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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 19 (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.
4. IF He be Infinite, he must be Eternal, that he is so hath been already proved. That an Infinite being should be of a finite duration is a contradiction; for what is Eternity but (if I may so say) an Infinite Time, or a continuance without Bounds.
5. IF he be Unchangeable, he must be Eternal. That he is so, will come nextly to be made good. This he cannot be except he be Eternal; for what greater change can there be than that which is from not being, to being: which he must have undergone, if he were not Eternal?
6. IF God were not Eternal, then must he be Originated, and that must be either by Creation or Generation: in either of these ways he must have an ••ss•i•nt, or some Author that must give him his being: but he is beholden to none. Rom. 11.35. Or who hath first given to him, and it shall be recompensed unto him again? yea THAT would be God and not HE. Yea, so he would be a subject capable either of Annihilation, or Corruption, which is the Imperfection of things created or generated; but God is neither way exposed, but is a standing Being: for his Name is, I AM. Gen. 2.14.
6. IF God were not Eternal, then must he be Originated, and that must be either by Creation or Gen•ration: in either of these ways he must have an ••ssint, or some Author that must give him his being: but he is beholden to none.