Online Bible 1995 March/ROM-1025.iso/olb/gill/d_000.lzh/D_035.TXT

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CHAP. VII.                                        OF THE LIFE OF GOD.                                                               35

are all fulfilled; not only because he is able and faithful
to perform, but because he continues for ever to make
them good; and therefore is said to "keep truth for
ever," Psalm cxlvi. 6. His covenant is firm and sure;
more immoveable than rocks and mountains; it stands
fast, with Christ, for ever, and God commands it for ever;
because he ever lives to keep it. His love is to ever-
lasting, as well as from it; he rests in it;nothing can
separate from it; and "with everlasting kindness he ga-
thers his people, and has mercy on them ;" and therefore
must be for ever: his grace, mercy, and goodness, con-
tinually endure, and therefore he himself must; and "he
will be the portion of his people for ever ;" their ever-
lasting ALL in ALL; and they shall reign and dwell with him
for evermore. All which proves him to be without end.
Thirdly, The Eternity of God, or his being from ever-
lasting to everlasting, is without succession, or any dis-
tinctions of time succeeding one another, as moments,
minutes, hours, days, months, and years: the reasons are,
because he existed before such were in being; Before
the day was, I am he, Isa. xliii. 13. before there was a
day, before the first day of the creation, before there were
any days, consisting of so many hours, and these of so
many minutes; and if his eternity past, may it be so called,
was without successive duration, or without succeeding
moments, and other distinctions of time, why not his du-
ration through time, and to all eternity, in the same man-
ner ? Should it be said, that days and years are ascribed
to God; it is true, they are; but it is in accommodation
and condescension to our weak minds, which are not ca-
pable of conceiving of duration but as successive: and
besides, those days and years ascribed to God are ex-
pressly said not to be as ours, d ob x. 5. He is, indeed,
called, The Ancient of Days, Dan. vii. 13. not ancient
in days, or through them, as aged persons are said to be
in years, and well stricken in them; not so God: the
meaning is, that he is more ancient than days; he was
before all days, and his duration is not to be measured by
them. And it may be observed, that the differences and
distinctions of time are together ascribed to God, and not
as succeeding one another; he is the same yesterday, to-
day, and  for ever; these are all at once, and together
with him; he is he which is, and was, and is to come,
Hob. xiii. 8. Rev. i. 4. these meet together in his name,
Jehovah {}; and so in his nature; he co-exists, with all
the points of time, in time; but is unmoved and unaf-
fected with any, as a rock in the rolling waves of the sea,
or a tower in a torrent of gliding water; or as the gnomon
or stile of a sundial, which has all the hours of the day
surrounding it, and the sun, by it casts a shade upon them,
points at and distinguishes them, but the stile stands firm
and unmoved, and not affected thereby: hence it is that
one day is with the Lord as a thousand years; and a
thousand years as one day, 2 Pet. iii. 8. But if his du-
ration was successive, or proceeded by succeeding mo-
ments, days, and years; one day would be but one day
with him, and not a thousand; and a thousand days would

,7 Plato observes, that to a temporal being we say of it, "it is, and
was, and will be ;" but to the eternal Being, "\~th sto estin monon\~, to him
only it is," in Tim~eo, p. 1051.
ts Joseph A!bo in Sepher Ikkarirn, fol. 66. i.
"9 O pater, O hominum, ivumque ~eterna potest;s Virgil. )Eneid,
!. 10. v. 17. Alii Dii aliquando Dii non fuerunt, sed Jupiter ab a~terno

answer to a thousand days, and not be as one only. Be-
sides, if his duration was measured by a succession of mo-
ments, &c. then he would not be immense, immutable,
and perfect, as he is: not immense, or unmeasurable, if
to be measured by minutes, hours, days, months, and
years; whereas, as he is not to be measured by space, so
not by time: nor immutable; since he would be one
minute what he was not before, even older, which cannot
be said of God; for as a Jewish writer {18} well observes,
it cannot be said of him, that he is older now than he was
in the days of David, or when the world was created; for
he is always, both before the world was made, and after
it will cease to be; times make no change in him. Nor
perfect; for if his duration was successive, there would be
every moment something past and gone, lost and irreco-
verable; and something to come not yet arrived to and
obtained; and in other respects he must be imperfect:
the knowledge of God proves him without successive du-
ration. God knows all things, past, present, and to come,
that is, which are so to us; not that they are so to him;
these he knows at once, and all together, not one thing
after another, as they successively come into being; all
things are open and manifest to him at once and toge-
ther, not only what are past and present, but he calls things
that are not yet, as though they were; he sees and knows
all in one view, in his all-comprehending mind: and as
his knowledge is not successive, so not his duration.
Moreover, in successive duration, there is an order of for-
mer and latter; there must be a beginning from whence
every flux of time, every distinction proceeds; every mo-
ment and minute has a beginning, from whence it is reck-
oned, so every hour, day, month, and year: but as it is
said of Christ, with respect to his divine nature, so it is
true of God, essentially considered, that he has neither
beginning of days, nor end of lift, Heb. vii. & In short,
God is Eternity itself, and inhabits eternity; so he did
before time, and without succession; so he does through-
out time; and so he will to all eternity. The very hea-
thens {19} themselves had a notion of their supreme God, as
eternal: and this is the definition Thales gave of God;
for being asked, What is God ? answered, What has nei-
ther beginning nor end; and therefore calls him, the most
Ancient {20}. Sallustius {21} denied that the.nature of God was
made, because it always was.

C H A P. VII.

OF THE LIFE OF GOD.

HAVING considered the attributes of Simplicity,
Immutability, Infinity', Omnipresence, and Eternity,
which belong to God, as an uncreated, infinite,. and
eternal Spirit; and which distinguish him from all other
spirits; I shall now proceed to consider such as belong
to him as an active and operative Spirit, as all spirits
are, more or less; but he is infinitely so, being actus,
et simplicissimus; he is all act; and activity sup-

fuit Dens, Pompon. Sabin. in ibid. \~dihkwn ex aiwnov atermonov eiv eteron\~
\~aiwna\~, Aristot. de Mundo, c. 7.
z,, . I,aert. Vita Thalet. !. t. p. 23, ~4. Plutarch, Sept. Sap. Convi~.
vol. e. p. 153.
2~ De Diis, c. S.