A treatise of Mr. Cottons clearing certain doubts concerning predestination together with an examination…A treatise of Mr. Cottons clearing certaine doubts concerning predestination together with an examination…

Pag. 29. God is the end of Christ, and Christ is the end of the elect; that is, because Christ is ordained unto God as unto the end, and the elect unto Christ, as unto the end: and unless he, that is, God, were the first end, or the manifestation of his glory, there should be no Christ; and if there were no Christ, there should be no elect: therefore altogether by the same reason, the creatures are therefore said to be theirs who are elect, because they are for the elect, and the elect are the ends of them; and so if the elect should not have been, no natures of the creatures should have been.

Pag. 29. God is the end of Christ, and Christ is the end of the elect; that is, because Christ is ordained unto God as unto the end, and the elect unto Christ, as unto the end: and unlesse hee, that is, God, were the first end, or the manifestation of his glory, there should be no Christ; and if there were no Christ, there should be no elect: therefore altogether by the same reason, the creatures are therefore said to be theirs who are elect, because they are for the elect, and the elect are the ends of them; and so if the elect should not have been, no natures of the creatures should have been.

Pag. ibid. l. 9, 10, &c. He hath chosen us in him before the constitution of the world. Now he speaks of Christ man, to wit, of Christ the head, as Hierome expresseth upon that place, and it appears most plainly by the text. Certainly, either I am deceived, or Saint Paul intends not that only, to wit, that God hath chosen us in Christ, before the true and real constitution of the world, which was made in time now six thousand years ago. For that God had chosen us in Christ before the temporal creation of all things, was no great thing, nor worthy of so great a pen; for so he chose oxen and stones: For he decreed them, and fore-saw them, before the creation of things in time, or before he made any thing in time; now before the constitution of the world, and from everlasting he devised them, and determined to make them. Therefore Paul intends some higher and more divine matter; to wit, that God in his eternity, when he devised with himself the creation of the world, even before that in order of reason he devised with himself concerning the election of his elect; and even then (I say) he had intended and fore-seen Christ, and in him he had chosen the predestinate.—lin. 27, 28, &c. a most efficacious reason; Every one willing things ordinately, first willeth the end; and of means those means which are nearer to the end: But Christ and the predestinate, and therefore all supernaturals are nearer to the end, that is, to the manifestation