Imatges de pàgina
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therefore most of all the fupreme good, which SER M. may be certainly known to be what it is, the ab- VIII. folutely beft, the highest and most excellent good, as hath been already fhewn; and yet by this argument it would be impoffible to do this. So abfurd is this maxim or pretence, that we are not to be affected with invifible things, and are under no obligation to love GOD, because we fee him not! In the last place,

(7.) It would alfo be confequent from hence, that man must be a creature from the very first made only to be miferable. For it is impoffible that fenfe fhould ever afford him relief against internal evils, or ever fupply him with fuitable and fatisfying good. How then can he be otherwife than miferable?

SENSE cannot afford him relief against internal evils, and no man can exempt himself from them, nor give himself any fecurity that he fhall never be invaded by fuch. Let there be never fo great a calm, and according to his present apprehenfion let all things be never so well now; yet no man can affure himself, that he fhall never meet with any inward pangs; that he shall never have cause to complain of the terrors of the Almighty befetting and overwhelming his foul, even ready to cut him off. These things have invaded as fortified breafts as any our age can afford; and no man knows when he is fecure from them. And fuppofe they do invade a man, and confcience molested by known and often repeated wickednefs does at length awake, and grow

VOL. grow furious; pray where fhall relief be had?
I. Will the things of fense afford it? Will they ease

'fuch pangs, or work off agonies of this nature?
In such a state of mind, for a man to feast him-
felf with the objects of fenfe, or with that which
pleases the
eye, would be as impertinent as mufick
to a broken leg, or fine clothes for the cure of a
fever or an ulcerous body.

NOR can sense be the inlet to a man of any
fuitable or fatisfying good. Let experience wit-
nefs. To those who have all fenfible enjoyments to
the full I would fay, "Are you happy? Can you
"pretend to want any thing that sense can pof-
"fibly supply you with to give pleasure to your
"fpirits? Have you not what you would have?
"and yet can you fay, all is full and well?"
Undoubtedly what was the wife man's experience,
would be every man's that were at leifure to con-
fider the cafe; The eye is not fatisfied with feeing,
'nor the ear filled with hearing. Senfe, let it be
gratified never fo much, will ftill live unfatisfied,
will be always craving and never contented. And
therefore by this fuppofition it must needs be con-
fequent, that man could be created for no other
ftate, than a state of mifery. But how abfurd
were it to suppose, that the God of all goodness
had made a creature, whom it should be impof-
fible, even to himself, to make happy! (for it is
impoffible to his nature ever to make himself vi-
fible to an eye of flesh) and that it should be
only poffible to terrify and torment his creature,

a Ecclef. 1. 8.

but

but not to fatisfy it and do it good! All thefe SER M. things do plainly evince that this excufe, to wit, VIII. we cannot love GOD, because we fee him not, is not only infufficient, but also moft abfurd. Then, fay we, it ought not to be admitted as an excuse at all, and men are still under an indifpenfible obligation to the love of GOD notwithstanding.

BUT here it may poffibly be fuggested to the thoughts of fome, "Admit it to be a duty to "love GOD, although we cannot see him. We " acknowledge that his invifibility renders it not "impoffible nor unreasonable to love him; and "therefore we see the excufe is infufficient, and "that many inconveniences and abfurdities "would enfue upon making it. But though it "will be no intire excufe, yet it will fure be a great alleviation. And methinks the love of "GOD in this world fhould not be fo ftrictly

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urged; or though we should not live in the "exercise of this duty, it should not be repre"sented as so very great a crime." Therefore in answer to this we are to evince to you according to what was propofed *,

II. THE greatness and heinoufnefs of the fin of not loving Go D, notwithstanding this excufe that we do not fee him. That it not only leaves it a fin ftill, but a moft horrid one. And this will appear if we confider fundry things that I have to mention to you, which will fhew it to be injurious

See p. 75.

VOL. injurious to our felves and others, but chiefly to I. the bleffed GOD himself, the great Author of our being.

1. IT cannot but be a most horrid thing, in as much as it is a most injurious distortion of our natural faculties. And therein it is injurious even to our felves, to our own, nature, and to GoD the great author and parent of all nature, at once. For what do we think he has given us fuch faculties for, as we find the nature of man to be inriched with? Why hath he given us a mind, originally capable of knowing him, and that could once retain GoD in his knowledge; or a will that could then embrace him by love? It must needs be a very injurious perversion of our own faculties, to withhold and divert them from the prime, the best and highest use, whereof they were originally capable. And it is a very unaccountable thing that it should be thus, that man should have a power given him, originally ordained by the very defignation of the God of nature to fuch and fuch purposes, and that it fhould never be applied thereunto. Not to love GOD is to fet thofe faculties one against the other, and both of them against him.

2. It is a moft vile debafing of our felves, and a fordid depreffion of our own fouls. By love we most strictly join our felves to that which is the object of our love, and enter into the closest and most inward union with it. And what is it that we love, while we love not God? Are not the things which our love terminates upon, fuch

as

as we should even be ashamed to think of fepa- SER M. rately and apart from him? What is there that VIII. is not base, when fevered from GOD, or if we do not eye and confider him in it? We cannot conceive of any creature whatfoever, not even of the best and most noble, but as of a moft horrid idol, if made the terminative object of our love, taken apart from GOD, and not confidered or regarded in fubordination to him who is fupreme. And as to the mind and spirit of a man, there is nothing that fo defiles it, that renders it fo impure as fpiritual idolatry does. A vile and filthy thing, that the spirit of a man fhould be alienated from GoD, and prostituted to an idol! For we make any thing fo, that we make the fupreme object of our love. And fo in effect we join ourfelves to vanity, as idols are wont to be called; to that which is not only vain, but by this means made odious and loathfome.

AND how deep a refentment fhould this be to us, that fo excellent a thing as the spirit of man, God's own offspring, fhould fuffer fo vile a dejection! that it fhould be depreffed and debased unto fuch meannefs as to join it felf to vanity and dirt, when it might be united with the GOD of glory, with the fulness and excellency of the DEITY; yea, and when it is apparent, that by the original defignation of that nature he hath given us, we were at firft made capable thereof! For how came we by that love which we find in our nature? We plainly fee we can love fomewhat. While we love not GoD there

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