Discourses upon the Existence and Attributes of God

1. The Name Jehovah signifies this Attribute, Exod. 3.14. I am that I am, I am hath sent me to you. It signifies his Immutability as well as Eternity. I am signifies his Eternity; that or the same that I am, his Immutability:^* As it respects the Essence of God, it signifies his unchangeable Being from Eternity to Eternity;^* As it respects the Creature, it signifies his constancy in his Counsels and Promises, which spring from no other cause but the unchangeableness of his Nature. The reason why Men stand not to their Covenant, is because they are not always the same: I am, that is, I am the same, before the Creation of the World, and since the creation of the World; before the entrance of Sin, and since the entrance of Sin; before their going into Egypt, and whiles they remain in Egypt. ^*The very Name Jehovah, bears according to the Grammatical Order, a mark of Gods Unchangeableness; It never hath any thing added to it, nor any thing taken from it; It hath no Plural Number, no Affixes, a Custom peculiar to the Eastern Languages; It never changes its letters as other words do.^* That only is a true being, which hath not only an eternal Existence, but stability in it: That is not truly a Being that never remains in the same state. All things that are changed, cease to be what they were, and begin to be what they were not, and therefore cannot have the title truly applied to them they are; they are indeed, but like a River in a continual Flux, that no man ever sees the same; let his eye be fixed upon one place of it, the water he sees, slides away, and that which he saw not, succeeds in its place; let him take his eye off but for the least moment, and fix it there again, and he sees not the same that he saw before. All sensible things are in a perpetual stream; that which is sometimes this and sometimes that, is not, because it is not always the same; whatsoever is changed, is something now which it was not alway: But of God it is said I am, which could not be if he were changeable; for it may be said of him he is not, as well he is, because he is not what he was; If we say not of him, he was, nor he will be, but only he is; whence should any change arrive? He must invincibly remain the same, of whose Nature, Perfections, Knowledge and Will, it cannot be said it was, as if it were not now in him; or it shall be, as if it were not yet in him;