never be able to forbear admiring the Skill and adoring the Wisdom and Goodness of the great Harmostes But since 't is so impossible for us to discern all the Connections and Tendencies of God's Actions how unreasonable is it for us to censure the Goodness of his Nature because there are some Actions of his and some Effects of those Actions whose Goodness at present we are not able to discover Wherefore if we have either Reason or Modesty in us we ought to be satisfied with those Arguments of his Goodness that are drawn from the Principles of his Nature and though we cannot account for the Goodness of all his Actions in particular yet firmly to resolve that nothing but Good can come from a good God PSALM CXIX 68 Thou art good and thou dost good I Proceed to the second Part of the Text viz. the Operations of God that flow from the immutable Goodness of his Nature Thou dost good And these as they flow from the Goodness of God's Nature so they are plain Proofs and Indications of it For as the Nature of Things is demonstrable by their Effects as well as their Causes so the Goodness of God may be as well demonstrated by the Operations it exerts and the Effects it produces in the World as by those Principles and Perfections of his Nature from whence it necessarily arises And it is as certain that that Being must be good that hath all the necessary Causes and Principles of Goodness in it for if it were indifferent to the Almighty whether he did Good or Evil he would doubtless either retire from Action and do neither or else he would do as much Mischief as Good or if he were inclined to do ill he would do it and not force himself to act contrary to his own Inclinations Wherefore since he doth Good so constantly and so universally he can neither be supposed to be averse nor indifferent to it and if he be neither of these his doing Good must necessarily proceed from the immutable Inclination of his Nature thereunto If therefore we can prove from the whole Course and Series of God's Operations that he doth Good it will be an infallible Argument that he is so Now all those Operations of God that pass out of himself and terminate upon others are reducible to Creation and Providence both which will afford us abundant Instances of the Truth of the Text that God doth Good I. I begin with the first viz. Creation in which it is apparent that God hath done an infinite deal of Good And hence the Psalmist tells us that the whole earth is full of the goodness of the Lord Psalm xxxiii 5 so also Psalm civ 24 O Lord how manifold are thy works in wisdom hast thou made them all the earth is full of thy Riches i. e. the Riches of his Goodness and so is the great and wide Sea And God himself after his great Work of Creation upon a general Survey of the whole Fabrick of Beings pronounces all to be very good Gen. i. 31 But to demonstrate more particularly the great Goodness that God hath expressed in his Creation I shall briefly give you these four Instances of it 1. That whatsoever Beings are incapable of Happiness in themselves he hath made them so far as they can be subservient to the Happiness of others 2. That he hath given actual Existence to all kinds of Beings that are capable of any Degree of Happiness 3. That he hath furnished them with all the sufficient Means and Abilities to obtain the utmost Happiness that they are capable of 4. That in all those Beings that are capable of Happiness he hath implanted a natural Disposition of Doing Good to others 1. That whatsoever Beings are incapable of Happiness in themselves he hath made them so far as they can be subservient to the Happiness of others For it is impossible that all Beings that are capable of Happiness could ever have been actually happy had not God created some Beings that are utterly incapable of it For thus all the Heavenly Bodies the Air and Earth and Fire and Water are Beings utterly incapable of Happiness they being all inanimate and consequently void of all Sense and Perception either of Happiness or Misery but yet it cannot be denied but they are indispensably necessary to the Happiness of a World of animated Beings that are capable of some Degrees of Happiness Thus for instance the Happiness of all sublunary Things of Men and Beasts of the Fowls of the Air and the Fishes of the Sea depends in a great Measure on those dead inanimated Elements and therefore if God had not created some Beings incapable of Happiness there are many Beings that are capable of it must either have not been or have been miserable And therefore God hath not only created these but out of his great Goodness to his living Creatures he hath created them in such an Order as renders them as subservient as they can be to their Welfare and Happiness Thus the Sun whom God hath ordained the universal Foster-father of all sublunary Beings though he feels no Happiness himself is created by our great Benefactor in such a Form and put in such a Course of Motion as renders him most serviceable to all those animated Beings that are capable of Happiness For first he is created of a fiery Substance by which he not only enlightens this lower World but warms and cherishes it with a fruitful and vigorous Heat And then God hath cast all its mighty Substance into the Figure of a perfect Globe that so if the Earth moves round it it might be able to communicate the comfort of its Light and Heat to it throughout all the Circle of its Motion or that if it moves round the Earth it may by its Figure which is most apt for Motion be the better enabled to walk his Rounds about the World and so visit all his Foster-Children and refresh them with his Light and Warmth as oft as their Necessities require And then for his Situation in the World what an exact Care hath the good Father of Beings taken to place him in such a convenient Distance as that he might neither be too near us nor too far from us both which would have been equally mischievous For had he been advanced higher in the Heavens he would have left us continually frozen and benighted had he been thrust lower he would have perpetually scorched us with the too near Neighbourhood of his Flames But from that Orb wherein he is placed all his Aspects on us are benigne and Thanks be to a good God we neither want his Heat or Light nor are we scorched and dazled by it For if God had not been very careful of the Publick Good he might as well have fixed the Sun in the Orb of the Moon as where it now is and then as its Nearness to us would have turned the World into a Torrid Zone so it would have
see those fare well whom we have seen deserve well and when any unjust Violence is offered them our Nature shrinks at and abhors it We pity and compassionate the Miserable when we know not why and are ready to offer at their Relief when we can give no Reason for it which is a plain Evidence that these Things proceed not merely either from our Education or deliberate Choices but from some natural Instinct antecedent to both and that in the very Frame of our Nature there is implanted by the Author of it a Sympathy with Virtue and an Antipathy to Vice And hence it is that in the Beginnings of Sin our Nature is so shy of an evil Action and doth so startle and boggle at it that it approaches it with such a modest Coyness and goes blushing to it like a Virgin to an Adulterers Bed that it passes into Sin with such Regret and Reluctancy and looks back upon it with such Shame and Confusion which in our tender Years when we are not as yet arrived to the Exercise of our Understandings cannot be supposed to proceed from Reason or Conscience but from some secret Instinct of Nature which by these and such like Indications declares it self violated and offended And this plainly shews the mighty Respect that God hath to Righteousness that he hath woven into our Beings such a grateful Sense of it and such a Horror of its Contraries For this natural Sense was doubtless intended by God to be the first Guide of humane Nature that so when as yet 't is not capable of following Reason and Conscience it might be led on to Righteousness by its own necessary Instincts that these might dispose us to our Duty and keep us out of all wicked Prejudices till we come under the Conduct of our Reason that so this may then lead us forward with more Ease and Facility in the Paths of Righteousness What a plain Indication therefore is this of God's Love of Righteousness that he hath taken so much Care to incline our Natures to it that he hath not only given us reasonable Faculties that do naturally direct us to Righteousness but hath also taken so much Care to lead us to it by Instinct till we are grown up to the Exercise of those Faculties and are capable of being guided by them 3 ly Another Indication of God's Love of Righteousness is his coupling good Effects to righteous Actions and bad ones to their Contraries For if we consult the Consequents of humane Actions we shall generally find that all moral Good resolves into natural in the Health and the Pleasure the Credit and Tranquility of those that practise it For so the first Great Mover in that Course and Series of Things which he hath established in the World hath ordered and disposed it that every Action which is morally Good should ordinarily tend to and determine in some natural Benefit and Advantage that the good Government of every Passion should tend to the Tranquility of our Minds and the due Regulation of every Appetite center in the Health and Pleasure of our Bodies that Abstinence and Humility Honesty and Charity should have happy Effects chained to them that they should contribute to our Good both private and publick and that their contrary Vices should be always pregnant with some mischievous Inconvenience that they should either untune the Organs of our Reason or impair the Vigour and Activity of our Tempers or imbroil the Peace and Tranquility of our Minds or invade the Common-weal of Societies which includes the Interest of each particular Member Such contrary Effects as these are as necessary to vertuous and vicious Actions in that Course of Things which God hath established as Light is to the Sun or Heat to the Fire by which he hath plainly demonstrated how contrarily he is affected to those contrary Causes For by those natural Goods and Evils which are appendent to humane Actions he hath plainly distinguished them into moral Goods and Evils and those good and bad Effects which he hath annexed to them are most sensible Marks of his Love of the one and his Hatred of the other For to be sure he would never have made Righteousness the Cause of so much good to us if he had not loved it nor Wickedness the Spring of so many Mischiefs and Inconveniences if he had not hated and abhorred it The Effects of Righteousness are ordinarily a Reward and the Consequents of Sin a Punishment to it self and this by God's own Order and Disposal and pray by what Significations can a Law-giver more effectually declare his Love and Hatred of Actions than by rewarding and punishing them 4 thly And lastly Another Indication of God's Love of Righteousness is the natural Presages and Abodings which he hath implanted in our Natures of the future Reward of righteous Actions and the future Punishment of their Contraries That there are such Abodings as these in humane Nature is apparent by this that antecedently to all divine Revelation Men of all Ages Nations and Religions have felt and experienced them yea and that it hath been experienced not only among the politer and more learned Nations who may be supposed to be persuaded of a future State by the probable Arguments of Philosophy but also among the most barbarous and uncultivated who cannot be supposed to have believed it upon Principles of Reason For though some of them have been so rude as to disband Society and live like Beasts without Laws and Government yet have they not been able to extinguish these their natural Hopes and Fears of future Rewards and Puishments which is an unanswerable Evidence how deeply the Sense of another World is imprinted upon humane Nature And as we have such a natural Sense of a future State as we cannot easily stifle so our Minds do naturally abode that we shall fare well or ill in it according as we behave our selves righteously or unrighteously in this Life When we do well and reflect upon it it leaves a delicious Farwel on our Minds our Conscience smiles and promises glorious Things that we shall reap from it most happy and blessed Fruits in the other World And as the Sense of doing well doth naturally suggest to us the most ravishing Hopes and blisful Expectations so the sense of doing ill fills our Minds with sad and dire Presages our Conscience abodes us a black and woful Eternity wherein we shall dearly pay for our sinful Delights and Gratifications And though for the present we can divert and stifle this troublesome sense of our Natures yet Naturam expellas is true in this also though we thrust off Nature with a Fork yet 't will return again upon us and a Fit of Sickness a sudden Calamity or a serious Thought will soon awake and revive in it these black Prognosticks of our future Torment And hence we generally find that bad Men are most afraid of Eternity when they are nearest to it their Fear like
weaker and that Pleasure and Ease that Tranquility of Mind and Peace of Conscience which we shall feel accruing to us out of the Discharge of our Duty will by Degrees so indear and connaturalize it to us that at last it will be much harder for us to sin than to obey Wherefore let us stand no longer like naked Boys shivering upon the Brinks of Religion wishing that we were in but afraid to venture but let us consider seriously resolve sincerely and then leap in boldly and though at first we may find it difficult to swim against the Stream and stem the Tyde of our own bad Inclinations yet if we can but hold out couragiously a while we shall feel the Current slacken by Degrees till the Tyde of Nature turn and run the contrary Way and then we shall be carried on with Ease and Delight and swim chearfully and pleasantly down with the Stream For when once we have conquered the bad Inclinations of our Nature Religion will be a mighty Ease and Refreshment to us and we shall feel a thousand times more Pleasure and Satisfaction in it than ever we did in all our sinful Enjoyments so that then we shall find the Truth of the Text and be able to pronounce from our own Experience that God's Commandments are not grievous PSALM CXIX 68 Thou art good and thou dost good I Have been discoursing concerning the Necessity of our loving of God in order to our being truly Religious and shewed you at large that this is not only the great Principle of all Religion but that of all others it is the most fruitful and operative And now that I may lay this Foundation of true Religion in you I shall explain to you the infinite Cause and Reason that we have to love him and because Goodness is the Beauty of a reasonable Nature and Beauty is the Object of Love I shall endeavour to demonstrate to you the infinite Goodness of God that I may thereby affect you with his Beauty and if possible inflame all your Souls with the Love of him And that I may the more fully convince you of the divine Goodness I shall endeavour to prove it from four distinct Topicks 1. From the Nature of God 2 ly From the Creation of God 3 ly From the Providence of God And 4 ly From the Revelations he hath made to the World And these I intend shall be the Arguments of four distinct Discourses the three first of which lie plainly in the Text Thou art good and thou dost good Thou art good That plainly denotes what God is in himself that he is naturally and essentially good that he is of a most loving kind and benevolent Nature and hath a most vehement Propension to do good to others founded in his immutable Being Thou dost good that denotes the Exercise and Out-going of this his essential Benevolence in the Works of his Creation and Providence and that this his natural Propension to do good is not at all sleepy or unactive that it is not a lazy and restive Woulding or Volition but that it always sallies forth into Action and doth most vigorously exercise it self either in making of Objects to imploy it self about or in upholding and governing them when they are made So that the Words contain these two things 1. What God is in himself Thou art good 2 ly What he is in those Actions that are determined without himself Thou dost good 1. I begin with the first of these What God is in himself Thou art good i. e. Thou art so essentially and according to the unalterable Propension of thy Nature And this as I told you I shall in the first Place endeavour to demonstrate from the Nature of God that is from that intire Complexion of all possible Perfections whereof his Nature is composed For in Order to our handling of this Argument this must be premised that God is a Being endowed with all possible Perfections and consequently thereunto that he is infinitely powerful and infinitely wise and consequently to that that he is infinitely Happy and consequently to this that he loves himself infinitely and that all this is so is very evident from the Nature of the Thing For first we must necessarily suppose one Original Cause of all Things for else we can give no possible Account how those Things that once were not could ever come into Being and we must also as necessarily suppose that this Original Cause was Self-originated i. e. that it received its Being and Existence from none but it self for else it cannot be the Original Cause but must it self be the Effect of some other Cause that was in Being before it That existing of it self without any Cause it is infinitely removed from Not-being for that which is without any Cause can ever be without any Cause meerly from that exuberant Fulness of Essence that is in it self And that which can be for ever without any Cause must necessarily be so because this is a most necessary Act and as such must be exerted ad extremum virium Agentis consequently to which we must also suppose that that which is infinitely removed from Not-being hath the utmost Perfection of Essence in it For the Notion of Essence nakedly considered is to be and therefore by how much the more remote any Essence is from Not-Being by so much the more perfect it must necessarily be Again in Consequence to this we must also suppose that that which hath in it self without any Cause the utmost Perfection of Essence must have in it self also the utmost of all other Perfections that by way of Adjunct or Attribute such an inexhaustible Essence is capable of that is that it must be Powerful and Wise and whatsoever else is a possible Perfection of Essence For Plenitude of Essence consists in being as much as it can be and so long as any Being is capable of being any more than it is it hath not all the possible Degrees of Essence in it for every Perfection that Essence by way of Attribute is capable of is a Degree of positive Entity Thus Wisdom and Power are not meer Privations of Weakness and Folly but Things that have some Degree of real positive Essence in them and consequently what Being soever hath not these must necessarily have it in some Degrees of Not-Being and 't is impossible that any Essence should be infinitely removed from Not-Being which hath any Degree of Not-Being in it Lastly consequently to this we must also suppose that a Being endowed with all possible Perfections being infinitely Powerful and infinitely Wise must needs be infinitely Happy for wheresoever those great Perfections are they must necessarily supply whatsoever is necessary to an infinite Happiness And then from hence it nessarily follows that a Being that is thus infinitely Happy must needs infinitely love and delight in it self because within the vast Circumference of its own Being it hath every Thing that it needs desires or affects
it is that Kings reign and Princes decree justice Prov. viii 15 'T is to this blessed Cause that we are to attribute our sitting safely under our own Vines and peaceably enjoying the Fruit of our Labours that we are not banished from Society and exposed to the Spoils and Ravages of those that are mightier than our selves that we are not become more savage than Wolves to one another and that the whole World is not converted into a Commonwealth of Cannibals For this would be the consequence of the Dissolution of Government and that would be the Consequence in all probability of God's withdrawing his Providence from the World 4 thly And lastly Another Instance of the Goodness of God's Providence to us is its contributing to the Invention and Improvement of all those useful Arts and Sciences that are in the World For if we seriously consider the prodigious Numbers of these wherewith the World doth abound and wherein the Generality of Mankind are imployed we are never able to imagin how they could have all been invented and improved as they are without the Direction of an Almighty Providence For had not the divine Providence prolonged the Lives of the first Inventers of them to such a prodigious Age as it did they would not have had Time to collect Experiments enough whereon to found any certain Theorems of natural Science How could they have measured the Motions of the heavenly Bodies or given any tolerable Account of their slow Revolutions if they had not lived so many Hundreds of Years as they did And though the Rudiments of proportion are lodged in our Minds yet it is not imaginable how Men could ever have improved them into so many various Practices of Arithmetick Musick Geometry and Mechanicks had they not been at first either inspired by God or had a long Space of Time allowed to reduce them into Rules of Practice And he that shall but seriously consider how far out of the Road of ordinary Experience many of the most useful Arts of the World lie such as Writing and Printing by which a Man may talk with his Friend a thousand Miles Distance and converse with the World when he is dead and gone will find sufficient Reason to attribute the Invention of them to the Sovereign Direction of the divine Providence without which neither am I able to imagin how the medicinal Virtues of sundry Herbs and Vegetables and Minerals could have been discovered which now are of great Use to us since even these also do lie exceedingly remote from common Observation And when I also consider how many Things are requisite to the compleating of the most useful humane Arts and what Intricacy and Mystery there is in them insomuch that in many Cases we are not able to give any Reason why this or that Cause in our Art should produce this or that Effect I must needs conclude that the Invention and Improvement of them hath been exceedingly promoted by the wise Providence of God And what Reason have we to adore and admire its unspeakabl Goodness towards us that by instructing us in so many excellent Arts hath not only found sufficient Imployment for the greatest Part of Mankind to subsist by but hath also taught us mutually to assist one another with all Kinds of Commodities and Conveniencies of Life So that now we want nothing that either Nature or Art can supply us withall the good God having furnished us not only with Materials to work upon but also with Art and Skill to manage and contrive them to the best Advantage One would have thought it had been sufficient for him to have created a World for us and therein to have furnished us with all that is necessary for our Being and Subsistence and so left it to our selves to use and apply his Blessings as we pleased but that he should condescend to instruct us in so many Arts of improving his Blessings how to dress and cook them to the best Advantage and one way or other to render the meanest of them all useful and beneficial to our selves and others is such a gracious Condescention of Goodness as for ever deserves our Praise and Admiration And so I have done with the first thing proposed which was to shew you what apparent Instances there are of the Goodness of God in his Providence towards us 2. I proceed to the next Thing proposed which was to shew you that though there be some Things in the World that to us seem to be very ill and hurtful yet it is infinitely unreasonable for us therefore to suspect the Goodness and Beneficence of God's Providence that because we see such an unequal Distribution of good Things to bad Men and bad Things to good Men and do find so much Sin and Wickedness in the World and so great a part of Mankind over-run with so much Barbarism Superstition and Idolatry because I say we see and find such Things as these in the World we have no Reason at all to charge the Providence of God For let us consider 1. That the Irregularities and Evils which God permits in the World are not the Effects of his Providence but of the Choices and Actions of free Agents 2. That many Things seem evil to us in the World because we take false Measures of Good and Evil. 3. That many other Things seem evil to us in the Course of God's Providence meerly because we often mistake bad Men for good and good Men for bad 4. That many Things seem Evil to us in the Course of God's Providence because we are acquainted but with a small Part of the World and do judge of what is good and evil for the Whole by what we find is good or evil for this small Part. 5. That many other Things seem evil to us in the Course of God's Providence because we judge of them by their present sensible Effects and are not able to comprehend the universal Drift and Connexion and Dependence of them 6. That many other Things seem evil to us in the Course of God's Providence meerly because we understand very little of the other World 1. That the Irregularities and Evils which God permits in the World are not the Effects of his Providence but of the Choices and Actions of free Agents That there is such a Thing as Sin in the World is by no Means to be charged upon the Providence of God for that neither commits any Sin it self nor impels or necessitates any others to commit it Let no Man say when he is tempted he is tempted of God for God cannot be tempted with evil neither tempteth he any Man Jam. i. 13 'T is true he permits us Men whom he hath made free Agents to act freely and if there were no Fault at all in making of free Agents as certainly there was not what Fault can there be in permitting them to act congruous to their own Natures And is it just that God's Providence should be blamed because it
doth not metamorphose free Agents into necessary ones that is because he doth not unmake what he hath made and subvert the Laws of his own Creation or is it reasonable that we who are the only Authors of Sin should blame the Providence of God for suffering us to be so For if Sin be an Evil it is an Evil to us and consequently we are much more concerned to prevent it than the Providence of God and if when we may we will not do it it is unreasonable that we should blame God for not forcing us to prevent it whether we will or no. So that all the Quarrel we can have against God's Providence is only this that it doth not tie our Hands and fetter our Liberty in the Chains of an Adamantine Necessity that is that he doth not undo his own Workmanship and thereby confess himself overseen in his Creation of us when there is no kind of Reason for it For I beseech you what hurt is it for Men to be made free Agents and left to their own Choice whether they will be happy or miserable And if it was no Fault at all for God to make us so what Reason have we to blame him for continuing us what he made us If therefore while he continues us free Agents we will needs chuse what is evil and misimploy the Talent of our natural Liberty the Fault is ours and not God's and we may thank our selves for all the bad Consequents of it and since not only Sin but most of the other Evils that are in the World proceed from our ill Use of our own Liberty we ought in all Reason to charge them upon our selves and not upon the good Providence of God 2 ly That many Things seem evil to us in the Course of God's Providence that are not so in themselves by Reason that we commonly take false Measures of Good and Evil. We think it a very great Evil for Instance that good Men are not blessed with great Plenty and Abundance and that bad Men are because we imagin Plenty and Abundance to be a very great Good and the contrary a very formidable Evil And this makes us blame the Providence of God because we see the good Things of this World so promiscuously distributed without any Discrimination of Persons whereas in reality Plenty and Abundance approaches nearer to the Nature of an indifferent Thing than of a very great and desirable Good For if we consult our own Experience we shall find that all worldly Goods are just what we make them and that they do as commonly prove Plagues as Blessings to the Owners of them that they intangle their Affections insnare their Innocence disturb their Peace provoke and pamper their extravagant Lusts and betray them first into Luxuries then into Gouts or Dropsies Catarrhs or Consumptions and these most commonly prove the Effects of outward Abundance So that in it self 't is almost of an indifferent Nature and doth good or Hurt to us according as we use and improve it and threfore though God sometimes suffers good Men to want and bad Men to enjoy it we have no Cause to quarrel at it for he understands the just Value of things though we do not he knows that the best of worldly Things are bad enough to be thrown away upon the worst of Men and so expresses his scorn of the admired Vanities of this World by scattering them with such a careless Hand and indulging the Enjoyment of them to the most despicable Persons So that we ought to conclude that he sets no great Value upon them since he concerns himself no more in their Distribution for why should he partake in the Errors of vulgar Opinion by expressing himself so regardful of these Trifles as to put them in golden Scales and weigh them out to Mankind by Grains and Scruples 3 ly That many other Things seem evil to us in the Course of God's Providence that are not so merely because we often mistake bad Men for good and good Men for bad For I dare say that that Observation upon which we ground our Quarrel against the Providence of God viz that it fares worst with the best and best with the worst of Men is not half so general as we make it for it is to be considered that generally we pity the miserable and envy the prosperous and these Passions of ours do commonly bribe our Judgments and make us think worse of the one and better of the other than either of them do deserve For those whom we pity we are inclined to love and those whom we love we are inclined to think well of and if we think well of them whether we have Reason for it or no we conclude that God ought to be as fond of them as we As on the contrary those whom we envy we always hate and those whom we hate we are inclined to think ill of and if we think ill of them we think that God is obliged to think so too And because we are so unreasonably inclined by our Passions to pass such false Judgments upon Men is it fit that we should quarrel at God because he doth not judge as unreasonably as our selves or because he doth not reward and punish Men according to the sentence that our blind Pity or Envy passes upon them If we could but strip our selves of all Passion and were but able to judge of Men not by what they appear but by what they really are I doubt not but we should find that even in this Life it fares best with the best and worst with the worst of Men but since we are not competent Judges of this Matter we should have a Care of reproaching the Providence of God with a Maxim that hath no other Foundation in the Nature of things but our own fallacious Observation 4 thly That many Things seem evil to us in the Course of Gods Providence that are not so because we are acquainted but with a small Part of the World and do judge of what is good or evil for the Whole by what we find is good and evil for this small Part. We are never able to comprehend how far the Dominions of the divine Providence extend nor how many Orders of Beings as well above as below us are concerned in its Empire and Government but unless we could do this we cannot be capable Judges of what is good or bad in the general Course of its Actions For that is good or bad in the Providence of God that is good or bad for its whole Empire and Dominion and though this or that may be an Inconvenience to this or that Part of it yet these particular Inconveniencies may be a great Convenience to the Whole As for Instance suppose a Man should come into the Country of Syberia which is a great Part of the Empire of Russia whither that Emperor is wont to banish all great Malefactors he would there find the Inhabitants in a most
more Sons to bestow upon us he being the only begotten of his Father Heaven and Earth are not able to furnish him with such another Gift to bestow upon us and if he should lay a Tax upon all his Creation to raise one great Contribution to the Happiness of Mankind and exact the utmost of every Creature that it is able to Contribute it would all fall infinitely short of what he hath done for us in this inestimable Gift of his own Son So that if this prove ineffectual it is beyond the Power of an omnipotent Bounty to relieve us For though God can do all Things that can be well and wisely done and do not imply a Contradiction yet this can be no Relief at all to us who reject his Son and refuse to be made happy in the gracious Method which he hath prescribed to us For after this mighty Gift of his own Son to save us according to the Method of his Gospel there remains nothing more to be done for us but either to save us whether we will or no or else to make us happy in our Sins and save us notwithstanding our Continuance in them the former of which can neither be well nor wisely done because by saving us against our Wills he must deal with us in such a Way as is repugnant to that Law of Liberty that is implanted in our Natures and use us not as Free but as Necessary Agents And if considering all things it was best and wisest that he should make us free Agents then it can neither be well nor wise to govern us as necessary ones since by so doing he must alter the Course of our Nature and consequently swerve and decline from what is best and wisest which would be to do Violence to the Perfection of his own Nature And then as for the latter he cannot do it because it implies a Contradiction For to make Men happy in their Sins is to make them happy in their Miseries Misery being as inseparable from Sin as Heat is from Fire and as intimately related to it as the Son is to the Father and consequently he may as possibly make a Father without a Son as a Sinner without Misery When therefore God hath done all for us that can possibly be done and we by our own Obstinacy have rendred all ineffectual we are beyond the Power of Remedy and must necessarily perish in our Sins And when we have no other Hope to depend on but this that the All-wise God will undo his own Workmanship and unravel our Nature by governing us contrary to the most wise Constitution of it or that the All-powerful God will effect Impossibilities and do that for us which is not an Object of Power how deplorable and desperate must our Condition be Wherefore as you would not run your selves beyond the Reach of all Mercy and excommunicate your own Souls from all Hope of Salvation be now at last persuaded to comply with Christ's Coming which was to reduce you from the Error of your Ways and to bring you to a serious Repentance JOHN III. 16 That whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting Life IN these Words you have the Love of God measured by a twofold Standard first by the Greatness of the Gift which he hath bestowed upon the World God so loved the World that he gave his only begotten Son Secondly by the blessed End for which he did bestow him that whosoever believeth in him should not perish c. The first of these I have already gone through and now I shall proceed to the Second viz. The blessed End for which he gave his only begotten Son That whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life In which Words you have also two very great Instances of God's infinite Love and good Will to Mankind the First is his imposing upon us such a gentle and easie and merciful Condition That whosoever believeth in him Secondly His proposing such a vast Reward to us upon our performing of this Condition I begin with the first viz. His imposing upon us such a gentle and easie and merciful Condition That whosoever believeth in him should not perish In the Management of which I shall do these two Things 1. Shew you what it is that is included in this Condition whosoever believeth in him 2. How good God hath been to us in making the Condition which he hath imposed upon us so gentle and merciful 1. What is it that is included in this Condition To which I answer in general that believing in Christ doth not only denote a naked Assent to the Truth of this Proposition That he is the Son of Cod and the Messenger of Gods Mind and Will to the World and the Saviour of Mankind but that it also includes whatsoever is naturally consequent thereunto For thus it is very ordinary with the Scripture to express the natural Effects and Consequents of things by their Causes and Principles This is the love of God saith the Apostle that we keep his Commandments 1 Jo. v. 3 whereas in strictness of Speaking our keeping his Commandments is only the Effect or Consequence of our loving him So Prov. viii 13 The fear of the Lord is to hate evil whereas indeed this is only the Effect or Consequence of the Fear of the Lord. Thus by knowing and hearing and remembring of God the Scripture usually expresses the consequent Effects of them Thus Act. xxii 14 The God of our Fathers hath chosen thee that thou shouldst know his Will that is that thou mayst not only know it but by thy Knowledge mayst be suitably affected with it for it was not to a bare contemplative Knowledge of it that St. Paul was chosen and then it follows and see that Just one and shouldst hear the voice of his Mouth that is that hearing the Voice of his Mouth thou shouldst thereby be induced to obey it for he was not meerly to hear Christ speaking to him out of the Heavens but that hearing him he might submit to his Will and become his Apostle to the World Many other Places I might easily give you where the natural Effects and Consequents are in Scripture expressed by their Causes and Principles And thus also Faith or Believing whensoever it is used in Scripture to signify the Condition of the Gospel-Covenant always imploies its natural Effects and Consequents that is sincere and universal Obedience to those Rules of Holy Living which the Gospel prescribes for this is the most natural Effect of our believing in Jesus Christ. And hence it is called the obedience of Faith Rom. xvi 26 that is the Obedience which springs from Faith as from its Cause and Principle And accordingly Rom. x. 16 you find that to believe and to obey the Gospel signifies one and the same Thing But they have not all obeyed the Gospel saith he for Esaias saith Lord who hath believed our report that is who hath believed it so
would need no farther Motives to persuade them to chuse what he Wills and Commands against all Persuasions to the contrary If I love God above my self I shall certainly chuse his Will before my own If I love him above all my Pleasures I shall chuse his Pleasures before my own and it will be a needless Thing to propose Motives to persuade me to do that which I like best and chuse that which I love above all the World So that whilst a Man hath Need of Motives to persuade him to chuse God and prefer his Will above all Temptations it is apparent he loves him not above all and consequently according to this Doctrine cannot be a good Man in the Judgment of the Law of Sincerity which if it were true I doubt the List of good Men would be reduced to a very small Number Wherefore since loving God above all is a high strain of Piety much above the low Estate of sincere and true Goodness to make it necessary to a good State must needs be very dangerous since it cannot but dishearten beginners in Religion and perplex their Consciences with needless and inextricable Scruples I confess not to love God above all who doth so infinitely exceed all in Degrees of Loveliness and Amability is an Argument of great Imperfection though not of Insincerity but if my Love to him be such as that together with my Hope and Fear excited by the other Motives of Religion it effectually operates on my Will so as to win it to an universal prevalent Consent to the Will of God I know no Reason I have to judge severely of my main State though I should be conscious to my self that my Love singly and apart from those other Motives had not Force enough in it to produce this happy Effect This therefore I conceive is the utmost Degree of Love to God that the Law of Sincerity exacts that we should so love him as by our Love in Concurrence with the other Arguments of Religion to be effectually prevailed on to obey him 3 ly The Law of Sincerity exacts such a Degree of Love of us as together with those other Motives of Christianity is prevalent to sincere Obedience and in this it differs from the Law of Perfection which requires such a Degree of Love of us as together with those other Motives is productive of perfect unsinning Obedience For as I have shewed you the Law of Perfection requires the utmost of our Possibility and consequently that we should love God as much as we can and consider and apply to our selves the other Motives of Religion as well and as closely as we are able and then proceed upon the whole to serve and obey God to the utmost of our Power and Ability which if we do we are perfectly innocent and inculpable unless you suppose that a Man may be blame-worthy for not doing more than he can But should the Law of Sincerity exact thus much of us I doubt it would exclude the best of Men out of the State of Goodness and Salvation for what Man is there that doth always love and obey God to the utmost of his present Possibility Wherefore all that this Law can be supposed to require of us is only such a Degree of Love as is requisite to render it a concurrent Cause of true sincere Obedience that is to say such a Love as in Concurrence with those great Motives of Reward and Punishment produces such an hearty Consent in us to the Will of God as will not suffer us any longer to persist either in carelss or affected Ignorance of it or in known and wilful Disobedience to it and there are no Infirmities or Miscarriages whatsoever inconsistent with such a Degree of Love to God but what are also inconsistent with such a Consent to his heavenly Will If therefore we thus love God to the Purposes of a sincere Obedience the Law of Sincerity acquits us and as for our Sins of Infirmity Surprize or Inadvertency we are accountable for them only to the Law of Perfection 4 thly And lastly The Law of Sincerity requires such a Degree of Love to God as together with those other Motives makes us not only sincere in our Obedience but also careful to improve it to further Degrees of Perfection And indeed this is necessarily included in the former for if our Love of God joyned with the other Arguments of Religion hath so far prevailed upon us as to win us to a sincere Consent to his heavenly Will we shall not only industriously avoid the known and wilful Violations of it but be very careful to correct those Flaws and Imperfections that are intermixed with our Obedience to it 'T is true when there is nothing but slavish Fear at the Bottom of a Mans Obedience that must necessarily contract and shrink up the Sinews of his Care and Endeavours and render him exceeding narrow and stingy in the Discharge of his Duty for having no farther Aim than his own Security he will do no more than what is necessary to avoid the Danger that he stands in Fear of and if he can but escape those known and wilful Sins that layd waste his Conscience and expos'd him to the Wrath of God that is the utmost he desires or aims at but as for those Miscarriages and sinful Imperfections which do only fall under the Cognizance of the Law of Perfection he is not at all concerned about them But when our Fear is intermingled with such a Degree of Love to God as the Law of Sincerity exacts that will make us careful not only to avoid those known and willful Sins that divorse us from the Favour of God but also to indear our selves more and more to him by correcting even those smaller Defects and Imperfections that do still adhere to our Duties and Natures For this is plain that no Man can heartily love God that doth not more and more desire to be beloved by him and that no Man can sincerely desire to be more and more beloved by God that doth not honestly endeavour to render himself more and more lovely in his Eyes that is to reform all those sinful Defects and Imperfections which stain and blemish the Beauty of his Soul Whosoever therefore contents himself with this not to be hated by God did never sincerely love him and whosoever desires more than this will as well be careful to correct those smaller Imperfections which render him less beloved of God as to avoid those known and wilful Sins which do expose him to God's Hatred If therefore our Religion doth not in some Measure improve our Natures if it doth not render us more patient and humble more charitable and heavenly minded it is a certain Sign that it is not acted by Love For if after having a long while continued in a Round of religious Duties we still return to the same Point and are in no Degree better than we were when we first began it is
to the just Reproaches of his own Mind No certainly should he any ways swerve in his own Choices Affections or Actions from the eternal Reason of his own Mind he would be so far from being pleased with himself that he would be his own eternal Torment and that infinite Reason which he himself cannot deceive or impose on would so Expose and Shame him that whensoever he reviewed himself he would be sure to appear a most gastly Spectacle in his own Eyes That therefore which renders him so infinitely happy in himself is not so much the Power he hath to defend himself from foreign Hurts and Injuries as the exact Agreement of all his Motions and Actions with the all-comprehending Reason of his own Mind He always sees what is best and what he so sees he always chuses and affects and this makes him perfectly satisfied with himself and fills him with infinite Joy and Complacency When ever he surveys himself in the glorious Mirror of his own Mind he discerns nothing in himself but what is infinitely lovely and amiable nothing but what exactly corresponds with the fairest Idea of his own infinite Reason every Thing in him is as it should be every Motion and every Action so perfectly good and exactly reasonable that his own all-seeing Eye can discern no possible Degree of Perfection wanting in them and this makes him infinitely pleased with himself infinitely joyed and contented in the Prospect of his own Beauty and Glory So that God's Holiness and Righteousness or which is the same Thing the exact Agreement of his Choices and Actions with the infallible Reason of his own Mind being the Principle and eternal Spring of his Happiness it is no Wonder if he loves it wheresoever he finds it for how should he forbear being pleased and delighted with it when he hath such a continued Experiment of the blessed Effects of it in his own Bosom when he feels himself made happy by it and hath every Moment a fresh Relish of the Joys and Pleasures which result from it Can he be so insensible of his own Happiness as not to be enamoured with the blessed Cause of it Or can the Tree be indifferent to him when the Fruit of it is so infinitely grateful No certainly it is impossible but that the eternal Sense he hath in himself of the Joy the Pleasure the Bliss of being holy should infinitely endear Holiness to him and engage his Soul in an everlasting Love of it 3 dly God loves Righteousness as it is an Improvement and Exaltation of his Creatures into his own Likeness and Resemblance Every Being that loves it self naturally affects so far as it is able to derive it self to beget its own Image and propagate its own Likeness and Resemblance which is an immediate Consequence of that Principle of Self-love that is in us which inclines us to encrease and multiply our selves and diffuse and spread our own Tempers and Natures And no Wonder then that God who is the best of Beings and whose Love to himself is as infinite as his own Beauties and Perfections should affect to derive and communicate himself to beget and propagate his own most amiable Image in his Creatures The infinite Love which he bears to himself cannot but engage him to like and approve his own Likeness and what he likes he must needs be inclined to produce where it is not and to love where it is But now Righteousness being that moral Attribute which comprises all those Perfections of his Nature wherein the Beauty and Glory of it consists is the only Accomplishment that can render a Creature like him in that which renders him so infinitely lovely in his own Eyes As for Omnipotence Omniscence Eternity and Omnipresence they are amiable only as they are crowned with infinite Righteousness and Goodness and abstracted from these they have nothing of Form or Comeliness in them That therefore which moulds us into a Resemblance of God and renders us like him in that which is the Beauty of all his other Attributes is Righteousness and therefore this he must love if he love himself because t is his own Image As for Power and Knowledge and length of Duration though we should partake of them with him to the highest Degree that is possible for Creatures yet we may be infinitely unlike him for so the Devils are who yet are liberally endowed with these natural Perfections of the Divinity but the more they imploy their Power and Knowledge to unrighteous Purposes the more ungodlike they are for being powerful and knowing and then only are Knowledge and Power god-like Perfections when Righteousness and Goodness is their Scope and Rule for without these they are only the Perfections of Devils but good and righteous Devils are Contradictions in Terms Since therefore 't is Righteousness only that can stamp us god-like Creatures God must needs love it out of that natural Inclination which he and all other Beings have to propagate his own Likeness For without Righteousness no Creature can resemble him and therefore if he love to be resembled as he must needs do because he loves himself he must love that which gives the Resemblance and this and this only is Righteousness and true Goodness 4 thly And lastly God loves Righteousness as it is the Spring or Cause from whence the highest Happiness of his Creatures is derived For he loves Beings more or less according to their intrinsick Worth and Value and doubtless of all Orders of Beings there are none so valuable as the rational and therefore if he love these most he cannot but be desirous of their Happiness and if he be he cannot but love that which is the Spring and Cause of it and this is universal Righteousness For the Foundation of our Happiness must necessarily be laid in the Perfection of our Natures and our Natures being rational the Perfection of them must consist in a perfect Complyance of all their Powers and Faculties with the eternal Rules of Reason which is all one with universal Righteousness For doubtless the highest Perfection of reasonable Faculties is to act most reasonably and then they act most reasonably when they govern themselves by the unchangable Laws of Righteousness Righteousness therefore being our Perfection as we are reasonable Beings must necessarily be the Spring and Principle of our Happiness and 't is as impossible for us to be happy without it as 't is to be well in Sickness or at Ease under Pain For to the Happiness of every Nature that is capable of being happy two Things are requisite First that there be no disorder within it self that its Parts and Faculties be not distempered nor their Vigour and Activity lessened and abated Secondly that all it's Faculties be imployed and exercised about such Objects as are most grateful and suitable to their Natures upon both which Accounts Righteousness is most necessary to the Happiness of every reasonable Nature For in the first Place 't is