be thought to look upon any thing without himself as determining his will to the defire, and neceffitating to the production of it. If then we confider God's Goodness, he was moved; if his All-fufficiency, he was not neceffitated: if we look upon his Will, he freely determined; if on his Power, by that determination he created the World.

Wherefore that ancient conceit of a neceffary emanation of God's goodness in the eternal Creation of the World will now eafily be refuted, if we make a distinction in the equivocal notion of Goodness. For if we take it as it fignifieth a rectitude and excellency of all virtue and holiness, with a negation of all things morally evil, vicious or unholy; fo God is abfolutely and neceffarily good: but if we take it in another sense, as indeed they did which made this argument, that is, rather for beneficence, or communicativeness of fome good to others; then God is not neceffarily, but freely, good, that is to fay, profitable and beneficial. For he had not been in the leaft degree evil or unjuft, if he had never made the World or any part thereof, if he had never communicated any of his perfection by framing any thing befide himself. Every proprietary therefore being accounted master of his own, and thought freely to bestow whatever he gives; much more must that one eternal and independent Being be wholly free in the communicating his own perfections without any neceffity or obligation. We must then look no farther than the determination of God's will in the Creation of the World.

For this is the admirable power of God, that with him to will is to effect, to determine is to perform. So the Elders fpeak before him that fitteth upon the Throne: Thou hast created all things, and for thy plea- Rev. iv. 11. fure (that is, by thy will) they are and were created. Where there is no refiftance in the object, where no need of preparation, application, or inftrumental advantage in the agent, there the actual determina

tion of the will is a fufficient production. Thus God did make the heavens and the earth by (z) willing them to be. This was his firft command unto the creatures, and their existence was their firft obedience. (a) Let there be light, this is the injunction; and there was light, that is the creation. Which two are fo intimately and immediately the fame, that though in our and (b) other tranflations those words, let there be, which exprefs the command of God, differ from the other, there was, which denote the prefent existence of the Creature; yet in the original there is no difference at all, neither in point nor letter. And yet even in the diverfity of the tranflation the phrase seems so expreffive of God's infinite power, and immediate efficacy of his will, that it hath raised some admiration of Mofes in the (c) enemies of the religion both of the Jews and Christians. (d) God is in the heavens, he hath done whatsoever he pleafed, faith David; yea in the making of the heavens, he therefore created them, because he pleased; nay more, he thereby created them, even by willing their creation.

Now although fome may conceive the Creature might have been produced from all eternity by the free determination of God's will, and it is fo far certainly true, that there is no inftant affignable before which God could not have made the World; yet as this is an Article of our Faith, we are bound to beHeb. xi. 3. lieve the heavens and earth are not eternal. Through

Faith we understand the worlds were framed by the word of God. And by that faith we are affured, that whatsoever poffibility of an eternal existence of the creature may be imagined, actually it had a temporal beginning; and therefore all the arguments for this World's eternity are nothing but fo many erroProv. viii. neous mifconceptions. The Lord poffeffed me in the beginning of his way, before his works of old, faith Wifdom. I was jet up from everlasting, from the beginning, or ever the earth was. And the fame

42, 23.

Wisdom

Wisdom of God being made man reflecteth upon the fame priority, faying, Now, O Father, glorify John xvii thou me with thine own felf, with the glory which I had 5. with thee before the World was. Yea, in the fame Chrift are we bleffed with all spiritual bleffings, according as he bath chofen us in him before the foundation of the World. The impoffibility of the origination of a circular motion, which we are fure is either in the heaven or earth, and the impropriety of the beginning of time, are fo poor exceptions, that they deserve not the leaft labour of refutation. The actual eternity of this World is so far from being neceffary, that it is of itself most improbable; and without the infallible certainty of Faith, there is no fingle perfon carries more evidences of his youth, than the World of its (e) novelty.

It is true indeed, fome ancient accounts there are which would perfuade us to imagine a strange antiquity of the World, far beyond the annals of Mofes, and account of the fame Spirit which made it. The (f) Egyptian Priests pretended an exact chronology for fome myriads of years, and the Chaldeans or (g) Affyrians far out-reckon them, in which they delivered not only a catalogue of their Kings, but also a table of the (b) eclipfes of the Sun and Moon.

But for their number of years nothing is more certain than their forgery; for the Egyptians did preferve the antiquities of other Nations as well as their own, and by the evident fallacy in others have betrayed their own vanity. When Alexander entered Egypt with his victorious army, the Priests could fhew him out of their facred hiftories an account of the Perfian Empire, which he gained by conqueft, and the Macedonian, which he received by birth, of of each for (i) eight thousand years: whereas nothing can be more certain out of the best historical account, than that the Perfian Empire, whether began in Cyrus or in Medus, was not then three hundred years old, and the Macedonian, begun in

Coranus,

Coranus, not five hundred. They then which made fo large additions to advance the antiquity of other Nations, and were fo bold as to present them to those which fo easily might refute them, (had they not delighted to be deceived to their own advantage, and took much pleasure in an honourable cheat) may without any breach of charity be fufpected to have extended the account much higher for the honour of their own country. Befide, their catalogues muft needs be ridiculously incredible, when the Egyptians make their firft King's reigns above (k) one thousand two hundred years apiece, and the Affyrians theirs above forty thoufand; except ye take the Egyptian years for (1) months, the Affyrians for days; and then the account will not seem fo formidable.

Again, for the calculation of Eclipfes, as it may be made for many thousand years to come, and be exactly true, and yet the world may end to-morrow; because the calculation must be made with this tacit condition, if the bodies of the Earth, and Sun, and Moon, do continue in their fubstance and conftant motion fo long: fo may it also be made for many millions of years paft, and all be true, if the world have been fo old; which the calculating doth not prove, but fuppofe. He then which should in the Egyptian temples fee the description of fo many Eclipfes of the Sun and Moon, could not be affured that they were all taken from real obfervation, when they might be as well described out of proleptical fuppofition.

Befides, the motions of the Sun, which they mention together and with authority equal to that of their other observations, are fo incredible and palpably fabulous, that they take off all credit and efteem from the reft of their narrations. this wild account of years, and feemingly accurate obfervations of the heavens, they left it written to pofterity, that the whole courfe of the celeftial motions was four times changed: so that (m) the Sun

For with

hath

hath twice rifen in the east and fet in the west, as now it does; and, on the contrary, twice rifen in the west and set in the east. And thus these prodigious antiquaries (n) confute themselves.

What then are these feigned obfervations and fabulous defcriptions for the World's antiquity, in refpect not only of the infallible annals of the Spirit of God, but even of the conftant teftimonies of more fober men, and the real appearances and face of things, which speak them of a far fhorter date? If we look into the Hiftorians which give account of ancient times, nay, if we peruse the fictions of the Poets, we shall find the firft to have no footfteps, the laft to feign no actions of fo great antiquity. (0) If the race of men had been eternal, or as old as the Egyptians and the Chaldees fancy it, how should it come to pass that the poetical inventions should find no actions worthy their heroick verfe before the Trojan or the Theban war, or that great adventure of the Argonauts? For whatfoever all the Muses, the daughters of Memory, could rehearse before thofe times, is nothing but the Creation of the World, and the nativity of their Gods.

If (p) we confider the neceffaries of life, the ways of freedom and commerce amongst men, and the inventions of all arts and fciences, the letters which we ufe, and languages which we speak, they have all known originals, and may be traced to their first authors. The firft beginnings were then fo known and acknowledged by all, that the inventors and authors of them were reckoned amongst their Gods, and worshipped by those to whom they had been fo highly beneficial: which honour and adoration they could not have obtained, but from fuch as were really fenfible of their former want, and had experience of a prefent advantage by their means.

If we fearch into the Nations themselves, we fhall fee none without fome original: and were VOL. I. thofe

H