The reconcilableness of God's prescience of the sins of men with the wisdom and…The reconcileableness of God's prescience of the sins of men with the wisdom and…

II. It were one of the greatest injuries to Religion, a subversion indeed of its very foundations. ⟨p. 6⟩And then by doing which, we could not more highly gratify atheistical minds, instead, and under pretence of ascribing perfections to the nature of God, to ascribe to it inconsistencies, or to give a self-repugnant notion of that adorable Being, The parts whereof should jostle and not accord with one another. And yet equal care is to be taken, lest while we endeavour to frame a consistent notion of God, we reject from it any thing that is truly a perfection, and so give a maimed one. Whereby we should undo our own design, and by our over much caution to make our conception of him agree with it self, make it disagree to him. For to an absolutely perfect Being, no other can agree than that, which not only is not made up of contradictions, but which also comprehends ⟨p. 7⟩in it all real perfections either explicitly, or which leaves room for all, by not positively excluding any of them. Which to do, and afterward, to assign that as the proper notion of God, were, it self, the greatest contradiction. We need therefore to be very wary, lest we pronounce too hastily concerning any thing, which to our most sedate thoughts, appears simply a perfection in it self, that it carries with it a repugnancy to somewhat else, necessary to be ascribed to him.

II. It were one of the greatest injuries to Religion, a subversion indeed of its very foundations. ⟨p. 6⟩