II. By the word "Theology" we do not understand a conception or a discourse of God himself, of which meaning it would properly admit; but we understand by it, "a conception" or a discourse about God and things divine," according to its

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common use.

III. It may be defined, The doctrine or science of the truth which is according to godliness, and which God has revealed to man, that he may know God and divine things, may believe on Him, and may through faith perform to Him the acts of love, fear, honour, worship and obedience, and may in return expect and obtain blessedness from Him through union with Him, to the Divine glory.

IV. The proximate and immediate object of this doctrine or science is, not God himself, but the duty and act of man which he is bound to perform to God: In Theology, therefore, God himself must be considered as the object of this duty.

V. On this account, Theology is not a theoretical science or doctrine, but a practical one, requiring the action of the whole man, according to all and each of its parts,-an action of the most transcendant description, answerable to the excellence of the object as far as the human capacity will permit.

VI. From these premises it follows, that this doctrine is not expressed after the example of natural science, by which God knows himself; but after the example of that notion which God has willingly conceived within himself from all eternity, about the prescribing of that duty and of all things required for it.

DISPUTATION II.

ON THE MANNER IN WHICH THEOLOGY MUST BE TAUGHT.

I. IT HAS long been a maxim with those Philosophers who are the masters of method and order, that the theoretical sciences ought to be delivered in [compositivo] a synthetical order, but the practical in an analytical order: On which account, and because Theology is a practical science, it follows that it must be treated according to [resolutiva] the analytical method.

II. Our discussion of this doctrine must therefore commence with its end, about which we must previously treat, with much brevity, both on [quod] its nature or what it is, and [quid] its qualities; we must then teach, throughout the entire discourse, the means for attaining the end; to which the obtaining of the end must be subjoined, and, at this, the whole discussion must terminate.

III. For according to this order, not only the whole doctrine itself, but likewise all its parts, will be treated from its principal end, and each article will obtain that place which belongs to it according to the principal relation which it has to its total and to the end of the whole.

IV. But though we are easily satisfied with all treatises in which the body of Divinity is explained, provided they agree according to the truth, at least in the chief and fundamental things, with the Scripture itself; and though we willingly give to all of them praise and commendation; yet, if on account only of inquiry into the order, and for the sake of treating the subject with greater accuracy, we may be allowed to explain what [desideremus] are our views and wishes.

V. In the first place, the order in which the Theology ascribed to God, and to the actions of God, is treated, seems to be inconvenient: Neither are we pleased with the division of Theology into the pathological, or that which is descriptive of [spiritual] diseases, and the therapeutic or sanative, after a preface of the doctrine about the principles, the end and the efficient: Nor with that, how accommodating soever it may be, in appearance, in which, after premising as its principles the word of God, and God himself, as the causes of our salvation, and therefore the works and effects of God, and man who is its subject is placed as a part of it. So neither do we receive satisfaction from the partition of Theological Science into the knowledge of God and of man; nor from that by which Theology is said to exercise itself about God and the church; nor that by which it is previously determined that we must treat about God, the motion of a rational creature to Him, and about Christ; nor does that which prescribes us to a discourse about God, the creatures, and principally about man and his fall, about his reparation through Christ, and about the sacraments and a future life.

DISPUTATION III.

ON BLESSEDNESS, THE END OF THEOLOGY.

I. THE end of Theology is the blessedness of man; and that not animal or natural, but spiritual and supernatural.

II. It consists in fruition, the object of which is a perfect, chief, and sufficient Good, which is God.

III. The foundation of this fruition is life, endowed with understanding and with intellectual [affectu] feeling.

IV. The connective or coherent cause of fruition is union with God; by which that life is so greatly perfected, that they who obtain this union are said to be "partakers of the Divine Nature and of life eternal."

V. The medium of fruition is understanding and [affectus] emotion or feeling :-Understanding, not by species or image, but by clear vision, which is called that of face to face: And Feeling, corresponding with this vision.

VI. The cause of blessedness is God himself, uniting himself with man; that is, giving himself to be seen, loved, possessed, and thus to be enjoyed by man.

VII. The antecedent or inly-moving cause is the goodness and the remunerative justice of God, which have the wisdom of God`` as their precursor.

VIII. The executive cause is the power of God, by which the soul is enlarged after the capacity of God, and the animal body is transformed and transfigured into a spiritual body.

IX. The end, event, or consequence is two-fold, (1.) a demonstration of the glorious wisdom, goodness, justice, power, and likewise the universal perfection of God; and (2.) his glorification by the beatified.

X. Its adjunct properties are, that it is eternal, and is known to be so by him who possesses it; and that it at once both satisfies every desire, and is an object of continued desire.

DISPUTATION IV.

ON RELIGION.

I. OMITTING all dispute about the question, "whether it be possible for God to render man happy by an union with Himself without the intervening act of man," we affirm, that it has pleased God not to bless man except by some duty performed according to the will of God, which God has determined to reward with eternal blessedness.

II. And this most equitable will of God rests on the foundation of the justice and equity according to which it seems [fas] lawful and proper, that the Creator should require from his creature endowed with reason an act tending to God; by which, in return, a rational creature is bound to tend towards God, its Author and Beneficent Lord and Master.

III. This act must be one of the entire man, according to each of his parts; according to his soul, and that entirely, and VOL. II.

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each of its faculties; and according to his body, so far as it is the mute instrument of the soul, yet itself possessing a capacity for happiness by means of the soul. This act must likewise be the most excellent of all those things which can proceed from man, and like a continuous act; so that whatever other acts those may be which are performed by man through some intervention of the will, they ought to be performed according to this act and its rule.

IV. Though this duty, according to its entire essence and all its parts, can scarcely be designated by one name, yet we do not improperly denominate it when we give it the name of RELIGION. This word in its most enlarged acceptation embraces three things, -the act itself, the obligation of the act, and the obligation with regard to God, on account of whom that act must be performed. Thus, we are bound to honour our parents on account of God.

V. Religion, then, is that act which our Theology places in order; and it is for this reason justly called "the Object of Theological Doctrine.”

VI. Its method is defined by the command of God, and not by human choice; for the word of God is its rule and measure. And as in these days we have this word in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament alone, we say that these Scriptures are the Canon according to which religion is to be conformed. We shall soon treat more fully about the Scriptures, how far it is required that we should consider them as the Canon of religion.

VII. The opposites to religion are,-impiety, that is, the neglect and contempt of God,and eeλopnoxea, will-worship, or superstition, that is, a mode of religion invented by man. Hypocrisy is not opposed to the whole of religion, but to its integrity or purity; because that in which the entire man ought to be engaged, is performed only by his body.

DISPUTATION V.

ON THE RULE OF RELIGION, THE WORD OF GOD, AND THE SCRIPTURES IN PARTICULAR.

I. AS RELIGION is the duty of man towards God, it is necessary that it should be so prescribed by God in his sure word, as to render it evident to man that he is bound by this prescript as it proceeds from God; or, at least, it may and ought to be evident to man.

II. This word is either evdiabetov [an inward or mental reasoning,] or @popopixov, [a spoken or delivered discourse] the former

of them being ingrafted in the mind of man by an internal inscription, whether it be an increation or a superinfusion; the latter being openly pronounced.

III. By the ingrafted word, God has prescribed religion to man, First by inwardly persuading him that God ought, and that it was His will, to be worshipped by man: Then, by universally disclosing to the mind of man the worship that is pleasing to himself, and that consists of the love of God and of one's neighbour: And, lastly, by writing or sealing a remuneration on his heart. This inward manifestation is the foundation of all external revelation.

IV. God has employed the outward word: FIRST, That He might repeat what had been ingrafted, might recall it to remembrance, and might urge its exercise. SECONDLY, That He might prescribe to him other things besides, which seem to be placed in a four-fold difference. (1.) For they are either such things as are homogeneous to the law of nature, which might easily be raised up on the things ingrafted, or which man could not with equal ease deduce from them. (2.) Or they may appear to be such things as these, yet such as it has pleased God to circumscribe, lest, from the things ingrafted, conclusions should be drawn that were universally, or at least for that time, repugnant to the will of God. (3.) Ör they are merely positive, having no communion with these ingrafted things, although they rest on the general [debito] duty of religion. (4.) Or, Lastly, According to some state of man, they are suitable to him, particularly for that into which man was brought by the fall from his primeval condition.

V. God communicates this external word to man, either orally, or by writing: For neither with respect to the whole of religion, nor with respect to its parts, is God confined to either of these modes of communication; but He sometimes uses one and sometimes another, and at other times both of them, according to his own choice and pleasure. He first employed oral enunciation in its delivery; and afterwards writing, as a more certain means against corruption and oblivion. He has also completed it in writing; so that we now have the infallible word of God in no other place than in the Scriptures, which are therefore appropriately denominated "the instrument of religion."

VI. These Scriptures are contained in those books of the Old and the New Testament which are called "Canonical:" They consist of the Five Books of Moses; the books of Joshua, Judges, and of Ruth; the First and Second of Samuel; the