When we attribute a foreknowledge to God, we mean that all things have ever been and remain eternally before his eyes. So that with respect to his knowledge, nothing is future nor passed; all things are present to him, and so present, that he does not only imagine them by representing to himself their ideas, like those things which present themselves to us through the medium of the imagination, when our souls retain them in our memory; but he beholds and contemplates them as though they were really before his eyes. That prescience extends through the circuit of the world, and over all creatures. We call predestination the eternal decree of God, by which he hath resolved in his council what he would do with every man in particular,

"God hath not only given testimony to the doctrine of individual predestination, but hath also afforded us a pattern of it in the race of Abraham. For he hath therein clearly shewn, that it belongs to him to ordain the destiny of every people, according to his own good pleasure. When the Most High,' says Moses, 'divided to the nations their inheritance, when he separated the sons of Adam, he set the bounds of the people according to the number of the children of Israel. For the Lord's portion is his people: Jacob the lot of his

inheritance.** He elsewhere speaks more expressly, saying, The Lord did not set his love upon you, nor choose you because ye were more in number than any people (for ye were the fewest of all people); but because the Lord loved you, and because he would keep the oath which he had sworn unto your fathers, hath the Lord brought you out with a mighty hand.' The same assertion is often repeated. Behold the heaven and the heaven of heavens is the Lord's thy God, the earth also with all that therein is only the Lord had a delight in thy fathers to love them, and he chose their seed after them, even you above all people, as it is this day.'

"He also shews them elsewhere, that the love of God is the cause of the protection with which they were favoured. This the faithful unanimously confess. He hath chosen us for his inheritance, the excellency of Jacob whom he loved. For to that gratuitous love they attributed all the excellency with which God hath crowned them, because they are well assured, not only that they have not acquired by any merit the advantages which they possess, but that the holy patriarch Jacob himself did not possess sufficient virtue to derive, either to himself or to his successors, so high a pre

* Deut. xxxii. 8-9.

rogative. The prophets also mention their election, in order to reproach them, and to cover them with confusion, for having so basely fallen by their ingratitude.

"But what reply will they make, who pretend to limit election to the dignity of men, or to the merit of their works; they see that one nation alone is preferred to all the rest of the world; they hear from the mouth of God himself, that he was not induced by any consideration to be more inclined towards a despicable, and afterwards a miserable and a rebellious people, than towards others. Will they plead against God, that he intended to propose to us such an example of his mercy? but their murmurings and their contradictions will not hinder the execution of his work. By throwing their blasphemies, like so many stones, against heaven, they will never wound his justice; they will only return upon their own heads. The Israelites, you perceive, are led to this principle of gratuitous election in their thanksgivings to God, It is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.' The negative employed is by no means superfluous, it is added that we may exclude ourselves; that we may not only learn that God is the author of all the blessings which render us acceptable, but that he was

self-induced in the communication of them, since he could find nothing in us worthy of such liberality.

To this doctrine the song of the whole church is responsive. O God, our fathers have told us what work thou didst in their days, in the times of old. For they got not the land in possession by their own sword, neither did their own arm save them; but thy right hand and thine arm, and the light of thy countenance, because thou hadst a favour unto them.' It is to be remembered, that the land of Canaan is to be considered as a visible symbol of the secret election of God, by which they were adopted. The words of the prophet David, contain the same idea. Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord and the people whom he hath chosen for his own inheritance. Samuel animates the righteous of his day, by the same consideration to entertain a good hope; For the Lord will not forsake his people, for his great name's sake; because it hath pleased the Lord to make you his people.'"*.

From the above considerations, it must appear to every impartial and reflecting mind, that, in the dispensations of providence from the

* Instit. lib. iii. cap. 21.

earliest ages, a perpetual illustration of the divine sovereignty hath been furnished, calculated to illustrate the character of Jehovah, as an independant being, deriving all his motives from himself. That the greatest and the best of beings should also be an absolute Sovereign, is a proposition so obvious, that it were trifling to attempt the illustration of it. The sovereignty of God admitted, (and it is presumed few persons, if any, calling themselves Christians, will dispute it,) furnishes a reply to all objections against the doctrine of election, as inconsistent with the character of Jehovah; election being only an act of that sovereignty so admitted. But, if such an act of sovereignty be philosophically just, it is also divinely attested. The election of the Jewish nation to be a distinct people from the rest of the world, and to an admission to exclusive privileges; may be considered as a specimen of the style and manner of the great Supreme, whose majesty places him above all enquiry and censure, though his goodness condescends to reveal a part of his ways; but, how little of him is known!

Those who bound their enquiries by the decisions of scripture, will attend with candour and impartiality to testimonies in favour of this doctrine deduced from thence,