The reasons of the Christian religion the first part, of godliness, proving by natural…

§. 4. Gods ultimate end in Creation and Providence, is not any supply or addition of Perfection or Blessedness in himself; as being absolutely perfect in himself, and capable of no addition.

But those who think that God doth produce all things ex necessitate naturae from Eternity, say, that as the Tree is not perfect without its fruits, so neither is God without his works: They say with Balbus in Cicero, and other Stoics, that the World is the most excellent Being; and that God is but the soul of the World: and though the Soul be a complete soul if it had no body, yet it is not a complete Man: and as the Tree is complete in genere causae without the fruit, yet not as a Totum containing those effects ab essentia which are its Part and End: So say they, God may be perfect without the World, as he is only the Soul and part of the World; but he is not a complete world, nor in toto.

But those who think that God doth produce all things ex necessitate naturae from Eternity, say, that as the Tree is not perfect without its fruits, so neither is God without his works: They say with Balbus in Cicero, and other Stoicks, that the World is the most excellent Being; and that God is but the soul of the World: and though the Soul be a compleat soul if it had no body, yet it is not a compleat Man: and as the Tree is compleat in genere causae without the fruit, yet not as a Totum containing those effects ab essentia which are its Part and End: So say they, God may be perfect without the World, as he is only the Soul and part of the World; but he is not a compleat world, nor in toto.

Answ. 1. That God is not the soul or constitutive cause of the World, but somewhat much greater, is proved before^*: And also that it was not from Eternity; and consequently that he created it not by natural necessity: The foundation therefore being overthrown, the building falleth. Those that hold the foresaid opinion must hold, that God is in point of duration, an eternal efficient, matter, form and end; and that in order of Nature, he is first an Efficient principle causing matter, and secondly, he is an efficient with matter, and in the third instant he is the form of the effected matter, and in the fourth instant he is the end of his operations herein. And if you call the efficient Principle only by the name of God, then you grant what I prove and you seemed to deny: But if he be not God as the mere efficient and end, but also as the matter; then you make every stone, and Serpent, and every thief and murderer, and devil, to be part of God,