Whichcote, Benjamin (1609-1683)

The Glorious Evidence and Power of Divine Truth

London

1698

"All Divine Truth is of one of these two Emanations:--Either it flows from God, in the first Instant and Moment of God's Creation; and then it is the Light of that Candle which God set up in Man, to light him; and that which by this Light he may discover, are all the Instances of Morality; of good Affection, and Submission towards God; the Instances of Justice and Righteousness to Men, and Temperance to himself:--Or [...]"

This is the Sum. All Divine Truth is of one of these two Emanations:--Either it flows from God, in the first Instant and Moment of God's Creation; and then it is the Light of that Candle which God set up in Man, to light him; and that which by this Light he may discover, are all the Instances of Morality; of good Affection, and Submission towards God; the Instances of Justice and Righteousness to Men, and Temperance to himself:--Or else, it is of an after Revelation and Discovery. Many being out of the Way of his Creation, by his Defection from God, is recover'd by this Revelation. Upon this Consideration, that Man was never better than finite and fallible and [considering] the Relation that God stands in, to his Creatures; and that he is the first and chiefest Goodness; it is [what] may be fairly supposed, that God will recover his Creation, one way or other. Wherefore, that which the New Testament doth discover, is that which was in general Expectation.

Light::Candle

Reading S. H. Clark's "'The Whole Internal World His Own': Locke and Metaphor Reconsidered" in JHI 59:2 (1998), 259. <Link to JSTOR>

See Select Sermons of Dr Whichcot (London, 1698), I, 15.

Text from The Cambridge Platonists: being Selections from the Writings of Benjamin Whichcote, John Smith, Nathanael Culverwell (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1901). <Link to Google Books>

03/21/2005

01/24/2012