N02384:503
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 17 (Question 4 cont.)
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.
THESE are some of the shades, which we draw of him, from the Attribute of a Spirit▪ but every like is also unlike; and though God resembleth himself to those choice b•ings or natures, yet we must conceive him to be Infinitely more Glorious then they, and transcendently to exceed them. We may look on the most noble Perfections of the most noble Beings, and say them of God, but when we have so said, we must remember that his Glory Incomparably exceeds them. Psal. 148.13. Let them praise the name of the Lord: for his name alone is excellent, his glory is above the earth and heaven. And respecting the present Attribute, let these things be observed, ⟨p. 54⟩1. SPIRITS are Creatures, but God is Increated: let us say as much as we can of the Angelical Perfections, we must still remember that they are but created Perfections, which they enjoy: and created Spirits had a beginning, but God is without beginning: they are the Children of time, but he is the Father of Eternity: they are indeed the sons of the morning, and the morning stars; time and they began in the same instant, but He was before all time, is from Everlasting: they had their being from another; it was given them: but he had His from no other. His Being is His own. 2. HENCE Spirits have a passive power in them, whereas God is a pure Act. It is a dispute among Pneumatists, whether Angels have any material Principles, or are pure Forms; it will not profit the Audience generally to debate it here, it is enough, their being Creatures assures us of their Passivity, or Potentiality in them; they did once pass from not being into being, & they are capable of returning to nonentity again: yea, are capable of the impressions of happiness & misery; are mutable Creatures; some of them did fall; all which things result from their passivity. None of which are compatible with God: He is one and the same, and cannot be touched or any wars altered: He is happy, but cannot be made happy, nor can he ever be made miserable: Hence called God blessed for ever. 3. ANGELS are limited by their own Essence. That they are limited beings is beyond dispute, for to be a Creature, and to be finite is reciprocal: how they are so limited, is a debate, which the curiosity of wits may exercise their reason in, but can form no Article of faith about: