A30241:427
CXLV expository sermons upon the whole 17th chapter of the Gospel according to St.…
CXLV expository sermons upon the whole 17th chapter of the Gospel according to St. John, or, Christs prayer before his passion explicated, and both practically and polemically improved by Anthony Burgess ...
London: printed by Abraham Miller for Thomas Underhill, 1656
Title page typeset from the transcription.
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.
In the fourth place, take notice that this expression, the true God, 1may be taken in a twofold sense, as truth is divided into veritas rei, and veritas conceptus, the truth of the thing, and the truth of conceiving of it: Now the Heathens when they worshipped Jupiter as the chiefest and highest God, there was the truth of the thing, there was a supreme and a chief that they intended, but there was no truth in their conceptions and apprehensions about him; therefore they added many other gods to him: Such a distinction as this the Apostle insinuates, Acts 17.23. where reproving them for their Idolatry, and telling them of an Altar with this inscription, To the unknown God, whom (saith he) you ignorantly worship, we declare to you. It was a true God they worshipped when they conceived of one supreme above the rest, but they had no true or right thoughts about him. Hence what the Poet said of Jupiter, the Apostle owneth as of the true God, for we are his offspring, Acts 17.28. Now their thoughts were Idolatricall about the true God, as Rom. 1. turning ⟨p. 92⟩his Image into the similitude of creatures; and then they superadded other Gods, which made Tertullian say, Deus non erit Deus, nisi homini placuerit. The sum of this particular is no more, then that even in their Polytheism and multiplied Idolatry that the Heathens lived in, there was a general implied assent that there was a God; so that although there was no truth at all in their apprehensions, yet something there was in the object generally considered, but not as it was particularly terminated upon any one thing.
In the fourth place, take notice that this expression, the true God, 1may be taken in a twofold sense, as truth is divided into veritas rei, and veritas conceptus, the truth of the thing, and the truth of conceiving of it: Now the Heathens when they worshipped Jupiter as the chiefest and highest God, there was the truth of the thing, there was a supream and a chief that they intended, but there was no truth in their conceptions and apprehensions about him; therefore they added many other gods to him: Such a distinction as this the Apostle insinuates,