A27004:194
The reasons of the Christian religion the first part, of godliness, proving by natural…
The reasons of the Christian religion the first part, of godliness, proving by natural evidence the being of God ... : the second part, of Christianity, proving by evidence supernatural and natural, the certain truth of the Christian belief ... / by Richard Baxter ... ; also an appendix defending the soul's immortality against the Somatists or Epicureans and other pseudo-philosophers.
London: printed by R. White for Fran. Titon, 1667
Part 1 › Chapter 5: What this Cause is, in it self. That it is God.
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.
So that it is most evident, seeing any thing now is, there hath been something eternally. And if something, it must needs be the first Cause, which is chief in excellency, and first in order of production, and therefore of existence.
§. 10. The first Cause must needs be independent, in being, perfections, and operations; and so be absolutely self-sufficient.
For it were not the first, if there were any before it:1 and being caused by nothing else, it was eternally sufficient in and for it self: otherwise that which it were beholden to, would have the place of a Cause to it. And if it caused not all, or ⟨p. 20⟩needed the help of any other,2 it is not absolutely the first Cause to all others, nor perfect in it self. That which could be eternally without a cause, and it self cause all things, is self-sufficient and independent.
For it were not the first, if there were any before it:1 and being caused by nothing else, it was eternally sufficient in and for it self: otherwise that which it were beholden to, would have the place of a Cause to it. And if it caused not all, or ⟨p. 20⟩needed the help of any other,2