ESSAY V. 465 position of God's conserving providence being a continual act of creation ? But surely these ideas seem to be shocking absurdities. Whereas if conservation be really a continued creation, the modes most .be created together with their substances every mo- ment ; since it is not possible for creatures, who every moment are supposed to be nothing but the immediate products of the divine will, should be capable, in every one of those very moments in which they are produced or created to form their own modes in simultaneous co-existence with their subjects. I own there are difficulties on the other side of the question, but the fear of making God the author of sin has bent my opi- nion this way. We must always inviolably maintain it for the honour of the blessed God, that all spirits as they come out of his hands, are created pure and innaocent: every sinful act pro- ceeds from themselves, by an abuse of their own freedom of will, or by a voluntarycompliance with the corrupt appetitesand incli- nations of flesh and blood. We must.find some better way there- fore to explain God's providential conservation of things, than by representing it as an act of proper and continual creation, lest we impute all the iniquities of all men and devils in all ages, to the pure and holy God who is blessedfor evermore. r!I VOL. VIII. G e 1
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