The covenant of life opened, or, A treatise of the covenant of grace

And who gave first to the Lord, and it shall be recompensed to him, ¹and he that gave first to him, man or Angel, must give his own (or then it is no giving) which he received not from God, either created being, or gift, or work (for any uncreated gift none can give to him) as is said. 2. What is given is amongst the all things that are of him, as the efficient, and to him, as the last end, and through him, as the conserver of all, and so can be no gift to him, Rom 11.36.

1. 1None gave first to the Lord, men or Angels.

And what God of free goodness, decrees to do, that he may decree not to do; and things falling under his decree, are not necessary, he cannot decree that man should be a reasonable creature▪ for it involves a contradiction to be a man, and not to be a reasonable creature. But no shadow of contradiction there is for the Lord to forbid to eat; and to forbid to eat under a punishment: And the not created world (it being from eternity nothing and a non ens) could not have any jus or right to plead that God would stand to what he decreed,¹ and give being and create a world, for if the Lord should not give being to it, and create what he had decreed from eternity to create, he should fail against his own unchangeable Nature, but should do no unjustice to an uncreated world, except we say God should be unjust, if he had not created the world▪ For being of justice is due to the world, and God refuses ⟨p. 45⟩to pay the debt of being to the uncreated world,² which is non-sense. And upon the same ground, if he should annihilate the world or take away life from living things, he should be unjust; It is safer therefore to say that God oweth the creature nothing, but we are his debtors, for service and praises, while we have any being.