Part 24
heavens and earth, without starting some practical affection to him for them ? Their knowledge of his excellency and works cannot be a lazy conI templation. It is impossible their wills and affections should be a thousand
miles distant from their understandings in their operations. It is not the
i least part of his condescending goodness to court in such methods the affec
tions of us worms, and manifest his desire to be beloved by us. Let us give i him, then, that affection he deserves, as well as demands, and which cannot
be withheld from him without horrible sacrilege. There is nothing worthy of love besides him. Let no fire be kindled in our hearts but what may ascend directly to him.
7. The seventh instruction is this : This renders God a fit object of trust and confidence. Since none is good but God, none can be a full and satis factory ground or object of confidence but God. As all things derive their beings, so they derive their helpfulness to us from God ; they are not there fore the principal objects of trust, but that goodness alone that renders them fit instruments of our support ; they can no more challenge from us a stable confidence than they can a supreme affection. It is by this the psalmist
allures men to trust in him : Ps. xxxiv. 8, ' Taste and see how good the Lord is.' What is the consequence ? ' Blessed is the man that trusts in thee.' The voice of divine goodness sounds nothing more intelligibly, and a taste of it produceth nothing more effectually than this. As the vials of his justice are to make us fear him, so the streams of his goodness are to make us rely on him. As his patience is designed to broach our repentance, BO his goodness is most proper to strengthen our assurance in him. That goodness which surmounted so many difficulties, and conquered so many motions, that might be made against any repeated exercise of it, after it had been abused by the first rebellion of man ; that goodness that, after so much contempt of it, appeared in such a majestic tenderness, and threw aside those impediments which men had cast in the way of divine inclina tions : this goodness is the foundation of all reliance upon God. Who is better than God ? And, therefore, who more to be trusted than God ? As
his power cannot act anything weakly, so his goodness cannot act anything unbecomingly, and unworthy of his infinite majesty. And here consider,
(1.) Goodness is the first motive of trust. Nothing but this could be the encouragement to man, had he stood in a state of innocence, to present him self before God ; the majesty of God would have constrained him to keep his due distance, but the goodness of God could only hearten his confidence ; it is nothing else now that can preserve the same temper in us in our lapsed condition. To regard him only as the judge of our crimes, will drive us from him ; but only the regard of him as the donor of our blessings, will allure us to him. The principal foundation of faith is not the word of God, but God himself, and God as considered in this perfection. As the goodness of God
in his invitations, and providential blessings, ' leads us to repentance,' Rom. ii. 4, so by the same reason the goodness of God, by his promises, leads us to reliance. If Goi be not first believed to be good, he would not be believed at all in anything that he speaks or swears. If you were not satisfied in the goodness of a man, though he should swear a thousand
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times, you would value neither his word nor oath as any security. Many times, where we are certain of the goodness of a man, we are willing to trust him without his promise. This divine perfection gives credit to the divine promises ; they of themselves would not be a sufficient ground of trust, without an apprehension of his truth ; nor would his truth be very comfort able, without a belief of his good will, whereby we are assured, that what he promises to give he gives liberally, free, and without regret. The truth of the promiser makes the promise credible, but the goodness of the promiser
makes it cheerfully relied on. In Ps. Ixxiii., Asaph's penitential psalm for his distrust of God, he begins the first verse with an assertion of this attri
bute, ver. 1, ' Truly God is good to Israel,' and ends with this fruit of it, ver. 28, ' I will put my trust in the Lord God.' It is a mighty ill-nature that receives not with assurance the dictates of infinite goodness (that can not deceive or frustrate the hopes we conceive of him), that is unconceivably more abundant in the breast and inclinations of the promiser, than expres sible in the words of his promise. All true faith works by love, Gal. v. 6, and therefore necessarily includes a particular eyeing of this excellency in the divine nature, which renders him amiable, and is the motive and encouragement of a love to him. His power indeed is a foundation of trust, but his goodness is the principal motive of it. His power without good will would be dangerous, and could not allure affection ; and his good will without power would be useless ; and though it might merit a love, yet could not create a confidence : both in conjunction are strong grounds of hope, especially since his goodness is of the same infinity with his wisdom and power ; and that he can be no more wanting in the effusions of this upon them that seek him, than in his wisdom to contrive, or his power to effect his designs and works.
(2.) This goodness is more the foundation and motive of trust under the gospel than under the law. They under the law had more evidences of divine power, and their trust eyed that much ; though there was an eminency of goodness in the frequent deliverances they had, yet the power of God had a more glorious dress than his goodness, because of the extraordinary and miraculous ways whereby he brought those deliverances about. Therefore in the catalogue of believers, in Heb. xi., you shall find the power of God to be the centre of their rest and trust ; and their faith was built upon the extraordinary marks of divine power, which were frequently visible to them. But under the gospel, goodness and love was intended by God to be the chief object of trust ; suitable to the excellency of that dispensation, he would have an exercise of more ingenuity in the creatures. Therefore it is said, Hosea
iii. 5, a promise of gospel times, ' They shall fear God and his goodness in the latter days,' when they shall return to ' seek the Lord, and David their king.' It is not said, they shall fear God and his power, but the Lord and his goodness, or the Lord for his goodness. Fear is often, in the Old Testa ment, taken for faith, or trust. This divine goodness, the object of faith, is that goodness discovered in David their king, the Messiah, or Jesus. God in this dispensation recommends his goodness and love, and reveals it more clearly than other attributes, that the soul might have more prevailing and sweeter attractives to confide in him.
(3.) A confidence in him gives him the glory of his goodness. Most nations, that had nothing but the light of nature, thought it a great part of the honour that was due to God to implore his goodness, and cast their cares upon it. To do good is the most honourable thing in the world, and to acknowledge a goodness in a way of confidence, is as high an honour as we can give to it, and a great part of gratitude for what it hath already
X. 18.] GOD'S GOODNESS. 885
.'expressed. Therefore we find often that an acknowledgment of one benefit 1 received was attended with a trust in him for what they should in the future Ineed : Ps. Ivi. 13, ' Thou hast delivered my soul from death, wilt thou not
I deliver my feet from falling ? ' So 2 Cor. i. 10. And they who have been j most eminent for their trust in him, have had the greatest elogies and comi mendations from him. As a diffidence doth disparage this perfection, think- | ing it meaner and shallower than it is, so confidence highly honours it. We never please him more than when we trust in him : Ps. cxlvii. 11, ' The I Lord takes pleasure in them that fear him, in them that hope in his mercy.' He takes it for an honour to have this attribute exalted by such a carriage of his creature. He is no less offended when we think his heart straitened, as if he were a parsimonious God, than when we think his arm shortened, as if he were an impotent and feeble God.
Let us therefore make this use of his goodness, to hearten our faith. When we are scared by the terrors of his justice, when we are dazzled by the arts of his wisdom, and confounded by the splendour of his majesty, we may take refuge in the sanctuary of his goodness ; this will encourage us, as well as astonish us ; whereas the consideration of his other attributes would only amaze us, but can never refresh us, but when they are considered marching under the conduct and banners of this. When all the other per fections of the divine nature are looked upon in conjunction with this excel lency, each of them send forth ravishing and benign influences upon the applying creature. It is more advantageous to depend upon divine bounty than our own cares ; we may have better assurance upon this account in his cares for us than in ours for ourselves. Our goodness for ourselves is finite, and besides, we are too ignorant ; his goodness is infinite, and attended with an infinite wisdom ; we have reason to distrust ourselves, not God. We have reason to be at rest under that kind influence we have
so often experimented ; he hath so much goodness that he can have no deceit ; his goodness in making the promise, and his goodness in working the heart to a reliance on it, are grounds of trust in him : Ps. cxix. 49,
' Remember thy word to thy servant, upon which thou hast caused me to hope.' If his promise did not please him, why did he make it ? If reliance on the promise did not please him, why did his goodness work it ? It would be inconsistent with his goodness to mock his creature, and it would be the highest mockery to publish his word, and create a temper in the heart of his supplicant suited to his promise, which he never intended to satisfy. He can as little wrong his creature as wrong himself, and therefore can never disappoint that faith which in his own methods casts itself into the arms of his kindness, and is his own workmanship, and calls him author. That goodness that imparted itself so freely in creation, will not neglect those
nobler creatures that put their trust in him. This renders God a fit object for trust and confidence.
8. The eighth instruction : This renders God worthy to be obeyed and honoured. There is an excellency in God to allure, as well as sovereignty to enjoin, obedience. The infinite excellency of his nature is so great, that if his goodness had promised us nothing to encourage our obedience, we ought to prefer him before ourselves, devote ourselves to serve him, and make his glory our greatest content ; but much more when he hath given such admirable expressions of his liberality, and stored us with hopes of richer and fuller streams of it. When David considered the absolute good ness of his nature, and the relative goodness of his benefits, he presently expresseth an ardent desire to be acquainted with the divine statutes, that he might make ingenious returns in a dutiful observance : Ps. cxix. 68, VOL. ii. B b
886 CHARNOCK'S WORKS. [MARK X. 18.
' Thou art good, and thou dost good, teach me thy statutes.' As his good ness is the original, so the acknowledgment of it is the end of all, which cannot be without an observance of his will. His goodness requires of us an ingenious, not a servile obedience.
And this is established upon two foundations.
(1.) Because the bounty of God hath laid upon us the strongest obliga tions. The strength of an obligation depends upon the greatness and numerousness of the benefits received. The more excellent the favours are, which are conferred upon any person, the more right hath the benefactor to claim an observance from the person bettered by him. Much of the rule and empire, which hath been in several ages conferred by communities upon princes, hath had its first spring from a sense of the advantages they have received by them, either in protecting them from their enemies, or rescuing them from an ignoble captivity ; in enlarging their territories, or increasing their wealth. Conquest hath been the original of a constrained, but bene
ficence always the original of a voluntary and free subjection.* Obedience to parents is founded upon their right, because they are instrumental in bestowing upon us being and life ; and because this of life is so great a benefit, the law of nature never dissolves this obligation of obeying, and honouring parents ; it is as long-lived as the law of nature, and hath an universal practice, by the strength of that law in all parts of the world. And those rightful chains are not unlocked, but by that which unties the knot between soul and body. Much more hath God a right to be obeyed and reverenced, who is the principal benefactor, and moved all those second causes to impart to us what conduced to our advantage. The just authority of God over us, results from the superlativeness of his blessings he hath poured down upon us, which cannot be equalled, much less exceeded by any other. As therefore upon this account he hath a claim to our choicest affections, so he hath also to our most exact obedience ; and neither one nor other can be denied him, without a sordid and disingenuous ingratitude. God therefore aggravates the rebellion of the Jews, from the cares he had in the bringing them up, Isa. ii. 2, and the miraculous deliverance from Egypt, Jer. xi. 7, 8, implying that those benefits were strong obligations to an in genuous observance of hint.
(2.) It is established upon this, that God can enjoin the observance of nothing but what is good. He may, by the right of his sovereign dominion, command that which is indiflerent in its own nature ; as in positive laws, the not eating the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, which had not been evil in itself, set aside the command of God to the contrary ; and likewise in those ceremonial laws he gave the Jews. But in regard of the transcendent goodness and righteousness of his nature, he will not, he : cannot command anything that is evil in itself, or repugnant to the true interest of his creature ; and God never obliged the creature to anything, but what was so free from damaging it, that it highly conduced to its good and welfare ; and therefore it is said, 1 John v. 8, ' that his commands are not
grievous,' not grievous in their own nature, nor grievous to one possessed with a true reason. The command given to Adam in paradise was not grievous in itself, nor could he ever have thought it so, but upon a false supposition instilled into him by the tempter. There is a pleasure results from the law of God to a holy rational nature, a sweetness tasted both by the understanding and by the will, for they both ' rejoice the heart, and enlighten the eyes' of the mind, Ps. xix. 8. God being essentially wisdom and goodness, cannot deviate from that goodness in any orders he gives the
* Amyrald, Dissert, p. 65.
MAKE X. 18.] 'GOD'S GOODNESS. 887
creature ; whatsoever he enacts, must be agreeable to that rule, and there fore he can will nothing, but what is good and excellent, and what is good for the creature ; for since he hath put originally into man a natural in
stinct to desire that which is good, he would never enact anything for the
creatures' observance, that might control that desire imprinted by himself, but what might countenance that impression of his own hand,* for if God idid otherwise, he would contradict his own natural law, and be a deluder of ibis creatures, if he impressed upon them desires one way, and ordered direc tions another. The truth is, all his moral precepts are comely in themselves,
'and they receive not their goodness from God's positive command, but that 'command supposeth their goodness. If everything were good because God
'loves it, or because God wills it, i. e. that God's loving it, or willing it, made ;that good which was not good before, then, as Camero well argues somewhere,
i God's goodness would depend upon his loving himself. He was good because ihe loved himself, and was not good till he loved himself; whereas indeed
God's loving himself doth not make him good, but supposeth him good. i He was good in the order of nature, before he loved himself, and his being
good was the ground of his loving himself, because, as was said before, if 'there were anything better than God, God would love that ; for it is incon-
1 sistent with the nature of God, and infinite goodness, not to love that which i is good, and not to love that supremely which is the supreme good. Further I to understand it, you may consider, if the question be asked, Why God loves
himself ? you would think it a reasonable answer to say, Because he is
1 good. But if the question be asked, why God is good, you would think i that answer, because he loves himself, would be destitute of reason ; but
the true answer would be, because his nature is so, and he could not be
God if he were not good. Therefore God's goodness is in order of our con ception before his self-love, and not his self-love before his goodness. So the moral things God commands are good in themselves before God com mands them ; and such, that if God should command the contrary, it would openly speak him evil and unrighteous. Abstract from Scripture, and weigh things in your own reason ; could you conceive God good if he should com mand a creature not to love him ? Could you preserve the notion of a good nature in him if he did command murder, adultery, tyranny, and cutting of throats ? You would wonder to what purpose he made the world, and framed it for society, if such things were ordered that should deface all comeliness of society. The moral commands given in the word appeared of themselves very beautiful to mere reason, that had no knowledge of the written law ; they are good, and because they are so, his goodness had
moved his sovereign authority strictly to enjoin them. Now this1 goodness, whereby he cannot oblige a creature to any thing that is evil, speaks him highly worthy of our observance, and our disobedience to his law to be full of unconceivable malignity ; that is the last thing.
The second use is a use of comfort. He is a good without mixture, good without weariness, none good but God, none good purely, none good in exhaustibly but God ; because he is good, we may upon our speaking expect his instruction : ' Good is the Lord, therefore will he teach sinners in his
way,' Ps. xxv. 8. His goodness makes him stoop to be the tutor to those worms that lie prostrate before him ; and though they are sinners full of filth, he drives them not from his school, nor denies them his medicines, if they
* As a heathen, Maximus Tyrius, Dissert, xxii. p. 220> ou yag Sl,a;c A// Tl 71 TO
388 CHAENOCK'S WORKS. [MARK X. 18.
apply themselves to him as a physician. He is good in removing the punishment due to our crimes, and good in bestowing benefits, not due to our merits ; because he is good, penitent believers may expect forgiveness :
Ps. Ixxxvii. 5, ' Thou, Lord, art good, and ready to forgive.' He acts not according to the rigour of the law, but willingly grants his pardon to those that fly into the arms of the mediator ; his goodness makes him more ready to forgive, than our necessities make us desirous to enjoy. He charged not upon Job his impatient expressions in cursing the day of his birth ; his goodness passed that over in silence ; and extols him for speaking the thing that is right, right in the main (Job xlii. 7, when he charges his friends for
' not speaking of him the thing that is right, as his servant Job had done'). He is so good, that if we offer the least thing sincerely, he will graciously receive it ; if we have not a lamb to offer, a pigeon or turtle shall be accepted upon his altar ; he stands not upon costly presents, but sincerely tendered services. All conditions are sweetened by it ; whatsoever any in the world enjoy is from a redundancy of this goodness, but whatsoever a good man enjoys is from a propriety in this goodness.
1. Here is comfort in our addresses to him. If he be a fountain and
of goodness, he cannot be weary of doing good, no more than a fountain sea are of flowing. All goodness delights to communicate itself. Infinite goodness hath then an infinite delight in expressing itself; it is a part of his goodness not to be weary of shewing it. He can never then be weary oi being solicited for the effusions of it. If he rejoices over his people to do them good, he will rejoice in any opportunities offered to him to honour his goodness, and gladly meet with a fit object for it. He therefore delights in prayer. Never can we so delight in addressing as he doth in imparting. He delights more in our prayers than we can ourselves. Goodness is not1 pleased with shyness. To what purpose did his immense bounty bestow
his Son upon us, but that we should be ' accepted both in our persons and petitions ' ? Eph. i. 6. ' His eyes are upon the righteous, and his ears
are open to their cry,' Ps. xxxiv. 15. He fixes the eye of his goodness upon them, and opens the ears of his goodness for them ; he is pleased to behold them, and pleased to listen to them, as if he had no pleasure in anything else. He loves to be sought to, to give a vent to his bounty : Job xxii. 21.
' Acquaint thyself with God, and thereby good shall come unto thee.' The word signifies to accustom ourselves to God. The more we accustom our selves in speaking, the more he will accustom himself in giving. He loves not to keep his goodness close under lock and key, as men do their trea sures. If we knock, he opens his exchequer, Mat. vii. 7. His goodness is as flexible to our importunities as his power is invincible by the arm of a silly worm. He thinks his liberality honoured by being applied to, and your address to be a recompence for his expense. There is no reason tc fear, since he hath so kindly invited us, but he will as heartily welcome us, The nature of goodness is to compassionate and communicate, to pity and relieve, and that with a heartiness and cheerfulness. Man is weary of beinc often solicited, because he hath a finite, not a bottomless goodness. H( gives sometimes to be rid of his suppliant, not to encourage him to a seconc approach. But every experience God gives us of his bounty is a motive tc
solicit him afresh, and a kind of obligation heihath laid upon himself tc' renew it, 1 Sam. xvii. 87. It is one part of his goodness that it is bound less and bottomless ; we need not fear the wasting of it, nor any weariness in him to bestow it. The stock cannot be spent, and infinite kindness car never become niggardly ; when we have enjoyed it, there is still an infinit* ocean in him to refresh us, and as full streams as ever to supply us. Wha
X. 18.J GOD'S GOODNESS. 889
Jan encouragement have we to draw near to God ! We run in our straits to
those that we think have most good will, as well as power to relieve and
,'protect us. The oftener we come to him, and the nearer we approach to him, the more of his influences we shall feel. As the nearer the sun, the more of its heat insinuates itself into us. The greatness of God, joined
jwith his goodness, hath more reason to encourage our approach to him than :our flight from him, because his greatness never goes unattended with his
goodness ; and if he were not so good, he would not be so great in the apprehensions of any creature. How may his goodness in the great gift^of
his Son encourage us to apply to him, since he hath set him as a day'sman between himself and us, and appointed him an advocate to present our requests for us, and speed them at the throne of grace, and he never leaves till divine goodness subscribes a fiat to our believing and just petitions.
2. Here is comfort in afflictions. What can we fear from the conduct of
infinite goodness ? Can his hand be heavy upon those that are humble before him ? They are the hands of infinite power indeed, but there is not any motion of it upon his people but is ordered by a goodness as infinite as his power, which will not suffer any affliction to be too sharp or too long.
, By what ways soever he conveys grace to us here, and prepares us for glory
hereafter, they are good ; and those are the good things he hath chiefly obliged himself to give: Ps. Ixxxiv. 11, ' Grace and glory will he give, and
no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly.' This David comforted himself with in that which his devout soul accounted the greatest calamity, ver. 2, his absence from the courts and house of God. Not an ill will, but a good will directs his scourge ; he is not an idle spectator of our combats; his thoughts are fuller of kindness than ours in any case can be of trouble. And because he is good, he wills the best good in everything he acts, in exercising virtue or correcting vice. There is no affliction with out some apparent mixtures of goodness. When he speaks how he had smitten Israel, Jer. ii. 30, he presently adds, ver. 81, ' Have I been a wil derness to Israel ? a land of darkness ? ' Though he led them through a desert, yet he was not a desert to them ; he was no land of darkness to them. While they marched through a land of barrenness, he was a caterer to provide them manna, and a place of broad rivers and streams. How often hath divine goodness made our afflictions our consolations, our diseases our medicines, and his gentle strokes reviving cordials ! How doth he provide for us above our deserts, even while he doth punish us beneath our merits ! Divine goodness can no more mean ill, than divine wisdom can be mistaken in its end, or divine power overruled in its actions. ' Charity thinks no
evil,' 1 Cor. xiii. 5. Charity in the stream doth npt, much less doth charity in the fountain. To be afflicted by a hand of goodness hath something com fortable in it, when to be afflicted by an evil hand is very odious. Elijah, who was loath to die by the hand of a whorish, idolatrous Jezebel, was very
desirous to ' die by the hand of God,' 1 Kings xix. 2-4. He accounted it a misery to have died by her hand, who hated him, and had nothing but cruelty, and therefore fled from her, when he wished for death as a desirable thing by the hand of that God who had been good to him, and could not but be good in whatsoever he acted.
3. The third comfort flowing from this doctrine of the goodness of God is, it is a ground of assurance of happiness. If God be so good that nothing is better, and loves himself as he is good, he cannot be wanting in love to those that resemble his nature and imitate his goodness. He cannot but love his own image of goodness ; wherever he finds it, he cannot but be
bountiful to it; for it is impossible there can be any love to any object with-
390 CHAENOCK'S WOBKS. [MARK X. 18.
out -wishing well to it and doing well for it. If the soul loves God as its chiefest good, God will love the soul as his pious servant. As he hath offered to him the highest allurements, so he will not withhold the choicest communications. Goodness cannot be a deluding thing ; it cannot consist with the nobleness and largeness of this perfection to invite the creature to him, and leave the creature empty of him when it comes. It is inconsistent with this perfection to give the creature a knowledge of himself, and a desire of enjoy ment larger than that knowledge, a desire to know and enjoy him perpetu ally, yet never intend to bestow an eternal communication of himself upon it. The nature of man was erected by the goodness of God, but with an
enlarged desire for the highest good, and a capacity of enjoying it. Can goodness be thought to be deceitful, to frustrate its own work, be tried with its own effusions, to let a gracious soul groan under its burden, and never resolve to ease him of it, to see delightfully the aspirings of the creature to another state, and resolve never to admit him to a happy issue of those desires? It is not agreeable to this unconceivable perfection to be uncon cerned in the longings of his creature, since their first longings were placed in them by that goodness, which is so free from mocking the creature or falling short of its well-grounded expectations or desires, that it infinitely exceeds them. If man had continued in innocence, the goodness of God without question would have continued him in happiness. And since he hath had so much goodness to restore man, would it not be dishonourable to that goodness to break his own conditions, and defeat the believing crea
ture of happiness after it had complied with his terms ? He is a believer's God in covenant, and is a God in the utmost extent of this attribute, as well as of any other, and therefore will not communicate mean and shallow benefits, but according to the grandeur of it, sovereign and divine, such as the gift of a happy immortality. Since he had no obligation upon him to make any promise but the sweetness of his own nature, the same is as strong upon him to make all the words of his grace good. They cannot be invalid in any one tittle of them, as long as his nature remains the same ; and his goodness cannot be diminished without the impairing of his Godhead, since it is inseparable from it. Divine goodness will not let any man serve God
for nought. He hath promised our weak obedience more than any man in
his right wits can say it merits : Mat. x. 42, ' A cup of cold water shall not lose its reward.' He will manifest our good actions, as he gave so high a testimony to Job in the face of the devil his accuser. It will not only be the happiness of the soul but of the body, the whole man, since soul and body were in conjunction in the acts of righteousness ; it consists not with the goodness of God to reward the one and to let the other lie in the ruins of its first nothing ; to bestow joy upon the one for its being principal, and leave the other without any sentiments of joy, that was instrumental in those good works, both commanded and approved by God. He that had the gooduess to pity our original dust, will not want a goodness to advance it ; and if we put off our bodies, it is but afterwards to put them on repaired and fresher. From this goodness the upright may expect all the happiness their nature is capable of.
4. It is a ground of comfort in the midst of public dangers. This hath more sweetness in it to support us than the malice of enemies hath to
deject us ; because he is good, he is a ' strong hold in the day of trouble,' Nah. i. 7. If his goodness extends to all his creatures, it will much more extend to those that honour him ; if the earth be full of his goodness, that part of heaven which he hath upon earth shall not be empty of it. He hath a goodness often to deliver the righteous, and a justice to put the wicked in
; MAEK X. 18.J GOD'S GOODNESS. 391
his stead, Prov. xi. 8. When his people have been under the power of their enemies, he hath changed the scene, and put the enemies under the power of his people ; he hath clapped upon them the same bolts which they
did upon his servants. How comfortable is this goodness that hath yet maintained us in the midst of dangers, preserved us in the mouth of lions, . quenched kindled fire, hitherto rescued us from designed ruin subtilly , hatched, and supported us in the midst of men very passionate for our • destruction ! How hath this watchful goodness been a sanctuary to us in ; the midst of an upper hell !
The third use is of exhortation.
1. How should we endeavour after the enjoyment of God as good! How earnestly should we desire him ! As there is no other goodness worthy of our supreme love, so there is no other goodness worthy our most ardent thirst. Nothing deserves the name of a desirable good, but as it tends to the attainment of this. Here we must pitch our desires, which otherwise will terminate in nullities or unconceivable disturbances.
(1.) Consider, nothing but good can be the object of a rational appetite. The will cannot direct its motion to anything under the notion of evil, evil in itself, or evil to it ; whatsoever courts it must present itself in the quality of a good in its own nature, or in its present circumstances to the present state and condition of the desire, it will not else touch or affect the
will. This is the language of that faculty : Ps. iv. 6, ' "Who will shew me any good ? ' And good is as inseparably the object of the will's motion, as truth is of the understanding's inquiry. Whatsoever a man would allure another to comply with, he must propose to the person under the notion of some beneficialness to him in point of honour, profit, or pleasure ; to act after this manner is the proper character of a rational creature. And though that which is evil is often embraced, instead of that which is good, and what we entertain as conducing to our felicity proves our misfortune, yet that is from our ignorance, and not from a formal choice of it as evil, for what evil is chosen it is not possible to choose under the conception of evil, but under the appearance of good, though it be not so in reality. It is inseparable from the wills of all men to propose to themselves that which in the opinion and judgment of their understandings or imagination is good, though they often mistake and cheat themselves.
(2.) Since that good is the object of a rational appetite, the purest, best, and most universal good, such as God is, ought to be most sought after. Since good only is the object of a rational appetite, all the motions of our souls should be carried to the first and best good ; a real good is most desirable ; the greatest excellency of the creatures cannot speak them so,
since by the corruption of man they are ' subjected to vanity,' Rom. viii. 20. God is the most excellent good, without any shadow ; a real something, without that nothing which every creature hath in its nature, Isa. xl. 17. A
perfect good can only give us content ; the best goodness in the creature is but slender and imperfect, had not the venom of corruption infused a vanity into it ; the make of it speaks it finite, and the best qualities in it are bounded, and cannot give satisfaction to a rational appetite, which bears in its nature an imitation of divine infiniteness, and therefore can never find an
eternal rest in mean trifles. God is above the imperfection of all creatures; creatures are but drops of goodness, at best but shallow streams ; God ia like a teeming ocean, that can fill the largest as well as the narrowest creek. He hath an accumulating goodness ; several creatures answer several neces sities, but one God can answer all our wants ; he hath an universal fulness,
892 CHABNOCK'S WORKS. [MARK X. 18.
to overtop our universal emptiness ; he contains in himself the sweetness of all other goods, and holds in his bosom plentifully what creatures have in their natures sparingly. Creatures are uncertain goods ; as they begin to exist, so they may cease to be ; they may be gone with a breath, they will certainly languish if God blows upon them, Isa. xl. 24. The same breath that raised them, can blast them, but who can rifle God of the least part of his excellency ? Mutability is inherent in the nature of every creature as a creature. All sublunary things are as gourds, that refresh us one moment
•with their presence, and the next fret us with their absence ; like fading flowers strutting to-day, and drooping to-morrow, Isa. xl. 6. While we possess them, we cannot clip their wings that may carry them away from us, and may make us vainly seek what we thought we firmly held. But God is as permanent a good, as he is a real one ; he hath wings to fly to them that seek him, but no wings to fly from them for ever, and leave them. God is an universal good. That which is good to one, may be evil to another ; what is desirable by one, may be refused as inconvenient for another ; but God being an universal, unstained good, is useful for all, convenient to the natures of all, but such as will continue in enmity against him. There is nothing in
God can displease a soul that desires to please him : when we are dark ness, he is a light to scatter it ; when we are in want, he hath riches to re lieve us ; when we are in a spiritual death, he is a prince of life to deliver us ; when we are defiled, he is holiness to purify us. It is in vain to fix our hearts anywhere but on him, in the desire of whom there is a delight, and in the enjoyment of whom there is an inconceivable pleasure.
(3.) He is to be most sought after, since all things else that are desirable had their goodness from him. If anything be desirable because of its good ness, God is much more desirable because of his, since all things are good by a participation, and nothing good but by his print upon it. As what being creatures have was derived to them by God, so what goodness they are possessed with, they were furnished with it by God. All goodness flowed from him, and all created goodness is summed up in him. The streams should not terminate our appetite, without aspiring to the fountain. If the waters in the channel, which receive mixture, communicate a pleasure, the taste of the fountain must be much more delicious. That original perfection of all things, hath an inconceivable beauty above those things it hath framed.
Since those things live not by their own strength, nor nourish us by their own liberality, but by the word of God, Mat. iv. 4, that God that speaks them into life, and speaks them into usefulness, should be most ardently desired as the best. If the sparkling glory of the visible heavens delight us, and the beauty and bounty of the earth please and refresh us, what should be the language of our souls upon those views and tastes, but that of the psalmist : Ps. Ixxiii. 25, ' Whom have I in heaven but thee, and there is none upon earth that I can desire beside thee !' No greater good can pos sibly be desired, and no less good should be ardently desired. As he is the supreme good, so we should bear that regard to him as supremely, and above all to thirst for him. As he is good, he is the object of desire ; as the choicest and first goodness, he is desirable with the greatest vehemency.
' Give me children, or else I die,' was an uncomely speech, Gen. xxx. 1. The one was granted, and the other inflicted ; she had children, but the last cost her her life. But give me God, or I will not be content, is a gracious speech, wherein we cannot miscarry ; all that God demands of us is, that we should long for him, and look for our happiness only in him. That is the first thing, endeavour after the enjoyment of God as good.
2. Often meditate on the goodness of God. What was man produced
MARK X. 18.] GOD'S GOODNESS. 393
for, but to settle his thoughts upon this ? What should have been Adam's employment in innocence, but to read over all the lines of nature, and fix his contemplations on that good hand that drew them ? What is man endued with reason for, above all other animals, but to take notice of this goodness spread over all the creatures, which they themselves, though they felt, could not have such a sense of, as to make answerable returns to their benefactor ? Can we satisfy ourselves in being spectators of it and enjoyers of it, only in such a manner as the brutes are ? The beasts behold things as well as we ; they feel the warm beams of this goodness as well as we, but without any reflection upon the author of them. Shall divine blessings meet with no more from us but a brutish view and beholding of them ? What is more just than to spend a thought upon him, who hath enlarged his hand in so
many benefits to us ? Are we indebted to any more than we are to him ? Why should we send our souls to visit anything more than him in his works ? That we are able to meditate on him, is a part of his goodness to us, who hath bestowed that capacity upon us ; and if we will not, it is a great part of our ingratitude. Can anything more delightful enter into us, than that of the kind and gracious disposition of that God who first brought us out of the abyss of an unhappy nothing, and hath hitherto spread his wings over us ? Where can we meet with a nobler object than divine goodness, and what nobler work can be practised by us than to consider it ? What is more sensible in all the operations of his hands, than his skill as they are considered in themselves, and his goodness as they are considered in relation to us ? It is strange that we should miss the thoughts of it, that we should look upon this earth, and everything in it, and yet overlook that which it is most full of, viz., divine goodness, Ps. xxxiii. 5. It runs through the whole web of the world ; all is framed and diversified by goodness ; it is one entire single goodness which appears in various garbs and dresses in every part of the creation. Can we turn our eyes inward, and send our eyes outward, and see nothing of a divinity in both, worthy of our deepest and seriousest thoughts ! Is there anything in the world we can behold but we see his bounty, since nothing was made but was one way or other beneficial to us ? Can we think of our daily food, but we must have some reflecting thoughts on our great caterer ? Can the sweetness of the creature to our palate, ob scure the sweetness of the provider to our minds ? It is strange that we should be regardless of that, wherein every creature without us, and every sense within us and about us, is a tutor to instruct us ! Is it not reason we should think of the times wherein we were nothing, and from thence run back to a never begun eternity, and view ourselves in the thoughts of that goodness, to be in time brought forth upon this stage, as we are at present. Can we consider but one act of our understandings, but one thought, one blossom, one spark of our souls mounting upwards, and not reflect upon the goodness of God to us, who, in that faculty that sparkles out rational thoughts, has advanced us to a nobler state, and endued us with a nobler principle, than all the creatures we see on earth, except those of our own rank and kind ! Can we consider but one foolish thought, one sinful act, and reflect upon the guilt and filth of it, and not behold goodness in sparing us, and miracles of goodness in sending his Son to die for us for the expiation of it ! This perfection cannot well be out of our thoughts, or at least it is horrible it should, when it is writ in every line of the creation, and in a legible rubric in bloody letters in the cross of his Son. Let us think with ourselves how often he hath multiplied his blessings, when we did deserve his wrath ; how he hath sent one unexpected benefit upon the heel of another, to bring us with a swift pace the tidings of good will to us ! How often hath he delivered
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us from a disease that had the arrows of death in its hand, ready to pierce us ! How often hath he turned our fears into joys, and our distempers into promoters of our felicity ! How often hath he mated a temptation, sent seasonable supplies in the midst of a sore distress, and prevented many dangers which we could not be so sensible of, because we were in a great measure ignorant of them ! How should we meditate upon his goodness to
our souls in preventing some sins, in pardoning others, in darting upon us the knowledge of his gospel and of himself in the face of his Son Christ ! This seems to stick much upon the spirit of Paul, since he doth so often
sprinkle his epistles with the titles of the ' grace of God,' ' riches of grace,' * unsearchable riches of God,' ' riches of glory,' and cannot satisfy himself with the extolling of it. Certainly we should bear upon our heart a deep and quick sense of this perfection ; as it was the design of God to manifest it, so it would be acceptable to God for us to have a sense of it. A dull re ceiver of his blessing is no less nauseous to him, than a dull dispenser
of his alms : ' He loves a cheerful giver,' 2 Cor. ix. 7. He doth himself what he loves in others ; is cheerful in giving, and he loves we should be serious in thinking of him, and have a right apprehension and sense of his goodness.
(1.) A right sense of his goodness would dispose us to an ingenuous wor ship of God. It would damp our averseness to any act of religion. What
made David so resolute and ready to 'worship towards his holy temple,' but the sense of his ' loving-kindness,' Ps. cxxxviii. 2. This would render him always in our mind a worthy object of our devotion, a stable prop of our confidence. We should then adore him when we consider him as ' our God,' and ourselves as ' the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand,' Ps. xcv. 7. We should send up prayers with strong faith and feeling, and praises with great joy and pleasure. The sense of his goodness would make us love him, and our love to him would quicken our adoration of him ; but if we regard not this, we shall have no mind to think of him, no mind to act anything towards him. We may tremble at his presence, but not heartily worship him ; we shall rather look upon him as a tyrant, and think no other affection due to him than what we reserve for an oppressor, viz., hatred and ill-will.
(2.) A sense of it will keep us humble. A sense of it would effect that for which itself was intended, viz., bring us to a repentance for our crimes, and not suffer us to harden ourselves against him. When we should deeply con
sider how he hath made the sun to shine upon us, and his rain to fall upon the earth for our support, the one to supple the earth, and the other to assist the juice of it to bring forth fruits, how would it reflect upon us our ill requitals, and make us hang down our heads before him in a low posture, pleasing to him and advantageous to ourselves ! What would the first charge be upon ourselves but what Moses brings in his expostulation against
the Israelites : Deut. xxxii. 6, ' Do I thus requite the Lord ? ' What, is this goodness for me, who am so much below him ; for me, who have so much incensed him ; for me, who have so much abused what he hath allowed ? It would bring to remembrance the horror of our crimes, and set us a-blushing before him, when we should consider the multitudes of his benefits, and our unworthy behaviour, that hath not constrained him, even against the inclination of his goodness, to punish us. How little should we plead for
a further liberty in sin, or palliate our former faults ! When we set divine goodness in one column, and our transgressions in another, and compare together their several items, it would fill us with a deep consciousness of our own guilt, and divest us of any worth of our own in our approaches to him.
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It would humble us, that we cannot love so obliging a God as much as he deserves to be loved by us ; it would make us humble before men. Who would be proud of a mere gift, which he knows he hath not merited ? How ridi culous would that servant be, that should be proud of a rich livery which is
a badge of his service, not a token of his merit, but of his master's magni ficence and bounty, which, though he wear this day, he may be stripped of
to-morrow, and be turned out of his master's family !
(3.) A sense of the divine goodness would make us faithful to him. The goodness of God obligeth us to serve him, not to offend him. The freeness of his goodness should make us more ready to contribute to the advance ment of his glory. When we consider the benefits of a friend proceed out of kindness to us, and not out of self-ends and vain applause, it works more upon us, and makes us more careful of the honour of»such a person. It is a pure bounty God hath manifested in creation and providence, which could not be for himself, who, being blessed for ever, wanted nothing from us. It
was not to draw a profit from us, but to impart an advantage to us : ' Our goodness extends not to him,' Ps. xvi. 2. The service of the benefactor is but a rational return for benefits, whence Nehemiah aggravates the sins of
the Jews : Neh. ix. 85, ' They have not served thee in thy great goodness, that thou gavest them,' i. e. which thou didst freely bestow upon them. How should we dare to spend upon our lusts that which we possess, if we con sidered by whose liberality we came by it ? How should we dare to be unfaithful in the goods he hath made us trustees of ? A deep sense of divine
goodness will ennoble the creature, and make it act for the most glorious and
noble end. It would strike Satan's temptations dead at a blow. It would pull off the false mask and vizor from what he presents to us, to draw us from the service of our^benefactor. We could not, with a sense of this, think him kinder to us than God hath and will be, which is the great motive of men, to join hands with him and turn their backs upon God.
(4.) A sense of the divine goodness would make us patient under our mise ries. A deep sense of this would make us give God the honour of his good ness in whatsoever he doth, though the reason of his actions be not apparent to us, nor the event and issue of his proceedings foreseen by us. It is a stated case, that goodness can never intend ill, but designs good in all its
acts, ' to them that love God,' Bom. viii. 28 ; nay, he always designs the best ; when he bestows anything upon his people, he sees it best they should have it ; and when he removes anything from them, he sees it best they should lose it. When we have lost a thing we loved, and refuse to be com forted, a sense of this perfection, which acts God in all, would keep us from misjudging our sufferings, and measuring the intention of the hand that sent them, by the sharpness of what we feel. What patient fully persuaded of the affection of the physician, would not value him, though that which is given to purge out the humours rack his bowels ? When we lose what we love, perhaps it was some outward lustre tickled our apprehensions, and we did not see the viper we would have harmed ourselves by ; but God seeing it, snatched it from us, and we mutter as if he had been cruel, and deprived us of the good we imagined, when he was kind to us, and freed us from the hurt we should certainly have felt. We should regard that, which in good ness ho takes from us, at no other rate than some gilded poisoH and lurking venom. The sufferings of men, though upon high provocations, are often
followed with rich mercies, and many times are intended as preparations for greater goodness. When God utters that rhetoric of his bowels, Hosea
xi. 8, ' How shall I give thee up, 0 Ephraim ? I will not execute the fierce ness of my anger !' he intended them mercy in their captivity, and would
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prepare them by it to walk after the Lord. And it is likely the posterity of those ten tribes were the first that ran to God, upon the publishing the gos pel in the places where they lived. He doth not take away himself, when he takes away outward comforts. While he snatches away the rattles we play with, he hath a breast in himself for us to suck. The consideration of his goodness would dispose us to a composed frame of spirit. If we are sick, it is goodness it is a disease, and not a hell ; it is goodness that it is a cloud, and not a total darkness. What if he transfers from us what we have ? He takes no more than what his goodness first imparted to us, and never takes so much from his people as his goodness leaves them. If he strips them of their lives, he leaves them their souls, with those facul ties he furnished them with at first, and removes them from those houses of clay to a richer mansion. The time of our sufferings here, were it the whole course of our life, bears not the proportion of a moment to that endless eter nity, wherein he hath designed to manifest his goodness to us. The con sideration of divine goodness would teach us to draw a calm even from storms,
and distil balsam from rods. If the reproofs of the righteous be ' an excel lent oil,' Ps. cxli. 5, we should not think the corrections of a good God to have a less virtue.
(5.) A sense of the divine goodness would mount us above the world. It would damp our appetites after meaner things ; we should look upon the world not as a god, but a gift from God, and never think the present better than the donor. We should never lie soaking in muddy puddles, were we always filled with a sense of the richness and clearness of this fountain wherein
we might bathe ourselves. Little petty particles of good will give us no content, when we were sensible of such an unbounded ocean. Infinite goodness rightly apprehended, would dull our desires after other things, and sharpen them with a keener edge after that which is best of all. How ear nestly do we long for the presence of a friend, of whose good will towards us we have full experience !
(6.) It would check any motions of envy. It would make us joy in the prosperity of good men, and hinder us from envying the outward felicity of the wicked. We should not dare with an evil eye to censure his good hand, Mat. xx. 15, but approve of what he thinks fit to do, both in the matter of his liberality, and the subjects he chooseth for it. Though, if the disposal were in our hands, we should not imitate him, as not thinking them subjects fit for bounty, yet since it is in his hands, we be to approve of his actions,
and not to have an ill-will towards him for his goodness, or towards those he is pleased to make the subjects of it. Since all his doles are given to invite men to repentance, Rom. ii. 4, to envy them those goods God hath bestowed upon them, is to envy God the glory of his own goodness, and them the felicity those things might move them to aspire to. It is to wish
God more contracted, and thy neighbour more miserable ; but a deep sense of his sovereign goodness would make us rejoice in any marks of it upon others, and move us to bless him instead of censuring him.
(7.) It would make us thankful. What can be the most proper, the most natural reflection, when we behold the most magnificent characters he hath imprinted upon our souls, the conveniency of the members he hath com pacted in our bodies, but a praise of him ! Such motion had David upon
the first consideration : Ps. cxxxix. 14, ' I will praise thee ; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.' What could be the most natural reflection, when
we behold the rich prerogatives of our natures above other creatures, the provision he hath made for us for our delight in the beauties of heaven, for our support in the creatures on earth ? What can reasonably be expected
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from uncorrupted man, to be the first motion of his soul, but an extol ling the bountiful hand of the invisible donor, whoever he be ? This would make us venture at some endeavours of a grateful acknowledgment, though we should despair of rendering anything proportionable to the greatness of the benefit ; and such an acknowledgment of our own weakness would be
an acceptable part of our gratitude. Without a due and deep sense of
divine goodness, our praise of it, and thankfulness for it, will be but cold, formal, and customary ; our tongues may bless him, and our heart slight him.
And this will lead us to the third exhortation ; —
3. Which is that of thankfulness for divine goodness. The absolute good ness of God, as it is the excellency of his nature, is the object of praise ; the relative goodness of God, as he is our benefactor, is the object of thankful ness. This was always a debt due from man to God ; he had obligations in the time of his integrity, and was then to render it ; he is not less, but more obliged to it in the state of corruption ; the benefits being the greater, by how much the more unworthy he is of them by reason of his revolt. The bounty bestowed upon an enemy that merits the contrary ought to be received with a greater resentment than that bestowed on a friend who is not unworthy of testimonies of respect. Gratitude to God is the duty of every creature that hath a sense of itself; the more excellent being any enjoy, the more devout ought to be the acknowledgment. How often doth David stir up, not only himself, but summon all creatures, even the insensible ones, to join in the concert ! Ps. cxlviii., he calls to the deeps, fire, hail, snow, moun tains and bills, to bear a part in this work of praise ; not that they are able to do it actively, but to shew that man is to call in the whole creation to assist him passively, and should have so much charity to all creatures, as to receive what they offer, and so much affection to God as to present to him
what he receives from him.* Snow and hail cannot bless and praise God, but man ought to praise God for those things, wherein there is a mixture of trouble and inconvenience, something to molest our sense, as well as some thing that improves the earth for fruit. This God requires of us, for this he instituted several offerings, and required a little portion of fruits to be pre sented to him as an acknowledgment they held the whole from his bounty. And the end of the festival days among the Jews was to revive the memory of those signal acts, wherein his power for them, and his goodness to them, had been extraordinarily evident. It is no more but our mouths to praise him, and our hand to obey him, that he exacts at our hands. He commands us not to expend what he allows us, in the erecting stately temples to his honour ; all the coin he requires to be paid with for his expense, is the ' offer ing of thanksgiving,' Ps. 1. 14 ; and this we ought to do as much as we can, eince we cannot do it as much as he merits, for ' who can shew forth all his
praise ?' Ps. cvi. 2. If we have the fruit of his goodness, it is fit he should have the ' fruit of our lips,' Heb. xiii. 15. The least kindness should inflame our souls with a kindly resentment. Though some of his benefits have a brighter, some a darker, aspect towards us, yet they all come from this com
mon spring : his goodness shines in all ; there are the footsteps of goodness in the least, as well as the smiles of goodness in the greatest ; the meanest, therefore, is not to pass without a regard of the author. As the glory of God is more illustrious in some creatures than in others, yet it glitters in all, and the lowest as well as the highest administers matter of praise ; but they are not only little things, but the choicer favours he hath bestowed upon us. How much doth it deserve our acknowledgment, that he should contrive our recovery when we had plotted our ruin ! that when he did from eternity
* Qu. 'them'?— ED.
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behold the crimes wherewith we would incense him, he should not, according to the rights of justice, cast us into hell, but prize us at the rate of the blood and life of his only Son, in value above the blood of men and lives of angels ! How should we bless that God, that we have yet a gospel among us, that we are not driven into the utmost regions, that we can attend upon him in the face of the sun, and not forced to the secret obscurities of the night ! Whatsoever we enjoy, whatsoever we receive, we must own him as the donor, and read his hand in it. Kob him not of any praise to give to an instrument. No man hath wherewithal to do us good, nor a heart to do us good, nor opportunities of benefiting us, without him. When the cripple received the soundness of his limbs from Peter, he praised the hand that
sent it, not the hand that brought it : Acts iii. 6, 8, he ' praised God.' When we want anything that is good, let the goodness of divine nature move us to
David's practice, to ' thirst after God,' Ps. xlii. 1 ; and when we feel the motions of his goodness to us, let us imitate the temper of the same holy man :
Ps. ciii. 2, ' Bless the Lord, 0 my soul ; and forget not all his benefits.' It is an unworthy carriage to deal with him as a traveller doth with a fountain, kneel down to drink of it when he is thirsty, and turn his back upon it, and perhaps never think of it more after he is satisfied.
4. And lastly, imitate this goodness of God. If his goodness hath such an influence upon us as to make us love him, it will also move us with an ardent zeal to imitate him in it. Christ makes this use from the doctrine
of divine goodness : Mat. v. 44, 45, ' Do good to them that hate you, that you may be the children of your Father which is in heaven : for he makes
his sun to rise on the evil and on the good.' As holiness is a resemblance of God's purity, so charity is a resemblance of God's goodness ; and this our Saviour calls perfection : ver. 48, ' Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.' As God would not be a perfect God without goodness, so neither can any be a perfect Christian without kind ness ; charity and love being the splendour and loveliness of all Christian graces, as goodness is the splendour and loveliness of all divine attributes. This, and holiness, are ordered in the Scripture to be the grand patterns of our imitation. Imitate the goodness of God in two things.
(1.) In relieving and assisting others in distress. Let our heart be as
large in the capacity of creatures, as God's is in the capacity of a creator. A large heart from him to us, and a strait heart from us to others, will not suit. Let us not think any so far below us as to be unworthy of our care, since God thinks none, that are infinitely distant from him, too mean for his. His infinite glory mounts him above the creature, but his infinite goodness stoops him to the meanest works of his hands. As he lets not the trans gressions of prosperity pass without punishment, so he lets not the distress of his afflicted people pass him without support. Shall God provide for the ease of beasts, and shall not we have some tenderness towards those that are of the same blood with ourselves, and have as good blood to boast of as runs in the veins of the mightiest monarch on earth ; and as mean and as little as they are, can lay claim to as ancient a pedigree as the stateliest prince in the world, who cannot ascend to ancestors beyond Adam ? Shall we glut ourselves with divine beneficence to us, and wear his livery only on
our own backs, forgetting the afflictions of some dear Joseph, when God, who hath an unblemished felicity in. his own nature, looks out himself to view and relieve the miseries of poor creatures ? Why hath God increased the doles of his treasures to some more than others ? Was it merely for themselves, or rather that they might have a bottom, to attain the honour of imitating him ? Shall we embezzle his goods to our own use, as if we
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•were absolute proprietors, and not stewards entrusted for others ? Shall we make a difficulty to part with something to others, out of that abundance he hath bestowed upon any of as ? Did not his goodness strip his Son of the glory of heaven for a time to enrich us ? and shall we shrug when we are to part with a little to pleasure him ? It is not very becoming for any to be backward in supplying the necessities of others with a few morsels, who have had the happiness to have had their greatest necessities supplied with his Son's blood. He demands not that we should strip ourselves of all for