And certainly, God, which hath promised us the reward of well-doing, which Christ himself claimed at the hands of the Father, ('I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do,) and the same God who hath threatened unto us the sorrow and torment of offences, could not, contrary to his merciful nature, be so unjust, as to bind us inevitably to the destinies or influences of the stars, or subject our souls to any imposed necessity. But it was well said of Plotinus, that the stars were significant, but not efficient; giving them yet something less than their due: and therefore, as I do not consent with those who would make those glorious creatures of God virtueless; so I think that we derogate from his eternal and absolute power and providence, to ascribe to them the same dominion over our immortal souls, which they have over all bodily substances and perishable natures: for the souls of men loving and fearing God, receive influence from that divine light itself, whereof the sun's clarity, and that of the stars, is by Plato called but a shadow, s Lumen est umbra Dei, et Deus est lumen luminis; "Light is the shadow of God's brightness, who is the "light of light." But to end this question, because this destiny, together with providence, prescience, and predestination, are often confounded, I think it not impertinent to touch the difference in a word or two; for every man hath not observed it, though all learned men have. SECT. XII. Of Prescience. PRESCIENCE, or foreknowledge, (which the Greeks call prognosis, the Latins præcognitio, or præscientia,) considered in order and nature, (if we may speak of God after the manner of men,) goeth before providence: for God foreknew all things before he had created them, or before they had being to be cared for; and prescience is no other than an infallible foreknowledge. For whatsoever ourselves S r John xviii. 4. Plat. Pol. 6. Ficin. in 1. 7. Pol. RALEGH, HIST. WORLD, VOL. I. D foreknow, except the same be to succeed accordingly, it cannot be true that we foreknow it. But this prescience of God (as it is prescience only) is not the cause of any thing Vfuturely succeeding: neither doth God's foreknowledge im pose any necessity, or bind. For in that we foreknow that the sun will rise and set; that all men born in the world shall die again; that after winter the spring shall come; after the spring, summer, and harvest; and that according to the several seeds that we sow, we shall reap several sorts of grain, yet is not our foreknowledge the cause of this, or any of these: neither doth the knowledge in us bind or constrain the sun to rise and set, or men to die; for the causes (as men persuade themselves) are otherwise manifest and known to all."The eye of man," saith Boetius, " behold"eth those things subject to sense, as they are; the eye "seeth that such a beast is a horse, it seeth men, trees, " and houses, &c. but our seeing of them (as they are) is "not the cause of their so being, for such they be in their 66 own natures." And again out of the same author; Divina providentia rebus generandis non imponit necessitatem, quia si omnia evenirent ex necessitate, præmia bonorum, et pæna malorum periret; "Divine providence," saith he, “imposeth no necessity upon things that are to "exist; for if all came to pass of necessity, there should nei"ther be reward of good, nor punishment of evil.” SECT. XIII. Of Providence. NOW providence (which the Greeks call pronoia) is an intellectual knowledge, both foreseeing, caring for, and ordering all things, and doth not only behold all past, all present, and all to come, but is the cause of their so being, which prescience (simply taken) is not: and therefore providence by the philosophers, saith St. Augustine, is divided into memory, knowledge, and care: memory of the past, t Boetius de Consol. knowledge of the present, and care of the future: and we ourselves account such a man for provident, as, remembering things past, and observing things present, can by judgment, and comparing the one with the other, provide for the future, and times succeeding. That such a thing there is as providence, the scriptures every where teach us; Moses in many places, the prophets in their predictions, Christ himself and his apostles assure us hereof; and besides the scriptures, Hermes, Orpheus, Euripides, Pythagoras, Plato, Plotinus, and (in effect) all learned men, acknowledge the providence of God; yea, the Turks themselves are so confident therein, as they refuse not to accompany and visit each other in the most pestilent diseases, nor shun any peril whatsoever, though death therein do manifestly present itself. The places of scripture proving providence are so many, both in general and particular, as I shall need to repeat but a few of them in this place: Sing unto God, saith " David, which covereth the heavens with clouds, and prepareth rain for the earth, and maketh the grass to grow upon the mountains, which giveth the beasts their food, and feedeth the young raven that cries. × All these wait upon thee; that thou mayest give them food in due season. Y And thou shalt drink of the river Chereth, saith God to Elijah; and I have commanded the ravens to feed thee there. Behold the fowls of the air: they sow not, nor reap; and yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Again; a Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father; yea, all the hairs of your head are numbered: and b St. Peter, Cast all your care on him, for he careth for you: and, his judgments are written, saith David. God therefore, who is every where present, d who filleth the heavens and the earth, whose eyes are upon the righteous, and his countenance against them that do evil, was therefore by Orpheus called oculus infinitus, "an infinite eye," behold ing all things; and cannot therefore be esteemed as an idle looker on, as if he had transferred his power to any other; for it is contrary to his own word, e Gloriam meam alteri non dabo; "I will not give my glory to another." No man commandeth in the king's presence, but by the king's direction; but God is every where present, and King of kings. The example of God's universal providence is seen in his creatures. The father provideth for his children; beasts and birds, and all living, for their young ones. If providence be found in second fathers, much more in the first and universal: and if there be a natural loving care in men and beasts, much more in God, who hath formed this nature, and whose divine love was the beginning, and is the bond of the universal: Amor divinus rerum omnium est principium, et vinculum universi, saith Plato; amor Dei est nodus perpetuus, mundi copula, partiumque ejus immobile sustentaculum, ac universæ machinæ fundamentum; "The love of God is the perpetual knot, and link or chain of "the world, and the immovable pillar of every part thereof, "and the basis and foundation of the universal." God therefore, who could only be the cause of all, can only provide for all, and sustain all; so as to absolute power, to every-where presence, to perfect goodness, to pure and divine flove, this attribute and transcendent hability of providence is only proper and belonging. SECT. XIV. Of Predestination. NOW for predestination, we can difference it no otherwise from providence and prescience, than in this; that prescience only foreseeth; providence foreseeth and careth for, and hath respect to all 5 creatures, even from the brightest angels of heaven, to the unworthiest worms of the earth: and predestination (as it is used, especially by divines) is only of men, and yet not of all to men belonging, but of e Esay xlii. 8. I f 1 John iv. 1. God is love. g Romans viii. and ix. 66 their salvation properly, in the common use of divines; or perdition, as some have used it. Yet h Peter Lombard, Thomas, Bernensis Theologus, and others, take the word predestination more strictly, and for a preparation to felicity. Divers of the fathers take it more largely sometimes: among whom St. Augustine, speaking of two cities and two societies, useth these words: Quarum est una, quæ prædestinata est in æternum regnare cum Deo, altera æternum supplicium subire cum Diabolo; "whereof one is it, which is predestinated to reign for ever with God, but the other is to "undergo everlasting torment with the Devil:" for according to Nonius Marcellus, destinare, est præparare; and of the same opinion are many Protestant writers, ask Calvin, Beza, Buchanus, Danæus, and such like: and as for the manifold questions hereof arising, I leave them to the divines; and why it hath pleased God to create some vessels of honour, and some of dishonour, I will answer with Gregory, who saith, Qui in factis Dei rationem non videt, infirmitatem suam considerans, cur non videat, rationem videt; "He that "seeth no reason in the actions of God, by consideration of “his own infirmity, perceiveth the reason of his blindness." And again with m St. Augustine, Occulta esse causa potest, injusta esse non potest; "Hidden the cause of his predesti-"nation may be, unjust it cannot be." SECT. XV. Of fortune and of the reason of some things that seem to be by fortune, and against reason and providence. LASTLY, seeing destiny or necessity is subsequent to God's providence, and seeing that the stars have no other dominion than is before spoken, and that nature is nothing but, as Plato calleth it, Dei artem, vel artificiosum Dei organum, "the art, or artificial organ of God:" and Cusa h Lomb. 1. 1. dist. 39. Thom. part. 1. dist. 23. Bern. in Probl. de p. d. i Aug. 1. 15. c. 1. de Civ. Dei. * Calv. in c. 9. ad Rom. v. 11. Bez. in magn. aun. in c. 9. ad Rom. Da- 1 Greg. Mag. Job ix. |