Part 18
God, and then afterwards good ; but he is good as he is God, his essence
* Ingelo, Bentivolio, et Uran, book iv. p. 260, 261. t Daille, Melange, part ii. p. 704, 705. J Ficini, Epist. lib. xi. epist. 30.
286 CHARNOCK'S WORKS. [MARK X. ] 8.
being one and the same, is formally and equally God and good. 'Aura. vadov, good of himself, was one of the names the Platonists gave him. He is essentially good in his own nature, and not by any outward action which follows his essence. He is an independent being, and hath nothing of good ness or happiness from anything without him, or anything he doth act about. If he were not good by his essence, he could not be eternally good, he could not be the first good, he would have something before him, from whence he derived that goodness wherewith he is possessed ; nor could he be perfectly good, for he could not be equally good to that from whom he derived his goodness. No star, no splendid body that derives light from the sun, doth equal that sun by which it is enlightened.
Hence his goodness must be infinite, and circumscribed by no limits. The exercise of his goodness may be limited by himself, but his goodness, the principle, cannot ; for since his essence is infinite, and his goodness is not distinguished from his essence, it is infinite also. If it were limited, it were finite : he cannot be bounded by anything without him ; if so, then he were not God, because he would have something superior to him, to put bars in his way. If there were anything to fix him, it must be a good or evil being : good it cannot be, for it is the property of goodness to encourage goodness, not to bound it ; evil it cannot be, for then it would extinguish goodness, as well as limit it ; it would not be content with the circumscrib ing it without destroying it ; for it is the nature of every contrary to endea vour the destruction of its opposite. He is essentially good by his own essence, therefore good of himself, therefore eternally good, and therefore abundantly good.
2. God is the prime and chief goodness. Being good per se, and by his own essence, he must needs be the chief goodness, in whom there can be nothing but good, from whom there can proceed nothing but good, to whom all good whatsoever must be referred as the final cause of all good. As he is the chief being, so he is the chief good. And as we rise by steps from the existence of created things, to acknowledge one supreme being, which is God, so we mount by steps from the consideration of the goodness of created things, to acknowledge one infinite ocean of sovereign goodness, whence the streams of created goodness are derived. When we behold things that partake of goodness from another, we must acquiesce in one that hath goodness by participation from no other, but originally from himself, and therefore supremely in himself above all other things ; so that as nothing greater and more majestic can be imagined, so also nothing better and more excellent can be conceived than God. Nothing can add to him, or make him better than he is, nothing can detract from him to make him worse, nothing can be added to him, nothing can be severed from him. No created good can render him more excellent ; no evil from any creature can render him less excellent : Ps. xvi. 2, our ' goodness extends not to him ;' wicked ness may hurt a man, as we are, and our righteousness may profit the son
of man ; but ' if we be righteous, what give we to him, or what receives he
at our hands ?' Job xxxv. 7, 8. As he hath no superior in place above him, so being chief of all, he cannot be made better by any inferior to him. How can he be made better by any, that hath from himself all that he hath ? The goodness of a creature may be changed, but the goodness of the Creator is immutable. He is always like himself, so good that he cannot be evil, as he is so blessed, that he cannot be miserable.
Nothing is good but God, because nothing is of itself but God; as all things being from nothing are nothing in comparison of God, so all things being from nothing are scanty and evil in comparison of God. If anything
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had been ex Deo, God being the matter of it, it had been as good as God is ; but since the principle whence all things were drawn was nothing, though the efficient cause by which they were extracted from nothing was God, they are as nothing in goodness, and not estimable in comparison of God : Ps.
Ixxiii. 25, ' Whom have I in heaven but thee,' &c. God is all good, every creature hath a distinct variety of goodness. God distinctly pronounced
every day's work in the creation good. Food communicates the goodness of its nourishing virtue to our bodies, flowers the goodness of their odours to our smell, every creature a goodness of comeliness to our sight, plants the goodness of healing qualities for our care, and all derive from themselves a goodness of knowledge objectively to our understandings. The sun by one sort of goodness warms us, metals enrich us, living creatures sustain us, and delight us by another ; all those have distinct kinds of goodness, which are eminently summed up in God, and are all but parts of his immense goodness. It is he that enlightens us by his sun, nourisheth us by bread : Mat. iv. 4, ' It is not by bread alone that we live, but by the word of God.' It is all but his own supreme goodness, conveyed to us through those varie ties of conduit pipes. God is all good ; other things are good in their kind, as a good man, a good angel, a good tree, a good plant, but God hath a good of all kinds eminently in his nature. He is no less all-good, than he is almighty, and all-knowing ; as the sun contains in it all the light and more light than is in all the clearest bodies in the world, so doth God contain in him self all the good, and more good, than is in the richest creatures. Nothing is good but as it resembles him, as nothing is hot but as it resembles fire, the prime subject of heat.
God is omnipotent, therefore no good can be wanting to him. If he wero destitute of any which he could have, he were not almighty. He is so good, that there is no mixture of anything, which can be called not good in him ; everything besides him wants some good which others have. Nothing can be so evil as God is good. There can be no evil,|but there is some mixture of good with it, no nature so evil, but there is some spark of goodness in it : but God is a good which hath no taint of evil ; nothing can be so supreme an evil, as God is supreme goodness.
He is only good without capacity of increase ; he is all good, and unmixedly good — none good but God ; a goodness like the sun, that hath all light and no darkness. That is the second thing, he is the supreme and chief goodness.
3. This goodness is communicative. None so communicatively good as God. As the notion of God includes goodness, so the notion of goodness includes diffusiveness ; without goodness he would cease to be a deity, and without diffusiveness he would cease to be good. The being good is neces sary to the being of God, for goodness is nothing else in the notion of it, but a strong inclination to do good ; either to find or make an object, wherein to exercise itself, according to the propension of its own nature, and it is an inclination of communicating itself, not for its own interest, but the good of the object it pitcheth upon. Thus God is good by nature, and his nature is not without activity, he acts conveniently to his own nature : Ps. cxix. 68,
' Thou art good, and dost good.' And nothing accrues to him by the com munications of himself to others, since his blessedness was as great before the frame of any creature, as ever it was since the erecting of the world, so that the goodness of Christ himself increaseth not the lustre of his happi
ness : Ps. xvi. 2, ' My goodness extends not to thee.' He is not of a niggardly and envious nature ; he is too rich to have any cause to envy, and too good to have any will to envy ; he is as liberal as he is rich, according
CHABNOCK'S WORKS. [MARK X. 18.
to the capacity of the object about which his goodness is exercised. The divine goodness being the supreme goodness, is goodness in the highest degree of activity ; not an idle, enclosed, pent-up goodness, as a spring shut up, or a fountain sealed, bubbling up within itself, but bubbling out of itself;
a fountain of gardens to water every part of his creation : ' He is as ointment poured forth,' Cant. i. 3. Nothing spreads itself more than oil, and takes up a larger place wheresoever it drops. It may be no less said of the good ness of God, as it is of the fulness of Christ, Eph. i. 23, ' He fills all in all.' He fills rational creatures with understanding, sensitive nature with vigour and motion, the whole world with beauty and sweetness. Every taste, every touch of a creature, is a taste and touch of divine goodness. Divine goodness offers itself in one spark in this creature, in another spark in the other creature, and altogether make up a goodness inconceivable by anv creature. The whole mass and extracted spirit of it is infinitely short of the goodness of the divine nature, imperfect shadows of that goodness which is in himself.
Indeed, the more excellent anything is, the more nobly it acts. How re motely doth light, that excellent brightness of the creation, disperse itself ! How doth that glorious creature which God hath set in the heavens, spread its wings over heaven and earth, roll itself about the world, cast its beams upward and downward, insinuate into all corners, pierce the depths, and shoot up its rays into the heights, encircle the higher and lower creatures in its arms, reach out its communications to influence everything under the
earth, as well as dart its beams of light and heat on things above or upon
the earth : Ps. xix. 6, ' Nothing is hid from it ;' not from its power, nor from its sweetness. How communicative also is water, a necessary and excellent creature ! How active is it in a river to nourish the living creatures engendered in its womb ; refresheth every shore it runs by, promotes the pro pagation of fruits for the nourishment, and bestows a verdure upon the ground for the delight of man ; and where it cannot reach the higher ground in its substance, it doth by its vapours, mounted up and concocted by the
sun, and gently distilled upon the earth, for the opening its womb to bring forth its fruits. God is more prone to communicate himself than the sun to spread his wings, or the earth to mount up its fruits, or the water to multiply living creatures. Goodness is his nature. Hence were there in ternal commmunications of himself from eternity, diffusions of himself with out himself in time in the creation of the world, like a full vessel running over. He created the world that he might impart his goodness to something without him, and diffuse larger measures of his goodness after he had laid the first foundation of it in its being, and therefore he created several sorts of creatures that they might be capable of various and distinct measures of his liberality, according to the distinct capacities of their nature, but imparted most to the rational creature, because that is only capable of an understand ing to know him, and will to embrace him. He is the highest goodness, and therefore a communicative goodness, and acts excellently according to his nature.
4. God is necesarily good. None is necessarily good but God ; he is as necessarily good, as he is necessarily God. His goodness is as inseparable from his nature as his holiness. He is good by nature, not only by will, as he is holy by nature, not only by will : he is good in his nature and good in his actions, and as he cannot be bad in his nature, so he cannot be bad in his communications ; he can no more act contrary to this goodness in any of his actions, than he can un-God himself. It is not necessary that God should create a world : he was at his own choice whether he would create or
MARK X. 18.] GOD'S GOODNESS. 289
no ; but when he resolves to make a world, it is necessary that he should make it good, because he is goodness itself, and cannot act against his own nature ; he could not create anything without goodness in the very act. The
very act of creation, or communicating being to anything without himself, is in itself an act of goodness as well as an act of power ; had he not been good in himself, nothing could have been endued with any goodness by him. In the act of giving being he is liberal, the being he bestows is a displaying his own liberality ; he could not confer what he needs not, and which could not be deserved, without being bountiful. Since what was nothing could not merit to be brought into being, the very act of giving to nothing a being was an act of choice goodness.
He could not create anything without goodness as the motive, and the necessary motive. His goodness could not necessitate him to make the world, but his goodness could only move him to resolve to make a world ; he was not bound to erect and fashion it because of his goodness, but he could not frame it without his goodness as the moving cause.
He could not create anything, but he must create it good. It had been inconsistent with the supreme goodness of his nature to have created only murderous, ravenous, injurious creatures ; to have created a bedlam rather than a world. A mere heap of confusion would have been as inconsistent with his divine goodness as with his divine wisdom.
Again, when his goodness had moved him to make a creature, his good ness would necessarily move him to be beneficial to his creature ; not that this necessity results from any merit in the creature which he had framed, but from the excellency and diffusiveness of his own nature, and his own glory, the end for which he formed it, which would have been obscure, yea, nothing, without some degrees of his bounty. What occasion of acknow ledgments and praise could the creature have for its being, if God had given him only a miserable being, while it was innocent in action ? The good ness of God would not suffer him to make a creature, without providing conveniences for it, so long as he thought good to maintain its being, and furnishing it with that which was necessary to answer that end for which he created it ; and his own nature would not suffer him to be unkind to hia rational creature while he was innocent. It had been injustice to inflict evil upon the creature that had not offended, and had no relation to an offending creature ; the nature of God could not have brought forth such an act. And therefore some* say that God, after he had created man, could not presently annihilate him, and take away his life and being. As a sovereign he might do it, as almighty he was able to do it, as well as create him, but in regard of his goodness he could not morally do it ; for had he annihilated man as soon as ever he had made him, he had not made man for himself, and for his own glory, to be loved, worshipped, sought, and acknowledged by him ; he would not then have been the end of man ; he had created him in vain, and the world in vain, which he assures us he did not, Isa. xlv. 18, 19. And certainly, if the gifts of God be without repent ance, man could not have been annihilated after his creation without repentance in God, without any cause, had not sin entered into the world. If God did not say to man, after sin had made its entrance into the world,
' Seek ye me in vain,' he could not, because of his goodness, have said so man in his innocence. As God is necessarily mind, so he is necessarily nil ; as he is necessarily knowing, so he is necessarily loving. He could
it be blessed if he did not know himself, and his own perfection ; nor jood if he did not delight in himself and his own perfections. And
* Cocceii, Sum. Theolog. p. 91. » VOL. II. T
290 CHARNOCZ'S WORKS. [MARK X. 18.'
this goodness, whereby he delights in himself, is the source of his delight in ] his creatures, wherein he sees the footsteps of himself. If he loves himself, , he cannot but love the resemblance of himself, and the image of his own goodness. He loves himself, because he is the highest goodness and excel lency, and loves everything as it resembles himself, because it is an efflux of his own goodness ; and as he doth necessarily love himself, and his own
excellency, so he doth necessarily love anything that resembles that excel lency, which is the primary object of his esteem. But,
5. Though he be necessarily good, yet he is also freely good. The necessity of the goodness of his nature hinders not the liberty of his actions. The matter of his acting is not at all necessary, but the manner of his acting in a good and bountiful way is necessary as well as free.* He created the world and man freely, because he might choose whether he would create it ; but he created them good necessarily, because he was first necessarily good in his nature, before he was freely a creator. When he created man, he freely gave him a positive law, but necessarily a wise and righteous law, because he was necessarily wise and righteous before he was freely a lawgiver. When he makes a promise, he freely lets the word go out of his lips ; but when he hath made it, he is necessarily a faithful performer, because he was neces sarily true and righteous in his nature, before he was freely a promiser. God is necessarily good in his nature, but free in his communications of it. To make him necessarily to communicate his goodness in the first creation of the creature, would render him but impotent, good without liberty and without will; if the communication of it be not free, the eternity of the world must necessarily be concluded, which some anciently asserted from the natural
ness of God's goodness, making the world flow from God as light from the sun. God indeed is necessarily good, affective, in regard of his nature ; but freely good, effective, in regard of the effluxes of it to this or that particular subject he pitcheth on. He is not necessarily communicative of his good ness, as the sun of his light, or a tree of its cooling shade, that chooseth not its objects, but enlightens all indifferently, without any variation or dis tinction ; this were to make God of no more understanding than the sun, to shine not where it pleaseth, but where it must. He is an under standing agent, and hath a sovereign right to choose his own subjects. It would not be a supreme goodness, if it were not a voluntary goodness. It is agreeable to the nature of the highest good to be absolutely free, to dis pense his goodness in what methods and measures he pleaseth, according to the free determinations of his own will, guided by the wisdom of his mind, and regulated by the holiness of his nature. He is not to ' give an account of any of his matters,' Job xxxiii. 18 ; 'He will have mercy on whom he will have mercy, and he will have compassion on whom he will
have compassion,' Kom. ix. 15. And he will be good to whom he will be good ; when he doth act, he cannot but act well ; so it is necessary ; yet he may act this good or that good to this or that degree ; so it is free. As it is the perfection of his nature, it is necessary ; as it is the communication of his bounty, it is voluntary. The eye cannot but see if it be open, yet it may glance upon this or that colour, fix upon this or that object, as it is conducted by the will. God necessarily loves himself, because he is good, yet not by constraint, but freedom, because his affection to himself is from a knowledge of himself; he necessarily loves his own image, because it is his image, yet freely, because not blindly, but from motions of understanding and will. What necessity could there be upon him to resolve to communi cate his goodness ? It could not be to make himself better by it ; for he
* Gilbert, de Dei Dominio, p. 6.
MARK X. 18.J GOD'S GOODNESS. 291
had a goodness uncapable of any addition ; he confers a goodness on his creatures, but reaps not a harvest of goodness to his own essence from his creatures. What obligation could there be from the creature to confer a goodness on him to this or that degree, for this or that duration ? If he had not created a man nor angel, he had done them no wrong ; if he had given them only a simple being he had manifested a part of his goodness, without giving them a right to challenge any more of him ; if he had taken away their beings after a time when he had answered his end, he had done them no injury ; for what law obliged him to enrich them, and leave them in that being wherein he had invested them, but his sole goodness ? What
ever sparks of goodness any creature hath are the free effusions of God's bounty, the offspring of his own inclination to do well, the simple favour of the donor, not purchased, not merited by the creature. God is as uncon strained in his liberty, in all his communications, as infinite in his goodness, the fountain of them.
6. This goodness is communicative with the greatest pleasure. Moses desired to see his glory, God assures him he should see his goodness, Exod. xxxiii. 18, 19, intimating that his goodness is his glory, and his glory his delight also. He sends not forth his blessings with an ill will; he doth not
stay till they are squeezed from him ; he ' prevents men with his blessings of goodness,' Ps. xxi. 3 ; he is most delighted when he is most diffusive, and his pleasure in bestowing is larger than his creatures' in possessing; he not covetous of his own treasures ; he lays up his goodness in order to laying it out with a complacency wholly divine. The jealousy princes have of their subjects makes them sparing of their gifts, for fear of giving them
materials for rebellion. God's foresight of the ill use men would make of his benefits damped him not in bestowing his largesses. Be is incapable of envy ; his own happiness can no more be diminished than it can be increased. None can overtop him in goodness, because nothing hath any good, but what is derived from him; his gifts are without repentance. Sorrow hath no footing in him, who is infinitely happy as well as infinitely good. Goodness and envy are inconsistent. How unjustly then did the devil accuse God ! What God gives out of goodness he gives with joy and gladness. He did not only will that we should be, but rejoice that he had
brought us into being. 'He rejoiced in his works,' Ps. civ. 21. And his Wisdom stood by him, ' delighting in the habitable parts of the earth,' Prov. viii. 31. He beheld the world after its creation with a complacency, and still governs it with the same pleasure wherewith he reviewed it. Infinite cheerfulness attends infinite goodness. He would not give if he had not a pleasure that others should enjoy his goodness; since he is better than any thing, and more communicative than anything, he is more joyful in giving out than the sun can be to run its race in pouring forth light. He is said
only to repent and grieve, when men an-swer not the obligations and ends of his goodness, which would be their own felicity as well as his glory. Though he doth not force greater degrees of his goodness upon those that neglect it, yet he denies them not to those that solicit him for it. It is always greater pleasure to him to impart upon the importunities of the creatures, than it is to a mother to reach out her breast to her crying and longing infant. He is not wearied by the solicitations of men, he is pleased
with their prayers, because he is pleased with the imparting of his own goodness. He seems to be in travail with it, longing to be delivered of it into the lap of his creature. He is as much delighted with petitions for his liberality in bestowing his best goodness, as princes are weary of the craving of their subjects. None can be so desirous to squeeze those that are under
292 CHAKNOCK'S WORKS. [MAKE X. 18.
them, as God is delighted to enlarge his hand towards them. It is the
nature of his goodness to be glad of men's solicitations for it, because they are significant valuations of it, and therefore fit occasions for him to bestow it. Since he doth not delight in the unhappiness of any of his creatures, he certainly delights in what may conduce unto their felicity. He doth with the same delight multiply the effects of his goodness, where his wisdom sees
it convenient, as he beheld the first fruits of his goodness, with a com placency upon the laying the topstone of the creation.
7. The displaying of this goodness was the motive and end of all his works of creation and providence.* God being infinitely wise, could not
act without the highest reason, and for the highest end. The reason that induced him to create, must be of as great an eminency as himself ; the
motive could not be taken from without him, because there was nothing but himself in being ; it must be taken therefore from within himself, and from some one of those most excellent perfections whereby we conceive him. But upon the exact consideration of all of them, none can seem to challenge that honour of being the motive of them, to resolve the setting forth any work but his own goodness. This being the first thing manifest in his creation, seems to be the first thing moving him to a resolution to create. Wisdom may be considered as directing, power considered as acting ; but it is natural to reflect upon goodness as moving the one to direct, the other to act. Power was the principle of his action, wisdom the rule of his action, goodness the motive of his action ; principle and rule are awakened by the motive, and subservient to the end. That which is the most amiable per fection in the divine nature, and that which he first took notice of as the foot
steps of them in the distinct view of every day's work, and the general view of the whole frame, seems to claim the best right to be entitled the motive and end of his creation of things.
God could have no end but himself, because there was nothing besides himself. Again, the end of every agent is that which he esteems good, and the best good for that kind of action. Since nothing is to be esteemed good but God, nothing can be the ultimate end of God but himself and his own goodness. What a man wills chiefly is his end ; but God cannot will any other thing but himself as his end, because there is nothing superior to him self in goodness. He cannot will anything, that supremely serves himself and his own goodness as his end ; for if he did, that which he wills, must be superior to himself in goodness, and then he is not God ; or inferior to them in goodness, and then he would not be righteous, in willing that which is a lower good before a higher. God cannot will anything as his end of
acting but himself, without undeifying himself. God's will being infinitely good, cannot move for anything but what is infinitely good ; and therefore whatsoever God made, he made for himself, Prov. xvi. 4, that whatsoever he made might bear a badge of this perfection upon it, and be a discovery of his wonderful goodness ; for the making things for himself doth not signify any indigence in God, that he made anything to increase his excellency (for that is capable of no addition), but to manifest his excellency. God possess ing everything eminently in himself, did not create the world for any need he had of it ; finite things were unable to make any accession to that which is infinite. Man indeed builds a house to be a shelter to him against wind and weather, and makes clothes to secure him from cold, and plants gardens for his recreation and health. God is above all those little helps ; he did
not make the world for himself in such a kind, but for himself, *'. e. the manifestation of himself, and the riches of his nature ; not to make himself
* Amyrald, Moral, torn. i. p. 260.
MARK X.. 18.] GOD'S GOODNESS. 298
blessed, but to discover his own blessedness to his creatures, and communi cate something of it to them. He did not garnish the world with so much bounty, that he might live more happily than he did before ; but that his rational creatures might have fit conveniencies. As the end for which God demands the performance of our duty is not for his own advantage, but for our good, Deut. x. 13, so the end why he conferred upon us the excellency of such a being, was for our good, and the discovery of his goodness to us. For had not God created the world, he had been wholly unknown to any
but himself ; he produced creatures that he might be known ; as the sun shines not only to discover other things, but to be seen itself in its beauty and brightness. God would create things, because he would be known in his glory and liberality ; hence is it that he created intellectual creatures, because without them the rest of the creation could not be taken notice of ;
it had been in some sort in vain ; for no nature lower than an understand ing nature was able to know the marks of God in the creation, and acknow ledge him as God. In this regard, God is good above all creatures, because he intends only to communicate his goodness in creation, not to acquire any goodness or excellency from them, as men do in their framing of things. God is all, and is destitute of nothing, and therefore nothing accrues to him by the creation, but the acknowledgment of his goodness. This goodness, therefore, must be the motive and end of all his works.
III. The third thing, that God is good. 1. The more excellent anything is in nature, the more of goodness and kindness it hath. For we see more of love and kindness in creatures that
are endued with sense, to their descendants, than in plants, that have only a principle of growth. Plants preserve their seeds whole that are enclosed in them ; animals look to their young only after they are dropped from them ; yet after some time take no more notice of them than of a stranger that never had any birth from them. But man, that hath a higher principle of reason, cherisheth his offspring, and gives them marks of his goodness while he lives, and leaves not the world at the time of his death without some testimonies of it ; much more must God, who is a higher principle than sense or reason, be good and bountiful to all his offspring. The more perfect anything is, the more it doth communicate itself. The sun is more excellent than the stars, and therefore doth more sensibly, more extensively disperse its liberal beams than the stars do. And the better any man is, the more charitable he is. God being the most excellent nature, having no thing more excellent than himself, because nothing more ancient than him self, who is the Ancient of days, there is nothing therefore better and more bountiful than himself.
2. He is the cause of all created goodness, he must therefore himself be the supreme good. What good is iu the heavens, is the product of some being above the earth ; and those varieties of goodness in the earth, and several creatures, are somewhere in their fulness and union. That, therefore, which possess all those scattered goodnesses in their fulness, must be all good,
all that good which is displayed in creatures, therefore sovereignly best. Whatsoever natural or moral goodness there is in the world, in angels, or men, or inferior creatures, is a line drawn from that centre, the bubblings of that fountain. God cannot but be better than all, since the goodness that is in creatures is the fruit of his own. If he were not good, he could pro duce no good ; he could not bestow what he had not. If the creature be
good, as the apostle says ' every creature' is, 1 Tim. iv. 4, he must needs be better than all, because they have nothing but what is derived to them
294 CHAENOCK'S WORKS. [MARK X. 18.
from him ; and much more goodness than all, because finite beings are not capable of receiving into them, and containing in themselves, all that good ness which is in an infinite being. When we search for good in creatures, they come short of that satisfaction which is in God, Ps. iv. 6. As the
certainty of a first principle of all things is necessarily concluded from the being of creatures, and the upholding and sustaining power and virtue of
God is concluded from the mutability of those things in the world ; whence we infer, that there must be some stable foundation of those tottering things, some firm hinge upon which those changeable things do move, without which there would be no stability in the kinds of things, no order, no agree ment, or union among them ; so from the goodness of everything, and their usefulness to us, we must conclude him good, who made all those things. And since we find distinct goodnesses in the creature, we must conclude that one principle whence they did flow, excels in the glory of goodness. All those little glimmerings of goodness which are scattered in the creatures, as the image in the glass, represent the face, posture, motion of him whose image it is, but not in the fulness of life and spirit, as in the original ; it is but a shadow at the best, and speaks something more excel lent in the copy. As God hath an infmiteness of being above them, so he hath a supremacy of goodness beyond them. What they have, is but a participation from him ; what he hath, must be infinitely super-eminent above them. If anything be good by itself, it must be infinitely good, it would set itself no bounds ; we must make as many gods as particulars of goodness in the world ; but being good by the bounty of another, that from
whence they flow must be the chief goodness. It is God's excellency and goodness, which like a beam pierceth all things.* He decks spirits with reason, endues matter with form, furnisheth everything with useful qualities.
As one beam of the sun illustrates fire, water, earth, so one beam of God enlightens and endows minds, souls, and universal nature. Nothing in the world had its goodness from itself, any more than it had its being from itself. The cause must be richer than the effect.
But that which I intend is the defence of this goodness. (1.) The goodness of God is not impaired by suffering sin to enter into the
world, and man to fall thereby. It is rather a testimony of God's goodness that he gave man an ability to be happy, than any charge against his good ness that he settled man in a capacity to be evil. God was first a benefactor to man, before man could be a rebel against God. May it not be inquired, whether it had not been against the wisdom of God to have made a rational creature with liberty, and not suffer him to act according to the nature he was endowed with, and to follow his own choice for some time ? Had it been wisdom to frame a free creature, and totally to restrain that creature from following its liberty ? Had it been goodness, as it were, to force the
creature to be happy against its will ? God's goodness furnished Adam with a power to stand ; was it contrary to his goodness to leave Adam to a free use of that power ? To make a creature, and not let that creature act accord ing to the freedom of his nature, might have been thought to have been a blot upon his wisdom, and a constraint upon the creature, not to make use of that freedom of his nature which the divine goodness had bestowed upon him. To what purpose did God make a law to govern his rational creature, and yet resolve that creature should not have his choice, whether he would obey it or no ? Had he been really constrained to observe it, his observa tion of it could no more have been called obedience, than the acts of brutes, that have a kind of natural constraint upon them by the instinct of their
* Ficinus in Com. Amor. Orat. cap. ii. p. 1326.
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nature, can be called obedience ; in vain had God endowed a creature with so great and noble a principle as liberty. Had it been goodness in God, after he had made a reasonable creature, to govern him in the same manner as he did brutes, by a necessary instinct ? It was the goodness of God to the nature of men and angels to leave them in such a condition to be able to give him a voluntary obedience, a nobler offering than the whole creation could present him with ; and shall this goodness be undervalued, and accounted mean, because man made an ill use of it, and turned it into wan tonness ? As the unbelief of man doth not diminish the redeeming grace of God, Rom. iii. 8, so neither doth the fall of man lessen the creating good ness of God. Besides, why should the permission of sin be thought more a blemish to his goodness than the providing a way of redemption for the destroying the works of sin and the devil be judged the glory of it, whereby he discovered a goodness of grace that surpassed the bounds of nature ? If this were a thing that might seem too obscure, or deface the goodness of God, in the permission of the fall of angels and Adam, it was in order to bring forth a greater goodness in a more illustrious pomp to the view of the world : Rom. xi. 32, ' God hath concluded them all in unbelief, that he might have mercy upon all.' But if nothing could be alleged for the defence of his goodness in this, it were most comely for an ignorant creature not to impeach his goodness, but adore him in his proceedings, in the same lan guage the apostle doth: ver. 33, ' Oh the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God ! how unsearchable are his judgments, and
his ways past finding out ! '
(2.) Nor is his goodness prejudiced by not making all things the equal sub jects of it.
[1.] It is true all things are not subjects of an equal goodness. The good ness of God is not so illustriously manifested in one thing as another. In the creation he hath dropped goodness upon some, in giving them beings and sense ; and poured it upon others, in endowing them with understand ing and reason. The sun is full of light, but it hath a want of sense ; brutes excel in the vigour of sense, but they are destitute of the light of reason;
in hath a mind and reason conferred on him, but he hath neither the inteness of mind nor the quickness of motion equal with an angel. In rovidence also he doth give abundance, and opens his hand to some, to
lers he is more sparing ; he gives greater gifts of knowledge to some, while he lets others remain in ignorance ; he strikes down some, and raiseth others ; he afflicts some with a continual pain, while he blesseth others with an uninterrupted health ; he hath chosen one nation wherein to set up his gospel sun, and leaves another benighted in their own ignorance. Known was God in Judea, they were a peculiar people alone of all the nations of the earth, Deut. xiv. 2. He was not equally good to the angels ; he held forth his hand to support some in their happy habitation, while he suffered
athers to sink in irreparable ruin ; and he is not so diffusive here of his
Dodness to his own as he will be in heaven. Here their sun is sometimes louded, but there all clouds and shades will be blown away and melted into lothing ; instead of drops here, there will be above rivers of life. Is any
reature destitute of the open marks of his goodness, though all are not
iriched with those signal characters which he vouchsafes to others ? He
a,t is unerring pronounced everything good distinctly in its production, id the whole good in its universal perfection, Gen. i. 4, 10, 12, 18, 21,
31. Though he made not all things equally good, yet he made nothing and though one creature, in regard of its nature, may be better than lother, yet an inferior creature, in regard of its usefulness in the order of
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the creation, may be better than a superior. The earth hath a goodness in bringing forth fruits, and the waters in the sea a goodness in multiplying food. That any of us have a being, is goodness ; that we have not so healthful a being as others, is unequal, but not unjust, goodness. He is good to all, though not in the same degree : ' The whole earth is full of his mercy,' Ps. cxix. 64. A good man is good to his cattle, to his servants; he makes a provision for all, but he bestows not those floods of bounty upon them that he doth upon his children. As there are various gifts, but one Spirit, 1 Cor. xii. 4, so there are various distributions, but from one good ness ; the drops as well as the fuller streams are of the same fountain, and relish of the nature of it ; and though he do not make all men partake of the riches of his grace after the corruption of their nature, is his goodness disgraced hereby, or doth he merit the title of cruelty ? Will any diminish the goodness of a father for his not setting up his son after he hath foolishly and wilfully proved bankrupt, or not rather admire his liberality in giving him so large a stock to trade with, when he first set him up in the world?
[2.] The goodness of God to creatures is to be measured by their distinct usefulness to the common end. It were better for a toad or serpent to be a man, i.e. better for the creature itself, if it were advanced to a higher degree of being, but not better for the universe. He could have made every pebble a living creature, and every living creature a rational one ; but that he made everything as we see, it was a goodness to the creature itself; but that he did not make it of a higher elevation in nature, was a part of his goodness to the rational creature. If all were rational creatures, there would have been wanting creatures of an inferior nature for their conveniency ; there would have wanted the manifestation of the variety and fulness of his good ness. Had all things in the world been rational creatures, much of that goodness which he hath communicated to rational creatures would not have appeared. How could man have shewed his skill in taming and managing creatures more mighty than himself ? What materials would there have been to manifest the goodness of God bestowed upon the reasonable crea tures for framing excellent works and inventions ? Much of the. goodness of God hath lain wrapped up from sense and understanding. All other things partake not of so great a goodness as man ; yet they are so subser vient to that goodness poured forth on man, that little of it could have been seen without them. Consider man, every member in his body hath a good ness in itself ; but a greater goodness as referred to the whole, without which the goodness of the more noble part would not be manifested. The head is the most excellent member, and hath greater impressions of divine goodness upon it, in regard that it is the organ of understanding. Were every mem ber of the body a head, what a deformed monster would man be ! If he were all head, where would be feet for motion and arms for action ? Man would be fit only for thought, and not for exercise. The goodness of God in giving man so noble a part as the head, could not be known without a tongue, whereby to express the conception of his mind, and without feet and hands whereby to act much of what he conceives and determines, and execute the resolves of his will. All those have a goodness in themselves, an honour, a comeliness from the goodness of God, 1 Cor. xii. 22, 23 ; but not so great a goodness as the nobler part. Yet if you consider them in their functions, and refer them to that excellent member which they serve, their inferior goodness is absolutely necessary to the goodness of the other, without which the goodness of the head and understanding would lie in obscurity, be insignificant to the whole world, and in a great measure to the person himself that wants such members.
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[3.] The goodness of God is more seen in this inequality. If God were equally good to all, it would destroy commerce, unity, the links of human society, damp charity, and render that useless which is one of the noblest and delightfullest duties to be exercised here. It would cool prayer, which is
excited by wants, and is a necessary demonstration of the creature's depend ence on God. But in this inequality, every man hath enough in his enjoy ments for praise, and in his wants matter for his prayer. Besides, the in equality of the creature is the ornament of the world. What pleasure could a garden afford if there were but one sort of flowers, or one sort of plants ? Far less than when there is variety to please the sight and every other sense.
Again, the freedom of divine goodness, which is the glory of it, is evident hereby. Had he been alike good to all, it would have looked like a neces sary, not a free act ; but by the inequality, it is manifest that he doth not
do it by a natural necessity, as the sun shines, but by a voluntary liberty, as being the entire lord and free disposer of his own goods ; and that it is the gift of the pleasure of his will, as well as the efflux of his nature ; that he hath not a goodness without wisdom, but a wisdom as rich as his bounty.
[4.] The goodness of God could not be equally communicated to all after their settlement in their several beings, because they have not a capacity in their natures for it. He doth bestow the marks of his goodness according to that natural capacity of fitness he perceives in his creatures. As the water of the sea fills every creek and gulf with different measures, according to the compass each have to contain it ; and as the sun doth disperse light to the stars above and the places below, to some more, to some less, accord ing to the measures of their reception : God doth not do good to all crea tures according to the greatness of his own power, and the extent of his own wealth, but according to the capacity of the subject ; not so much good as he can do, but so much good as the creature can receive. The creature would sink if God would pour out all his goodness upon it. As Moses would have perished if God should have shewn him all his glory, Exod. xxxiii. 18, 20. He doth manifest more goodness to his reasonable crea tures, because they are more capable of acknowledging and setting forth his goodness.
[5.] God ought to be allowed the free disposal of his own goodness. Is not God the lord of his own gifts ; and will you not allow him the privilege of having some more peculiar objects of his love and pleasure, which you allow without blame to man, and use yourself without any sense of a crime? Is a prince esteemed good, though he be not equally bountiful to all his servants, nor equally gracious in pardoning all his rebels ? and shall the goodness of the great Sovereign of the world be impeached, notwithstanding those mighty distributions of it, because he will act according to his own
, wisdom and pleasure, and not according to men's fancies and humours ? Must purblind reason be the judge and director how God shall dispose of his own, rather than his own infinite wisdom and sovereign will ? Is God less good because there are numberless nothings which he is able to bring into being ? He could create a world of more creatures than he hath done. Doth he therefore wish evil to them by letting them remain in that nothing from whence he could draw them? No; but he denies that good to them which he is able, if he pleased, to confer upon them.
If God doth not give that good to a creature which it wants by his own demerit, can he be said to wish evil to it, or only to deny that goodness
• which the creature hath forfeited,* and which is at God's liberty to retain or disperse ? Though God cannot but love his own image where he finds
* Camero, p. 30.
. 298 CHABNOCK'S WORKS. [MARK X. 18.
it, yet when this image is lost, and the devil's image voluntarily received, he may choose whether he will manifest his goodness to such a one or no. Will you not account that man liberal, that distributes his alms to a great company, though he rejects some. Much more will you account him good, if he rejects none that implore him, but dispenseth his doles to every one
upon their petition. And is he not good because he will not bestow a far thing upon those that address not themselves to him ? God is so good, that he denies not the best good to those that seek him. He hath promised life and happiness to them that do so. Is he less good because he will not dis tribute his goodness to those that despise him ? Though he be good, yet his wisdom is the rule of dispensing his goodness.
[6.] The severe punishment of offenders, and the afflictions he inflict
upon his servants, are no violations of his goodness. The notion of God's vindictive justice is as naturally inbred and implanted in the mind of man as that of his goodness, and those two sentiments never shocked one another. The heathen never thought him bad because he was just, nor unrighteoi because he was good. God being infinitely good, cannot possibly intend or
act anything but what is good. ' Thou art good, and thou dost good,' Ps. cxix. 68 ; i. e. whatsoever thou dost is good, whatsoever it be, pleasant or painful to the creature. Punishments themselves are not a moral evil in the person that inflicts, though they are a natural evil in the person that
suffers them.* In ordering punishment to the wicked, good is added to evil ; in ordering impunity to the wicked, evil is added to evil. To punist wickedness is right, therefore good ; to leave men uncontrolled in theii wickedness is unrighteous, and therefore bad. But again, shall his justic€ in some few judgments in the world impeach his goodness, more than his wonderful patience to sinners is able to silence the calumnies against him ? Is not his hand fuller of gracious doles than of dreadful thunderbolts? Doth he not oftener seem forgetful of his justice, when he pours upon the guilty the streams of his mercy, than to be forgetful of his goodness when he sprinkles in the world some drops of his wrath ?
First, God's judgments in the world do not infringe his goodness ; for, First, The justice of God is a part of the goodness of his nature. Goc himself thought so, when he told Moses he would make all his goodness pa before him, Exod. xxxiii. 19. He leaves not out in that enumeration of the
parts of it his resolution by ' no means to clear the guilty ; but to visit the iniquity of the fathers upon the children,' Exod. xxxiv. 7. It is a property of goodness to hate evil, and therefore a property of goodness to punish it It is no less righteousness to give according to the deserts of a person in a way of punishment, than to reward a person that obeys his precepts in a way of recompence. Whatsoever is righteous is good ; sin is evil, and therefore whatsoever doth witness against it is good. His goodness there fore shines in his justice, for without being just he could not be good. Sin is a moral disorder in the world. Every sin is injustice. Injustice breaks
God's order in the world ; there is a necessity therefore of justice to put the world in order. Punishment orders the person committing the injury, who, when he will not be in the order of obedience, must be in the order of
suffering for God's honour. The goodness of all things which God pro nounced so, consisted in their order and beneficial helpfulness to one another. When this order is inverted, the goodness of the creature ceaseth. If it be a bad thing to spoil this order, is it not a part of divine good ness to reduce them into order, that they may be reduced in some measure to their goodness ? Do we ever account a governor less in goodness
*' Boet'.us.
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because he is exact in justice, and punisheth that which makes a disorder in his government ? And is it a diminution of the divine goodness to punish that which makes a disorder in the world ? As wisdom without goodness would be a serpentine craft, and issue in destruction, so goodness without justice would be impotent indulgence, and cast things into confusion. When
Abel's blood cried out for vengeance against Cain, it spake a good thing; Christ's blood, speaking better things than the blood of Abel, implies that Abel's blood spake a good thing ; the comparative implies a positive, Heb. xii. 24. If it were the goodness of that innocent blood to demand justice, it could not be a badness in the Sovereign of the world to execute it. How can God sustain the part of a good and righteous judge, if he did not pre serve human society ? And how would it be preserved without manifesting himself by public judgments against public wrongs ? Is there not as great a necessity that goodness should have instruments of judgment, as that there should be prisons, bridewells, and gibbets in a good commonwealth ? Did not the thunderbolts of God sometimes roar in the ears of men, they would sin with a higher hand than they do, fly more in the face of God, make the world as much a moral as it was at first a natural chaos. The ingenuity of men would be damped if there were not something to work upon their fears to keep them in their due order. Impunity of the nocent person is worse than any punishment. It is a misery to want medicines for the cure of a sharp disease, and a mark of goodness in a prince to consult for the security of the political body, by cutting off a gangrened and corrupting member. And what prince would deserve the noble title of good, if he did not restrain by punishment those evils which impair the public welfare ? Is it not necessary that the examples of sin, whereby others have been encouraged to wickedness, should be made examples of justice, whereby the same per sons, and others, may be discouraged from what before they were greedily inclined unto ? Is not a hatred of what is bad and unworthy, as much a part of divine goodness, as a love to what is excellent and bears a resemblance to himself ? Could he possibly be accounted God, that should bear the same degree of affection to a prodigious vice as to a sublime virtue, and should behave himself in the same manner of carriage to the innocent and culpable ? Could you account him good if he did always with pleasure behold evil, and perpetually suffer the oppressions of the innocent under unpunished wickedness ? How should we know the goodness of the divine nature, and his affection to the goodness of his creature, if he did not by some acts of severity witness his implacable aversion against sin, and his care to pre serve the good government of the world ? If corrupted creatures should always be exempt from the effects of his indignation, he would declare him self not to be infinitely good, because he would not be really righteous. No man thinks it a natural vice in the sun, by the power of its scorching heat, to dry up and consume the unwholesome vapours of the air; nor are the demonstrations of divine justice any blots upon his goodness, since they are both for the defence and glory of his holiness, and for the preservation of the beauty and order of the world.
Secondly, Is it not part of the goodness of God to make laws, and annex threatenings ; and shall it be an impeachment of his goodness to support them ? The more severe laws are made for deterring evil, the better is that prince accounted in making such provision for the welfare of the community. The design of laws, and the design of upholding the honour of those laws by the punishment of offenders, is to promote goodness, and restrain evil. The execution of those laws must be therefore pursuant to the same design of goodness which first settled them. Would it not be contrary to goodness,
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to suffer that which was designed for the support of goodness to be scorned and slighted ? It would neither be prudence nor goodness, but folly and vice, to let laws, which were made to promote virtue, be broken with im punity. Would not this be to weaken virtue, and give a new life and vigour to vice? Not only the righteousness of the law itself, but the wisdom of the lawgiver, would be exposed to contempt, if the violations of it remained uncontrolled, and fhe violence offered by men passed unpunished. None but will acknowledge the divine precepts to be the image of the righteous ness of God, and beneficial for the common good of the world : Rom. vii.
12, ' The law is holy, just, and good,' and so is every precept of it. The law was for no other end but to keep the creature in subjection to and depen dence on God ; this dependence could not be preserved without a law, nor that law be kept in reputation without a penalty ; nor would that penalty be significant without an execution. Every law loseth the nature of a law, without a penalty ; and the penalty loseth its vigour, without the infliction of it. How can those laws attain their end, if the transgressions of them
be not punished ? Would not the wickedness of men's hearts be encouraged by such a kind of uncomely goodness ? and all the threatenings be to no other end than to engender vain and fruitless fears in the minds of men ? Is it good for the majesty of God to suffer itself to be trampled on by his vassals ; to suffer men, by their rebellion, to level his law with the wicked ness of their own hearts, and, by impunity, slight his own glory, and encour age their disobedience ? Who would give any man, any prince, any father that should do so, the name of a good governor ? If it were a fruit of divine goodness to make laws, is it contrary to goodness to support the honour of them ? It is every whit as rational, and as good, to vindicate the honour of his laws by justice, as at first to settle them by authority ; as much good ness to vindicate it from contempt, as at first to enact it. As it is as much wisdom to preserve a law as at first to frame it, shall his precepts be thought by him unworthy of a support, that were not thought by him unworthy to be made ? The same reason of goodness that led him to enjoin them, will lead him to revenge them. Did evil appear odious to him while .he enacted his law ; and would not his own goodness, as well as his wisdom, appear odious to him if he did never execute it ? Would it not be a denial of his own goodness, to be led by the foolish and corrupt judgment of his creatures, and slight his own law, because his rebels spurn at it ? Since he valued it before they could actually contemn it, would he not misjudge his own law and his own wisdom, discount from the true value of them, condemn his own acts, censure his precepts as unrighteous, and therefore evil and injuri ous, remove the differences between good and evil, look upon vice as virtue, and wickedness as righteousness, if he thought his commands un worthy of a vindication ? How can there be any support to the honour of his precepts, without sometimes executing the severity of his threatenings ?
And, as to his threatenings of punishment for the breach of his laws, are they not designed to discourage wickedness, as the promises of reward were designed to encourage goodness ? Hath he not multiplied the one to scare men from sin, as well as the other to allure men to obedience ? Is not the same truth engaged to support the one as well as the other ? And how could he be abundant in goodness, if he were not abundant in truth ? Both are linked together, Exod. xxxiv. 6 : if he neglected his truth, he would be out of love with his own goodness, since it cannot be manifested in per forming the promises to the obedient, if it be not also manifested in execut ing his threatenings upon the rebellious. Had not God annexed threatenings to his laws, he would have had no care of his own goodness. The order
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between God and the creature, wherein the declaration of his goodness con sisted, might have been easily broken by his creature ; man would have freed himself from subjection to God, been unaccountable to him. Had this, consisted with that infinite goodness whereby he loves himself, and loves his creatures ? As, therefore, the annexing threatenings to his law was a part of his goodness, the execution of them is so far from being a blemish, that it is the honour of his goodness. The rewards of obedience, and the punishment of disobedience, refer to the same end, viz., the due manifesta tion of the valuation of his own law, the glorifying his own goodness, which enjoined so beneficial a law for man, and the support of that goodness in the creatures, which, by that law, he demands righteously and kindly of them.
Thirdly, Hence it follows, that not to; punish evil would be a want of goodness to himself. The goodness of God is an indulgent goodness in a way of wisdom and reason, not a fond goodness in a way of weakness and folly. Would it not be a weakness, always to bear with the impenitent ? a want of expressing a goodness to goodness itself? Would not goodness have more reason to complain for a want of justice to rescue it, than men have reason to complain for the exercise of justice in the vindication of it ? If God established all things in order, with infinite wisdom and goodness, and God silently behold for ever this order broken, would he not either charge himself with a want of power, or a want of will, to preserve the marks of his own goodness ? Would it be a kindness to himself to be careless of the breaches of his own orders ? His throne would shake, yea, sink from under him, if justice, whereby he sentenceth, and judgment, whereby he executes
his sentence, were not the supports of it: 'Justice and judgment are the habitation of thy throne,' Ps. Ixxxix. 14, ]"OQ, the stability or foundation of thy throne, so Ps. cxii. 2. Man would forget his relation to God, God would be unknown to be sovereign of the world, were he careless of the
breaches of his own order : Ps. ix. 16, ( The Lord is known by his judgments which he executes.' Is it not a part of his goodness to preserve the indis pensable order between himself and his creatures ? His own sovereignty, which is good, and the subjection of the creature to him as sovereign, which is also good : the one would not be maintained in its due place, nor the other restrained in due limits without punishment. Would it be a goodness in him to see goodness itself trampled upon constantly, without some time or other appearing for the relief of it ? Is it not a goodness to secure his own honour, to prevent further evil ? Is it not a goodness to discourage men by judgments, sometimes from a contempt and ill use of his bounty, as well as sometimes patiently to bear with them, and wait upon them for a reformation ? Must God be bad to himself, to be kind to his enemies ? And shall it be accounted an unkindness and a mark of evil in him not to
suffer himself to be always outraged and defied ? The world is wronged by
sin, as well as God is injured by it. -How could God be good to himself, if he righted not his own honour ; or be a good governor of the world, if he did not sometimes witness against the injuries it receives sometimes from the works of his hands ? Would he be good to himself, as a God, to be careless of his own honour ? or good, as the rector of the world, and be
regardless of the world's confusion ?
That God should give an eternal good to that creature that declines its duty, and despiseth his sovereignty, is not agreeable to the goodness of his
wisdom, or that of his righteousness ; it is a part of God's goodness to love himself : would he love his sovereignty, if he saw it daily slighted, without sometimes discovering how much he values the honour of it ? Would he have any esteem for his own goodness if he beheld it trampled upon, without
802 CHARNOCK'S WORKS. [MARK X. 18.
any will to vindicate it ? Doth mercy deserve the name of cruelty because it pleads against a creature that hath so often abused it, and hath refused to .have any pity exercised towards it, in a righteous and regular way? Is
sovereignty destitute of goodness because it preserves its honour against one that would not have it reign over him ? Would he not seem, by such a regardlessness, to renounce his own essence, undervalue and undermine his own goodness, if he had not an implacable aversion to whatsoever is contrary to it ? If men turn grace into wantonness, is it not more reasonable he should turn his grace into justice ?