Love to Christ, necessary to escape the curse at his coming

But you may say, This is that offensive Doctrine that […] the difference betwixt common and ⟨p. 32⟩special Grace, to be only gradual, and not specific; and God forbid that we should think that God will damn a man for want of further degrees of Grace, when he hath it in truth and kind, and the degrees do not vary the kind.

But you may say, This is that offensive Doctrine that 〈…〉 the difference betwixt common and ⟨p. 32⟩special Grace, to be only gradual, and not specifical; and God forbid that we should think that God will damn a man for want of further degrees of Grace, when he hath it in truth and kind, and the degrees do not vary the kind.

1. The degrees do not vary nor alter the kind in things natural, but they may, and do, in things moral. For Example, The degrees of Reason, acuteness of Wit, solidity of Judgment, that one man might have, more than another man, doth not make him more a man as to his Species or kind, than another man that is in those respects inferior to him; for both (quoad Speciem) as to Kind, are men; have the Human Nature, and the specific difference whereby they are distinguished from things of any other kind: but yet degrees might make a specific difference in morals, where the act as natural is still of the same kind. For instance: In eating and drinking little or much, the natural act of both is still the same; but in morality, if a man eat and drink for quantity and quality according to the rules and guidance of Prudence, and no more; this is a virtue called Temperance; but if in degrees he doth exceed, and eateth more, and drinketh more than that Mediocrity, quoad nos, prescribed by Prudence (in which the nature of this Virtue doth consist) doth admit of, then though eating and drinking considered Physically, be of the same kind, yet in a moral respect it alters the kind, and is called quite by another name, viz. Intemperance, Gluttony, and Drunkenness.