Theological Questions

1. How does it appear that something has existed from eternity?
2. How does it appear that this earth and the visible system are not from
eternity?
3. How does it appear that the existence of man is derived and dependent?
4. How do you prove the natural perfections of God, viz. his intelligence,
infinite power, foreknowledge, and immutability?
5. How do you prove his moral perfections, that he is a friend of virtue, or
absolutely holy, true, just, and good?
6. How do you prove that the Scriptures are a revelation from God? And
what are the evidences, internal and external?
7. How do you prove the divine mission of Christ?
8. How do you prove the divinity of Christ?
9. How do you prove the personality and divinity of the Holy Ghost?
10. How do you prove that the persons in the Trinity are one God?
11. Whence arose the Manichean notion of two Gods, and how is it
confuted?
12. Whence arose the polytheism of the pagans, and how confuted?
13. Whence was it that the knowledge of the one true God, in which Noah
was instructed, was not preserved among his posterity in all ages?
14. Why are not mankind in all ages (their internal faculties and external
advantages being sufficient) united in right sentiments of the one true
God?
15. Were the moral character of God and the moral law understood and
loved, would there be any objections against revealed religion?
16. What is the true idea of God’s decrees?
17. How do you prove absolute and particular election?
18. Did God decree the existence of sin?
19. Why did God decree sin?
20. In what sense did he introduce sin into the universe?
21. How do you reconcile this with the holiness and goodness of God?
22. What is necessary to constitute a moral agent?
23. Are men moral and free agents?
24. What is the difference between natural and moral power and inability?
25. How is absolute moral necessity, or inability, consistent with the free
agency of men?
26. How is the doctrine of universal, absolute decrees, consistent with the
free agency of men?
27. How do you prove an universal and special providence?
28. What is the covenant of redemption?
29. If man was created in original righteousness, how is that consistent
with moral agency? It being said that a necessary holiness is no
holiness.
30. What was the constitution under which Adam in innocency was placed?
31. Was Adam under the same necessity of falling that we are of sinning?
32. Are all intelligences bound to love God supremely, sinners and devils?
33. Is the law holy, just, and good, and how is it proved?
34. Are they, who are under its curse, bound to delight in it?
35. How great is the demerit of sin?
36. Are the torments of hell eternal?
37. How do you reconcile them with the justice and infinite goodness of
God?
38. How do you reconcile them with those texts which say Christ died for
all men, that God will not that any should perish?
39. How does it appear that human nature is originally depraved?
40. Whence comes that depravity?
41. How is it proved to be total?
42. What is the covenant of grace?
43. Are the law and gospel inconsistent with each other?
44. Why was an atonement, and one so precious as the blood of Christ,
necessary?
45. In what manner did Christ atone for sin?
46. To whom doth it belong to provide an atonement, God, or the sinner?
47. Did Christ redeem all men alike, elect and non-elect?
48. Can the offer of the gospel be made in sincerity to the non-elect?
49. How is redemption applied?
50. What is the office of the Holy Ghost in the work of redemption?
51. What is regeneration?
52. Whence arises the necessity of it?
53. What is true love to God?
54. What is true benevolence to men?
55. What is true repentance, and how distinguished from legal?
56. What is true faith?
57. What is pardon and justification? What is their foundation, and what is
the influence of faith therein?
58. How are full satisfaction and free pardon consistent?
59. Is the sinner forgiven before he repents?
60. Is sanctifying grace needful at all to any man, unless with respect to
that which is his duty, and in neglect of which he would be without
excuse?
61. What is the sum of man’s duty, and what the effect produced by the
sanctifying influence of the Holy Spirit?
62. Can that holy volition in us, which is the effect of divine power, be
wholly our act, or our duty?
63. How is it proved that unbelief is sin, and that all errors in moral matters
are of a criminal nature?
64. Will the wicked heathens, Jews, infidels, and errorists of every kind, be
without excuse at the day of judgment?
65. What is the essence of true virtue, or holiness?
66. Is there no virtue in the exercise of natural conscience, the moral sense,
natural compassion, and generosity?
67. Is not self-love the root of all virtue?
68. Do not the unregenerate desire to be regenerated, and can they not
properly pray for regenerating grace?
69. Do they not desire the heavenly happiness?
70. What is the utmost the unregenerate do in the use of the means of
grace?
71. Is any duly done by them therein?
72. Do they grow better in the use of means?
73. To what are they to be exhorted?
74. What is the real advantage of the assiduous use of means to the
unregenerate?
75. How do you prove that the institution of the Sabbath is of perpetual
obligation?
76. How is it that the Sabbath is changed from the seventh to the first day
of the week?
77. How do you prove that public worship is to be celebrated on the
Sabbath?
78. What is the foundation of the duty of prayer, since God is omniscient
and immutable?
79. How do you prove that family prayer is a duty?
80. To whom are the promises of the gospel made, to the regenerate, or
unregenerate?
81. Are no encouragements given to the unregenerate?
82. How do you prove the saints’ perseverance?
83. What is the nature of a Christian church?
84. Who are fit for communion therein?
85. What is the nature and import of baptism?
86. How do you prove infant baptism?
87. What is the nature of the Lord’s supper?
88. What are the rules and end of church discipline?
89. What is the character of a good minister of Christ?
90. In what does the happiness of heaven consist?

—Jonathan Edwards.

Gargoyles

I really have a notion of why I have collected all the nonsensical things there are here. I have not the patience nor perhaps the constructive intelligence to state the connecting link between all these chaotic posts. But it could be stated. This row of shapeless and ungainly monsters which I now set before the reader does not consist of separate idols cut out capriciously in lonely valleys or various islands. These monsters are meant for the gargoyles of a definite cathedral. I have to carve the gargoyles, because I can carve nothing else; I leave to others the angels and the arches and the spires. But I am very sure of the style of the architecture, and of the consecration of the church.

—G.K. Chesterton, Alarms and Discursions.

Oneself

The only thing one can usually change in one's situation is one's self. And yet one can't change that either—only ask our Lord to do so, keeping on meanwhile with the sacraments, prayers, and ordinary rule of state. ... When the need comes God never fails to carry out in us His otherwise impossible instructions. In fact He always has to do all the things—all the prayers, all the virtues. ... Having to depend solely on God is what we all dread most. And of course that just shows how very much, how exclusively, we have been depending on things.

—C.S. Lewis, Letters.

Dum Vivimus Vivamus

Live while you live, the Epicure would say,
And seize the pleasures of the present day!*
Live while you live, the Sacred Preacher cries,
And give to God each moment as it flies.^
Lord in my views let both united be;
I live in pleasure when I live to thee.

—Dr. Doddridge, epigram on his family arms.

*1 Cor 15:32.
^Eccl 9:10.

'Life'

The World's a bubble, and the Life of Man Less than a span,
In his conception wretched, from the womb So to the tomb;
Curst from his cradle, and brought up to years With cares and fears.
Who then to frail mortality shall trust,
But limns on water, or but writes in dust.

Yet whilst with sorrow here we live opprest, What life is best?
Courts are but only superficial schools To dandle fools:
The rural parts are turn'd into a den Of savage men:
And where's city from foul vice so free,
But may be term'd the worst of all the three?

Domestic cares afflict the husband's bed, Or pains his head:
Those that live single, take it for a curse, Or do things worse:
Some would have children: those that have them moan Or wish them gone:
What is it, then, to have, or have no wife,
But single thraldom, or a double strife?

Our own affections still at home to please Is a disease:
To cross the seas to any foreign soil, Peril and toil:
Wars with their noise affright us; when they cease, We are worse in peace;-
What then remains, but that we still should cry
For being born, or, being born, to die?

—From Reliquiæ Wottonianæ, 1651. This poem was signed “Ignoto” in the first ed. It was first ascribed to Bacon in Farnaby’s Florilegium, 1629, and has elsewhere been ascribed to Raleigh, Donne, and Henry Harrinton. The evidences of Bacon’s authorship are briefly stated in Dr. Hannah’s Courtly Poets, ed. 1870, p. 117. The poem is paraphrased from a Greek epigram variously attributed to Poseidippus, to the comic poet, Plato, and to Crates, the. lyric poet, beginning:

Ποίην τις βιότοιο τάμοι τριβον; ειν ἀγορῆ μεν
Νείκεα καὶ χαλεπταὶ πρηξιες κ.τ.λ.
(Anthol. Græca, ix. 359.)

A literal translation of this epigram reads: “What path in life shall a person cut through! In the forum are quarrels and difficult suits; at home cares; in the fields enough of toils; in the sea fright; in a foreign land fear, if you have anything; but if you are in a difficulty, vexation. Have you a wife? you will not be without anxiety. Are you unmarried? you live still more solitary. Children are troubles. If childless life is a maimed condition. Youth is thoughtless. Gray hairs are strengthless. There is a choice of one of these two things, either never to have been born, or to die as soon as born.” (Bohn.)

Recollections

I know not any thing more pleasant, or more instructive, than to compare experience with expectation, or to register from time to time the difference between idea and reality. It is by this kind of observation that we grow daily less liable to be disappointed. ... At least record it to yourself before custom has reconciled you to the scenes before you, and the disparity of your discoveries to your hopes has vanished from your mind. It is a rule never to be forgotten, that whatever strikes strongly, should be described while the first impression remains fresh upon the mind.

—Samuel Johnson, letter to James Boswell, in his 'Life' volume 1.

Christians in the World

Christians are distinguished from other men neither by country, nor language, nor the customs which they observe. For they neither inhabit cities of their own, nor employ a peculiar form of speech, nor lead a life which is marked out by any singularity. The course of conduct which they follow has not been devised by any speculation or deliberation of inquisitive men; nor do they, like some, proclaim themselves the advocates of any merely human doctrines. But, inhabiting Greek as well as barbarian cities, according as the lot of each of them has determined, and following the customs of the natives in respect to clothing, food, and the rest of their ordinary conduct, they display to us their wonderful and confessedly striking method of life. They dwell in their own countries, but simply as sojourners. As citizens, they share in all things with others, and yet endure all things as if foreigners. Every foreign land is to them as their native country, and every land of their birth as a land of strangers. They marry, as do all [others]; they beget children; but they do not destroy their offspring. They have a common table, but not a common bed. They are in the flesh, but they do not live after the flesh. They pass their days on earth, but they are citizens of heaven. They obey the prescribed laws, and at the same time surpass the laws by their lives. They love all men, and are persecuted by all. They are unknown and condemned; they are put to death, and restored to life. They are poor, yet make many rich; they are in lack of all things, and yet abound in all; they are dishonoured, and yet in their very dishonour are glorified. They are evil spoken of, and yet are justified; they are reviled, and bless; they are insulted, and repay the insult with honour; they do good, yet are punished as evil-doers. When punished, they rejoice as if quickened into life; they are assailed by the Jews as foreigners, and are persecuted by the Greeks; yet those who hate them are unable to assign any reason for their hatred. To sum up all in one word— what the soul is in the body, that are Christians in the world. The soul is dispersed through all the members of the body, and Christians are scattered through all the cities of the world. The soul dwells in the body, yet is not of the body; and Christians dwell in the world, yet are not of the world.

—Epistle to Diognetus (2nd century Christian apologetic), Chapter 5, translated by James Donaldson & Alexander Roberts, quoted in Tim Dowley, Eerdman's Handbook to the History of Christianity, quoted by Mark Fodale, Pray, Love, Serve (Part 2), 1 Peter 4.7-11, 6/30/2013.

Nihilism

Where am I, or what? From what causes do I derive my existence, and to what condition shall I return? Whose favour shall I court, and whose anger must I dread? What beings surround me? and on whom have, I any influence, or who have any influence on me? I am confounded with all these questions, and begin to fancy myself in the most deplorable condition imaginable, environed with the deepest darkness, and utterly deprived of the use of every member and faculty.

Most fortunately it happens, that since Reason is incapable of dispelling these clouds, Nature herself suffices to that purpose, and cures me of this philosophical melancholy and delirium, either by relaxing this bent of mind, or by some avocation, and lively impression of my senses, which obliterate all these chimeras. I dine, I play a game of backgammon, I converse, and am merry with my friends. And when, after three or four hours' amusement, I would return to these speculations, they appear so cold, and strained, and ridiculous, that I cannot find in my heart to enter into them any farther.

—David Hume, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, quoted in C.S. Lewis, Essays.

Oh wearisome Condition of Humanity!

Oh wearisome Condition of Humanity!
Borne under one Law to another bound:
Vainely begot, and yet forbidden vanity,
Created sicke, commanded to be sound.

—Fulke Greville, Mustapha, Chorus Sacerdotum, quoted in C.S. Lewis, English Literature in the Sixteenth Century.

Welfare State

The modern State exists not to protect our rights but to do us good or make us good – anyway, to do something to us or to make us something. Hence the new name 'leaders' for those who were once 'rulers'. We are less their subjects than their wards, pupils, or domestic animals. There is nothing left of which we can say to them, 'Mind your own business.' Our whole lives are their business.

I write 'they' because it seems childish not to recognise that actual government is and always must be oligarchical. Here, I think, lies our real dilemma. Probably we cannot, certainly we shall not, retrace our steps. We are tamed animals (some with kind, some with cruel, masters) and should probably starve if we got out of our cage.

—C.S. Lewis, Willing Slaves of the Welfare State.