Part 34
Ixiii. 16, « Abraham is ignorant of us, and Israel acknowledges us not.' The Jews never called upon Abraham, though the covenant was made with him
for the whole seed ; not one departed saint, for the whole four thousand
518 CHARNOCK'S WORKS. [Ps. CXLYII. 5.
years between the creation of the world and the coming of Christ, was ever
prayed to by the Israelites, or ever imagined to have a share in God's omniscience, so that to pray to St Peter, St Paul, much less to St Roch, St S within, St Martin, St Francis, &c., is such a superstition that hath no footing in the Scripture.
To desire the prayers of the living, with whom we have a communion, who can understand and grant our desires, is founded upon a mutual charity ; but to implore persons that are absent, at a great distance from us, with whom we have not, nor know how to have any commerce, supposeth them in their departure to have put off humanity, and commenced gods, and en dued with some part of the divinity to understand our petitions ; * we are, indeed, to cherish their memories, consider their examples, imitate their graces, and observe their doctrines ; we are to follow them as saints, but
not elevate them as gods, in ascribing to them such a knowledge which is only the necessary right of their and our common Creator. As the invoca tion of saints mingles them with Christ in the exercise of his office, so it sets them equal with God in the throne of his omniscience, as if they had as much credit with God as Christ in a way of mediation, and as much know
ledge of men's affairs as God himself. Omniscience is peculiar to God, and incommunicable to any creature ; it is the foundation of all religion, and therefore one of the choicest acts of it, viz. prayer and invocation. To
direct our vows and petitions to any else is to invade the peculiarity of this perfection in God, and to rank some creatures in a partnership with him in it.
[2.] This attribute is injured by curiosity of knowledge, especially of future things, which God hath not discovered in natural causes, or super
natural revelation. It is a common error of men's spirits to aspire to know what God would have hidden, and to pry into divine secrets ; and many men are more willing to remain without the knowledge of those things which may, with a little industry, be attained, than be divested of the curiosity of inquiring into those things which are above their reach. It is hence that some have laid aside the study of the common remedies of nature, to find
out the philosopher's stone, which scarce any ever yet attempted but sunk in the enterprise. From this inclination to know the most abstruse and difficult things, it is that the horrors of magic and the vanities of astrology have sprung, whereby men have thought to find, in a commerce with devils and the jurisdiction of the stars, the events of their lives, and the disposal of states and kingdoms. f Hence also arose those multitudes of ways of divi nation invented among the heathen, and practised too commonly in these
ages of the world. This is an invasion of God's prerogative, to whom secret things belong : Deut. xxix. 29, ' Secret things belong unto the Lord our God, but revealed things belong to us and our children.' It is an intoler able boldness to attempt to fathom those, the knowledge whereof God hath reserved to himself, and to search that which God will have to surpass our understandings, whereby we more truly envy God a knowledge superior to our own, than we in Adam imagined that he envied us. Ambition is the greatest cause of this, ambition to be accounted some great thing among men, by reason of a knowledge estranged from the common mass of man kind, but more especially that soaring pride to be equal with God, which lurks in our nature ever since the fall of our first parents. This is not yet laid aside by man, though it was the first thing that embroiled the world with the wrath of God. Some think a curiosity of knowledge was the cause of the fall of the devils ; I am sure it was the foil of Adam, and is yet the
* Daille, Melang. part ii. p. 560, 561. f Amyraut, Moral, torn. iii. p. 75, &c.
Ps. CXLVII. 5.] GOD'S KNOWLEDGE. 519
crime of his posterity ; had he been contented to know what God had fur nished him with, neither he nor his posterity had smarted under the venom
of the serpent's breath.
All curious and bold inquiries into things not revealed are an attempt upon the throne of God, and are both sinful and pernicious, like to glaring upon the sun, where, instead of a greater acuteness, we meet with blindness,
and too dearly by * our ignorance in attempting a superfluous knowledge. As God's knowledge is destined to the government of the world, so should ours be to the advantage of the world, and not degenerate into vain speculations.
[3:] This attribute is injured by swearing by creatures. To swear by the name of God in a righteous cause, f when we are lawfully called to it by a superior power, or for the necessary decision of some controversy, for the ends of charity and justice, is an act of religion and a part of worship, founded upon and directed to the honour of this attribute ; by it we acknow ledge the glory of his infallible knowledge of all things. But to swear by false gods, or by any creature, is blasphemous ; it sets the creature in the place of God, and invests it in that which is the peculiar honour of the divinity ; for, when any swear truly, they intend the invocation of an in fallible witness, and the bringing an undoubted testimony for what they do assert. While any therefore swear by a creature, or a false god, they profess that that creature, or that which they esteem to be a god, is an infallible witness, which to be is only the right of God ; they attribute to the creature that which is the property of God alone, to know the heart, and to be a wit ness whether they speak true or no, and this was accounted by all nations the true design of an oath. As to swear falsely is a plain denial of the allknowledge of God, so to swear by any creature is to set the creature upon the throne of God, in ascribing that perfection to the creature which sove reignly belongs to the Creator, for it is not in the power of any to witness to the truth of the heart, but of him that is the searcher of hearts.
[4.] We sin against this attribute by censuring the hearts of others. An open crime indeed falls under our cognisance, and therefore under our judgment ; for whatsoever falls under the authority of man to be punished,
falls under the judgment of man to be censured, as an act contrary to the law of God. Yet when a censure is built upon the evil of the act which is obvious to the view, if we take a step farther, to judge the heart and state, we leave the revealed rule of the law, and ambitiously erect a tribunal
equal with God's, and usurp a judicial power, pertaining only to the supreme governor of the world ; and consequently pretend to be possessed of this perfection of omniscience, which is necessary to render him capable of the exercise of that sovereign authority. For it is in respect of his dominion that God hath the supreme right to judge ; and in respect of his knowledge that he hath an incommunicable capacity to judge.
In an action that is doubtful, the good or evil whereof depends only upon God's determination, and wherein much of the judgment depends upon the discerning the intention of the agent, we cannot judge any man without a manifest invasion of God's peculiar right. Such actions are to be tried by
God's knowledge, not by our surmises. God only is the master in such cases, to whom a person « stands or falls,' Kom. xiv. 4. Till the true principle and ends of an action be known by the confession of the party
acting it, a true judgment of it is not in our power. Principles and ends
lie deep and hid from us ; and it is intolerable pride to pretend to have a
joint key with God, to open that cabinet which he hath reserved to himself.
Besides the violation of the rule of charity in misconstruing actions,
* Qu. 'buy'?— ED. t Cajetan, Sum. p. 190.
520 CHARNOCK'S WORKS. [Ps. CXLYII. 5.
which may be great and generous in their root and principle, we invade
God's right, as if our ungrounded imaginations and conjectures were in joint commission with this sovereign perfection ; and thereby we become
usurping 'judges of evil thoughts,' James ii. 4. It is therefore a boldness worthy to be punished by the judge, to assume to ourselves the capacity
and authority of him who is the only judge. For as the execution of the divine law for the inward violation of it belongs only to God, so is the right of judging a prerogative belonging only to his omniscience ; his right is therefore invaded if we pretend to a knowledge of it. This humour of men the apostle checks, when he saith, 1 Cor. iv. 5, * He that judgeth me is the Lord : therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come, who will manifest the counsels of all hearts.' It is not the time yet for God to erect a tribunal for the trial of men's hearts, and the principles of their actions ; he hath reserved the glorious discovery of this attribute for another season. We must not therefore presume to judge of the counsels of
men's hearts, till God hath revealed them by opening the treasuries of his own knowledge.
Much less are we to judge any man's final condition. Manasseh may sacrifice to devils, and unconverted Paul tear the church in pieces ; but God had mercy on them and called them. The action may be censured, not the
state, for we know not whom God may call. In censuring men, we may doubly imitate the devil, in a false accusation of the brethren, as well as in an ambitious usurpation of the rights of God.
(2.) This perfection is injured, by presuming upon it, or making an ill
use of it : as in the neglect of prayer for the supply of man's wants, be cause God knows them already ; so that that which is an encouragement to prayer, they make the reason of restraining it before God. Prayer is not to administer knowledge to God, but to acknowledge this admirable perfection of the divine nature. If God did not know, there were indeed no use of prayer ; it would be as vain a thing to send up our prayers to heaven, as to implore the senseless statue or picture of a prince for a protection. We pray because God knows, for though he know our wants with a knowledge of vision, yet he will not know them with a knowledge of supply, till he be sought unto, Mat. vi. 82, 33. All the excellencies of God are ground of adoration ; and this excellency is the ground of that part of worship we call prayer, Mat. vii. 11. If God be to be worshipped, he is to be called upon :
invocations of his name in our necessities is a chief act of worship, whence the temple, the place of solemn worship, was not called the house of sacrifice,
but * the house of prayer.'
Prayer was not appointed for God's information as if he were ignorant, but for the expression of our desires ; not to furnish him with a knowledge of what we want, but to manifest to him by some rational sign convenient to our nature, our sense of that want, which he knows by himself. So that prayer is not designed to acquaint God with our wants, but to express the desire of a remedy of our wants. God knows our wants, but hath not made promises barely to our wants but to our asking, that his omniscience in hearing, as well as his sufficiency in supplying, may have a sensible honour in our acknowledgments and receipts. It is therefore an ill use of this excellency of God to neglect prayer to him as needless, because he knows already.
(3.) This perfection of God is wronged by a practical denial of it. It is the language of every sin, and so God takes it when he comes to reckon with men for their impieties. Upon this he charges the greatness of the iniquity of Israel, the overflowing of blood in the land, and the perverseness
Ps. CXLVII. 5.] GOD'S KNOWLEDGE. 521
of the city : ' They say, The Lord hath forsaken the earth, and the Lord sees not,' Ezek. ix. 9. They deny his eyes to see, and his resolution to punish.
[1.] It will appear in forbearing sin from a sense of man's knowledge, not of God's. Open impieties are refrained [from] because of the eye of man ; but secret sins are not checked because of the eye of God. Wicked ness is committed in darkness, that is restrained in light ; as if darkness
were as great a clog to God's eyes as it is to ours, as though his eyes were muffled with the curtains of the night, Job xxii. 14. This it is likely was at
the root of Jonah's flight ; he might have some secret thought that his master's eye could not follow him, as though the close hatches of a ship could secure him from the knowledge of God, as well as the sides of the ship could from the dashing of the waves. What lies most upon the con science when it is graciously wounded, is least regarded, or contemned when
it is basely inclined. David's heart smote him not only for his sin in the gross, but as particularly circumstantiated by the commission of it in the sight
of God : Ps. li 4, ' Against thee, thee only, have I sinned, and done this
evil in thy sight.' None knew the reason of Uriah's death but myself, and because others knew it not, I neglected any regard to this divine eye. When
Jacob's sons used their brother Joseph so barbarously, they took care to hide it from their father, but cast away all thoughts of God, from whom it could not be concealed.
Doth not the presence of a child bridle a man from the act of a longed
for sin, when the eye of God is of no force to restrain him ? As if God's knowledge were of less value than the sight of a little boy or girl, as if a child only could see, and God were blind. He that will forbear an unworthy
action for fear of an informer, will not forbear it for God ; as if God's omni science were not as full an intelligencer to him, as man can be an informer to a magistrate. As we acknowledge the power of men seeing us when we
are ashamed to commit a filthy action in their view, so we discover * the power of God seeing us when we regard not what we do before the light of his eyes. Secret sins are more against God than open. Open sins are against the law, secret sins are against the law and this prime perfection of his nature. The majesty of God is not only violated, but the omniscience of God disowned, who is the only witness. We must, in all of them, either imagine him to be without eyes to behold us, or without an arm of justice to punish us. And often it is, I believe, in such cases, that if any thoughts
of God's knowledge strike upon men, they quickly damp them, lest they should begin to know what they fear, and fear that they might not eat their pleasant sinful morsels.
[2.] It appears in partial confessions before God. As by a free, full, and ingenuous confession we offer a due glory to this attribute, so by a feigned and curtailed confession we deny him the honour of it ; for though by any confession we in part own him to be a sovereign and judge, yet by a half and pared acknowledgment, we own him to be no more than a human and ignorant one. Achan's full confession gave God the glory of his omni science, manifested in the discovery of his secret crime : Joshua vii. 19,
' And Joshua said to Achan, My son, give glory to the Lord God of Israel, and make confession unto him.' And so, Ps. 1. 23, 'Whoso offereth praise
glorifieth me,' or confession, as the word signifieth, in which sense I would rather take it, referring to this attribute, which God seems to tax sinners
with the denial of, ver. 21, telling them that he would open the records of
their sins before them, and indict them particularly for every one. If there-
* Qu. < disown ' ?— ED.
522 CHAKNOCK'S WOEKS. [Ps. CXLYII. 5.
fore you would glorify this attribute, which shall one day break open your consciences, offer to me a sincere confession. When David speaks of the happiness of a pardoned man, Ps. xxxii. 1, 2, he adds, 'in whose spirit
there is no guile,' not meaning a sincerity in general, but that ingenuity in confessing.* To excuse or extenuate sin, is to deny God the knowledge of the depths of our deceitful hearts. When we will mince it rather than aggravate it, lay it upon the inducements of others when it was the free act
of our own wills, study shifts to deceive our judge, this is to ' speak lies of him,' as the expression is, Hosea vii. 13 ; as though he were a God easy to be cheated, and knew no more than we are willing to declare. What did
Saul's transferring his sin from himself to the people, 1 Sam. xv. 15, but charge God with a defect in this attribute ? When man could not be like God in his knowledge, he would fancy a God like to him in his ignorance, and imagine a possibility of hiding himself from his knowledge ; and all men tread more or less in their father's steps, and are fruitful to devise distinctions to disguise errors in doctrine, and excuses to palliate errors in practice. This crime Job removes from himself, when he speaks of several
acts of his sincerity : ' If I covered my transgression as Adam, by hiding my iniquity in my bosom,' Job xxxi. 33, I hid not any of my sins in my own conscience, but acknowledged God a witness of them, and gave God the glory of his knowledge by a free confession. I did not conceal it from God as Adam did, or as men ordinarily do, as if God could understand no more of their secret crimes than they will let him, and had no more sense of their faults than they would furnish him with. As the first rise of confession is the owning of this attribute (for the justice of God would not scare men, nor the holiness of God awe them without a sense of his knowledge
of their iniquities), so to drop out' some fragments of confession, discover some sins, and conceal others, is a plain denial of the extensiveness of the divine knowledge.
[3.] It is discovered by putting God off with an outside worship. Men are often flatterers of God, and think to bend him by formal glavering de votions, without the concurrence of their hearts, as though he could not pierce into the darkness of the mind, but did as little know us as one man
knows another. There are such things as ' feigned lips,' Ps. xvii. 1 ; a contradiction between the heart and the tongue, a clamour in the voice and
scoffing in the soul, a crying to God, * Thou art my father, the guide of my youth,' and yet speaking and doing evil to the utmost of our power, Jer. iii. 4, 5 ; as if God could be imposed upon by fawning pretences, and, like old Isaac, take Jacob for Esau, and be cozened by the smell of his garments ;
as if he could not discern the negro heart under an angel's garb. Thus Ephraim, the ten tribes, apostatised from the true religion, would go with their flocks and their herds to seek the Lord, Hosea v. 6 ; would sacrifice multitudes of sheep and heifers, which was the main outside of the Jewish religion ; only with their flocks and their herds, not with their hearts, with those inward qualifications of deep humiliation and repentance for sin, as
though outside appearances limited God's observation, whereas God had told them before that he ' knew Ephraim, and Israel was not hid from him' ver. 3. Thus to do is to put a cheat upon God, and think to blind
his all-seeing eye, and therefore it is called deceit : Ps. Ixxviii. 36, ' They did flatter him with their mouths.' The word HD3 signifies to deceive as well as to flatter ; not that they or any else can deceive God, but it implies an endeavour to deceive him by a few dissembling words and gestures, or an imagination that God was satisfied with bare professions, and would not
* Camero. p. 89, col. 1.
Ps. CXLVII. 5.] GOD'S KNOWLEDGE. 523
concern himself in a further inquisition. This is an unworthy conceit of God, to fancy that we can satisfy for inward sins, and avert approaching judgments by external offerings, by a loud voice, with a false heart, as if
God (like children) would be pleased with the glittering of an empty shell, or the rattling of stones, the chinking of money, a mere voice, and crying without inward frames and intentions of service.
[4.] In cherishing multitudes of evil thoughts. No man but would blush for shame if the base, impure, slovenly thoughts, either in or out of duties of worship, were visible to the understanding of man. How diligent would he be to curb his luxuriant and unworthy fancies, as well as bite in his words ; but when we give the reins to the motions of our hearts, and suffer them to run at random without a curb, it is an evidence we are not concerned for their falling under the notice of the eye of God, and it argues a very weak belief
of this perfection, or scarce any belief at all. Who can think any man's heart possessed with a sense of this infinite excellency, that suffers his mind, in his meditation on God, to wander into every sty, and be picking up stones upon a dunghill ? What doth it intimate but that those thoughts are as invisible or inaudible to God as they are to men without the garments of words ?* When a man thinks of obscene things, his own natural notions, if revived, would tell him that God discerns what he thinks, that the depths of his heart are open to him ; and the voice of those notions is, deface those
vain imaginations out of your minds. But what is done ? Men cast awayrational light, muster up conceits, that God sees them not, knows them not, and so sink into the puddle of their sordid imaginations as though they remained in darkness to God.
I might further instance, [5.] In omission of prayer, which arises sometimes from a flat atheism. Who will call upon a God that believes no such being ? Or from partial
atheism, either a denial of God's sufficiency to help, or of his omniscience to know, as if God were like the statue of Jupiter in Crete, framed without ears.
[6.] In the hypocritical pretences of men to exempt them from the ser vice God calls them to ; when men pretend one thing, and intend another. This lurks in the veins sometimes of the best men ; sometimes it ariseth from the fear of man, when men are more afraid of the power of man than of dissembling with the Almighty. It will pretend a virtue to cover a secret
wile, and ' choose the tongue of the crafty,' as the expression in Job, chap. xv. 5. The case is plain in Moses, who, when ordered to undertake an eminent service, pretends a want of eloquence, and an ungrateful slowness of speech, Exod. iv. 10. This generous soul, that before was not afraid to discover himself in the midst of Egypt for his countrymen, answers sneakingly to
God, and would veil his carnal fear with a pretence of insufficiency and
humility. 'Who am I, that I should go unto Pharaoh?' Exod. iii. 11. He could not well allege an inability to go to Pharaoh, since he had had an education in the Egyptian learning, which rendered him capable to appear at court. God at last uncaseth him, and shews it all to be a dissimulation ; and whatsoever was the pretence, fear lay at the bottom. He was afraid of his life upon his appearance before Pharaoh, from whose face he had fled upon the slaying the Egyptian, which God intimates to him, Exod. iv. 19,
' Go, and return unto Egypt, for all the men are dead which sought thy
life.' What doth this carriage speak, but as if God's eye were not upon our inward parts; as though we could lock him out of our hearts that cannot be shut out from any creek of the hearts of men and angels.
* Drexel Nicetas, lib. ii. cap. x. p. 357.
524 CHARNOCK'S WORKS. [Ps. CXLYII. 5.
Use 2. The second use is of comfort. It is a ground of great comfort under the present dispensation wherein we are. We have heard the doctrinal part, and God hath given us the experimental part of it in his
special providence this day* upon the stage of world. And blessed he God that he hath given us a ground of comfort without going out of our ordinary
course to fetch it, whereby it seems to be peculiarly of God's ordering for us. 1. It is a comfort in all the clandestine contrivances of men against the church. His eyes pierce as far as the depths of hell. Not one of his
church's adversaries lies in a mist ; all are as plain as the stars which he numbers. ' Mine adversaries are all before thee,' Ps. Ixix. 19 ; more ex actly known to thee than I can recount them. It is a prophecy of Christ,
wherein Christ is brought in speaking to God, of his own and the church's enemies. He comforts himself with this, that God hath his eye upon every particular person among his adversaries. He knows where they repose themselves when they go out to consult, and when they come in with their resolves. He discerns all the rage that spirits their hearts, in what corner it lurks, how it acts ; all the disorders, motions of it, and every object of that rage. He cannot be deceived by the closest and subtilest person. Thus
God speaks concerning Sennacherib and his host against Jerusalem, Isa. xxxvii. 28, 29. After he had spoke of the forming of his church and the weakness of it, he adds, * But -I know thy abode, and thy going out and thy doming in, and thy rage against me ; because thy rage against me, and thy tumult is come up into mine ears, therefore will I put my hook in thy
nose, and my bridle in thy lips, and I will turn thee back,' &c. He knows
all the methods of the counsels, the stages they had laid, the manner of execution of their designs, all the ways whither they turned themselves, and would use them no better than men do devouring fish and untamed beasts, with a hook in the nose and a bridle in the mouth. Those statesmen in Isa.
xxix. 15, thought their contrivances too deep for God to fathom, and too close for God to frustrate : « They seek deep to hide their counsels from the Lord ; surely your turning of things upside down shall be esteemed as
the potter's clay,' of no more force and understanding than a potter's vessel, which understands not its own form wrought by the artificer, nor the use it
is put to by the buyer and possessor ; or shall be esteemed as a potter's vessel, that can be as easily flung back into the mass from whence it was taken, as preserved in the figure it is now endued with. No secret designer
is shrouded from God's sight, or can be sheltered from God's arm. He understands the venom of their hearts better than we can feel it, and dis covers their inward fury more plainly than we can see the sting or teeth of a viper when they are opened for mischief ; and to what purpose doth God know and see them, but in order to deliver his people from them in his own
due time : ' I know their sorrow, and am come down to deliver them,' Exod. iii. 7, 8. The walls of Jerusalem are continually before him ; he knows, therefore, all that would undermine and demolish them. None can hurt
Zion by any ignorance or inadvertency in God.
It is observable that our Saviour, assuming to himself a different title in every epistle to the seven churches, doth particularly ascribe to himself this of knowledge and wrath in that to Thyatira, an emblem or de scription of the Romish state : Kev. ii. 19, * And unto the angel 9f the church at Thyatira write : These things saith the Son of God,
who hath his eyes like to a flame of fire, and his feet like fine brass.' His eyes, like a flame of fire, are of a piercing nature, insinuating themselves into
all the pores and parts of the body they encounter with ; and his feet, like
* Nov. 1678, when the popish plot was discovered.
Ps. CXLVII. 5.] GOD'S KNOWLEDGE. 525
brass, to crush them with, is explained, verse 23, < I will kill her children with death, and all the churches shall know that I am he which searches the reins and the heart : and I will give to every one of you according to
your works.' He knows every design of the Romish party, designed by that
church of Thyatira.* Jezebel, there, signifies a whorish church, such a
church as shall act as Jezebel, Ahab's wife, who was not only a worshipper of idols, but propagated idolatry in Israel, slew the prophets, persecuted
Elijah, murdered Naboth, the name whereof signifies prophecy, seized upon his possession. And if it be said that, verse 1 9, this church was commended
for her works, faith, patience, it is true Rome did at first strongly profess
Christianity, and maintained the interest of it, but afterwards fell into the
practice of Jezebel, and committed spiritual adultery. And is she to be owned for a wife that now plays the harlot, because she was honest and
modest at her first marriage ? And though she shall be destroyed, yet not
speedily : f verse 22, * I will cast her into a bed,' seems to intimate the destruction of Jezebel not to be at once and speedily, but in a lingering way, and by degrees, as sickness consumes a body.
2. This perfection of God fits him to be a special object of trust. If he were forgetful, what comfort could we have in any promise ? How could we depend upon him if he were ignorant of our state ? His compassions to pity us, his readiness to relieve us, his power to protect and assist us, would be insignificant, without his omniscience to inform his goodness and direct
the arm of his power. This perfection is, as it were, God's office of intelli gence. As you go to your memorandumbook to know what you are to do,
so doth God to his omniscience. This perfection is God's eye, to acquaint him with the necessities of his church, and directs all his other attributes in their exercise for and about his people. You may depend upon his mercy that hath promised, and upon his truth to perform, upon his sufficiency to supply you and his goodness to relieve you, and his righteousness to reward you, because he hath an infinite understanding to know you and your wants, you and your services. And without this knowledge of his, no comfort could be drawn from any other perfection ; none of them could be a sure nail to hang our hopes and confidence upon. This is that the church always celebrated :
Ps. cv. 8, * He hath remembered his covenant for ever, and the word which he hath commanded to a thousand generations ; ' and verse 42, ' He remem bered his holy promise ; ' and Ps. cvi. 45, ' He remembered for them his covenant.' He remembers and understands his covenant, therefore his pro mise to perform it, and therefore our wants to supply them.
3. And the rather, because God knows the persons of all his own. He hath in his infinite understanding the exact number of all the individual per
sons that belong to him : 2 Tim. ii. 19,' The Lord knows them that are
his.' He knows all things, because he hath created them ; and he knows his people, because he hath not only made them, but also chose them. He could no more choose he knew not what, than he could create he knew not what. He knows them under a double title : of creation, as creatures, in the common mass of creation ; as new creatures, by a particular act of separation. He cannot be ignorant of them in time whom he foreknew from eternity. His knowledge in time is the same he had from eternity. He foreknew them that he intended to give the grace of faith unto ; and he knows them after they believe, because he knows his own act in bestowing
grace upon them, and his own mark and seal wherewith he hath stamped
* For the evidence of it I refer you to Dr More's Exposition of the Seven Churches, worthy every learned and understanding man's reading, and of every sober Komanist. t Coc. in loc.
526 CHARNOCK'S WORKS. [Ps. CXLVII. 5.
them. No doubt but he that ' calls the stars of heaven by their names,' Ps. cxlvii. 4, knows the number of those living stars that sparkle in the firma ment of his church. He cannot be ignorant of their persons, when he num bers the hairs of their heads, and hath registered their names in the book of life. As he only had an infinite mercy to make the choice, so he only hath an infinite understanding to comprehend their persons. We only know the elect of God by a moral assurance in the judgment of charity, when the con versation of men is according to the doctrine of God. We have not an in fallible knowledge of them, we may be often mistaken ; Judas, a devil, may be judged by man for a saint, till he be stripped of his disguise. God only hath an infallible knowledge of them ; he knows his own records, and the counterparts in the hearts of his people. None can counterfeit his seal, nor can any raze it out. When the church is either scattered like dust by per secution, or overgrown with superstition and idolatry, that there is scarce any grain of true religion appearing, as in the time of Elijah, who complained that he was left alone, as if the church had been rooted out of that corner of the world, 1 Kings xix. 14, 18, yet God knew that he had a number fed in
a cave, and had reserved ' seven thousand men ' that had preserved the purity of his worship, and ' not bowed their knee to Baal.' * Christ knew his sheep as well as he is known of them, yea, better than they can know him. History acquaints us that Cyrus had so vast a memory that he knew the name of every particular soldier in his army, which consisted of divers nations.
Shall it be too hard for an infinite understanding to know every one of that host that march under his banners ? May he not as well know them as know the number, qualities, influences of those stars which lie concealed from our eye, as well as those that are visible to our sense ? Yes, he knows them, as a general, to employ them, as a shepherd, to preserve them. He
knows them in the world to guard them, and he knows them, when they are out of the world, to gather them, and cull out their bodies, though wrapped up in a cloud of the putrified carcasses of the wicked. As he knew them from all eternity to elect them, so he knows them in time to clothe their persons with righteousness, to protect their persons in calamity, according to his good pleasure, and at last to raisej and reward them according to his promise.
4. We may take comfort from hence, that our sincerity cannot be un known to an infinite understanding. Not a way of the righteous is con
cealed from him, and therefore they shall ' stand in judgment before him.' Ps. i. 6, 'The Lord knows the way of the righteous;' he knows them to observe them, and he knows them to reward them. How comfortable is it to appeal to this attribute of God for our integrity, with Hezekiah : 2 Kings xx. 3, ' Remember, Lord, how I have walked before thee in truth, and with
a perfect heart.' Christ himself is brought in this prophetical psalm draw ing out the Icomfort of this attribute : Ps. xl. 9, ' I have not refrained my lips, 0 Lord, thou knowest,' meaning his faithfulness in declaring the righteousness of God. Job follows the same steps : ' Also now, behold, my record is in heaven, and my witness is on high,' Job xvi. 19; my inno cence hath the testimony of men, but my greatest support is in the records of God. Also now, or besides the testimony of my own heart, I have another witness in heaven that knows the heart, and can only judge of the principles of my actions, and clear me from the scorn of my friends, and the accusations of men, with a justification of my innocence. He repeats it twice, to take the greater comfort in it. God knows that we do that in the simplicity of our hearts, which may be judged by men to be done for
* Turrettine's Sermons, p. 362.
Ps. CXLVII. 5.J GOD'S KNOWLEDGE. 527
unworthy and sordid ends. He knows not only the outward action, hut the inward affection, and praises that which men often dispraise ; and writes down that with an euge, ' Well done, good and faithful servant,' which men daub with their severest censures, Rom. ii. 29. How refreshing is it to consider that God never mistakes the appearance for reality, nor is led by the judgment of man ! He sits in heaven, and laughs at their follies and
censures. If God had no sounder and no more piercing a judgment than man, woe be to the sincerest souls, that are often judged hypocrites by some. What a happiness is it for integrity to have a judge of infinite understanding, who will one day wipe off the dirt of worldly reproaches !
^ 'Again, God knows the least dram of grace and righteousness in the
hearts of his people, though but as a * smoking flax,' or as the least bruise of a saving conviction, Mat. xii. 20, and knows it so as to cherish it. He knows that work he hath begun, and never hath his eye off from it to abandon it.
5. The consideration of this excellent perfection in God may comfort us in our secret prayers, sighs, and works. If God were not of infinite under standing, to pierce into the heart, what comfort hath a poor creature that hath a scantiness of expressions, but a heart in a flame ? If God did not understand the heart, faith and prayer, which are internal works, would be in vain. How could he give that mercy our hearts plead for, if he were ignorant of our inward affections ? Hypocrites might scale heaven by lofty expressions, and a sincere soul come short of the happiness he is prepared for, for want of flourishing gifts. Prayer is an internal work, words are but the garment of prayer ; meditation is the body, and affections the soul and
life, of prayer : « Give ear to my words, 0 Lord ; consider my meditation,' Ps. v. 1. Prayer is a rational act, an act of the mind, not the act of a parrot ; prayer is an act of the heart, though the speaking prayer is the work of the tongue. Now, God gives ear to the words, but he considers the meditation, the frame of the heart. Consideration is a more exact notice than hearing, the act only of the ear. Were not God of an infinite understanding, an omniscient, he might take fine clothes, a heap of garments, for the man himself, and be put off by glittering words, without a spiritual frame. What matter of rejoicing is it, that we call not upon a deaf and ignorant idol, but on one that listens to our secret petitions to give them a despatch, that knows our desires afar off, and from the infiniteness of his mercy, joined with his omniscience, stands ready to give us a return ! Hath he not a book of remembrance for them that fear him, and for their sighs and ejaculations to him as well as their discourses of him, Mai. iii. 16; and not only what prayers they utter, but what gracious and holy thoughts
they have of him, ' that thought upon his name ' ? Though millions of sup plications be put up at the same time, yet they have all a distinct file (as I may say) in an infinite understanding, which perceives and comprehends them all. As he observes millions of sins committed at the same time by
a vast number of persons, to record them in order to punishment, so he dis tinctly discerns an infinite number of cries at the same moment to register them in order to an answer.
A sigh cannot escape an infinite understanding, though crowded among a mighty multitude of cries from others, or covered with many unwelcome distractions in ourselves, no more than a believing touch from the woman
that had the bloody issue could be concealed from Christ, and be undiscerned from the press of the thronging multitudes. Our groans are as audible and
intelligible to him as our words, and he knows what is the mind of his ^ own
Spirit, though expressed in no plainer language than sobs and heavings,
528 CHAENOCK'S WORKS. [Ps. CXLYII. 5.
Horn. viii. 27. Thus David cheers up himself under the neglects of his
friends : Ps. xxxviii. 9, * Lord, my desire is before thee ; and my groaning is not hid from thee.' Not a groan of a panting spirit shall be lost till God hath lost his knowledge, not a petition forgotten while God hath a record, nor a tear dried while God hath a bottle to reserve it in, Ps. Ivi. 8.
Our secret works are also known and observed by him, not only our out ward labour, but our inward love in it, Heb. vi. 10. If with Isaac we go
privately into the field to meditate, or secretly * cast our bread upon the waters,' he keeps his eye upon us to reward us, and returns the fruit into our own bosoms, Mat. vi. 4, 6 ; yea, though it be but a cup of cold water, from an inward spring of love given to a disciple. He sees your works and your labours, and faith and patience in working them, Rev. ii. 2, all the
marks of JOUY industry, and strength of your intentions, and will be as exact at last in order to a due praise, as to open sins in order to a just recompence, 1 Cor. iv. 5.
6. The consideration of this excellent attribute affords comfort in the
afflictions of good men. He knows their pressures, as well as hears their cries, Exod. iii. 7. His knowledge comes not by information from us, but his compassionate listening to our cries springs from his own inspection into our sorrows; he is affected with them before we make discovery of them. He is not ignorant of the best season, when they may be usefully inflicted, and when they may be profitably removed. The tribulation and
poverty of his church is not unknown to him : Rev. ii. 8, 9, ' I know thy works and tribulation,' &c. He knows their works, and what tribulation they meet with for him ; he sees their extremities, when they are toiling against the wind and tide of the world, Mark vi. 48 ; yea, the natural exigencies of the multitude are not neglected by him, he discerns to take
care of them. Our Saviour considered the three days' fasting of his fol lowers, and miraculously provides a dish for them in the wilderness. No
good man is ever out of God's mind, and therefore never out of his com passionate care ; his eye pierceth into their dungeons, and pities their miseries. Joseph may forget his brethren, and the disciples not know Christ when he walks upon the midnight waves and turbulent sea,* but a lion's den cannot obscure a Daniel from his sight, nor the depths of the whale's belly bury Jonah from the divine understanding. He discerns Peter in his chains, and Stephen under the stones of martyrdom ; he knows Lazarus under his tattered rags, and Abel wallowing in his blood ; his eye and knowledge goes along with his people when they are transplanted into foreign countries, and sold for slaves into the islands of the Grecians ; for
« he will raise them out of the place,' Joel iii. 6, 7. He would defeat the hopes of the persecutors, and applaud the patience of his people. He knows his people in the tabernacle of life, and in the ' valley of the shadow of death,' Ps. xxiii. He knows all penal evils, because he commissions and directs them. He knows the instruments, because they are his sword, Ps. xvii. 13 ; and he knows his gracious sufferer, because he hath his mark. He discerns Job in his anguish, and the devil in his malice. By the direc tion of this attribute he orders calamities, and rescues from them : ' Thou
hast seen it, for thou beholdest mischief and spite,' Ps. x. 14. That is the comfort of the psalmist, and the comfort of every believer, and the ground of committing themselves to God under all the injustice of men.
7. It is a comfort in all our infirmities. As he knows our sins to charge them, so he knows the weakness of our nature to pity us. As his infinite understanding may scare us, because he knows our transgressions, so it may
* Barlow's Man's Refuge, p. 29, 30.
Ps. CXLVII. 5.] GOD'S KNOWLEDGE. 529
relieve us, because he knows our natural mutability in our first creation :
* He knows our frame, he remembers that we are dust,' Ps. ciii. 14. It is the reason of the precedent verses, why he removes our transgression from
us, why he is so backward in punishing, so patient in waiting, so forward in pitying ; why ? He doth not only remember our sins, but remember our frame or forming, what brittle, though clear glasses we are by creation, how easy to be cracked. He remembers our impotent and weak condition by corruption ; what a sink we have of vain imaginations that remain in us
after regeneration ; he doth not only consider that we were made according to his image, and therefore able to stand, but that we were made of dust and weak matter, and had a sensitive soul, like that of beasts, as well as an
intellectual nature, like that of angels, and therefore liable to follow the
dictates of it without exact care and watchfulness. If he remembered only the first, there would be no issue but indignation ; but the consideration of
the latter moves his compassion. How miserable should we be for want of
this perfection in the divine nature, whereby God remembers and reflects upon his past act in our first frame, and the mindfulness of our condition excites the motion of his bowels to us ! Had he lost the knowledge how he
first framed us, did he not still remember the mutability of our nature as we were formed and stamped in his mint, how much more wretched would our condition be than it is ! If his remembrance of our original be one ground
of his pity, the sense of his omniscience should be a ground of our comfort
in the stirring of our infirmities ; he remembers we were but dust when he made us, and yet remembers we are but dust while he preserves and for bears us.
8. It is some comfort in the fears of some lurking corruption in our hearts. We know by this whither to address ourselves for the search and discovery of it. Perhaps some blessings we want are retarded, some cala mities we understand not the particular cause of are inflicted, some petitions we have put up hang too long for an answer, and the chariot wheels of divine goodness move slow, and are long in coming. Let us beg the aid of this attribute to open to us the remoras, to discover what base affection there is that retards the mercies we want, or attracts the affliction we feel, or bars the door against the return of our supplications. What our dim sight cannot
discover, the clear eye of God can make visible to us. Job x. 2, * Shew me wherefore thou contendest with me.' As in want of pardon, we particularly plead his mercy, and in our desires for the performance of his promise we argue with him from his faithfulness, so in the fear of any insincerity or hidden corruption we should implore his omniscience. For as God is a God in covenant, our God, our God in the whole of his nature, so the per fections of his nature are employed in their several stations as assistances of
his creatures. This was David's practice and comfort. After that large meditation on the omniscience and omnipresence of God, he turns his thoughts of it into petitions for the employment of it in the concerns of his soul, and begs a mercy suitable to the glory of this perfection : Ps. cxxxix. 23,
' Search me, 0 God, and try my heart ; try me, and know my thoughts ; ' dive to the bottom : ver. 24, ' And see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.' His desire is not barely that God should know him, for it would be senseless to beg of God that he should have mercy, or faithfulness, or power, or knowledge in his nature ; but he desires the exercise of this attribute in the discovery of himself to himself,
in order to his sight of any wicked way, and humiliation for it, and reforma tion of it in order to his conduct to everlasting life. As we may appeal to
this perfection to judge us, when the sincerity of our actions is censured by
530 CHAKNOCK'S WORKS. [Ps. CXLVII. 5.
others, so we may implore it to search us when our sincerity is questioned by ourselves, that our minds may be enlightened by a beam from his knowledge, and the little thieves may be pulled out of their dens in our hearts by the hand of his power. In particular, it is our comfort that we can, and our necessity that we must, address particularly to this, when we engage solemnly in a work of self-examination ; that we may have a clearer eye to direct us than our own, that we may not mistake brass for gold, or counterfeit graces for true ; that nothing that is filthy and fit to be cast out may escape our sight, and preserve its stations. And we need not question the laying at the door of this neglect (viz., not calling in this attribute to our aid, whose proper office it is, as I may so say, to search and inquire) all the mistakes, ill success, and fruitlessness of our endeavours in self-exami
nation, -^because we would engage in it in the pitiful strength of our own dimness, and not in the light of God's countenance, and the assistance of his eye, which can discern what we cannot see, and discover that to us which we cannot manifest to ourselves. It is a comfort to a learner of an
art, to have a skilful eye to overlook his work, and inform him of the defects. Beg the help of the eye of God in all your searches and selfexaminations.
9. The consideration of this attribute is comfortable in our assurances of, and reflections upon, the pardon of sin, or seeking of it. As God punishes men for sin according to his knowledge of them, which is greater than the knowledge their own consciences have of them, so he pardons accord ing to his knowledge. He pardons not only according to our know
ledge, but according to his own. He is greater than any man's heart, to condemn for that which a man is at present ignorant of, and greater than our hearts, to pardon that which is not at present visible to us ; he knows that which the most watchful conscience cannot take a survey of. If God had not an infinite understanding of us, how could we have a perfect and full pardon from him ? It would not stand with his honour to pardon he knew not what. He knows what crimes we have to be pardoned, when we know not all of them ourselves, that stand in need of a gracious remission ; his omniscience beholds every sin, to charge it upon our Saviour.
If he knows our sins that are black, he knows every mite of Christ's righteousness, which is pure, and the utmost extent of his merits, as well as the demerit of our iniquities. As he knows the filth of our sin, he also
knows the covering of our Saviour ; he knows the value of the Redeemer's sufferings, and exactly understands every plea in the intercession of our advocate. Though God knows our sins oculo indice, yet he doth not see them oculo judice, with a judicial eye. His omniscience stirs not up his justice to revenge, but his mercy to pity. His infinite understanding of
what Christ hath done directs him to disarm his justice, and sound an alarm to his bowels. As he understands better than we what we have com mitted, so he understands better than we what our Saviour hath merited, and his eye directs his hand in the blotting out guilt, and applying the remedy.
Use 3. The third use shall be to sinners to humble them, and put them upon serious consideration. This attribute speaks terrible things to a pro fligate sinner. Basil thinks that the ripping open the sins of the damned to their faces by this perfection of God is more terrible than their other tor ments in hell. God knows the persons of wicked men, not one is exempted from his eye, he sees all the actions of men as well as he knows their per
sons : Job xi. 11, 'He knows vain men, he sees wickedness also.' Job xxxiv. 21, <His eye is upon all their goings.' He hears the most private whispers, Ps. cxxxix. 4 ; the scope, manner, circumstance of speaking he
Ps. CXLVII. 5.J GOD'S KNOWLEDGE. 531
knows it altogether ; ' he understands all our thoughts,' the first bubblings of that bitter spring, ver. 2. The quickest glances of the fancy, the closest musings of the mind, and the abortive wouldings or wishes of the will, the language of the heart as well as the language of the tongue ; not a foolish thought or an idle word, not a wanton glance or a dishonest action ; not a negligent service, or a distracting fancy, but is more visible to him than the
filth of a dunghill can be to any man by the help of a sunbeam. How much better would it be for desperate sinners to have their crimes known to all
angels in heaven, and men upon earth, and devils in hell, than that they should be known to their sovereign, whose laws they have violated, and
to their judge, whose righteousness obligeth him to revenge the injury !
1. Consider, what a poor refuge is secrecy to a sinner ! Not the mists of a foggy day, not the obscurity of the darkesl/night, not the closest curtains, nor the deepest dungeon, can hide any sin from the eye of God. Adam is
known in his thickets, and Jonah in his cabin. Achan's wedge of gold is discerned by him, though buried in the earth, and hooded with a tent. Shall Sarah be unseen by him, when she mockingly laughs behind the door ?
Shall Gehazi tell a lie, and comfort himself with an imagination of his master's ignorance, as long as God knows it ? Whatsoever works men do, are not hid from God, whether done in the darkness or daylight, in the midnight darkness or the noonday sun. He is all eye to see, and he hath a great wrath to punish. The wheels in Ezekiel are full of eyes : a piercing eye to behold the sinner, and a swift wheel of wrath to overtake him. God is light,
and of all things light is most difficultly kept out. The ' secretest sins are set in the light of his countenance,' Ps. xc. 8, as legible to him as if writ with a sunbeam ; more visible to him than the greatest print to the sharpest eye. The fornications of the Samaritan woman, perhaps known only to her own conscience, were manifest to Christ, John iv. 16. There is nothing so secretly done, but there is an infallible witness to prepare a charge. Though God be invisible to us, we must not imagine we are so to him ; it is a vanity therefore to think we can conceal ourselves from God, by concealing the notions of God from our sense and practice. If men be as close from the eyes of all men, as from those of the sun ; yea, if they could separate them
selves from their own shadow ; they could not draw themselves from God's understanding. How then can darkness shelter us, or crafty artifices de fend us ? With what shame will sinners be filled, when God, who hath traced their steps, and writ their sins in a book, shall make a repetition of
their ways, and unveil the web of their wickedness.
2. What a dreadful consideration is this to the juggling hypocrite, that masks himself with an appearance of piety ! An infinite understanding judges not according to the veils and shadows, but according to truth : ' He judges not according to appearance,' 1 Sam. xvi. 7. The outward comeli
ness of a work imposeth not on him ; his knowledge, and therefore his esti mations, are quite of another nature than those of men. By this perfection
God looks through the veil, and beholds the litter of abominations in the secrets of the soul, the true quality and principle of every work, and judges of them as they are, and not as they appear. Disguised pretexts cannot deceive him ; the disguises are known afar off before they are weaved, he pierceth into the depths of the most abstruse wills ; all secret ends are dis sected before. Every action is naked in its outside, and open in its inside, all are as clear to him as if their bodies were of crystal, so that if there be
any secret reserves, he will certainly reprove us, Job xiii. 10. We are often
deceived, we may take wolves for sheep, and hypocrites for believers ; for
the eyes of men are no better than flesh, and dive no further than appear-
632 OHAKNOCK'S WORKS. [Ps. CXLVII. 5.
ance ; but an infinite understanding, that fathoms the secret depths of the heart, is too knowing to let a dream pass for a truth, or mistake a shadow
for a body. Though we call God Father all our days, speak the language of angels, or be endowed with the gift of miracles, he can discern whether we
have his mark upon us ; he can espy the treason of Judas in a kiss ; Herod's intent of murdering under a specious pretence of worship ; a Pharisee's fraud under a broad philactery ; a ravenous wolf under the softness of a
sheep's skin ; and the devil in Samuel's mantle, or when he would shroud himself among the sons of God, Job i. 6, 7. All the rooms of the heart, and every atom of dust in the least chink of it, is clear to his eye. He can strip sin from the fairest excuses, pierce into the heart with more ease than the sun can through the thinnest cloud or vapour, and look through all
Ephraim's ingenious inventions to excuse his idolatry, Hosea v. 3. Hypocrisy then is a senseless thing, since it cannot escape unmasking by an infinite understanding. As all our force cannot stop his arm, when he is resolved to punish, so all our sophistry cannot blind his understanding, when he comes to judge. Woe to the hypocrite, for God sees him ; all his juggling is open and naked to infinite understanding.
3. Is it not also a senseless thing to be careless of sins committed long ago ? The old sins forgotten by men, stick fast in an infinite understanding. Time cannot raze out that which hath been known from eternity. Why should they be forgotten many years after they were acted, since they were foreknown in an eternity before they were committed, or the criminal capable to practise them ? Amalek must pay their arrears of their ancient unkindness to Israel in the time of Saul, though the generation that committed them were rotten in their graves, 1 Sam. xv. 2. Old sins are written in a book, which lies always before God ; and not only our own sins, but the
sins of our fathers, to be requited upon their posterity: Isa. Ixv. 6, ' Behold it is written.' What a vanity is it, then, to be regardless of the sins of an age that went before us ; because they are in some measure out of our
knowledge, are they therefore blotted out of God's remembrance ? Sins are bound up with him, as men do bonds, till they resolve to sue for the debt :
' The iniquity of Ephraim is bound up,' Hosea xiii. 12. As his foreknow ledge extends to all acts that shall be done, so his remembrance extends to all acts that have been done. We may as well say, God foreknows nothing that shall be done to the end of the world, as that he forgets any things that hath been done from the beginning of the world. The former ages of the
world are no further distant from him than the latter. God hath a calendar
(as it were) or an account-book of men's sins ever since the beginning of the world, what they did in their childhood, what in their youth, what in
their manhood, and what in their old age. He hath them ' in store among his treasure,' Deut. xxxii. 34. He hath neither lost his understanding to know them, nor his resolution to revenge them. As it follows : ver. 35,
' To me vengeance belongs.' He intends to enrich his justice with a glorious manifestation, by rendering a due recompence. And it is to be observed, that God doth not only necessarily remember them, but sometimes binds
himself by an oath to do it : Amos viii. 7, ' The Lord hath sworn by the excellency of Jacob, Surely I will never forget any of their works ;' or in the Hebrew, ' If I ever forget any of their works ;' that is, let me not be accounted a God for ever, if I do forget ; let me lose my Godhead, if I lose my remembrance. It is not less a misery to the wicked, than it is a com fort to the godly, that their record is in heaven.
4. Let it be observed, that this infinite understanding doth exactly know the sins of men ; he knows so as to consider. He doth not only know them,
Ps. CXLVII. 5.] GOD'S KNOWLEDGE. 533
but intently behold them : Ps. xi. 4, 'His eyelids try the children of men,' a metaphor taken from men, that contract the eyelids when they would wistly and accurately behold a thing ; it is not a transient and careless
look : Ps. x. 14, ' Thou hast seen it ;' thou hast intently beheld it, as the word properly signifies. He beholds and knows the actions of every par ticular man, as if there were none but he in the world ; and doth not only know, but ponder, Prov. v. 21, and « consider their works,' Ps. xxxiii. 15. He is not a bare spectator, but a diligent observer : « By him actions are weighed,' 1 Sam. ii. 3, to see what degree of good or evil there is in them, what there is to blemish them, what to advantage them, what the quality and quantity of every action is. Consideration takes in every cir cumstance of the considered object. Notice is taken of the place where, the minute when, the mercy against which it is committed ; the number of them
is exact in God's book : ' They have tempted me now these ten times,' Num. xiv. 22, against the demonstrations of my glory in Egypt and the wilderness. The whole guilt in every circumstance is spread before him. His
knowledge of men's sins is not confused, such an imperfection an infinite understanding cannot be subject to ; it is exact, for ' iniquity is marked before him,' Jer. ii. 22.
5. God knows men's miscarriage so as to judge. This use his omni science is put to, tojoaaintain his sovereign authority in the exercise of his justice. His notice of the sins of men is in order to a just retribution: Ps.
x. 14, ' Thou hast seen mischief, to requite it with thy hand.' The eye of his knowledge directs the hand of his justice, and no sinful action that falls under his cognizance but will fall under his revenge ; they can as little escape his censure as they can his knowledge. He is a witness in his omniscience, that he may be a judge in his righteousness. ' He knows the hearts of the wicked ' so as to hate their works, and testify his abhorrency of that which is of high value with men, Luke xvi. 15. Sin is not pre served in his understanding, or written down in his books to be moth-eaten as an old manuscript, but to be opened one day and copied out in the con sciences of men. He writes them to publish them, and sets them in the light of his countenance, to bring them to the light of their consciences. What
a terrible consideration is it, to think that the sins of a day are upon record in an infallible understanding, much more the sins of a week. What a num ber, then, do the sins of a month, a year, ten or forty years arise to ! How many actions against charity, against sincerity ! What an infinite number
is there of them, all bound up in the court-rolls of God's omniscience, in order to a trial, to be brought out before the eyes of men ! Who can seri
ously consider all those bonds, reserved in the cabinet of God's knowledge, to be sued out against the sinner in due time, without an unexpressible horror ?
Use 4. The fourth use is of exhortation. Let us have a sense of God's knowledge upon our hearts. All wickedness hath a spring from a want of due consideration and sense of it. David concludes it so, Ps. Ixxxvi. 14 ; the proud rose up against him, and violent men sought after his soul, be cause they did not set God before them. They think God doth not know, and therefore care not what nor how they act. When the fear of this attri
bute is removed, a door is opened to all impiety. What is there so villanous but the minds of men will attempt to act ? What reverence of a Deity
can be left, when the sense of his infinite understanding is extinguished ? What faith could there be in judgment, in witnesess? How would the
foundations of human society be overturned ! the pillars upon which com
merce stands be utterly broken and dissolved! What society can be
534 CHARNOCK'S WORKS. . [Ps. CXLVIL 5.
preserved if this be not truly believed and faithfully stuck to ? But how easily would oaths be swallowed and quickly violated if the sense of this perfection were rooted out of the minds of men ! What fear could they have of calling to witness a being they imagine blind and ignorant ? Men secretly imagine that God knows not, or soon forgets, and then make bold to sin against him, Ezek. viii. 12. How much does it therefore concern us
to cherish and keep alive the sense of this ? If God * writes us upon the palms of his hands,' as the expression is, to remember us, let us engrave him upon the tables of our hearts to remember him. It would be a good motto to write upon our minds, God knows all, he is of infinite under standing.