2. That he foreknows how every man will act in the situation to which he is called —
a Ps. xxxi. 15. b Actsxvii. 26.
vol. I. A A
[He foresaw infallibly how Pharaoh would act in resisting all the means that should be used to bring him to a compliance with the divine command. Nor is there any thing hid from his all-seeing eye : if there were, it would be impossible for hirn to foretell, as he has done by his Prophets, the minutest circumstances that could occur, and at the distance of many hundred years. The prophecies relating to the death of our blessed Lord specify what should be said, as well as done, by persons who were least of all aware that they were fulfilling any prediction, and who would rather, if it had been possible, have prevented its accomplishment. We may be sure, there- fore, that that testimony respecting him is true, " Known unto him are all things, from the beginning of the world0."]
3. That, whilst he leaves to every man the free exercise of his will, he overrules the actions of all for the accomplishment of his own eternal purposes —
[God, as we have observed, had decreed to magnify him- self in his mode of bringing forth Ins people from Egypt. But, in order to tins, it was necessary that his will should be opposed, and that occasion should be given for the executing of his judgments upon the oppressors of Iris people. He knew what Pharaoh would do under such circumstances : and he both preserved him in life, and elevated him to the throne, that he might have an opportunity of manifesting what was in Ins heart, and be able to carry into effect the dictates of his own depravity. In all that he did, he was perfectly a free agent : for though it is said, that " God hardened Pharaoh's heart," he did so, not by infusing any evil principle into him, but by giving him up to the impulse of his own inveterate corruptions. God foresaw how those corruptions would operate, and that they would lead to the accomplishment of his own eternal purpose : and he needed only to leave Pharaoh to the dictates of his own mind, to secure the final execution of all that he himself had ordained. God had determined every thing respecting the crucifixion of our blessed Lord : but he needed not to inspire the Jewish rulers with envy, or the Roman governor with timidity, or Judas with covetousness, or the populace with cruelty: it was sufficient to give them up respectively to the dominion of their own lusts ; and they all infallibly concurred to " do what his hand and his counsel had determined before to be doned." It is precisely in the same way that we are to account for all that is done, whether it be good or evil ; except that, in the effecting of what is good, he puts the desire to effect it into the heart of the agent, whilst in the perpetration of evil he merely gives up the person to
c Acts xv. 18. <i Acts iv. 28.
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the influence of his own lusts. In either case, the agent is perfectly free, and follows what is the bent of his own heart : only, in the one case, the heart is renewed, and in the other it is left under the power of its own depravity. Josiah and Cyrus both fulfilled the counsels of Heaven ; the one by burning men's bones on the altar which Jeroboam had raised, and the other by liberating the Jews from Babylon. Both these events were foretold hundreds of years before they came to pass ; and the very names of the agents were declared hundreds of years before any persons of their name were known in the world. Sennacherib also fulfilled the will of Heaven, in punishing God's offending people : " Howbeit he meant not so, neither did his heart think so ; it was in his heart only to aggrandize himself at the expense of other nations6." But God, by all, accom- plished "the counsel of his own willf:" and in all things " shall his counsel stand, and he will do all his willg."]