N02384:1518
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 56 (Question 16)
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.
Here then, (1.) IF the Soul be propagated, it is either by multiplication, division, or seminal gener•• us. I know not a fourth way that can be conceived; and therefore the disjunction is full. Now, 1. IT is not by Multiplication. Some fail one Soul multiplies another, as one light lights up another. But the comparison will not hold. For, 1. There is a communication of an elementary substance from the ⟨p. 195⟩••ghting, to that which is lighted by it, whereas the real rabble Soul is not elementary ••d so cannot administer any elementary substance, which is the alone subject of s••n mutations. Nay, 2. Why should the rato••al Soul be more capable of multiplicating […] felt then Angels? they are both of a ••••• tual nature, and we hear of no such way •f Spirits multiplying themselves, nor indeed […] it intelligible. Yea, 3. This multiplication must be either natural, or voluntary. ••eetly natural it is not, because a Soul •nowing and willing, cannot perform any •uch action, without knowledge and will. Not yet voluntary, for then it should depend on the will: And it so, how comes it to pass that such as are illegitimate are reasonable Beings, endowed with humane Souls? It •s certain that for the most part, their conception is against the will of their Parents, who would rather have prevented it, if it •ad been in their power. 2. NOT by Division. A part of the Soul of the Parents is not cut off to make a Soul for the Child; for then it would be impaired hereby; and so by degrees it would waste and wear out it self, since it is not nourished, and so repaired by elementary nutriment as the Body is. Moreover, it may be well here enquired, whether this Soul proceeds from one or both of the Parents; if from one only, from which? For the Soul of each is equally divisible? If from both equally, how comes a Soul which is without parts, to be made up of several parts? 3. NOT by seminal Generation. For the Soul is an immortal and constant Being, and is not therefore […] subject of Generation. Whatsoever is produced by Generation, is in its own nature liable to corruption. But this is contrary to the nature of the reasonable Soul which was made incorruptible. We shall therefore find the different manner of the creation of the Body, & of the Soul,