CXLV expository sermons upon the whole 17th chapter of the Gospel according to St.…

This being fully confirmed let us open the Doctrine. And

1. Consider, That the Christian faith doth only clearly and fully inform us of the beginning of the world; It's an expression the Scripture hath often, Before the foundations of the earth were laid; As for those Philosophers called Peripatetics, whose Master was Aristotle, they generally affirmed the world was from Eternity, indeed it's doubted what Aristotle's mind was, but it's plain in his Topics, he makes this Proposition, whether the world be eternal, only a dialectical Problem, a Proposition that might be disputed either way, as having no certainty in it, and indeed how can it be otherwise, for that is a received Maxim with them, Ex nihilo nihil fit; This is the foundation of all their Philosophy, and therefore grant this, then the world could not be made, but how ignorant were the great and learned men in the world of Gods power, that which the least babe almost in Christianity doth know; As for those disputes of some, who though they acknowledge de facto, that the world was created in time, yet question whether it was possible that it might have been from the beginning; It's a needless and unprofitable Question, What cause then have we to bless God for Scripture-light, when the great learning of the world, was wholly in darkness in this respect.

1. Consider, That the Christian faith doth only clearly and fully inform us of the beginning of the world; It's an expression the Scripture hath often, Before the foundations of the earth were laid; As for those Philosophers called Peripateticks, whose Master was Aristotle, they generally affirmed the world was from Eternity, indeed it's doubted what Aristotles minde was, but it's plain in his Topicks, he makes this Proposition, whether the world be eternall, only a dialecticall Probleme, a Proposition that might be disputed either way, as having no certainty in it, and indeed how can it be otherwise, for that is a received Maxime with them, Ex nihilo nihil fit; This is the foundation of all their Philosophy, and therefore grant this, then the world could not be made, but how ignorant were the great and learned men in the world of Gods power, that which the least babe almost in Christianity doth know; As for those disputes of some, who though they acknowledge de facto, that the world was created in time, yet question whether it was possible that it might have been from the beginning; It's a needlesse and unprofitable Question, What cause then have we to blesse God for Scripture-light, when the great learning of the world, was wholly in darknesse in this respect.