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

We know, that God knows the future voluntary Actions of Men in such a Sense before-hand, as that he is able particularly to declare, and foretell them, and write them, or cause them to be written down in a Book, as He often has done; and that therefore the necessary Connection which there is between God's Knowledge and the Event known, does as much prove the Event to be necessary before-hand, as if the divine Knowledge were in the same Sense before the Event, as the Prediction or Writing is. If the Knowledge be infallible, then the Expression of it in the written Prediction is infallible; that is, there is an infallible Connection between that written Prediction and the Event. And if so, then it is impossible it should ever be otherwise, than that that Prediction and the Event should agree: And this is the same Thing as to say, 'tis impossible but that the Event should come to pass: and this is the same as to say, that it's coming to pass is necessary.— So that it is manifest, that there being no proper Succession in God's Mind, makes no Alteration as to the Necessity of the Existence of the Events which God knows. Yea,

2. This is so far from weakening the Proof, which has been given of the Impossibility of the not coming to pass of future Events known, as that it establishes that wherein the Strength of the foregoing Arguments consists, and shows the Clearness of the Evidence. For,

2. This is so far from weakening the Proof, which has been given of the Impossibility of the not coming to pass of future Events known, as that it establishes that wherein the Strength of the foregoing Arguments consists, and shews the Clearness of the Evidence. For,

(1.) The very Reason why God's Knowledge is without Succession, is, because it is absolutely perfect, to the highest possible Degree of Clearness and Certainty: all Things, whether past, present or to come, being viewed with equal Evidence and Fullness; future Things being seen with as much Clearness, as if they were present; the View is always in absolute Perfection; and absolute constant Perfection admits of no Alteration, and so no Succession; the actual Existence of the Thing known, don't at all increase, or add to the Clearness or Certainty of the Thing known: God calls the Things that are not, as tho' they were; they are all one to Him as if they had already existed. But herein consists the Strength of the Demonstration before given, of the Impossibility of the not existing of those Things whose Existence God knows; That it is as impossible they should fail of Existence, as if they existed already. This Objection, instead of weakening this Argument, sets it in the clearest and strongest Light; for it supposes it to be so indeed, that the Existence of future Events is in God's View so much as if it already had been, that when they come actually to exist, it makes not the least Alteration or Variation in his View or Knowledge of them.