Stephen Charnock's The Existence and Attributes of God - Edition Comparison

Published: Sep 16, 2024
Updated: Mar 15, 2025

Earlier this year I ordered the two-volume set of Stephen Charnock’s The Existence and Attributes of God, published by the Banner of Truth Trust.

This work is published as volume 1 and volume 2 of a 5-volume set of all of Charnock’s works.

Having been a long-time reader of Puritan literature, I dove into this after seeing it repeatedly recommended in other books, such as Robert Reymond’s What Is God? and knowing it was considered as a magnum opus of English reformation theology.

The Existence and Attributes of God is a dense work: in-depth yet economical in language. The Banner of Truth edition has, as all of its books do, an attractive design.

Facsimile Version? #

These volumes seem to be facsimile versions, not of the original 1684 work, but perhaps from a reprint set in the 19th century.

Most of the Banner’s catalog is not made up of facsimiles, and I don’t have a quibble with facsimiles per se, having bought, when it was still available, John Preston’s Breastplate of Faith and Love.

Preston’s book was published by Banner as a facsimile of the original 1630 edition. And that facsimile edition was beautifully done.

Here’s a glimpse of Preston’s book.

However, in the Charnock volumes, the line spacing seems cramped and the font is small.

The Crossway Edition: New Edition, New Layout #

Given this work is so dense that you can spend considerable time in one section alone, I switched to Crossway’s two-volume set (2022).

The Crossway layout “breathes” providing good line spacing, font size, and margins.

Not surprisingly, the Crossway volumes are much thicker than those from the Banner of Truth. Here’s volume 2, next to Hugh Martin’s Jonah and a few other books for comparison.

This edition is unabridged, but some very long (e.g., paragraph-long) sentences have been divided into two, and some archaic terms have been updated.

Other terms, which may not be well-known, include definitional footnotes.

Free E-Book Options #

You also have the choice to opt for an e-book version of Charnock’s work, available for free on the Monergism.com website.

For in-depth study I recommend the Crossway version.