A27004:371
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
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.
§. 14. XI. If man act, per media propter finem, and loth discerned by reason, then he must be ruled by a Law. But the Antecedent is sure: Ergo, &c.
For the End is ever something apprehended sub ratione boni, (and the ultimate end, sub ratione optimi possibilis:) and the Means are chosen and used, sub ratione conducibilis, as apt to attain the End. This Means and End are not to be discerned only by sense and imagination, as in brutes every object is apprehended, but by reason; this Reason is defectible and liable to error, and therefore the rational evidences must be proposed to it, and that conveniently: For he that knoweth not Reason, why he should choose, refuse, or act, cannot do it Rationally. And the Will being as apt to be seduced by the sense,1 hath need of due motives to determine it. Therefore there is need of the Regulation of a Law, containing the direction of a superior wisdom, with authority and motives of consequential Good or Evil, proposed by one that can accomplish it.
For the End is ever something apprehended sub ratione boni, (and the ultimate end, sub ratione optimi possibilis:) and the Means are chosen and used, sub ratione conducibilis, as apt to attain the End. This Means and End are not to be discerned onely by sense and imagination, as in bruits every object is apprehended, but by reason; this Reason is defectible and liable to error, and therefore the rational evidences must be proposed to it, and that conveniently: For he that knoweth not Reason, why he should chuse, refuse, or act, cannot do it Rationally. And the Will being as apt to be seduced by the sense,1 hath need of due motives to determine it. Therefore there is need of the Regulation of a Law, containing the direction of a superiour wisdom, with authority and motives of consequential Good or Evil, proposed by one that can accomplish it.
- 1Non potest consistere Respablica, ubi non est honos virtuti, nec poena scelerosis. Demosth.