A27004:634
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.
§. 28. Having proved, that God must be loved above our selves, we need no other proof, that not we, 1but God must be our ultimate end.
- 1Justitia nihil expetit praemii, nihil pretii: per se igitur expetitur: eademque omnium virtutum causa atque sententia est: Atque etiam si emolumentis, non suapte natura virtus expetitur, una erit virtus, quae malitia rectissimè dicetur. Ut enim quisque ad suum commodum refert maxim quaecunque agit, ita minime est vir bonus: ut qui virtutem praemio metiuntur, nullam virtutem nisi malitiam putant. Cicero de Leg. 1. p. 227.Justitia nihil expetit praemii, nihil pretii: per se igitur expetitur: eademque omnium virtutum causa atque sententia est: Atque etiam si emolumentis, non suapte natura virtus expetitur, una erit virtus, quae malitia rectissimè dicetur. Ut enim quisque ad suum commodum refert maxime quaecunque agit, ita minime est vir bonus: ut qui virtutem praemio metiuntur, nullam virtutem nisi malitiam putant. Cicero de Leg. 1. p. 227.
§. 29. Because we here see not God intuitively, but in his Works, we are bound with fervent desire to study and contemplate them, and therein to feast our love in beholding and tasting of his Love and Goodness.
As a Man will look on the Picture, the Letters, the works of his absent Friend, and retain the Image of him in his heart; so God, though not absent, yet unseen, expresseth himself to us in all his works, that we may studiously there behold, admire and love him.