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…

But withal, he observes a doubt, the solution whereof must not be pretermitted; that is, whether this opinion can be maintained according to the doctrine of Aquinas; for, saith he, pag. 16. S. Thomas existimat, minimè Christi praedestinationem futuram si homo non reccasset. Ex quo fieri videtur consequens, prius visum à Deo fuisse peccatum, & volitam ejus permissionem, quam volita fuisset incarnatio Verbi: atque adeò non apparet quomodo in via Thomistarum stare possit, quod primum omnium decretorum Dei fuerit incarnatio seu praedestinatio Verbi, si jam praecessit peccati visio atque permissio. Si verò priusquam peccatum videretur fuit Christus praedestinatus, jam ergo etiam non existente peccato, Christus, qui ante visum peccatum praedestinatus fuerat, veniret: Quod directè pugnat cum doctrina S. Thomae.

But withall, hee observes a doubt, the solution whereof must not bee pretermitted; that is, whether this opinion can be maintained according to the doctrine of Aquinas; for, saith he, pag. 16. S. Thomas existimat, minimè Christi praedestinationem futuram si homo non reccasset. Ex quo fieri videtur consequens, prius visum à Deo fuisse peccatum, & volitam ejus permissionem, quam volita fuisset incarnatio Verbi: atque adeò non apparet quomodo in via Thomistarum stare possit, quod primum omnium decretorum Dei fuerit incarnatio seu praedestinatio Verbi, si jam praecessit peccati visio atque permissio. Si verò priusquam peccatum videretur fuit Christus praedestinatus, jam ergo etiam non existente peccato, Christus, qui ante visum peccatum praedestinatus fuerat, veniret: Quod directè pugnat cum doctrina S. Thomae.

By the way, I observe a vain supposition to be the ground of all this perturbation, and conflictation of contrary opinions, in this Argument: And the presupposition is this, That the decree of Christs incarnation and of our predestination, as also of creation, and of the permission of sin, cannot be coordinate and simultanea, but must needs be subordinate and one before another. And so he carrieth himself in the confirmation of the priority of those decrees which he fancieth to be before the other, as chiefly to oppose the priority of the others. And this I account a very vain supposition, (though, I confess, for many years I was carried away with the common error, and therewithal still found my self in a brake or labyrinth, without hope of extricating my self) as I have here proved in part, but elsewhere more at large. But as for the solution of the doubt proposed, his answer is this, Prius Deum voluisse unionem hypostaticam & incarnationem Verbi, quam vellet permittere peccatum, & quam vellet condere naturam hominis & totius universi. But I have already demonstrated the falsity of this. But hee proceeds, Quia tamen non est volita incarnatio sine peccato, imo dependenter est volita à permission peccati, & à natura rerum tanquam à mediis; idcirco non sequitur, futurum esse Christum si peccatum non esset, aut si universum non esset. Two things he constitutes media tendentia ad incarnationem Christi; and indeed, if the incarnation of Christ were first in intention, as the end, all other things intended after, must be intended as