A careful and strict enquiry into the modern prevailing notions of that freedom of…

Another Thing which has been said by some Arminians, to take off the Force of what is urged from God's Prescience, against the Contingence of the Volitions of moral Agents, is to this Purpose; That when we talk of Foreknowledge in God, there is no strict Propriety in our so Speaking; and that altho' it be true, that there is in God the most perfect Knowledge of all Events from Eternity to Eternity, yet there is no such Thing as before and after in God, but He sees all Things by one perfect unchangeable View, without any Succession. —To this I answer,

1. It has been already shown, that all certain Knowledge proves the Necessity of the Truth known; whether it be before, after, or at the same Time.— Tho' it be true, that there is no Succession in God's Knowledge, and the Manner of his Knowledge is to us inconceivable, yet thus much we know concerning it, that there is no Event, past, present, or to come, that God is ever uncertain of; He never is, never was, and never will be without infallible Knowledge of it; He always sees the Existence of it to be certain and infallible. And as he always sees Things just as they are in Truth; hence there never is in Reality any Thing contingent in such a Sense, as that possibly it may happen never to exist. If, strictly speaking, there is no Foreknowledge in God, 'tis because those Things which ⟨p. 128⟩are future to us, are as present to God, as if they already had Existence: and that is as much as to say, that future Events are always in God's View as evident, clear, sure and necessary, as if they already were. If there never is a Time wherein the Existence of the Event is not present with God, then there never is a Time wherein it is not as much impossible for it to fail of Existence, as if it's Existence were present, and were already come to pass.