to himself what he has If he had given to inferiour things what they have he had bin their creatour If inferiour things had given him what he has they had given him more then they have in themselvs and would be superiour to him The same almighty lord made order'd proportion'd and limited all within their severall bounds All are the works of his hands He made us and not we ourselvs Ps. 100. 3. Again the excellent order of so different and innumerable things demonstrates the creatour to be but one Every inferiour order of things is exactly calculated and fitted to the use and service of it's superiour The elements enter the constitution of trees and plants nourishing them continually Herbs and the fruits of trees enter into creatures endued with sense and nourish them Elements herbs fruits and the flesh of beasts enter into man and nourish him The celestial bodies Sun moon and stars do influence and give vigour and warmth unto all Thus do inferiour things help the superiour in great unity harmony and order Things in the first second and third degrees are ordeined for the service of man who is the only creature in the fourth Now if the many particular and speciall natures comprehended in the three general degrees of inferiour things be ordeined for the relief and Service of one nature only to wit man's much more ought that nature to yeeld itself wholly up to the service of one only nature above it the divine There are many distinct special natures comprehended under one generall in the three inferiour degrees of things There are many species or natures in the first elements sun moon stars metals mineralls stones c. In the second are many several natures species or kinds of trees and plants In the third are several kinds of birds beasts fishes and creeping things very different in their natures But in the fourth we find only one nature or species wherein all the individuals do agree All the severall species or distinct natures of things in the first degree are united in one generall consideration as having being only All the several species in the second have being and life only All in the third agree in this that they have being life and sense only not reason Thus may we observe a generall unity of the distinct respective species under the three inferiour degrees of creatures In the fourth all are of one species or particular nature differing only individually And that nature which is above humane and all the rest must have one degree of unity above humane to wit numericall without any diversity so much as in individuals One degree of unity ought to be acknowledg'd incident to the divine nature above humane which can be no other or lesse then this that one and the same undivided substance nature or essence be found in three divine persons really distinct from and yet most intimately one with each other Otherwise would nor the unity of divine nature in three persons be superiour to the unity of humane nature in three or more men All created natures are gathered up and knit together in humane nature which is but one species and humane nature is united with the supream nature of all So comes the whole world to be consummated and terminated in the greatest unity that is possible Moreover he that gave being life sense and understanding to his creatures has all these eminently and incomparably in himself beyond what they are in the creature He has being life sense and understanding in supream perfection and unity He had them from all eternity in himself He received them not from any other nor did he give them to himself They are not limited in him For who should measure them out unto him They are infinite immeasurable and boundless They are all one and the same thing in him Life sense and understanding are the self-same thing with his being In him is no composition What then is attributable unto his being is attributable to all the rest If his being be infinite his understanding is infinite c. Thus having found out the infinite perfection of God by the finite things which he hath made we may further conclude from such infinite perfection that he made not the world as standing in need of any thing his creatures could be or do unto him for ever But in meer bounty did he communicate unto them their being in order to bring them into a final state of indissoluble union with himself which is their utmost perfection and eternall blessednes Chap. 3. Section I. The special agrement or harmony that is found in the constitution of man with other creatures 1. MAn has a special harmony with the lowest sort of inferiour things in the frame or composition of his body as also in the scitâ—ation of the parts thereof He is made up of the same elemental materials with them The nobler and more excellent of them are scituated above those of lesser value The celestial bodies are highest the earth is the lowest part of the visible creation The elements according to their different intrinsecall worth and usefulnes have their place and scituation in the universe higher or lower So in the body of man the head as the noblest part is the highest the feet as the meanest are the lowest And as the heavenly bodies do influence and rule the inferiour parts of the world so do the head hands and other superiour parts of man's body govern and order the inferiour 2. Man has a special agrement or similitude with things of the second degree in the production of his body The seed of plants and trees is sown and lies hid for a season in the earth so is the seed from which man in due time springs up sown and covered in the lowest parts of the earth Again from one small seed wherein is no apparent diversity but great similitude of parts many very different things do spring up and come forth as roots stock bark pith leaves flowers fruits and seeds In like manner from the small seed of man wherein is no discernable dissimilitude or diversity of parts do so many different and wonderfull parts come forth head eyes nose ears tongue hands fingers leggs feet toes brain heart lungs stomack liver spleen reins bones nervs veins arteries c. When we duly consider such a number of different parts so fitly disposed qualified temper'd and scituated for our use we may well conclude that we are fearfully and wonderfully made curiously wrought or embroidered by the hand of the lord 3. Thirdly man has a special agrement and much more likenes yet with things of the third degree in the production constitution and life of his body They are generated by male and female so is he They are formed and in due season brought forth as he They have head eyes nose mouth tongue teeth heart liver stomack and other parts as he They can se hear goe from place to place eat drink digest and be
union with god's to his unspeakable advantage is signified to him by such natural and advantageous transmutations as are observable in inferiour creatures Things of the lowest degree are changed or tranform'd into things of the second things of the second into those of the third and all into man the only creature in the fourth The elements are transform'd as they run-together into the composition of trees and plants These with their fruits roots c. are transform'd into things of the third degree whereby they receive a more noble being in the life of sense And all are farther advanc'd by way of transformation into the life of man in whom they do attein a yet more noble and excellent kind of being And man by rightly placing his love upon God so as to live in his will advances all in his own person and nature into unchāgable union with God By this last transformation do all things in man attein the most excellent kind of being that is possible for them to have If man be not induced freely to yield up himself to the will of God by this last and utmost transformation he thwart's the naturall order and course of the whole universe to his own destruction Inferiour things do most orderly attein their advance by quitting their own form's and ascending into personal union with rational nature in him If he refuse to quit the naturall activity life and freedom of his rationall powers to live in the transcendently more excellent freedom and power of the mind and will of God as partaker of the divine nature he for whom all the rest were made is the only disorderly creature to his own eternal damage and confusion Chap. 9. Section I. Two first loves or chiefly beloveds THere are properly but two principal loves or beloveds God and self his will or our own The love of God carries our will forth to a right general universal love of all things as the works of his hands loved and approved by him If our own will be by way of reflexion upon itself our chiefly beloved such a narrow private love will not carry us forth to a right love of any other things but will cause us to regard or value them no otherwise then as relating or subservient unto the great idol self-interest We shall love only ourselvs in them not them as the works of God's hands related to and approved by him To these two chief loves of God or self are all other loves reducible as flowing from the one or other of them There can be but one thing chiefly beloved for whose sake only other things in connexiō therewith or as related thereunto are loved All other subordinate loves to all other things considered as in harmony correspondence union and connexion with the chief beloved are included in the first love as the basis and cause of all the root and fountain whence they do pullulate and arise All are but as one love centring in and relating to the chief beloved T is the chief beloved only that is properly loved in all other things Whatever is in conjunction with that must necessarily be loved and whatever is against it or contrary to it will as certainly be hated It is so strongly and intimately united with the will does so vehemently and intirely draw and engage it unto itself that it suffers it not to love any other thing but for it's sake as in harmony with and subserviency thereunto By necessary consequence so many particular hatreds wil be begotten in the will as there are things contrary to or against its chief beloved and as many particular subordinate and secondary loves as there are things in harmony and union therewith If the radical or chief love be good just and orderly all the rest are so too if evil corrupt and disorderly so are the rest As is the root such are the branches as the fountain so are the streams issuing there-from Self-love is a narrow private unlawfull destructive thing the fountain and root of all false and unlawful loves of other things If the love of God be not the chief the love of the creature is And amongst the creatures that which is most neer and dear unto the will wil be its chief beloved and that is the will itself which can reflect its love upon itself as the most dear lovely and desireable thing to itself If then God be not a man's chief beloved his own will or himself most certainly is And then he loves neither God nor any other creature but as conducible to the gratifying and pleasing of his selfish private narrow will If he do seem to have some regard unto God so as to pray to him he does in such demeanour but make use of God in a subserviency to his own selfish will He askes things of God to consume upon his lusts Jam. 4. 3. He regards not God any body or any thing else but as conducible and helpful towards the bringing in provisions for his flesh to fulfill the lusts thereof Rom. 13. 14. In the first sin of Adam we all turn'd away from God into the love of our own will in distinction from and opposition to his Such self-love can never be destroy'd or eradicated but by the irresistible grace of God which alone can cause man's will freely to draw off and disengage its love from every thing else in order to the receiving of the omnipotent creatour in the room of a fraile impotent creature as its chief beloved By receiving God for its beloved it is furnish'd with the power and armour of God ha's the power of godlines in it whereby to withstand all the powers and works of darkness No created being can bear up against a man that 's thus furnished with power from on high If God be for us in us with us who can be against us Rom. 8. 31. SECT II. THese two chief loves are capital enemies of each other contending for primacy The primacy is due to god alone and he has no enemy to contest with but self love As he is infinitly above all so ought he to be loved above all The prerogative and honour of being our chief beloved does on all accounts belong to him alone Whatever then stands in competition with or oppositiō to him in this point ought to be look'd upon and handled as the capital enemy of god Self-love is an unjust false tortuous inordinate love contrary to god to truth to the good of man to the order and voice of nature in the whole universe T is the root of all other evil loves of all vice injustice iniquity To deny God the first place in our hearts and to place our selvs in his room is a high contempt of him a denying and jusslling him out of what is his due by the law of nature When a man bestow's his chief love on himself he offends God both as he is the giver and receiver of his own love He gives and receiv's that unto
unto God love fear praise obedience hope faith confidence c. belong's to his honour and the neglect thereof or opposit's thereunto are a dishonour to him He that does not love fear and obey him beleeve hope and trust in him dishonour's contemn's and injur's him Chap. 17. Sect. I. The private honour of man is the capital enemy of God's honour MAn cannot be a more direct capital enemy of God in any thing then by contriving and designing his own honour praise glory fame or name in and by all he does and by seeking the encrease and multiplication thereof He that seeks his own honour busies himself to procure the encrease and multiplication thereof in the hearts of other men So his own foolish vain heart and the hearts of others all which ought to be vessels and living temples of God's honour are made temples of his own honour fame and name His own private honour which is the enemy of god's intrudes into and possesses the room thereof in his own and others hearts which is the greatest injury that can be offered unto God Such temper'd men desire to jussle the honour of god quite out of the world out of all hearts to make room for their own the capital enemy thereof Every man is for or against God the friend or enemy of God seek's his own honour or God's There 's no middle way The seeking of self-honour does so blind a mā that he cannot se or think aright of the honour of god He ought therefore to avoid his own honour as the most poisonous deadly destructive vanity of all vanities that will finally appear to be nothing and will expose him to be eternally worse then nothing All honour will perish but god's and so will all that seek any other honour then his Who can defend his own honour against the omnipotent God What transcendent folly and blindnes is it for the thing formed to think of prospering in a contest with him that formed it SECT II. The honour of God is attended with man's profit the honour of man tends directly to his own damage and ruine GOd made all things for his own honour as the principal end of all He then that seeks any other honour in oppositiō to that does what in him lies pervert the whole world and frustrate God's intention in making it He sets himself up by his own private autority will and pleasure in the room of God and would have the world filled with his name fame and praise as a temple of his own private selfish honour Hast thou o man an arm like God Job 40. 9. contend not with him then If thou do 't is easy to guesse what wil be the issue betweē a poor fraile impotent creature and the omnipotent creatour to whom all nations are lesse then nothing and vanity Isai. 40. 17. The fruit of all such contests must needs be unutterable damage unto man The more a man muse's upon and seek's his own honour the more is he still dark'ned and blinded as to any right knowledg or consideration of God and his honour He madly digg's his own grave hasten's to his own eternal ruine He lay's the foundation of his self contrived hapines in a lie an errour a meer nullity his own honour He not only loses all his labour in such a self-seeking trade but is sure to be ruin'd by it As he therefore tender's his own hapines he ought to flee and avoid his own honour praise and glory that is enmity to God as the greatest evil Eternal shame perpetual confusion and everlasting contempt wil be the certain portion of all that finally seek their own honour But if a man honour God God will put honour upon him and glorify him for ever in himself Vain man that 's eager and hot in the pursuit and maintenance of his own private honour though unjust and undue will not patiently endure the least diminution thereof as we may ordinarily find And can we then think the almighty God will suffer any diminution of his honour that 's most justly due unto him without punishing the offendour Chap. 18. Section I. Concerning Angelical nature HAving thus read over the book of the visible creation and considered of some special and highly concerning instructions unto man deducible there-from let us proceed to take notice of a third sort of created nature which is invisible In the three former of the four degrees of creatur's already spoken to we find meer bodily nature in the fourth to wit man bodily and intellectual or spiritual nature joyn'd together By these things so manifested and known may we ascend to the consideration of intellectual nature as found alone by itself in separation from bodily Bodily nature has two wayes of existing one by itself in the three inferiour degrees of created beings another in conjunction with intellectual nature in the fourth man Intellectual nature then being far more excellent then bodily and much more neer and like to its creatour will doubtless be found to have the like priviledg of existing also two wayes first singly as a whole being in angels secondly in composition with bodily as part of a being in man We may farther conclude also that angels as the choicer sort of first-created beings excelling all others in understanding and strength Psal. 103. 20 were first made Man though the most excellent creature in the visible world lord and master of all the rest was last created because in respect of the bodily part of his constitution the other visible creatures were a requisite provision for his enterteinment and subsistence But angels being meer spirits unconcern'd in and independent on the visible or material parts of the creation for their subsistence and operations might well be before any of this visible fabrick was set up These morning stars and sons of God sang together and shouted for joy when the foundations of the earth were fast'ned and the corner-stone thereof was laid by the hand of the creatour Job 38. 6. 7. Now forasmuch as angelical nature had the same kind of free-will that man had in his first make the things above proved concerning the obligation duty and true interest of man may be look'd on as equally proved in reference to angels So have we by ascending natur's ladder found out the divine nature uncreated which is the same numerical nature in three persons and then three created natures meer bodily meer intellectuall and mixt SECT II. The sin of Angels ANgels sin'd before men Sin and depravation were first found in intellectual nature Angelical nature sin'd without any instigation to evil by any superiour nature already fallen Humane nature sin'd and fell by the instigation of angelical the highest kind of created nature already fallen Sin therefore was first in angelical nature For till angels were sinners they would not tempt man to sin Sin was brought into humane nature differently from the way it entred into angelical It was first brought into the weaker
THE BOOK OF NATURE Translated and Epitomiz'd Psal. 19. 1 6. Rom. 1. 19 20. By GEORGE SIKES Printed in the yeer 1667. CHAP. I. Four degrees of created beings THere are four generall degrees of creatures by which as four distinct rounds in the ladder of created nature man may ascend to the right knowledg of himself and of God There was no other generall and visible book for mankind to read the mind of God in and their duty towards him for the first 2513. yeers of the world Then began the book of the holy Scriptures to be written by Moses which was finished by John about the yeer 4100. The former volume of it was peculiarly committed to the jews To them perteined the giving of the law the service of God and the promises Other nations took little notice of it till the promised Messiah came in the flesh and brake down the middle wall of partition between them and the jews on which the holy Oracles became common to all the world But this book though it do more perfectly excellently and fully declare the mind of God as to the duty and concerns of man then the book of nature yet doth it no wayes rescind obliterate or invalidate it That book is yet in being and doth by the various voices and lines thereof administer the same significant instruction unto man as from the beginning And hereof is he obliged to take notice even by the Scriptures of truth as may appear by the two places thereof quoted in the title-page with others which for brevity I refer to the reader's enquiry 1. The first generall degree or lowest rank of creatures comprehend's all those things that have being only not life sense or understanding 2. The 2 d comprehend's all such things as have being and life only not sense nor understanding 3. The third comprehend's all those creatures that have being life and sense but not reason or understanding 4. The fourth comprehend's only those creatures that have being life sense and understanding with free-will which are rationall and intellectuall powers In the lowest round of this ladder the first degree of created beings we find more various species or kinds as also more individualls then in the second in the second more then in the third in the third more then in the fourth There is but one species or nature at all in the fourth to wit humane and not so many individuals as in any of the former trhee 1. In the first degree we find abundance of distinct species or natures of things one above another in dignity the four elements all inanimate compounds the visible heavens with the furniture thereof Sun Moon and Stars Water excells the earth and is scituated above it Air excells water in dignity and scituation Fire excells air The celestial orbes with their furniture excell them all The glory of the celestial bodies it one the glory of the terrestrial another There is one glory of the Sun another of the Moon another of the Stars And one Star differeth from or excelleth another Star in glory There are also many kinds or species of metalls and mineralls generated under the earth very different in worth and excellency as Gold Silver copper tinn ledd brimstone alume c. There are also divers sorts of precious stones different in worth as Diamonds Rubies Saphirs and the rest amongst which the Diamond has the pre-eminence Many other kinds of things there are in the first degree of different natures from each other together with all sorts of artificiall things which agree in this that they have being only not life sense nor understanding 2. In the second degree are all trees and plants or herbs Of both sorts there are many species distinguish'd from and surmounting one another in their different properties qualities and usefulness They draw nourishment from the earth whereby they do grow bring forth fruit and seed for the use of man as also for the multiplying of themselvs 3. In the third degree are conteined all variety of creatures that have being life and sense but not reason Sense here is comprehensive of whatsoever is found in meer animals birds beasts fishes and creeping things over and beyond what is to be found in any things of the second rank to wit plants and trees 4. In the fourth round of nature's ladder we find but one species or nature only man 's In man is summ'd up and put together whatever is found in the other three degrees to wit being life and sense advanc'd into a union with reason or understanding and free-will This nature is lord of the other three and ought to own no other lord over it but God himself These four degrees of things well considered of which there can be no doubt as being evident unto the common reason and experience of mankind we may by duly comparing and observing of them as to their agreements with or differences from each other gain great instruction as to our duty towards God and advantages therein both temporall and eternall Chap. 2. Section I. The generall agreement that is found in the constitution of man with other creatures THe agreement or similitude man hath with the three inferiour sorts of creatures is twofold general and special So also is his difference from them or excellency above them generall and special His general agrement is this 1. He has being with elements Sun Moon Stars and all inanimate compounds His body is compounded of nourished and mainteined by the elements and products thereof as other things are He dwells and lives in and by them every moment 2. He has life with trees and plants They live are nourish'd grow encrease and multiply by propagation of their like The herb yeeldeth seed and the fruit-tree yeeldeth fruit after his kind whose seed is in itself Gen. 1. 11. 3. In harmony or agrement with things of the third degree birds beasts fishes and every thing that creepeth upon the earth he has outward senses seing hearing c. He has also all the inward senses powers or faculties of animalish life He has the attractive retentive digestive and expulsive powers in order to growth nourishment and generation He sees hear's smell 's tast's sleep's wake 's eates drink 's c. as they do No degree then of created being is wanting in the composition of every individual man He ha's being with all inanimate parts of the creation life with herbs and trees sense with beasts reason with angels He is the only true microcosm or little world in whose nature and constitution is put together al the variety of nature that 's to be found in the whole creation SECT II. The fruit or profit that 's to be reaped from this general agrement of man with all inferiour creatures FRom this general view and comparison of himself with all inferiour creatures may man argue and certainly conclude that there is some invisible lord over him who gave to all inferiour things what they have and
his service rightly performed unto God exceed the service which other creatures perform to him Now the more excellent the service is the greater is the profit thereby redounding unto man He therefore must needs have incomparably more profit from his service of love freely performed unto God then from any service that inferiour creatur's do by a natural necessity and impulse perform unto him And the more perfectly any man serv's God the more profit he receiv's unto himself 'T is the true interest then and highest concern of man to be incessantly performing his service of love to God with all his heart soul mind and strength seing all redounds singly and intirely to his own advantage The service other creatures perform to man is not remunerable or capable of reward because not freely performed but by natural necessity The service perform'd by man to God being free is remunerable Man then receiving all the advantage by both services let us distinctly consider what profit he receiv's by the first and what by the second By the first perform'd by other creatures unto him his being is for a while continued in this mortal state By the second performable by him in Christ unto God is his everlasting wel-being atteinable So much then as the eternal wel-being of man excell's his bare temporal being in a mortal body does the second service exceed the first in dignity and profit A bare being is not profitable unto man unless he may have a wel-being Other creatures then by serving him with all they have unless he serv God with all he has will but aggravate his sin and adde to his misery Being was given unto man in order to his wel-being So is the service of other creatures performed unto man for his temporary being in this world in order to that service he ought to perform unto God with reference to his eternal wel-being in the world to come If the second service be not performed by man to God the first to wit of other creatures unto him is render'd void and to no purpose as much as in man lies Yea it is perverted to the service of the devil in enmity to God All the service perform'd by other creatures to a man that serv's not God is lost or worse The main end and chief design of God in creating the world is frustrated and rendred of no effect by the man that serv's not God We do plainly experience that man can't continue his being in this world unless maintein'd and upheld by other creatur's nor can other creatur's continue or subsist unless upheld by the same hand that made them If they could they would be greater in this point of self-preservation then man Man can't maintein them in being but is maintein'd by them Some other hand then above both mainteins them and him by them But man alone stands indebted unto God as for his own being and theirs so for the continuance of both By the first service perform'd by inferiour creatures unto man they are brought into union with him By the second performed by man unto God he is brought into union with God So in and by man the world comes to be united with God All things that came out of the love of God to man by the love of man to God are brought into union with him that made them He then that does not love and serve the lord does what in him lies towards the disjoyning and seperating of the world from God and the bringing of all things into disorder and confusion Man alone in whose nature and constitution all sorts of created nature life and being are put together is the means in and by whom all inferiour creatures come to be united with God SECTION III. FRom the first obligation on man or debt of love which he owes unto God does naturally arise a second like unto it and that is the love of all creatures as the works of his hands and as bearing any thing of his image or superscription upon them on which account himself pass'd that universal approbation that every thing that he had made was very good Gen. 1. 31. But forasmuch as amongst all things there mention'd men for whom the rest were made do beare the most compleat and lively image of God upō them they are on God's account to be loved by us more then any inferiour creatures All men as of one and the same nature ought to look upon themselvs as one man not many There ought by the very law of nature to be the strictest union the greatest peace and agreement amongst them that 's possible As their love of God in the first place so is the love of one another in the second as bearing his image founded in the law of nature Thou shalt love the lord thy God with all thy heart soul strength and mind say's Christ. This is the first and great commandment And the second is like unto it Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself On these two commādments hang all the law and the prophets Mat. 22. 37 40. All men are bound by the law of their own nature to live in perfect union with God and with one another by love The greatest unity amongst men arises from their first being united with God and the firmer their union the greater their strength Self-love divides us from God and consequently from one another So come we to lose that strength which depend's on union and to lie naked and exposed in our own single persons to all the wiles and darts of the devil c. Inferiour creatures are to be loved by mā only on God's account as the works of his hands bearing some characters and shadowy resemblāces of his infinitly persect being and life We are not to look on ourselvs as obliged to them for any benefit use or service we receive from them or have of them but unto God only who causes them to perform such beneficiall service The loving of inferiour creatures as gratifying our sensual desires is so far from being a natural consequent of our loving God that 't is direct enmity to him Such love of this world and the things thereof is enmity to God If any man thus love the world the love of the father is not in him Jam. 4. 4. 1 Jo. 2. 15. To ask of God creature-contentments to consume upon our lusts Jam. 4. 3. is to desire him that he would maintein us in our enmity against himself The multiplicity of heathen Gods and the various idolatries in the world have arisen from man's unlawful prohibited love of inferiour creatures Many heathens concluded that any thing that did them good was a God On this account were they induced to worship the sun moon stars fire air earth water sheep oxen c. Such unlawfull idolatrous love of inferiour creatures has its rise as a natural consequent from self-love When we love our own wills in distinction from and opposition to God's we love the creatures appointed for
advance the soul into a higher and more excellent state then at first he gave it will proportionally rarefy spiritualize and exalt the body at the resurrection into a far more excellent state then when formed by him out of the dust of the ground Gen. 3. 19. or fashioned in the lowest parts of the earth his mother's womb Psal. 139. 15. The spirit of man transform'd by the love of God ascends to a partaking of the divine nature 2. Pet. 1. 4. the body by its proportionable transformation will ascend into a spiritualty of being as partaker of the very nature of the spirit In the essentials of his constitution thus advanced compleated and perfected will he have an absolute fulnes of joy and blessednes for ever He will for ever have all he can desire and for ever be rid of all he hates and would not have And then farther from this radical fundamental joy in God will spring up innumerable other secondary joy's on the account of all that are in the same state of blessednes with himself His joy wil be multiplied according to the numberless multitude of saved men and angels Rev. 7. 9. The elect angels rejoyce in man's hapines why should not elected men rejoyce eternally in theirs Every man in heaven will ever love every one as himself that 's in the same blessed condition with himself and therefore equally rejoyce in the joy of every one as in his own If then therebe innumerable men that will have the like joy in God every one of them will have innumerable joyes Every ones unspeakable joy in God wil be innumerably multiplied by the like unspeakable joy in others All this is the necessary certain eternal fruit and consequent of man's wel-fix'd love of God Chap. 13. Sect. I. The temporary fruit of self-love THe temporary fruit of self-love in this world cannot be any true joy but only a sophistical deceptive seeming joy carrying reall sadnes in the womb of it He that loves his own will praise honour glory and bodily pleasur's loves and seek's after such things as conduce thereunto worldly riches dignities offices sciences c. Such a man when he has any considerable hopes or enjoyment of such things he has a proportionable kind of joy And because all these things may pass away be lost or destroy'd he fear 's to lose them and hates all that would diminish or destroy them From such danger fear and hatred sadnes must needs arife His joy then at best in such delusive transient vanities hath sorrow and vexation of spirit most intimatly connexed with it From the properties and conditions of self-love may we certainly conclude the properties of the joy arising there-from If such love be an inordinate unjust tortuous false vicious corrupt unclean thing contrary to the nature of God and man as also to the order of the whole universe if it be a most wicked filthy malignant abominable thing the joy arising from it must needs be of the same complexion and have the self-same evil qualities properties and conditions Self-love is the leading injustice and injury dishonorable to God and destructive to man It sets up a false God in the room of the true the will of man in opposition to the will of God Any joy man can have in such a course must needs be a false deceptive inordinate unjust vicious corrupt joy contrary to the nature of God and man as also to the nature and order of all creatures T is a most wicked filthy poisonous mortal dark lying joy As the root is so is the fruit And forasmuch as self-love render's a man the capital enemy of God as thereby usurping a power of living in the absolute Soveraignty and unsubjected exercise of his own will which is the peculiar prerogative and incommunicable priviledg of God alone all the joy he can possibly find in such a course is but yet a higher strein of enmity to God All his joy and complacency in things temporal is but a rebellious exulting and rejoycing in his contempt of and enmity to God The more a man has of such joy the greater enemy of God is he Self-love and the love of God cannot stand or dwell quietly together in the same will but as capital enemies will destroy and expell one another In like manner is it with the two opposite joyes thence arising The joy that spring's up from the love of God strengthen's man's union with God The joy which spring's from self-love divides separat's and alienat's a man more and more from God For the maintenance of a false joy such a multitude of temporal things appear's requisite as cannot usually be gotten without damage and destruction to others and ourselvs The love of such riches as are the nourishmēt and maintenance of a false joy will put us upon the exercise of many such foolish and hurtful lusts as drown men in destruction and perdition 1 Tim. 6. 9. True joy in the lord render's a man bountiful courteous merciful humble mild and sweet False joy in the creature make's him cruel wicked proud implacable revengful and all that 's naught The former preserv's peace unity friendship and all that 's good amongst men the latter tend's to the dissolution of all right friendship sowes envy strife divisions animosities and all that 's evil amongst them The former alway's profit's the latter alwayes hurt 's him that has it The former enlighten's and cleer's up mans understanding the latter more and more darken's and blind's it The former will have the greatest reward the latter the greatest punishment SECTION II. The eternal fruit of self-love IMmediatly after this life he that had nothing but a false temporary momentany joy in the fleeting things thereof wil for ever be deprived of all that he loved desired or rejoyced in He wil be compelled by the hand of God to have all that he would not have and he wil be everlastingly deprived of all he would have his own honour glory praise and bodily pleasur's The soul of man in hel cannot but think of such things as will give it perpetual sorrow It will look upon itself as the most deformed filthy disorder'd thing imaginable contrary to God in the utmost extreamity contrary to the uprightnes and glory of its own first-created natural being and much more contrary to the yet more excellent glory of spiritual life it was capable of having bio advanced into by a new creation or the true regeneration which it wilfully refused The soul finding itself in this dismal posture will most vehemently desire to be rid of itself by annihilation but never can Man in such case will most earnestly desire God may lose his being that there may be no omnipotent hand to keep him up in being and punish him He wil be eternally displeased that either God or himself or any other creatur's are continued in being because all makes for his woe Thus will fond self-love end at last in eternal self-abhorrency sorrow and