We regard this language as inaccurate. For with regard to the first limit, his own nature, his power, resides in his will, and he certainly can do whatsoever he wills to do. It would be more accurate, therefore, to say that his infinitely wise and righteous will always chooses wisely and righteously, than to say that wis- dom or righteousness limits his power.
With regard to the second limit. Contradictions are not things. To be and not to be at the same time, and in the same sense is a mere logical quibble.
39. How can absolute omnipotence be proved to belong to God?
1st. It is asserted by Scripture. — Jer. xxxii., 17 ; Matt, xix., 26 ; Luke i., 37 ; Eev. xix., 6.
2d. It is necessarily involved in the very idea of God as an infinite being.
3d. Although we have seen but part of his ways, (Job xxvi., 14), yet our constantly extending experience is ever revealing to us new and more astonishing evidences of his power, which always indicate an inexhaustible reserve.
THE WILL OF GOD.
40. What is meant by the will of God ?
The will of God is the infinitely and eternally wise, powerful, and righteous essence of God willing. In our conception it is
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that attribute of the Deity to which we refer his purposes and decrees as their principle.
41. In what sense is the will of God said to be free, and in what sense necessary ?
The will of God is the wise, powerful, and righteous essence of God willing. His will, therefore, in every act is certainly and yet most freely both wise and righteous. The liberty of indiffer- ence is evidently foreign to his nature, because the perfection of wisdom is to choose the most wisely, and the perfection of right- eousness is to choose the most righteously.
On the other hand, the will of God is from eternity absolutely independent of all his creatures and all their actions.
42. What is intended by the distinction betioeen the decretive and the preceptive will of God?
The decretive will of God is God efficaciously purposing the certain futurition of events. The preceptive will of God is God, as moral governor, commanding his moral creatures to do that which he sees it right and wise that they in their circumstances should do.
These are not inconsistent. What he wills as our duty may very consistently be different from what he wills as his purpose. What it is right for him to permit may be wrong for him to ap- prove, or for us to do.
43. What is meant by the distinction between the secret and revealed will of God ?
The secret will of God is his decretive will, called secret, be- cause although it is sometimes revealed to man in the prophecies and promises of the Bible, yet it is for the most part hidden in God.
The revealed will of God is his perceptive will, which is always clearly set forth as the rule of our duty. — Deut. xxix., 29.
44. In what sense do the Arminians maintain the distinction between the antecedent and consequent will of God, and what are the objections to their view of the subject ?
This is a distinction invented by the schoolmen, and adopted
118 THE ATTRIBUTES OF GOD.
by the Arminians, for reconciling the will of God with their theory of the free agency of man.
They call that an antecedent act of God's will which precedes the action of the creature, e. g., before Adam sinned God willed him to be happy. They call that a consequent act of God's will which followed the act of the creature, and is consequent upon that act, e. g., after Adam sinned God willed him to suffer the penalty due to his sin.
It is very evident that this distinction does not truly repre- sent the nature of God's will, and its relation to the acts of his creatures : first, God is eternal, and therefore there can be no distinction in his acts as to time ; second, God is eternally om- niscient and omnipotent. If he wills anything, therefore, he must from the beginning will the means to accomplish it, and thus secure the attainment of the end willed. Otherwise God must have, at the same time, two inconsistent wills with regard to the same object. The truth is that God, eternally and un- changeably, by one comprehensive act of will, willed all that happened to Adam from beginning to end in the precise order and succession in which each event occurred ; third, God is in- finitely independent. It is degrading to God to conceive of him as first willing that which he has no power to effect, and then changing his will consequently to the independent acts of his creatures.
It is true, indeed, that because of the natural limits of our capacities we necessarily conceive of the several intentions of God's one, eternal, indivisible purpose, as sustaining a certain logical, (not temporal,) relation to each other as principle and consequent. Thus we conceive of God's first (in logical order) decreeing to create man, then to permit him to fall, then to elect some to everlasting life, and then to provide a redemption. — • Turrettin.