THIRD TOPIC

THE ONE AND TRIUNE GOD

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FIRST QUESTION - Can the existence of God be irrefutably demonstrated against atheists? We affirm.

1. God has condescended to reveal himself to us both in nature and in the Scriptures.
2. The subject admits of a threefold division:
1. we may know that he is (with respect to existence)
2. we may know that we may know who he is (with respect to his nature and attributes)
3. we may know who he is (with respect to the persons)
3. Although that there is a God is an indubitable first principle of religion, yet the number of atheists in the world render this question necessary.
4. The question is whether such a knowledge of the deity is implanted in men by nature, that no one can be wholly ignorant of him; or whether the existence of God can be demonstrated by unanswerable arguments. We affirm this.
5. The demonstration of deity rests upon four foundations principally:
1. the voice of universal nature
2. the contemplation of man himself
3. the testimony of conscience
4. the consent of all mankind
6. (1) Nature proves the being of God since she proclaims that she not only is, but is from another and could not be without another.
7. (2) The newness of the world with the commencement of motion and of time proves the necessary existence of God.
8. If men were from eternity, there would be granted infinite generations succeeding each other, and the number of men who have lived thus far would be infinite.
9. If in posterior eternity there can be granted a duration which had a beginning and will not have an end, then in anterior eternity there can be granted a duration which may have an end and yet never had a beginning.
10. (3) The wonderful beauty and order of the universe is another proof.
11. Things which come by chance are uncertain and ill-arranged and have nothing constant and similar; but nothing can be conceived more regular and composed than this universal frame.
12. (4) The tendency of all things toward an end confirms this.
13. (5) Man has in the make up of his own body and mind a familiar teacher of this very truth.
14. (6) This is especially taught by this power and stimulus of conscience whose sense can neither be blunted, nor accusation escaped, nor testimony corrupted.
15. I do not mean to deny that by a habit of sinning their conscience may be made so callous that occasionally and for a time they may seem to have lost all sense of sin and may not feel or care for the goads of conscience; but it cannot be said that they have lost all sense entirely.
16. (7) Another argument is the constant and perpetual sense and consent of all men: there is some deity who ought to be religiously worshiped.
17. This universal agreement  of all men concerning this primary truth
1. cannot come from simple desire (which in many would have been to deny any god)
2. cannot come for ancestral tradition (which could never produce a general consent in all minds)
3. can only arise from the evidence of the thing itself
18. There is implanted in each one from birth a sense of deity which does not allow itself to be concealed and which spontaneously exerts itself in all adults of sound mind.
19. Many other arguments might be adduced to confirm this truth:
1. from the prophecies of contingent future events
2. from the heroic actions of illustrious men
3. from the public judgments and punishment of crimes
4. from miracles surpassing the power of all nature
20. These and the like arguments are sufficient to cover with confusion the impious fighter against God, and are more clearly confirmed by the testimony of the word which has inscribed this persuasion on the minds of believers.
21. To these arguments ad hominem might also be added those of sufficient force to move even the atheist to believe in deity, if not for the sake of vindicating God himself, at least for his own sake:
1. if there was no God, no society in the world would be safe
1. without virtue nothing can be safe
2. without God there would be no virtue
3. there would be no right nor wrong
2. if there was no God, no mortals would be safe from violence, fraud, perjury, and murder
22. Although God is not manifest to the senses as he is in himself, yet he can perceived in his works.
1. it is a false assumption that there is nothing in the intellect which was not before in some sense - universals are in the intellect and never were in any sense
2. God may be certainly known in the mind from his works and a posteriori, although we cannot perceive him with our eyes or any of the other senses
23. What to us may appear disordered, with God may be perfectly arranged.
24. Although various things in the world seem to be useless, hurtful, and dangerous, tending to the misery of the human race, it does not follow that the world was not created and is not now directed by some perfectly good and wise being.
25. The prosperity of the wicked and the adversity of the pious exhibit a most wise dispensation which converts all these to its own glory and the salvation of the pious.
26. Infinite goodness does not immediately take away all evils; it judges that the permission of evil for the purpose of extracting good from it.
27. When God is said to be from himself, this must be understood to mean that he is from one, he is self-existent, and not to mean that he is the cause of himself, because he would then be before and after himself.
28. Rulers have been able to misuse religion for coercion because of the universal persuasion of deity in the minds of all people.

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SECOND QUESTION - Are there any atheists so called? We deny.

1. After laying down certain distinctions, it will be apparent in what sense it may be true that there can be many atheists, and yet there are none.
2. First, an atheist may be either speculative or practical:
   1. the former as to faith, not acknowledging a God
   2. the latter as to manners and life, recognizing but not worshiping him
   3. we admit there are many practical atheists, we deny there are any speculative

3. Second, a speculative atheist is either direct and express or indirect and interpretive:
1. the direct is one who shakes off all knowledge, sense and belief of deity
2. the indirect is one who attributes to or denies to God such things that by necessary consequence God is denied
3. here we treat of the former and not the latter
4. Third, the direct atheist is either one externally disputing, or internally doubting:
1. concerning the former we do not treat, but concerning the latter
2. the question is whether there are atheists who expressly believe it in their hearts and profess it with their mouth; this we deny
5. The reasons are:
• there is implanted in man a knowledge of God and sense of divinity
6. • the atheist has the work of the law written in him (Rom. 2:14), and although men of impiety often endeavor to shake it off, they cannot
7. • God has so clearly manifested himself in his works that men even by feeling may find him (Acts 17:26-27), and cannot open their eyes without being struck with the majesty and splendor of so great a deity
8. The acquired knowledge of God is usually obtained in the threefold way of causality, eminence, and negation:
1. by way of causality - when from the effects we infer the cause and from second causes ascend to the first
2. by way of eminence - we ascribe to God whatever of perfection there is in creatures
3. by way of negation - we remove from him whatever is imperfect in creatures
9. When it is said, "The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God" (Psa. 14:1), the certain persuasion of an atheist denying God is not so much described, as the doubt, and endeavor of the impious man striving to extinguish this knowledge; therefore he doe not say he believes and maintains, but he "says".
10. An external negation of God differs from a fixed and constant denial in the heart.
11. Whatever authors say of stifling of the light of nature for a time in a state of fury, ought not to be referred to the total extinction of that natural knowledge.
12. The Gentiles are called atheists (Eph. 2:12) not because they recognize no deity, but because they lack the knowledge of the true deity.
13. Those who were called atheists among the ancients were not so much enemies of every deity, as despisers of idols and false gods.
14. It is one thing for the actual thought of God to be absent for a time from the mind of an atheist, it is another for the knowledge of God to be absent.
15. To the examples of atheist who seem to have denied all sense of deity, we cannot tell what their real persuasion was.
16. We maintain that no one can utterly cast out of his heart all sense of deity anymore than he divest himself of conscience.

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THIRD QUESTION - Is God one? We affirm against the heathen and Tritheists.

1. According to Gregory Nazianzus, the opinions concerning God can be reduced to three principle ones:
1. anarchy, which atheist maintain
2. polyarchy, which the heathen hold
3. monarchy, which Christians teach
2. One numerically is used in two senses: either affirmatively only or also exclusively.
1. in the former sense - that is one which is undivided in itself
2. in the latter sense - that is one which is the only one, besides which there is nothing like it
3. the question here concerns not the former sense but in the latter
3. The question does not concern the personal numerical unity (as will be proved later), rather the question concerns whether God is one numerically as to essence.

4. The question is not whether there are many Gods so called, rather the question is whether there are more than one in reality and as to essence. This we deny.

5. That there is but one God both the Scriptures frequently assert and reason proves.
6. Reason confirms this - it is a contradiction to suppose more infinite, eternal, omnipotent and most perfect beings and also more rulers of the world:
   1. for if there are more, they would either be equal (and so neither would be the first and most perfect); 
   2. or unequal (and so the inferior would not be God) 
   3. or one would be the cause of all the rest (and so he would be the true God) 
   4. or not (and so no one of them would be God because he would not be the cause of all)

7. Nor was this altogether unknown by the heathen themselves when they assigned to one supreme God the government of the universe.
8. The variety of divine names and attributes does not argue a plurality of gods; they are used to connote the perfection of the one God by many inadequate conceptions.
9. Although there are more persons that one in God, yet there are not more natures - of the three divine persons, there is only one undivided and singular essence which, being infinite, is communicable to more than one.

10. Polytheism and atheism are properly reckoned as springing from the same foolish origin.

11. Since reason and nature lead us to but one God, whence could the polytheism of the Gentiles takes its rise? First, the principle is the forgetfulness of the true God, and the necessity of man.
12. Second, the veneration and worship of those who bestowed remarkable blessings upon the human race introduced a multitude of gods.
13. Third, an occasion of polytheism was not only the multitude of divine names, but principally the variety and abundance of the attributes and works of God.

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FOURTH QUESTION - Is his name so peculiar to God alone as to be incommunicable to creatures? We affirm against the Socinians.

1. God is both a being singular in the highest sense, and in his own nature distinct from every thing whatsoever, hence he does not need a discretive name; nor does a name properly belong to him.
1. yet because all our knowledge begins from a name, he assumes various names in Scripture to accommodate himself to us
2. some are taken from might (El, Elohim), some from omnipotence and all-sufficiency (Shaddai), some from loftiness (Elion), others from dominion (Adonai)
3. but the first and principal name is Jehovah, which is derived from his essence or existence
2. There are two principal questions concerning this name.
1. one is grammatical, concerning it pronunciation
2. the other is theological, concerning its use
3. we treat here only of the latter
3. The Socinians maintain that this name can be communicated to various creatures, but we say that this name is so peculiar to God as to be altogether incommunicable to creatures.
4. The reasons are:
• God claims this name as his own and peculiar to himself (Isa. 42:8, 48:11; Amos 5:8, 9:6)
5. • the etymology and signification of the word is such as agrees with God alone; it is evident that it implies most especially three things which are seen to be connected (Isa. 44:24-26)
   1. the eternity and independence of God (Exo. 3:14)
   2. it implies causality and efficiency (Isa. 44:24)
   3. it implies immutability and constancy in promises
   4. but since eternal existence, omnipotent power and immutable truth belong to God alone the name Jehovah (which embraces these three) ought to be peculiar to him alone
6. • it is always used in the singular and never in the plural
   • it nowhere occurs with and affix or in the constructive state
7. If this name is anywhere applied to an angel (Gen. 16:13, 18:17, 48:15-16; Exo. 3:2), the "uncreated angel" is meant - the Son of God.
   1. he is designated an uncreated angel (Gen. 16:10)
   1. by the name because only one of the three angels who appeared is called Jehovah
   2. from the divine attributes, since he claims for himself omnipotence and omniscience
   3. from honor because Abraham adores him
   2. the angel is said to have redeemed Jacob from all evil (the prerogative of God alone) and he sought a blessing from him which no one by God can give (Gen. 48:16)
   3. the angel who appeared to Moses (Exo. 3) is immediately afterwards called Elohim and Adonai; it said to have sent Moses (Exo. 4:5) and to be the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob
8. The angel of Jehovah is not always distinguished essentially from Jehovah (the one sent from the sender), but only personally; thus he who is the angel of Jehovah is also the angel Jehovah.

9. To do something by the authority of God (which applies to a created angel) differs from having the authority of God and to claim his name (which belongs to no one but the true and eternal God).

10. When the apostle commends hospitality to angels (Heb. 13:2), he is not referring to the uncreated angel who remained with Abraham (Gen. 18:1-15), but to the two created angels who appeared to Lot (Gen. 19:1-11).

11. It is not contradictory to be "the angel of Jehovah" and to be "Jehovah". As to the former, Jehovah is taken hypostatically, but as to the later, essentially.

12. The angel spoken of by Moses (Exo. 23:20) cannot be a creature because he would not then be able to pardon the transgressions of men.

13. It is one thing to be and be called Jehovah; another for Jehovah to be and to dwell somewhere; the latter is said of the church (Ezek. 48:35).

14. It is one thing to inscribe a symbol on an altar, but another to ascribe some name to an altar. The former is said in Exodus 17:15.

15. The customary expression when the ark was taken up or rested, "Rise up. Jehovah, and let thine enemies be scattered" (Psa. 68:1), was not directed to the ark itself, but to God adumbrated in the ark.

16. It is not said in Jeremiah 33:16 that Jerusalem shall be called "Jehovah, our righteousness."

17. The word Kyriou ("Lord") when taken absolutely can be ascribed to no one but God alone.

18. As there is a difference between what the prince does by himself and immediately and what he performs by his servants, so the gospel is said to be more excellent in this sense - Christ incarnate promulgated it immediately and by himself speaks to us, while he willed to give us the law by Moses and angels.

19. It cannot be said that the name Jehovah is given either to the golden calf (Exo. 32:5) or to Micah's image (Jdg. 17:3) because in both places that name is given to the true God.

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FIFTH QUESTION - Can the divine attributes be really distinguished from the divine essence? We deny against the Socinians.

1. To understand the question certain things must be premised concerning the divine attributes.
1. the essential properties by which he makes himself known to us and by which he is distinguished from creatures
2. those which are attributed to him according to the measure of our conception in order to explain his nature
2. Attributes are not something superadded to his essence, making it perfect, rather they indicate perfections essential to the divine nature conceived by us as properties
3. Although the several attributes represent the most fertile and simple nature of God, yet they can represent it only inadequately.
4. These inadequate conceptions of the essence of God are presented to us not by an exclusive or privative precision.
5. The question concerning the divine attributes as distinct from the divine essence is agitated by the Socinians who maintain that the attributes of God are really distinct from his essence.
6. Those things are said to differ really which are distinguished s things diverse according to essence.
7. The attributes of God cannot really differ from his essence or from one another because God is most simple and perfect.
8. Since in the most simple divine essence there is ground for forming diverse formal conceptions concerning the divine perfections, it is bet to say that these attributes are virtually to be distinguished both from the essence and from each other.
9. Although the attributes are essentially and intrinsically one in God, yet they may properly be said to be distinguished both intellectually as to the diverse formal conception and objectively and effectively as to the various external object and effect.
10. Although our formal conceptions of the essence and properties of God may be diverse, yet they cannot be called false.
1. they are actually indivisible in God on account of his perfect simplicity, but yet virtually distinct
2. in the formal sense they are distinguished in our conceptions
11. He who conceives what is actually and really one and simple in God as actually and really diverse, conceives what is false.
1. he who conceives that which is actually one in itself as more than one virtually and extrinsically or objectively, does not conceive what is false
2. he conceives the thing imperfectly and inadequately on account of the weakness of the human intellect
12. The divine attributes may be regarded either absolutely in themselves, or relatively as to their effects towards creatures.
13. The properties are many on the part of the operations and effects, but not on the part of the subject or principle, which is one and perfectly simple.
14. Where there is priority and posteriority as to absolute and real being, there is a real difference; but not where there is only priority and posteriority as to known and intellible being.
15. The definition of a thing in itself differs from our conceptions of that thing. Now the definitions of the divine properties are rather of our conceptions than of the thing itself.

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SIXTH QUESTION - Is the distinction of attributes into communicable and incommunicable a good one? We affirm.

1. Among the various distinctions of the divine attributes, none occurs more frequently than that by which they are distributed into communicable and incommunicable.
2. Communication is twofold:
   1. one essential and formal - we say all the properties of God are equally incommunicable, nor more capable of being communicated than the divine essence
   2. the other by resemblance and analogy - we confess this can be granted since God produces in creature effects analogous to his own properties, such as goodness, justice, wisdom, etc.
3. Those attributes can properly be called incommunicable strictly and in every way, which are so proper to God that nothing similar or analogous, or any image and trace can be found in creatures, such as infinity, immensity, eternity, etc.
4. The communicable attributes are not predicated of God and creatures univocally because there is not the same relation.
1. they are predicated analogically, by analogy both of similitude and of attribution
2. in this sense, God alone is said to be good (Matt. 19:17), i.e., originally, independently, essentially; but concerning creatures only secondarily, accidentally and participatively
5. Believers are said to be partakers of the divine nature (2 Pet. 1:4) not univocally (by a formal participation of the divine essence), but only analogically.
6. The distinction of attributes into communicable and incommunicable argues no inequality of the divine properties because all are equally essential to him.
7. This distinction cannot favor the error of those who maintain that the divine properties were communicated to the human nature of Christ.
1. communication in the concrete, as to person differs from communication in the abstract, as to nature
2. communication may be formal and intransitive by a transfusion of the same properties which are in God into the human nature of Christ (which we reject); or it may be transitive and effective by analogy (which we hold)

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SEVENTH QUESTION - Is God most simple and free from composition? We affirm against Socinus and Vorstius.

1. The Socinians deny that simplicity can be attributed to God according to the Scriptures.
1. the Remonstrants also agree
2. the orthodox have constantly taught that the essence of God is perfectly simple and free from all composition
2. Simple is used in two senses:
1. absolutely and simply - as in every kind of being excludes composition
2. relatively and comparatively - excludes it only in respect to some
3. The simplicity of God is his incommunicable attribute by which the divine nature is conceived by us not only as free from all composition and division, but also as incapable of composition and divisibility.
4. This is proved to be a property of God:
1. from his independence
2. from his unity
3. from his perfection
4. from his activity
5. For in God essence cannot be conceived without existence. For this reason, God calls himself Jehovah to signify that being belongs to him in a far different manner than to all created things, not participatively and contingently, but necessarily, properly, and independently.
6. All composition infers mutation by which a thing becomes part of whole, which it was not before
7. We are called the race and offspring of God (Acts 17:28), not by a participation of the same essence, but by similarity of likeness; efficiently not essentially.
8. In divine things there are one essence and three hypostases,which are modes distinguishing the persons from each other, but not composing because they are not real entities concurring to the composition of some fourth thing, since they have one common essence; but they are only modifications according to which the essence is conceived to subsist in three persons.
9. In this sense, nothing hinders God (who is one in essence) from being three persons.
10. The decrees of God can be regarded in two ways:
1. subjectively - they do not differ from God himself and are no other than God himself decreeing
2. objectively - they do differ because they may be conceived as many and various
11. The decrees of God are free, not absolutely and as to the principle, but relatively as to the end.
12. The decrees of God are immanent acts of the divine will, but not properly its effect.
13. Although the essence of God is absolute and implies no relation to creatures, yet this does not hinder it from having a certain reference and relation to creatures.
14. Whatever in God is essential and absolute is God himself. Thus the absolute attributes may be identified really with the divine essence and are in it essentially, not accidently.
15. The relative attributes do not argue composition, but distinction.
16. The personal property of the Son does not make his essence different from that of the Father, for nothing real is added to the essence, rather it only makes the Son distinct from the Father. Distinction is not composition.
17. The fathers often insist on this simplicity of God.

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EIGHTH QUESTION - Is God infinite in essence? We affirm against Socinus and Vorstius.

1. The infinity of God follows his simplicity and is equally defused through the other attributes of God, and by it the divine nature is conceived as free from all limit in imperfection as to essence.
2. We treat of infinity proper and in itself, not as something simply beyond our ability to measure.
3. We treat of absolute and not of potential infinity.
4. The Socinians and Vorstius do not acknowledge the immensity of God as to essence, so they deny that God is actually infinite simply.
5. The orthodox attribute infinity to God with respect to essence.
• first, Scripture clearly teaches it (Psa. 145:3; Job 11:7-9; Isa. 40:12, 15, 17)
• second, from the pure perfections of God
1. he must be infinite, because an infinite good is better than a finite
2. the perfections in created things are included within certain limits beyond which they are not extended, and all their activity has a certain sphere beyond which they cannot go, this is not so with God
7. This is further confirmed by the consideration of his infinite power.
8. God is said to be infinite in essence in three ways:
1. originally, because he is absolutely independent
2. formally, because he has an absolute infinite essence
3. virtually, because his activity has no finite sphere, nor does he need the concourse of any cause in acting
9. Although God cannot produce an infinite effect, yet he does not cease to be of infinite virtue because he acts in an infinite mode.
10. None can be said to have attained a perfectly absolute knowledge of God - neither men nor angels - because the finite is not capable of the infinite.
11. Although God perfectly and adequately knows himself, it does not follow that his essence is finite because both the knowledge and apprehension which God has of himself are infinite.
12. It implies a contradiction for something to be indefinite and to be actually infinite without any limits of essence.
13. The measure of the creatures' perfection is taken from the greater or lesser degrees which each thing partakes from God.
14. All perfections belong to God, either formally or eminently.
15. That which is so that it is not anything else is finite with respect to substance. Of God however this cannot be said, who is so something that nevertheless he is all things eminently, containing in himself eminently the perfections of all things.
16. Infinity of essence does not require the thing to be formally all substance, but only to contain the perfections of every substance, if not formally, at least eminently.

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NINTH QUESTION - Is God immense and omnipresent as to essence? We affirm against Socinus and Vorstius.

1. The infinity of God is to be considered with respect to place and time by which he is conceived as uncircumscribed by any limits of place (immensity) or time (eternity). We speak first of immensity.
2. The question does not concern the presence or power and operation, rather the question concerns the presence of nature.
3. The question does not concern the various mode of the special divine presence, but relates to the general presence of God by essence, abstracted from all singular modes.
4. God may be said to be present with all things in three modes:
1. by power and operation - he is said to be everywhere by his power because he produces and governs all things and works all things in him (Acts 17:28)
2. by knowledge - he sees and beholds all things (Heb. 4:13)
3. by essence - his essence penetrates all things and is wholly by itself intimately present with each and everything. This one we properly treat here
5. Three modes of being in a place are commonly held:
1. circumscriptively - attributed to bodies because they are in place and space
2. definitively - applicable to created spirits and incorporeal sustances
3. repletively - which is ascribed to God because his immense essence is present with all and, as it were, completely fills all places
6. Therefore God is said to be repletively everywhere and this should be understood in a most different manner from the mode of being in place of bodies.
1. wherever he is,
1. he is wholly in all things
2. yet wholly beyond all
3. included in no place and excluded from none
2. the rabbis call him place (mqvm) to intimate that he is not contained in a place, but contains all things in himself
7. The Socinians with Vorstius argue with us concerning this immensity and omnipresence of God
1. they maintain that God is contained in heaven
2. they place substantial ominipresence among absurdities and impossibilities
3. they teach that God (according to his essence) is in heaven, but according to his virtue and efficacy is on the earth and present with all creatures
8. The orthodox believe the immensity and omnipresence of God, not only as to virtue and operation, but principally as to essence is so intimately present with all things that it is both everywhere in the world and yet is not included in the world.
9. The reasons are:
• Scripture ascribes this omnipresence to God (Psa. 139:7-10; Isa. 66:1; Jer. 23:24; 1 Kgs 8:27)
• to no purpose is it objected by Crellius that these passages treat of omnipresence of power and efficacy, not of essence:
  1. the words themselves teach the contrary (which refer not to operation, but to the very essence itself
  2. the presence of God is equally asserted of all places mentioned; either he is everywhere as to essence or he is nowhere as to essence
  3. the design of the psalmist is to show that no one can be concealed from God
  4. the presence of power does not exclude, but necessarily supposes the presence of essence, for where God is not, there he cannot operate because he operates immediately by his essence
• the same is proved by those passages which teach that God works all thing in all and sustains them by the word of his power (Heb. 1:3) and when he uses second causes, he is most intimately present with them in order to work by them
• if God is not immense in essence, but finite, it will favor the contradiction that the creature is greater than God
  1. if the essence of God is not elsewhere than in heaven, the universe will be greater than God
  2. if he is finite in essence, he must also be finite in power
  3. if God is not immediately present with creatures by his essence, but only by operation, the belief of the incarnation of the Son of God could not rest upon a sure foundation, for what kind of hypostatical union could have taken place with the human nature, if the divine essence remained concluded in heaven and was not present on earth?
13. God is said "to be in heaven," not exclusively of the earth, but because in heaven as a royal palace, he displays his glory in an eminent manner.
14. It is not unworthy of the divine majesty to be everywhere on earth, even the most filthy places, because he is not there by physical contact or by any mingling or composition.
15. God is far off from the wicked (as to the special presence of his favor and grace), but is always present with them by his general presence of essence.
16. Although he is differently in heaven and in hell (here by grace, there by justice; here as blessing; there as punishing), yet he can in both places as to the immensity of his essence.
17. Although the essence of God is abstracted from all created entities, it does not follow that he cannot be omnipresent as to essence.
18. The universal spaces of the world do not exhaust the immensity of God so as to be contained in and circumscribed by them.
19. He who conceives God as everywhere present by his essence does not therefore conceive him as extended like bodies through the whold world.
20. The denial of the doctrine of the essential omnipresence of God encourages atheism because it takes away the reverence and fear of him, feigning that he is absent and therefore either does not see or cannot punish the sins of men.
21. The operation of God supposes his presence, and he must first be conceived to be and to exist before he can be conceived of as acting.
22. Out of immensity arises omnipresence, which supposes immensity as its foundation: God is therefore omnipresent because he is immense.
23. When God is said to ascend or descend, to go away or to come, this does not take away his omnipresence because it is not said with respect to his essence, but only to the absence or presence of his divine operation.
24. The heathen themselves were not ignorant of this attribute of God.

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TENTH QUESTION - Does the eternity of God exclude succession according to priority and posteriority? We affirm against the Socinians.

1. The infinity of God in reference to duration is called eternity to which these three things are ascribed:
1. that is it without beginning
2. without end
3. without sucession - the question concerns this one - whether his eternity is without succession or whether it is subject to the differences of time
4. we maintain that God is free from every difference of time, and no less from succession than from beginning and end
2. The question does not concern eternity improperly and relatively, but eternity absolutely and properly so called, both anterior as well as posterior.
3. Scripture teaches that such eternity belongs to God (Gen. 21:33; Isa. 57:15; 1 Tim. 1:17; Psa. 102:25-27).
4. He is said to be "the first and the last (Isa. 41:4; Rev. 1:8).
1. he is the beginning without beginning because while he is the beginning fo all things, he himself has no beginning
2. he is the end without end because he is the end to which all things are referred
3. that which is without beginning is also without succession because succession depends upon a beginning and implies order according to former and latter
5. The eternity of God cannot have succession because his essence admits none.
1. because it is perfectly simple and immutable
2. because it is unmeasurable - that which continues by succession can in some way be measured
6. The eternal duration of God embraces all time - the past, present, and future; but nothing in him can be past or future because his life remains always the same and immutable.
7. The three differences of time are applied to God when he is called "the one who is, and was and is to come" (Rev. 1:4). This is not done formally, but eminently and after the manner of men.
8. Although eternity may coexist with all the differences of time, it does not follow that they equally coexist among themselves.
9. The whole eternity does not coexist with all the differences of time taken at once, but dividedly as they mutually succeed each other.
10. Although time coexists with the whole of eternity, it is not therefore eternal.
11. The immense God embraces in his immensity all the extended and divisible parts of the world.
12. It is not absurd that the world and time should be contained in a point of eternity.
13. When a thousand years are said to be in the sight of God as one day (Psa. 90:4) it intimates that God is not to be measured by our rule, for God is not subject to any differences of time.
14. God is called "the ancient of days," not as stricken with old age, but as before and more ancient than days themselves and the birth of time.
15. When the actions of God are considered either as past or present or future, this is said not with respect to the efficient reason, but in reference to the effects and objects.
16. Time and eternity are not related to each other as part and whole, but as species of duration mutually opposed.

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ELEVENTH QUESTION - Is God immutable both in essence and will? We affirm.

1. Immutability is an incommunicable attribute of God by which is denied of him not only all change, but also all possibility of change, as much with respect to existence as to will.
2. The orthodox maintain that every kind of immutability is to be ascribed to him both as to nature and as to will.
3. Scripture expressly attributes it to him (Mal. 3:6; Psa. 102:26; Jam. 1:17; Num. 23:19; Isa. 46:10).
4. Reason confirms it of he is Jehovah, and so a necessary and independent being that can be changed by no one.
5. Creation did not produce a change in God.
6. God was not changed by the incarnation; the Word was made flesh, not by a conversion of the Word into flesh, but by and assumption of the flesh to the Word.
7. God can will the change of various things without prejudice to the immutability of his will because even from eternity he had decreed such a change.
8. It is one thing to be indifferent to various object; another to be mutable.
9. The power of varying his own acts is not the principle of mutability in itself, but only in its objects.
10. It is one thing to inquire whether God might have determined himself to other objects than those he has decreed before he had resolved anything concerning them; another whether the decree having been formed he could rescind it. The latter we deny, bu the former we assert.
11. Repentance is attributed to God after the manner of men but must be understood after the manner of God; not with respect to his counsel, but to the event.
12. Unfulfilled promises and threatenings do not argue a change of will because they were conditional, not absolute.
13. When the death Hezekiah was predicted, there was not a declaration of what would happen according to the will of God, but of what would happen unless God interposed.
14. The necessity of the immutability we ascribe to God does not infer Stoic fate.

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TWELFTH QUESTION - Do all things fall under the knowledge of God, both singulars and future contingencies? We affirm against Socinus.

1. Among the communicable and positive attributes there are three principal ones by which his immortal and perfectly happy life is active: intellect, will, and power.
2. Concerning the intellect of God and the disquisition of his knowledge, two things above all others must be attended to: the mode and the object.
• the mode consists in his knowing all things perfectly, undividedly, distinctly and immutably
  1. perfectly because he knows all things by himself
  2. undividedly because he knows all things intuitively and noetically, not discursively and dianoetically (by inferring one thing from another)
  3. distinctly because he sees through all things at one glance so that nothing can escape him
  4. immutably because he see the various turns and changes of things by an immutable cognition
• the object of the knowledge of God is both himself and all things extrinsic to him, whether possible or future
4. The principal question here is that about singulars and future contingent things which some wish to withdraw from the knowledge of God
5. Scripture is so clear on this subject as to leave no room for doubt (Matt. 10:29-30; Heb. 4:13; Psa. 147:4).
6. The divine understanding is no more debased by the knowledge of a mean thing; if the power of God was not lowered when he created them, why should his knowledge be debased by the contemplation of them?
7. Another question of greater importance refers to future contingent things, the knowledge of which the Socinians endeavor to wrest from God in order to establish more easily the indifference of free will. The orthodox maintain that future contingent things fall under the infallible knowledge of God.
8. On the state of the question observe:
• that a thing may be contingent in two ways,
  1. with respect to the first cause
  2. with respect to second causes
  3. we speak of future contingents in the latter case
• a thing can be considered either as to the certainty of event or as to the mode of production - a future contingent thing implies both
10. Thus the question is whether things fall under the infallible knowledge of God, not as knowing them only indeterminately and probably, but determinately and most certainly - this we affirm.
11. The reasons are:
• because Scripture frequently claims such a knowledge (John 21:17; 1 John 3:20)
• Acts 15:18 - the reference here is to every work of God or of men, for the universal mark admits of no restriction, but shows that James proceeded from the genus to the species
• although they are not as to real being, yet they are as to known being
• Heb. 4:13; Psa. 139:1-4; Jer. 1:5; Isa. 48:8; Ezek. 11:5
• because God predicts future contingent things, therefore he knows them (Isa. 46:10)
• because the most perfect nature of God demands it
• because he is the searcher of hearts
• because he is omnipresent
• the decree of providence draws this necessarily after it, because as whatever takes place in time, God immutably decree either to effect or to permit, so he ought infallibly to foreknow it all (Psa. 115:3; Rom. 11:36; Eph. 1:11)
17. Although it is difficult to comprehend the mode in which God certainly knows future contingent things, yet the thing itself is not therefore denied.
18. The principal foundation of the divine knowledge about future contingent thing is not either the nature of second causes or simply the divine essence, but the decree alone by which things pass from a state of possibility to a state of futurition, and because the decree of God is not occupied  about the thing, but also about the mode of the thing.
19. If the truth of future contingent things is indeterminate with respect to us, it is not so with respect to God, to whom all future things appear as present.
20. It was possible for Christ not to be crucified, if God had so willed, and impossible on account of the decree.
21. It is one thing for a thing to be able to be done or not to be done, another for a thing to be able to be at the same time future and not future.
22. We acknowledge a contradiction in these two propositions - the man is about to walk and he is not about to walk; but not in these - the man is about to walk, and he is able not to walk.
23. The infallibility and certainty of the event does not take away the nature of the contingency of things because things can happen necessarily as to the event and yet contingently as to the mode of production.
24. Although men's actions may be free (because done spontaneously and by a previous judgment of reason), they do not cease to be the necessary with respect to the divine decree and foreknowledge.
25. The infallible foreknowledge of God does not imply that God is the cause of sins because God foreknows sins as certainly about to be; not as if they were to be effected by him as sins, but to be permitted and yet regulated by him. This mode makes him no more guilty in his foreknowledge and decree than in the execution because neither the decree nor the foreknowledge subject the man to an intrinsic necessity, but only to an extrinsic as to the event.
26. God does not make trial of men from ignorance, but from the most wise providence in order to declare to others what was before unknown to them.
27. Although God testifies that he willed to go down and see whether the cry of Sodom which came to him was true (Gen. 18:21), it does not follow that he was ignorant of the nature and degree of the impiety of that city before.
28. God is said to expect grapes from the vineyard (Isa. 5:4) not because he was ignorant of what would happen, but this is spoken after the manner of men because he seriously charged the people to be studious of good works.
29. When God conceives future contingent things as certainly future, he does not conceive of them otherwise than they are; but he knows them relatively to the decree as necessarily about to take place and determinate which, relative to their cause, he knows as indeterminate and contingently future.

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THIRTEENTH QUESTION - Is there a middle knowledge in God between the natural and the free? We deny against the Jesuits, Socinians and Remonstrants.

1. Although the knowledge of God is one and simple intrinsically no less than his essence, yet it can be considered in different ways extrinsically as to the objects. It is commonly distinguished by theologians into the knowledge of simple intelligence (or natural and indefinite) and the knowledge of vision (or free and definite).
1. the former is the knowledge of things merely possible and is called indefinite because nothing on either hand is determined by God concerning them 
2. the latter is the knowledge of future things and is called definite because future things are determined by the sure will of God
3. hence they mutually differ:
   1. in object because the natural knowledge is occupied with possible things, but free from future things
   2. in foundation because the natural is founded on the omnipotence of God, but the free depends upon his will and decree by which things pass from a state of possibility to a state of futurition
   3. in order because the natural precedes the decree, but the free follows it because it beholds things future; now they are not future except by the decree
2. Besides these two species of divine knowledge, a third was devised by the Jesuits.
   1. they called it "middle" because it is between the natural and the free and differs from both
   2. it differs from the indefinite and natural because it is occupied about future, but not about possible things
   3. if differs from the free because it relates not to things certainly future, but only hypothetically so
   4. the authors explain this middle knowledge to mean the foreknowledge of God about future condition events whose truth depends not upon the free decree of God, but upon the liberty of the creature
3. The design of the Jesuits was to defend the semi-Pelagian heresy of foreseen faith and good works in election, and to support the figment of free will.
4. This invention was afterwards adopted by the Socinians and Remonstrants who defend it so as to preserve free will.
5. The question is not whether God knows future contingencies, rather whether they belong to a kind of middle knowledge distinct from the natural and free.
6. The question relates to contingent conditional future things, which can be and not be. The inquiry relates to whether they can be certainly and determinately known antecedently to the decree of God; this we deny.
7. The question is whether a special decree concerning the certain futurition of this or that thing precedes so that God may see that thing antecedently; this we deny.
8. The question is whether besides the natural knowledge (which is only of things possible) and the knowledge of vision (which is only of things future), there may be granted in God a certain third or middle knowledge concerning conditional future things by which God knows what men or angels will freely do without a special decree preceding; this the orthodox deny.
9. The reasons are:
• natural and free knowledge embrace all knowable things
• things not true cannot be foreknown as true; condition future things are not true apart from the determination of the divine will
• if all the acts of the created will fall under the divine providence so that none are independent and indeterminate, no middle knowledge can be granted
• no uncertain knowledge should be ascribed to God; how can an uncertain thing afford foundation to certain knowledge
• this middle knowledge takes away the dominion of God over free acts because according to it the acts of the will are supposed to antecedent to the decree and therefore have their futurition not from God, but from itself
• on the supposition of such a knowledge, a reason for predestination can be assigned out of God besides his purpose and good pleasure
15. 1 Samuel 23:11-12 cannot favor this middle knowledge because it is not so much a prediction of future things which were still in futurition. The words "to descend" and "to deliver up" do not refer to the act itself as hypothetically future, but they are put for the purpose and intention, i.e., to have in the mind to do this (as Acts 12:6 and 16:27.)
16. The words of Christ (Matt. 11:21) are a hyperbolical kind of speech where Christ wishes to exaggerate the contumacy and rebellion of the hearers. So Christ does not speak of the foreknowledge of any future conditional things, but wishes by using hyperbole to upbraid the Jews for ingratitude and impenitence greater than Tyre and Sidon.
17. Examples from 2 Samuel 12:8; Psalm 81:14-15, and 2 Kings 13:19.
18. It is one thing for God to foresee or know the connection of one thing with another; another to know connection as future in is such a subject placed in this or that state.
19. It is one thing for God to know all the connections of all things as necessary and the causes of things about to happen through them antecedently to the decree (this we deny); another to know the contingent connections of events and of all possible future things (this we affirm).
20. It is denied that the coexistence of a free act on hypothesis can be conceived to be determinately antecedently to the decree; it is granted that it may be possibly.
21. Necessity and contingency have a different relationship in simple terms from what they have in complex.
22. Although God antecedently to his decree can know of the various means which can be used to move the will, yet he cannot know that they will actually persuade antecedently to the will of giving those means and of moving the will efficaciously to produce the effect.
23. The futurition of things depends upon nothing but the decree of God, and therefore can be foreknown only from the decree.

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FOURTEENTH QUESTION - Does God will some things necessarily and others freely? We affirm.

1. The will of God necessarily follows his understanding. But because good is either uncreated and infinite or finite and created, twofold object can be assigned to the will.
2. On the state of the question observe:
• that necessity is twofold
1. absolute, which simply and by itself and its own nature cannot be otherwise
2. hypothetical, which is not so of itself but could be otherwise
• free is said either with reference to spontaneity (done without compulsion) or indifference (it can be done and not done)
• there are two kinds of things willed
1. principal, which hold relation of the ultimate end
2. secondary, which has the relation of the means
5. God wills himself necessarily, not only by a hypothetical necessity but also by an absolute necessity. But other things he wills freely because, since no created thing is necessary with respect to God but contingent, so he wills all things as that he could not will them.
6. This liberty of the divine will about created things must be understood absolutely and a priori and with respect to the things considered in themselves.
1. God will created things necessarily from hypothesis because (supposing he has once willed) he can no more will them on account of the immutability of his will
2. speaking absolutely he wills them freely because he is influenced to will them at first by no necessity, but by merer liberty and could abstain from their production
7. This indifference of the divine will is the greatest proof of his perfection who, as an independent being needs nothing out of himself.
8. God wills all created things not to make himself perfect, but to communicate himself and to manifest his goodness and glory in them.
9. He wills these things not to increase, but to diffuse his goodness.
10. There is not the same reason of the understanding in knowing and of the will in willing because the understanding has the things in itself; whereas the will makes them.
11. Although every volition of God is eternal, yet they ought not immediately to be called absolutely necessary.
12. The question concerning sin will come in another section.

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FIFTEENTH QUESTION - May the will be properly distinguished into the will of decree and of precept, good purpose (eudokias) and good pleasure (euarestias), signified, secret and revealed? We affirm.

1. Although the will in God is only one and most simple, yet because it is occupied differently about various objects it may be apprehended as manifold (not in itself, but on the part the things willed).
2. Hence have arisen various distinctions of the will of God
1. the first and principal distinction is that of the decretive and preceptive will
   1. decretive - that which God will to do or permit himself
      1. relates to the futurition and the event of things and is the rule of God's external acts
      2. cannot be resisted and is always fulfilled (Rom. 9:19)
   2. preceptive - what he wills that we should do
      1. concerned with precepts and promises and is the rule of our action
      2. often violated by men (Matt. 23:37)
3. There are various passages of Scripture in which both wills of God are signified at the same time.
4. God can without contradiction will as to precept what he does not will as to decree inasmuch as he wills to prescribe something to man, but does not will to effect it (as he willed Pharaoh to release the people, but yet nilled their actual release).
5. Although these wills may be conceived by us as diverse (owing to the diversity of the objects), yet they are not contrary; for they are not occupied about the same thing.
6. The objects of God's will
   1. the preceptive will may have
      1. affirmative objects - when effecting the thing prescribed
      2. negative objects - consisting in the prohibition of a thing
   2. the decretive will may also have
      1. affirmative objects - in respect to the end
      2. negative objects - in respect to the will ceasing, and it may be called permissive by which he determines not to hinder the creature from sinning
7. Which will can stand with another:
1. the affirmative decretive will cannot stand together with the negative preceptive will, because God cannot effect what the law forbids
2. the affirmative decretive will best agrees with the affirmative preceptive will, for the same who prescribes faith decrees to give it to the elect
3. the affirmative preceptive will can stand together with the negative decretive will, so that God may prescribe to the creature what nevertheless he does not will to effect in the creature
8. Besides this distinction of will, there is another by which it is distributed into the will of eudokias (good purpose), and euarestias (good pleasure).
1. the will eudokias relates to the decretive - by which God testifies his approval about the things which he has determined to perform (Matt. 11:26; Eph. 1:5, 9) 
2. the will euaresias relates to the preceptive - by which God declares what is pleasing to himself and what he wills to be done by men (Rom. 12:2; Eph. 5:10; Col. 3:20) 
9. It is not to be understood that that which depends on the eudokia of God may not also be acceptable (euareston) to him.
10. We may sometimes interchange the eudokia for the euarestia, when it is spoken of those things with which God is pleased because there is in them some quality or condition which agrees with the nature of God and therefore gains his favor.
11. Euarestia in contradistinction from eudokian
1. means nothing else than the mere complacency by which God approves anything as just and holy and delights in it
2. hence it does not properly include any decree or volition in God, but only implies the agreement of the thing with the nature of God
3. the approval of anything is not forthwith his volition
12. Although to the will euarestias belong also the promises of giving salvation to believers, it doe not follow that it ought to connote any condition. The promises added to the precepts signify only what God will grant to believers and penitents, not what he wills to grant to all those to whom the precept is proposed.
13. The third distinction is into the will as signi and beneplaciti.
14. The Scholastics's use:
1. they say the beneplacit will is that which remains concealed previously in God and is left to his most free power and becomes at length known by some oracle or by the event
2. they say the will of sign is that which by some sign is made known to us and which indicates some effect out of God as the sign of his will
   1. they reckoned five signs by which the will of God is manifested: precept, prohibition, counsel, permission, operation
   2. but this is false because
      1. there are more such signs, for instance promises and threatenings, prophecies and narrations
      2. operation is not a sign of will, but it effect belonging to the beneplacit will
      3. permission does not fall under the signified, but under the beneplacit will
      4. counsel may be either referred to the beneplacit or included in the precept
15. With more propriety the beneplacit will is made by us to answer to the decretive and the will of sign is made by us to answer to the preceptive and approving.
16. It is called the signified will because it signifies what God wills to enjoin upon man as pleasing to himself and his bounden duty.
17. The will of sign can also be called the will of beneplacit when it is occupied about things approved by God and things which he decrees to enjoin upon the creature, but in this case it is used to denote the placitum or decree of God concerning the effecting or permitting of a certain thing.
18. There cannot be contrariety between these two wills because they do not will and nill the same thing in the same manner and respect.
1. the will of purpose is the will of event and execution
2. the signified will is the will of duty and of obligation to it
3. God can both, without contradiction, command Abraham to sacrifice Isaac and at the same time will that the sacrifice not take place
19. Although God may be said to will the salvation of all by the will of sign and to nill it by the beneplacit will, yet there is no contradiction here. To will to call to faith and salvation, and yet to nill to give that faith and salvation are not at variance.
20. The will of sign which is set forth as extrinsic ought to correspond with some internal will in God that it may not be false and deceptive; but that internal will is not the decree concerning the gift of salvation to this or that one, but the decree concerning the command of faith and promise of salvation if the man does believe.
21. The promised salvation set forth by the will of sign does not properly and directly fall under the precept because in their formal nature promise and precept differ.
1. the former indicates a blessing, the latter a duty
2. although it is necessary that the promise should have some foundation as to the certainty of the event, that must not be sought from the decree of God about particular persons, but from his decree about the things themselves
3. thus it happens that salvation is most surely in the gospel promised to all believers because so close is the connection between faith and salvation from the good pleasure of God that no one can have the former without the latter
22. It cannot be the conditional will to save each and every individual under that condition because would testify that he will what in reality he does not will towards those passed by (from whom he withholds the condition).
23. Since that will of sign has never been universal with respect to each and every one, the mercy signified by it cannot be universal.
24. If God by this will signified that he willed the salvation of all without exception, he would have signified that he willed what he least willed, but when it signifies that the wills the salvation of all believers and penitents, it signifies that he wills that which he really wills.
25. The fourth distinction of the will is into secret and revealed.
1. secret will
   1. commonly applied to the decretive will which is for the most part concealed in God
   2. a profound and unfathomable abyss (Psa. 36:6; Rom. 11:33-34)
   3. has for its object all those things which God will either to effect or permit
   4. always takes place
2. revealed will
   1. commonly applied to the preceptive will manifested in the law and gospel
   2. discoverable to all, nor is it far from us (Deut. 30:14; Rom. 10:8)
   3. relates to those things which belong to our duty and are proposed conditionally
   4. often violated
26. It is called secret will not because it is concealed from us and never revealed, but that it remains concealed from us until it is revealed.
27. Although the secret will concerning our election remains concealed in God, it does not follow that we can have no certainty of salvation because although we cannot gain it a priori, yet we can a posteriori.
28. Whatever Christ willed to be done in time by men, that he has also revealed in time; but it does not forthwith whatever he has decreed to be done by himself from good pleasure.
29. It is not necessary that God should exercise a good will to all for salvation by an antecedent will, nor is it necessary that if he wills to pour out his goodness on the creature by the blessing of creation and providence, that he ought to exercise good will to it unto salvation.

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SIXTEENTH QUESTION - May the will be properly distinguished into antecedent and consequent, efficacious and inefficacious, conditional and absolute? We deny.

1. Besides the previous distinctions of the divine will received by the orthodox, there are also others proposed by our adversaries.
2. Such is the distinction of the will into antecedent and consequent frequently met with among the Scholastics.
3. Some theologians among us wish to retain this distinction.
   1. as to the commands, they wish the antecedent will to have place in precepts, but the consequent in promises and threats added to the precepts by way of sanction
   2. as to the decrees, they wish the antecedent will to have place with regard to order and our manner of conception, so that it is termed that which is conceived to go before; but the consequent is that which is conceived to follow another act of the will
4. But our theologians reject the sense which understands by antecedent will the purpose of God concerning the saving of all men universally (preceding the act of the human will), but by consequent will the decree concerning the salvation of believers and the damnation of unbelievers (posterior to the human will and depends upon its good or bad acts).
5. The Arminians wish that to be the antecedent will by which God wills something to the rational creature before every or any act of that creature, but by consequent that by which he wills something to the rational creature after some act.
6. This distinction is in many ways injurious to God:
   • because it attributes to him contrary wills, that wills the salvation of all and wills the salvation only of some
7. • this distinction cannot have place in God without ascribing to him no only folly and impotence; but also mutability because there can be no place for the consequent will until the antecedent is first rescinded
8. • the antecedent will is not so much a will as an empty and void desire incapable of accomplishment which cannot apply to God (the most wise and powerful)
9. • God in this way would be subjected to man since the consequent will is said to depend upon the determination of the human will so that no one is elected by God who does not first choose God by his faith and repentance
10. • it is repugnant to the gospel which constantly teaches that God will to save not all simply, but only the elect and believers in Christ and that the means of salvation are not offered or conferred upon all, but only upon some.
    • it overthrows the eternal election of God because it leaves it uncertain, founded not upon the good pleasure of God, but upon the human will.
11. In 1 Samuel 13:13, the antecedent will is not set forth by which he willed to establish the kingdom of Saul forever.
12. This twofold will cannot be proved from Matthew 23:37
1. because it is not said that God willed to scatter those whom he willed to gather together, but only that Christ willed to gather together those whom Jerusalem nilled to be gathered, but notwithstanding their opposition Christ did not fail in gathering together those whom he willed
   1. Augustine: "She indeed was unwilling that her sons should be gathered together by him, but notwithstanding her unwillingness he gathered together his sons whom he will" (Enchiridion 24 [97])
   2. Jerusalem is here to be distinguished from her sons as the words themselves prove
2. the will here alluded to is not the decretive but the preceptive
13. The preceptive will only is indicated which prescribed to it the duty of repentance so as to render it inexcusable.
14. The will of saving all men does not overthrow the decree of reprobation of passing by many because it is neither the decretive will, but only the preceptive and approving will; nor the universal, which respects all and individuals, but only general, which is indiscriminately extended to any. So they can be called to the marriage by the preceptive will who nevertheless were excluded from it from eternity by the will of good pleasure.
15. The second distinction usually brought forward is that of effectual and ineffectual will, which is understood to mean that the effectual will corresponds with the decretive; but that the ineffectual will coincides with the preceptive.
1. Scripture testifies that the counsel of God is immutable and that his will cannot be resisted (Isa. 46:10; Rom. 9:19); if it cannot be resisted, it must accomplish what he intended
2. the ineffectual will cannot be attributed  to God without convicting him of either of ignorance or of impotence
3. nor ought ineffectual will be attributed not to his good pleasure, because that would only prove that God had not seriously willed it, for he who seriously intends anything uses all the means in his power to accomplish it
4. the same reasons which teach that there is no antecedent will prove there is no ineffectual will
16. Although every will of God is effectual because the event intended is always brought about, it ought not immediately to be efficient for efficiency is only in good things, but efficacy also in evil.
17. The passages which attribute a desire or wish to God do not immediately prove any ineffectual will in him.
1. if referred to the past, these passages mean nothing else than a serious disapproval of committed sins with a strong rebuke to the ingratitude of men and a declaration of the benefits lost and the evils incurred by their sins (Psa. 81:13; Isa. 48:18)
2. but if they relate to the future, they imply only a serious command supported by promises and threatenings (Deut. 32:29)
18. Ezekiel 18:23 does not favor the inefficacious will or the feeble desire of God because the word chpts (which occurs here) does not denote desire so much as delight and complacency. Thus God may be said not to delight in the punishment of the wicked, although he wills it as an exercise of his justice.
19. The third distinction is in the absolute (that which depends upon nothing out of himself) and conditional (that which is suspended upon a condition out of God) will. The latter is rejected because it is repugnant to his independence, wisdom, and power.
20. The condition upon which God is conceived to will anything, will either be certainly future from the decree of God or certainly not future, nor even possible.
1. if certainly future, if will no longer be conditional, but absolute
2. if certainly not future, God would be made to seriously intend something under a  condition never to take place, which God himself does not will to grant
21. The conditional will ought to be regarded in two ways:
1. a priori and antecedently suspended upon a condition
2. a posteriori and consequently, whose execution depends upon the intervention of some condition in the creature
3. in the latter sense, the will less accurately can be called conditional because the decrees of God ordain with the end the means also for carrying it into execution (i.e., he who decrees us to salvation, decrees also faith and repentance as the mean of obtaining it)
22. It is one thing for the condition to be such on the part of the internal act or of the volition itself; another to be such on the part of the external object or of the thing willed. In the latter sense, we grant the things willed to be conditional, but not in the former.
23. Thus this proposition that God wills the salvation of men, provided they believe, may have a twofold sense.
1. it may signify that God wills or determines salvation to come to us under the condition of faith - here salvation only is conditional and not the will of God, for the will of God has determined the condition as much as the salvation
2. or it may signify that from the condition of faith posited, there arises in God the will of conferring salvation upon men; in this sense the proposition is false
   1. nothing temporal can be the cause of that which is eternal
   2. the will in God is not to be conceived of as suspended upon a condition antecedently
   3. God does not will to save men if they believe, but he wills them to believe in order to salvation

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SEVENTEENTH QUESTION - Can any cause be assigned for the will of God? We deny.

1. This question is rendered necessary by the Pelagians who, in the matter of predestination, seek in the foresight of faith or of the good use of free will the causes of the divine will out of God.
2. It is one thing to seek for the reason of the will of God; another for the cause. The question concerns a cause properly so called, moving the will of God to will this or that (which we deny).
3. As the will of God is the cause of all things, so it can have no cause of itself. 
4. It is one thing to grant a cause on the part of the act of willing, another on the part of the thing willed.
1. in the former sense, no cause of the will of God can be granted
2. in the latter sense, there can because among the things willed by him, some may be the cause of others
3. there is an order and causality among the things willed by God (so that one may be for another), but not in the divine volition which recognizes no cause out of itself
5. If some cause or motive must be sought, it is not to be sought out of God, but only in his justice and mercy by which the will is incited to action.
6. Although among the effects of the divine will some have the relation of causes with respect to others, yet their power is not such that they can move the divine will to elicit its own act, since they are the effects of it as the first cause.

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EIGHTEENTH QUESTION - Is the will of God the primary rule of justice? We distinguish.

1. Some hold that all moral good and evil depend upon the free will of God and nothing is good and just unless God wills it. Others contend that some essential goodness and justice in moral acts exists antecedently to the will of God, so that the things are not good and just because God wills them, but God wills them because they are good and just.
2. We follow the latter opinion with these distinctions:
1. the will can be called the primary rule of justice either intrinsically (his will is regulated by his justice) or extrinsically (the justice in us is regulated by nothing else than his will)
2. the law of God is either natural and indispensable (founded on his nature and holiness) or free and positive (depending only upon his will)
3. This being posited, I say that the will is the first rule of justice extrinsically and in reference to us, but not intrinsically and in reference to God.
1. this is true in respect to us because the fount of justice ought to be sought nowhere else than in the will of God
2. but with respect to God, the will cannot always be called the first rule of justice
   1. it is a rule in those things which have only a free and positive goodness, but not in those which have essential goodness (i.e., in ceremonial, not in moral)
   2. in the latter, God's will is regulated, not extrinsically, but intrinsically (viz., by his most holy nature)
   3. hence it has been said that certain things are good because God will them, but that God wills others because they are just and good per se and in their own nature (such as the love of God and our neighbor)
4. The reasons are:
• as there is granted in God natural justice and holiness antecedently to his free will, so the moral goodness and justice founded upon the justice and holiness of God and bearing his image, must be natural
• there is in God an eternal and indispensable right (antecedent to every free act of will) by which as Creator he has dominion over the creature; and since there is such a right in God antecedently to his will, there must be some rule of justice independent of his will
• if the will of God was the first rule of justice even intrinsically so that nothing would be good and just unless God wills it, it would follow that there would no crimes which he cannot command and by it render them morally good as commands
7. God is not under any moral duty outwardly because he is a debtor to no one, and there is no cause out of him which can place him under obligation. Yet he can be under obligation inwardly because he is a debtor to himself and cannot deny himself.
8. With respect to God and his right of obliging or commanding, the rule of good and bad exists antecedently to the will of God because it is founded on his very holiness and justice.
9. It is absurd to say that God depends on something out of himself, but not that he depends upon himself (i.e., that he wills nothing unless according to his own holiness and justice).
10. God is not bound to the law which he imposes on man, but he is not free and absolved from all the matter of the law, so that he can either command or himself do the opposite of it.
11. Although the divine will is simply free outwardly, yet from the supposition of one free act it can be necessitated to another (e.g., if he will to promise absolutely, he must fulfill the promise).
12. Man sins immediately against the revealed law of God, but also mediately and consequently against God, the author of the law, and the supreme Lord who imposed it.

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NINETEENTH QUESTION - Is vindictive justice natural to God? We affirm against the Socinians.

1. To the will of God are attributed two principal virtues:
1. justice - by which God is in himself holy and just and has the constant will of giving to each his due
2. goodness - by which he is conceived as the supreme good and the giver of all good
2. The word "justice" is generally used in two senses:
1. the universal comprehension of all virtues and is called universal justice -as God is in himself perfectly holy and just, so in all his works he preserves and incorruptible justice
2. or justice is take for particular justice, which gives each his due, is occupied with with the distribution of rewards and punishments and is called distributive
3. Divine justice can be considered either absolutely or relatively.
1. absolutely - the rectitude and perfection of the divine nature
2. relatively - with respect its exercise through the divine will according to the rule of his supreme right and eternal wisdom; and it may be regarded as twofold
   1. in the rule and government of creatures
   2. or in judgments (in granting rewards or in chastisements and punishments (vindictive))
      1. premiative - in granting rewards
      2. vindictive - in chastising or punishing
      3. the proposed question treats this item
      4. to understand this, certain things must be premised
4. The rational creature and his moral dependence upon God being supposed:
1. the first egress of this justice is in the constitution of the penal law
2. the second egress is in the infliction of punishment
   1. the right of God with regard to punishment is either supreme and rigorous or it is a right tempered by a certain moderation
      1. as to the former - punishment is imposed not only on sin but also on the very person of the sinner
      2. as to the latter - there is granted a manifold moderation in the exercise of justice either in time (delay) or in persons (by transfer) or in degree (by mitigation)
   2. hence arises a twofold right with regard to the infliction of punishment
      1. one necessary and indispensable with respect to sin itself
      2. the other free and positive with respect to the sinner
   3. justice demands necessarily that all sin should be punished, but does not equally demand that it should be punished in the very person sinning or at such a time and in such a degree
   4. the Scholastics were correct when they said that impersonally punishment is necessarily inflicted upon every sin, but not personally upon every sinner
5. Although we hold the egress of justice to be necessary, yet we do not deny that God exercises it freely.
6. Hence it is evident in what sense this justice may be called natural, because it is founded in the very nature of God and even identified with it.
7. This justice can be regarded in three ways:
1. as a potentially  - in which sense it is the will of God turning away from and willing to punish sinners
2. as an actuality itself and the act of judgment and punishment by which it carries out its judgments towards sinners
3. for its effect or the punishment inflicted by justice
4. here we treat not the third but the first two which are joined together in Psalm 119:137
8. A question is raised here by the Socinians concerning vindictive justice.
1. in order to destroy the satisfaction of Christ, they deny that vindictive justice is natural to God, but is only the effect of his most free will
2. Socinus denies that there is any attribute in God necessarily demanding a satisfaction for sin
   1. if God punishes sin, this is the perfectly free effect of his will from which he might abstain
   2. "Nor is there any justice in God obliging him to punish sin altogether, from which he cannot abstain. There is indeed in God perpetual justice, but this is nothing else than equity and rectitude" (Praelectionis theologicae 16 [1627], p. 87)
   3. "That which is commonly called justice as opposed to mercy is not a quality of God, but only the effect of his will" (ibid., p. 88)
9. The orthodox maintain that this justice is an essential property of God and not merely the effect of his free will.
10. Therefore the question comes to this - whether the vindictive justice of God is so natural to him that he cannot but exercise it and to leave sin unpunished would be repugnant to it; or whether it is so free in god that its exercise depends upon his will and good pleasure alone. We defend the former.
11. That vindictive justice is essential to God these four argument especially prove: (1) the voice of Scripture, (2) the dictates of conscience and the consent of nations, (3) the sanction of the law with the whole Levitical, (4) our redemption through the death of Christ
• Scripture frequently ascribes this justice to God
  1. in those places in which the praise of perfect holiness and justice is given to God by which he is said to utterly detest and turn away from sin (Exo. 34:7; Hab. 1:13; Psa. 5:4)
     1. we conclude, if the hatred of sin is necessary in God, justice is equally necessary
     2. if he hates sin necessarily, he must necessarily punish it
     3. the sins of the elect he has punished in Christ
12. 2. in those places which speak of God as a just judge (Gen. 18:25; Rom. 3:5-6, 1:18, 32; 2 Thess. 1:6)
13. • the dictates of conscience and the consent of nations confirm the testimony of Scripture
    1. the former when it places man before the tribunal of God and either accuses him or excuses him in good and evil deeds (Rom. 2:14-15)
    2. the latter by which among all people this persuasion has prevailed that God is the just Judge of crimes, and if he did not exercise this justice, he would not be God
14. • the moral and ceremonial law itself establishes the same thing - the necessity of sacrifices depended not on the mere will, but on the very essential justice of God
15. • the death of Christ no less plainly demonstrates this
    1. if it was free and indifferent to God to punish or not to punish sin without compromising his justice, what reason can be devised to account for subjecting his Son to an accursed and cruel death?
    2. his offering of himself for us was not a work of bare will, but of justice, which demanded this sacrifice for its own satisfaction (Rom. 3:25; Col. 1:20)
16. A magistrate would err, if by a too great indulgence he would dispense with the right of punishment as this would give impunity to crimes.
17. By not punishing sin, God would:
1. do injury to no one out of himself
2. do injury to his own justice
3. do injury to the laws enacted by him
4. do injury to the public good
5. deny himself and divest himself of the natural dominion which he exercises over creatures
18. Although the effects of justice depend upon the free will of God, it does not follow that justice itself is equally a free act of will.
19. It is one thing to punish sins from a physical necessity (such as exists in fire to burn); another to do so from moral and rational necessity.
20. Although the effects of justice and mercy may be contrary on account of the diversity of their objects, it does not follow that these attributes are contrary in themselves.
21. The justice and mercy of God differ in their exercise.
1. mercy is perfectly free, able to exert or not exert itself without injury to anyone because it consists in a merely gratuitous act which is not bound to exercise towards anyone - he owes mercy to no one
2. the act of justice, although most free, is nevertheless necessary because it is due - it consists in rendering to each one its own
22. If there were no sinful creature, there would be no justice or mercy as to relative being, but there would always be justice as to absolute being.
23. Although God can exercise forebearance as to the degree of punishment, it does not follow that he can equally take away all degrees of punishment.
24. The question here is not simply whether God can through his potency not punish sin; but whether he can through his justice.
25. Although from his absolute right God is able to annihilate creatures, he cannot equally inflict upon an innocent person infernal and everlasting torment.

* * * * * * * * * *

NINETEENTH QUESTION - Is vindictive justice natural to God? We affirm against the Socinians.

1. To the will of God are attributed two principal virtues:
1. justice - by which God is in himself holy and just and has the constant will of giving to each his due
2. goodness - by which he is conceived as the supreme good and the giver of all good
2. The word "justice" is generally used in two senses:
1. the universal comprehension of all virtues and is called universal justice -as God is in himself perfectly holy and just, so in all his works he preserves and incorruptible justice
2. or justice is take for particular justice, which gives each his due, is occupied with with the distribution of rewards and punishments and is called distributive
3. Divine justice can be considered either absolutely or relatively.
1. absolutely - the rectitude and perfection of the divine nature
2. relatively - with respect its exercise through the divine will according to the rule of his supreme right and eternal wisdom; and it may be regarded as twofold
   1. in the rule and government of creatures
   2. or in judgments (in granting rewards or in chastisements and punishments (vindictive))
      1. premiative - in granting rewards
      2. vindictive - in chastising or punishing
      3. the proposed question treats this item
      4. to understand this, certain things must be premised
4. The rational creature and his moral dependence upon God being supposed:
1. the first egress of this justice is in the constitution of the penal law
2. the second egress is in the infliction of punishment
   1. the right of God with regard to punishment is either supreme and rigorous or it is a right tempered by a certain moderation
      1. as to the former - punishment is imposed not only on sin but also on the very person of the sinner
      2. as to the latter - there is granted a manifold moderation in the exercise of justice either in time (delay) or in persons (by transfer) or in degree (by mitigation)
   2. hence arises a twofold right with regard to the infliction of punishment
      1. one necessary and indispensable with respect to sin itself
      2. the other free and positive with respect to the sinner
   3. justice demands necessarily that all sin should be punished, but does not equally demand that it should be punished in the very person sinning or at such a time and in such a degree
   4. the Scholastics were correct when they said that impersonally punishment is necessarily inflicted upon every sin, but not personally upon every sinner
5. Although we hold the egress of justice to be necessary, yet we do not deny that God exercises it freely.
6. Hence it is evident in what sense this justice may be called natural, because it is founded in the very nature of God and even identified with it.
7. This justice can be regarded in three ways:
1. as a potentially  - in which sense it is the will of God turning away from and willing to punish sinners
2. as an actuality itself and the act of judgment and punishment by which it carries out its judgments towards sinners
3. for its effect or the punishment inflicted by justice
4. here we treat not the third but the first two which are joined together in Psalm 119:137
8. A question is raised here by the Socinians concerning vindictive justice.
1. in order to destroy the satisfaction of Christ, they deny that vindictive justice is natural to God, but is only the effect of his most free will
2. Socinus denies that there is any attribute in God necessarily demanding a satisfaction for sin
   1. if God punishes sin, this is the perfectly free effect of his will from which he might abstain
   2. "Nor is there any justice in God obliging him to punish sin altogether, from which he cannot abstain. There is indeed in God perpetual justice, but this is nothing else than equity and rectitude" (Praelectionis theologicae 16 [1627], p. 87)
   3. "That which is commonly called justice as opposed to mercy is not a quality of God, but only the effect of his will" (ibid., p. 88)
9. The orthodox maintain that this justice is an essential property of God and not merely the effect of his free will.
10. Therefore the question comes to this - whether the vindictive justice of God is so natural to him that he cannot but exercise it and to leave sin unpunished would be repugnant to it; or whether it is so free in god that its exercise depends upon his will and good pleasure alone. We defend the former.
11. That vindictive justice is essential to God these four argument especially prove: (1) the voice of Scripture, (2) the dictates of conscience and the consent of nations, (3) the sanction of the law with the whole Levitical, (4) our redemption through the death of Christ
• Scripture frequently ascribes this justice to God
  1. in those places in which the praise of perfect holiness and justice is given to God by which he is said to utterly detest and turn away from sin (Exo. 34:7; Hab. 1:13; Psa. 5:4)
     1. we conclude, if the hatred of sin is necessary in God, justice is equally necessary
     2. if he hates sin necessarily, he must necessarily punish it
     3. the sins of the elect he has punished in Christ
12. 2. in those places which speak of God as a just judge (Gen. 18:25; Rom. 3:5-6, 1:18, 32; 2 Thess. 1:6)
13. • the dictates of conscience and the consent of nations confirm the testimony of Scripture
    1. the former when it places man before the tribunal of God and either accuses him or excuses him in good and evil deeds (Rom. 2:14-15)
    2. the latter by which among all people this persuasion has prevailed that God is the just Judge of crimes, and if he did not exercise this justice, he would not be God
14. • the moral and ceremonial law itself establishes the same thing - the necessity of sacrifices depended not on the mere will, but on the very essential justice of God
15. • the death of Christ no less plainly demonstrates this
    1. if it was free and indifferent to God to punish or not to punish sin without compromising his justice, what reason can be devised to account for subjecting his Son to an accursed and cruel death?
    2. his offering of himself for us was not a work of bare will, but of justice, which demanded this sacrifice for its own satisfaction (Rom. 3:25; Col. 1:20)
16. A magistrate would err, if by a too great indulgence he would dispense with the right of punishment as this would give impunity to crimes.
17. By not punishing sin, God would:
1. do injury to no one out of himself
2. do injury to his own justice
3. do injury to the laws enacted by him
4. do injury to the public good
5. deny himself and divest himself of the natural dominion which he exercises over creatures
18. Although the effects of justice depend upon the free will of God, it does not follow that justice itself is equally a free act of will.
19. It is one thing to punish sins from a physical necessity (such as exists in fire to burn); another to do so from moral and rational necessity.
20. Although the effects of justice and mercy may be contrary on account of the diversity of their objects, it does not follow that these attributes are contrary in themselves.
21. The justice and mercy of God differ in their exercise.
1. mercy is perfectly free, able to exert or not exert itself without injury to anyone because it consists in a merely gratuitous act which is not bound to exercise towards anyone - he owes mercy to no one
2. the act of justice, although most free, is nevertheless necessary because it is due - it consists in rendering to each one its own
22. If there were no sinful creature, there would be no justice or mercy as to relative being, but there would always be justice as to absolute being.
23. Although God can exercise forebearance as to the degree of punishment, it does not follow that he can equally take away all degrees of punishment.
24. The question here is not simply whether God can through his potency not punish sin; but whether he can through his justice.
25. Although from his absolute right God is able to annihilate creatures, he cannot equally inflict upon an innocent person infernal and everlasting torment.

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TWENTIETH QUESTION - How do they differ from each other?

1. As vindictive justice is concerned with the infliction of physical punishment, so goodness and the qualities contained under it are occupied with the communication of good, but diversely.
2. The goodness of God is that by which he is conceived not only absolutely and in himself, but also relatively and extrinsically as beneficent towards creatures.
3. Although the goodness of God extends itself to all creatures, yet not equally.
1. it exhibits the greatest diversity in the communication of good
   1. one is general (Psa. 36:6-7)
   2. another special (Acts 14:17)
   3. yet another most special (Psa. 73:1)
2. if you seek the causes of this diversity, various ones can be assigned besides his will
   1. it was in accordance with his supreme dominion
   2. the wisdom of God demanded that a certain order should exist in things
   3. it conduced to the beauty of the universe
   4. it afforded a better demonstration of the inexhaustible fountain of divine goodness
4. From goodness flows love by which he communicates himself to the creature; there is usually a threefold distinction made in the divine love.
1. "love of creature" (philoktisia)
2. "love of man" (philoanthrōpia)
3. "love of the elect" (eklektophilia)
4. although love considered affectively and on the part of the internal act is equal in God, yet regarded effectively it is unequal because some effects of love are greater than others
5. There are three degrees of one and the same love of God.
1. the love of benevolence
   1. he love us before we were
   2. John 3:16
   3. by this he elects us
2. the love of beneficence
   1. he loves us as we are
   2. Ephesians 5:25; Revelation 1:5
   3. by this he redeems and sanctifies us
3. the love of complacency
   1. he loves us when we are renewed after his image
   2. Isaiah 62:3; Hebrews 11:6
   3. by this he gratuitously rewards us as holy and just
6. These four things in the highest manner commend the love of God towards us:
1. the majesty of the lover, who is not bound to love us; indeed who can most justly hate and destroy us if he so willed
2. the poverty and unworthiness of the loved, being empty and weak creatures, sinners and guilty, rebellious servants
3. the worth of Christ in whom we are loved
4. the multitude and excellence of the gifts which flow out from that love to us
7. Grace succeeds love by which God is conceived as willing to communicate himself to the creature from gratuitous love without any merit in the creature and notwithstanding its demerit. It is usual to understand it principally in two ways:
1. affectively - with respect to the internal act of God towards us
2. effectively - with regard to the effects which it produces in us
8. Grace, taken effectively, indicates all the gifts of the Holy Spirit gratuitously given to us by God.
9. Grace is distributed into decretive and executive.
1. decretive denotes the eternal purpose of God concerning the electing of us before the foundations of the world were laid
2. executive embraces the universal dispensation of that wonderful mystery which exercised itself towards the elect in redemption and in calling, justification and sanctification
10. Mercy attends upon the grace of God.
1. grace exercises itself about man as a sinner
2. mercy is exercised about man as miserable
11. It does not spring from any external cause which usually excited mercy in men, rather it springs from God's goodness alone. So freely is it occupied, that it can exert or not exert itself without injury to anyone (Rom. 9:18).
12. Mercy is commonly considered as twofold:
1. general and temporal by which God succors all creatures subjected to any misery (Psa. 104:27)
2. special and saving by which he has compassion on his own, electing out of the mass of fallen men certain ones to be saved through Christ
13. The magnitude of his mercy may be collected from various sources:
1. with regard to the principle of pitying
2. to the objects
3. to the mode and effects
4. to duration because it is eternal
5. to the severity of the divine justice
6. to the number and heinousness of sins
7. to the multitude of miseries and temptations
8. to the terror of death and the divine judgment
14. Although the mercy of God is more ample and manifold with regard to the effects which are innumerable, yet it has its own objects and vessels into which it is poured out.

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TWENTY-FIRST QUESTION - What is the omnipotence of God, and does it extend to those things which imply a contradiction? We deny.

1. The power of God can be distinguished as his right and authority to do anything and the force and faculty of his acting. We speak here of the latter.
2. We treat of the active power of God, the principle of acting on another.
3. The question does not concern the actual power according to which God irresistibly does whatsoever he wills to do, yet in the time and manner which seems best to him (Psa. 115:3).
4. Although power and will do not really differ, it does not follow that the power is not more extended than the actual volition itself.
5. Scholastics deduced from the idea of absolute power the suggestion that God can do whatever can be imagined by us whether good or evil, contradictory or not. Calvin rightly denies this absolute power because it would not belong to power and virtue, but to impotency and imperfection.
6. The object of God's power is nothing other than the possible, i.e., whatever is not repugnant to be done. But the impossible falls not under the omnipotence of God, not from a defect in his power, but from a defect in the possibility of the thing because it involves in its conception contradictory predicates.
7. Impossible and possible are used in three ways:
1. supernaturally
   1. impossible - that which cannot be made even by divine power (a sensible stone)
   2. possible - that which can take place at least divinely (resurrection of the dead)
2. naturally
   1. impossible - that which cannot be done by the powers of nature and second causes, but can be done by supernatural power (creation of the world)
   2. possible - that which does not exceed the power of finite nature
3. morally
   1. impossible - that which cannot be done according to the laws of holiness
   2. possible - that which is agreeable to the laws of virtue
4. God can indeed do the naturally impossible, but not what is said to be such either morally or supernaturally
8. The impossible to nature with respect to second causes (i.e., which surpasses the usual and customary course of nature) differs from the impossible by nature (i.e., which is repugnant to the nature of a thing with respect to all causes).
9. The impossible is so either on the part of the thing (repugnant to its nature) or on the part of God.
   1. Something may be possible to others but not to God (e.g., to lie, sin, and die)
   2. Augustine: "God is omnipotent and since he is omnipotent he cannot die, nor be deceived, nor deny himself. He cannot do many things, and yet he is omnipotent; and he is therefore omnipotent because he cannot do these things, for if he could die he would not be omnipotent" (The Creed [De symbolo: sermo ad catechumenos] 1)
10. Hence it is evident what must be determined concerning the object of God's power.
11. We gather what must be judged concerning contradictories; for that is said to be contradictory which is logically impossible, i.e., which has a repugnancy and includes contradictory predicates.
1. a repugnance may be immediate and explicit when the terms are explicitly contradictory
2. it may be mediate and implicit when the repugnant terms only virtually and implicitly include a contradiction
12. That such things do not fall under God's power is evident:
1. because impossibilities cannot be done by him and contradictories are impossible because a contradiction is of eternal disjunction and to affirm and deny, to be and not to be are eternally opposed
2. the power of God is concerned with being; but a contradiction is a non-entity
3. if he could perform contradictories, he could make the same thing to be and not be at the same time so that two contradictory propositions might be true [and false] at the same time
4. then evidently nothing would be impossible any more because there would be nothing greater than that which contradicts
13. When he is said to be omnipotent or able to do all things, the word "all things" distributes only entities, under which impossible and contradictory things are not contained.
14. God can indeed do thing which are above man's reason because he is able to do above all that we ask or thing (Eph. 3:20), but not things contrary to reason.
15. It is one thing to say that God can do more than we can understand and our mind conceive, it is another to say that he can do things which imply a contradiction.
16. With God no word or thing is impossible (Luke 1:37), but that which is contradictory is not such; rather it is a nothing and a non-entity.
17. To do contraries is one thing; to do contradictories another.
18. God could have made the past not to be the past in the divided sense and before it was the past; but in the compound sense, he cannot make what is past to be not past because it is no less impossible for a thing to have been and not to have been at the same time then for it to be and not to be.
19. The power of God cannot be convicted of impotence for not being able to do things impossible anymore than the vision because it cannot see sounds or the hearing because it cannot hear colors.
20. Matthew 3:9 does not prove that God can do contradictories. It only rebukes the vainglory of the Jews, that if they were destroyed God could miraculously father another people.
21. Although all the works