374 RUIN AND RECOVERY, &C. mind or understanding by supernatural influence, and sets the great things of the gospel and eternity in such a powerful and bright view before thesoul, as fully convinces the judgment, and such as God knows will effectually and certainly persuade the will, and all the following powers, to comply with the proposals of grace, both in the first actual turn of the heart or conversion, as well as in all future good actions : And as he knows it will have this certain effect, so he designs it shall. " Thus, says he, the will of man is left to enjoy its own na- tural freedom, and tochuse or refuse piety and happiness. God, by a knowledge and foresight of all the natures and tempers of men, and all the events of things, and by concurring thus or by the operations of his Spirit of grace, he does that by his grace, which he is certain will issue in the accomplishment of his own gracious designs ; and yet he does not make it necessary by any absolute physical influence. He chuses some men to re- pentance and salvationfrom the beginning, he forms their natu- ralpowers, and he disposes of their providentialcircumstances in life, so as he foreknows will answer his gracious and eternal pur- poses ; he enlightens their understandings so powerfully by his grace and Spirit, that he, who knows their frame, is certain will finally persuade their wills to comply with the proposals and de- mands of his gospel. And thus hiselecting grace obtains its ori- ginal design, without constraining the will of man, or entrenching upon the honour of God's moral government. And to speak yet further in a philosophical sense, " R sup- poses the will of man to' be so free and undeterminable by his 'other powers, that he does not suppose it to be naturally and ne- cessarily moved in this compliance, even by the light of themind : but that it feels itself persuaded and overcome in a moral way, by the powerful motives"and arguments which are set before the mind, and freely determines itself, and makes choice of the grace of God and salvation *. And he adds further, a that all these scriptures before-men- tioned,' which C has alledged, may be sufficiently and happily explained to maintain our own original sinfulness and impotence to all that is good, and to secure the necessity of divine grace ; since he acknowledges that without this divine sovereign influ- ence or illumination of the mind, the will of man would never bechanged; and that God bestows this light or powerful illu- mination on the soul, on purpose to produce this divine change on the will ; and he foreknows certainly, and designs that it shall produce it, though he does not make it necessary and irresistible. The great God may properly be said to convert the soul, to change the heart or the will, to regenerate the man, to create a * See this matter explained more at large, in section v, of an " Essay on the Freedom of Will both in God and Man."
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy OTcyMjk=