Remarks on the Foreknowledge of God, Suggested by Passages in Dr. Adam Clarke's Commentary on the New Testament

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1819. Excerpt: ... as liath been observed, he hath foretold) if their futurition were a mere contingency, and depended on the uncertain will of the subordinate agent, not determined by the supreme." But neither of these seem able to infer the dismal conclusion of God's concurring by a determinative influence unto wicked actions. "Not the former: for it may well be thought sufficiently to salve the rights and privileges of the first cause; to assert that no action can be done but by a power derived from it; which in reference to forbidden actions, intelligent creatures may use, or not use, as they please, without over asserting that they must be irresistibly determined also, even to the worst of actions done by them. "Besides, that it seems infinitely to detract from the perfection of the ever blessed God, to affirm that he was not able to make a creature, of such a nature, as, being continually sustained by him, and supplied with power every moment suitable to its nature, should be capable of acting unless whatsoever he thus enables, he determines (that is, for it can mean no less thing, impel) it to do also. And except it were affirmed impossible to God to have made such a creature, (that is, that it implied a contradiction, which certainly can never be proved,) there is no imaginable pretence why it should not be admitted, he hath done it: rather than so fatally expose the wisdom, goodness, and righteousness of God, by supposing him to have made laws for his reasonable creatures, impossible, through his own, irresistible counteraction, to be observed; and afterwards to express himself displeased, and adjudge his creatures to eternal punishment, for not observing them. "I am not altogether ignorant what attempts hare been made to prove it impossible, nor again, what hath b...