An answer to two treatises of Mr. John Can, the leader of the English…An answer to two treatises of Mr. Iohn Can, the leader of the English…

The Philosophical Maxim to which you have reference is. ¹Posito une contrariorum ponitur & alterum. But as you cite it, It is as hard to be found as your translation is to be understood. That it is not universal, appeareth out of Arist. himself, who putteth down the contrary Maxim as true and certaine. ²Non necessarium est, Si contrariorum alterum sit & alterum esse. Nam si omnes sint sanitas quidem erit, morbus non erit. So in the first Creation of all things, all things were very good and there was nothing evil. All things created are finite in act, but amongst things created there neither is nor can be a natural infinite. Truth and false-hood, good and evil, Piety, and Idolatry are opposite, and that before ever false-hood, evil or Idolatry had any being in the world. Contraries we know expel one another, Or if one be necessary in the subject the other cannot be in it, at least in the intense degree, as if fire be hot it cannot be cold; Now it is necessary, that every thing created be finite and good as created, and therefore good had a being before evil. If it be objected, that opposites are relatives, and relatives are together in nature, the answer is, they are relatives secundum dici, as they speak, not secundum esse, which may be said to be together in nature; Not that both are in act existent out of their causes, but because the nature of one being known the nature of the other may be known, whether it be, or be not, whether it may be or may not be. We know likewise, that not only good is opposed to evil, but evil to evil, as covetousness to prodigality and this the Philosopher himself confesseth. So that these propositions must be rightly limited or they are both false.³

The Philosophicall Maxime to which you have reference is. ¹Posito une contrariorum ponitur & alterum. But as you cite it, It is as hard to be found as your translation is to be understood. That it is not universall, appeareth out of Arist. himselfe, who putteth down the contrary Maxime as true and certaine. ²Non necessarium est, Si contrariorum alterum sit & alterum esse. Nam si omnes sint sanitas quidem erit, morbus non erit. So in the first Creation of all things, all things were very good and there was nothing evill. All things created are finite in act, but amongst things created there neither is nor can be a naturall infinite. Truth and false-hood, good and evill, Piety, and Idolatry are opposite, and that before ever false-hood, evill or Idolatry had any being in the world. Contraries we know expell one another, Or if one be necessary in the subject the other cannot be in it, at least in the intense degree, as if fire be hot it cannot be cold; Now it is necessary, that every thing created be finite and good as created, and therefore good had a being before evill. If it be objected, that opposites are relatives, and relatives are together in nature, the answer is, they are relatives secundum dici, as they speake, not secundum esse, which may bee said to be together in nature; Not that both are in act existent out of their causes, but because the nature of one being knowne the nature of the other may be knowne, whether it be, or be not, whether it may bee or may not bee. Wee know likewise, that not only good is opposed to evill, but evill to evill, as covetousnesse to prodigality and this the Philosopher himselfe confesseth. So that these propositions must be rightly limited or they are both false.