the event. In the first and proper sense it followeth not that God decreed to permit Sin, because he rmitteth it: For permitting here is but a bare