natural, necessary, and essential to its own existence and enjoyment. This great, exalted, and incomprehensible Being is perfection itself, in all uncreated, original, necessary, and never ceasing extremes it is most certainly what we call God.* * See Note B. on the preceding Proposition. c3 PROPOSITION III. PROVING THE DOCTRINE FROM THE NATURE OF THE DIVINE EFFICIENCY. [The Divine Being must, in its own nature, be a necessary principle of spiritual life, intelligence, moral excellence, and efficiency-must necessarily possess all perfections, natural and moral—must necessarily comprehend within itself perfect efficiency-The sense in which the word efficiency is used in this Essay-Agreement about the term ad extra-Difference respecting it ad intra-Upon these two views, different opinions respecting the doctrine are founded—Intelligent efficiency inhering in the Divine Essence-must be active, energetic, operative, and influential-The Divine Essence must necessarily partake of these also-No exertion or manifestation of the divine efficiency, ad extra, can be adequate to the whole extent of its nature --There must then be a way in which it can be exerted to the very uttermost, ad intra, or it cannot be exerted to the very uttermost at all—If it be not, this implies imperfection-If it be, this implies a plurality of modes of the subsistence of the Divine Essence and perfections -If it be granted that the Divine Being can, in any one instance, from all past eternity, through all future eternity, exert or manifest the divine efficiency, in all its extent, the argument is gained-Inference drawn from Reid's view of power-Reid's theory cannot be applied, in its fullest extent, to the divine efficiency— Proof of the doctrine farther established by the activity of the divine nature, or the principle of life, intelli gence, and moral excellence-Farther proof from the nature, power, and will, of the Divine Being-A peculiar law of the constitution and economy of the Divine Essence and perfections undeniably establishing all this-Upon no other principles can finite intelligence have just conceptions of the Divine Being.] FROM the foregoing reasoning, founded on the nature of duration and space, as necessary and essential perfections of the Divine Essence or Substance, we clearly see, that this Divine Being, whatever it is, must, in its own nature, be a necessary principle of spiritual life, intelligence, moral excellence, and efficiency; since it can easily be proved that it is the great First Cause of all created things. Now it has been already proved, that this great First Cause must be eternal, and, being eternal, it must be immense and immutable; and being so, it must be independent; and being independent, it must be necessarily existent; and being necessarily existent, it must comprehend within itself absolutely, and without regard to any other being whatever, all perfections, natural and moral, and all sufficiency for its own existence, and for its absolute perfection, enjoyment, and happiness; and that without the smallest dependence upon, or the least regard to, any created being, either in time or eternity, as contributing any way whatever to its existence, or to its consummate perfection, or absolute, uninterrupted, and ever lasting enjoyment and happiness in itself; and which we must consider as, in all respects, necessarily existent, necessarily perfect, and necessarily happy, of and from itself. 2. Now, a Being that is necessarily existent, and all-sufficient, and infinitely happy, must necessarily be spiritual, everliving, morally excellent, and efficient; necessarily possessing and comprehending within itself, activity, energy, and operation, and all attributes and perfections consistent with self-existence, moral excellence, and happiness; and being a necessary principle of spiritual life, it must necessarily be intelligent; and being necessarily intelligent, it must possess perfect moral excellence; and possessing necessary moral excellence, it must necessarily possess within itself absolute, perfect, and underived, existence, and all perfections, natural and moral, necessary to self-enjoyment and happiness: It must, therefore, necessarily comprehend within itself, absolutely, and exclusive of all other beings, perfect efficiency, consistent with self-existence, spiritual life, intelligence, and moral excellence. Our primary notion and conception of this great First Cause, that is consistent with reason, must be that of a moral mode of necessary existence, independence, eternity, immensity, and immutability, comprehending necessary life, intelligence, moral excellence, and efficiency; and, by the moral economy of its own nature, of itself naturally constituting the personality of its own essence and perfections. For we can have no idea of life, intelligence, moral excellence, and efficiency, but as they subsist in personality. And upon a careful investigation of the economy of necessary life, intelligence, moral excellence, and efficiency, according to their own nature, possessing underived activity, energy, and operative iufluence, they must subsist in personality, which is naturally and necessarily constituted by this economy of its own essence. Iclude that this first mode is all the modes of necessary personality which may subsist in that essence. And from the nature or law of necessary life, intelligence, moral excellence, and efficiency, which is that of activity, energy, and operation, and from the economy of the Divine Essence, with all these inhering in it, we have the strongest reason to conclude, that there must be more modes of the subsistence of the Divine Essence and perfections than one. This will be farther illustrated in the investigation of the divine efficiency. We have no reason to con 3. By the word efficiency, in this Essay, we are not to understand causation, when speaking of the Divine Being, ad intra; nor are we to understand the beginning of motion; though motion must originally be the consequent of the divine efficiency, in many instances in creation and providence for creating efficiency is only à |