Page:A Philosophical Inquiry Concerning Human Liberty (3rd ed., 1735).djvu/78

 ''potest fingi quæso, quod in nobis liberum fit, aliter & aliter fieri, quam ille præscierit aut nunc agat? Pugnat itaque ex diametro præscientia & omnipotentia Dei cum nostro libero arbitrio. Aut enim Deus falletur præsciendo, errabit & agendo (quod est impossibile) aut nos agemus & agemur secumdum ipsius præscientiam & actionem.'' And our learned Dr. says, ''the fore-knowledge of an event does certainly and necessarily infer, that there must be such an event; for as much as the certainty of knowledge depends upon the certainty of the thing known. And in this sense it is, that God’s decree and promise give a necessary existence to the thing decreed or promised, that is to say, they infer it by infallible consequence; so that it was as impossible for Christ not to rise from the dead, as it was for God absolutely to decree and promise a thing, and yet the thing not come to pass.''

I could also bring in the greatest Divines and Philosophers who are asserters of liberty, as confirming this argument; for they acknowledge, that they are unable to reconcile the divine prescience and the liberty of man toge-