N02384:1319
A complete body of divinity in two hundred and fifty expository lectures on the…A compleat body of divinity in two hundred and fifty expository lectures on the…
A complete body of divinity in two hundred and fifty expository lectures on the Assembly's Shorter catechism wherein the doctrines of the Christian religion are unfolded, their truth confirmed, their excellence displayed, their usefulness improved; contrary errors & vices refuted & exposed, objections answered, controversies settled, cases of conscience resolved; and a great light thereby reflected on the present age. / By the Reverend & learned Samuel Willard, M.A. late Pastor of the South Church in Boston, and vice-president of Harvard College in Cambridge, in New-England. ; Prefaced by the pastors of the same church. ; [Six lines of Scripture texts]A compleat body of divinity in two hundred and fifty expository lectures on the Assembly's Shorter catechism wherein the doctrines of the Christian religion are unfolded, their truth confirm'd, their excellence display'd, their usefulness improv'd; contrary errors & vices refuted & expos'd, objections answer'd, controversies settled, cases of conscience resolv'd; and a great light thereby reflected on the present age. / By the Reverend & learned Samuel Willard, M.A. late Pastor of the South Church in Boston, and vice-president of Harvard College in Cambridge, in New-England. ; Prefac'd by the pastors of the same church. ; [Six lines of Scripture texts]
printed by B. Green and S. Kneeland for B. Eliot and D. Henchman, 1726
AN EXPOSITION OF THE ASSEMBLY's SHORTER CATECHISM: IN Two Hundred a… › Sermon 48 (Question 12)
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
2. HAPPINESS is the attainment of the Creature's End; and Misery is the loss of his End. And here understand me not to intend the End of the Decree, which we call, God's End; which can never be lost; •t the End proposed to Man, in which by Obedience he was to receive the Reward, and this we call Man's End, ⟨p. 152⟩because he was obliged by the Precept to aim at it: But Man by Creation neither obtains nor loseth his End, but is put into a Capacity for either.
2. HAPPINESS is the attainment of the Creature's End; and Misery is the loss of his End. And here unders•and me not to intend the End of the Decree, which we call, God's End; which can never be lost; •t the End proposed to Man, in which by Obedience he was to receive the Reward, and this we call Man's End, ⟨p. 152⟩because he was obliged by the Precept to aim at it: But Man by Creation neither obtains nor loseth his End, but is put into a Capacity for either.
3. HAPPINESS or Misery are the Reward or Punishment of the Creature according to some Rule, and the respect that his State and Actions bear to the Rule. Happiness therefore follows upon Eupraxy or Well-doing, Misery upon Evil-doing; but Man by Creation had done neither Good or Evil: And before he could, he must have a Rule given him, which must be the Measure of it; which belongs to this Government. Man had the Habits of Original Holiness and Righteousness, enabling him to bring forth the Actions of true Obedience, and so to be made Happy: But being mutable, he might miss and fail: Happiness was Conditionally promised him in the Covenant; but the actual Fruition of it, depended upon his Trial.