Chapter XII
Some of the principal objections why mercy should not be a natural attribute
of the Divine nature, answered out of the proofs and parallels in the foregone
chapter.
The proofs in the foregone chapters, especially the paralleling of power with mercy, and then of those other attributes, grace, &c., as they confirm
CHAP. XII.] OF JUSTIFYING FAITH. 109
the thing, so they will most amply serve to answer the greatest objections
that are alleged against it.
Obj. 1. The first objection lies thus, that is not natural* wherein God
is arbitrary and free in working any effects thereof, or in the using of it, and puttings of it forth. But such is mercy, as even in these very passages unto Moses which are alleged ; I will be merciful to whom I will be mer
ciful, which is adjoined to this proclamation. Compare Exod. xxxiii. 19,
* I will proclaim the name of the Lord before thee, and will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will shew mercy on whom I will shew mercy. In brief, that they say is not natural, the working and operation of which
depends upon God s free will.
Ans. The answer is ready, and clear, and home, as it may be taken
from the instance of God s power ; for, according to this rule and measure,
power itself in God should not be a natural attribute ; for all things which he worketh by his power,
* he worketh after the counsel of his own
will, Eph. i. 11 (and therefore it is he doth not all he can do, Mat. iii. 9 ;
chap. xxvi. 53), which is the same with the exercise of his mercy, of which
it is in like manner said they are according to the good pleasure of his
will again and again, Eph. i. 5. His will keeps the operations both of
mercy and power, as it were, under lock and key, and lets them out as God himself pleaseth. Yea, and further, you have both of these at once
put together; and, as you have heard mercy and power in themselves
paralleled, they are so in their operations too, as being like instances of
this very thing, as appears in the apostle s allegation, and putting into one
those two speeches of God : Rom. ix. 17, 18, For this same purpose have
I raised thee up, that I might shew my power in thee, and that my name
might be declared throughout the earth : Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth. So, then, both are
said to depend, and to be guided in their actings by his will alike. Again,
look, that although the acting and effect of power is but voluntary, yet still
that effect proceeds from that vis, force, strength, or power, that is natural
to God, and which in God is infinite ; which power sets itself to the effect
ing everything, only his will still orders that putting forth of it where, and
when, and the measure of it. And therefore it is all one to say, Who hath resisted his will? as the apostle, as to say, Who hath hardened him
self against his power ? as in Job ix. 4, for his natural power immediately
is that in him which exerts itself in every such act of his will, and without
that nothing would be done or hath been done. And in parallel unto this, the manifestation of mercy in all the works of our salvation depends upon his good pleasure, and yet in and unto the effecting or endowing us with
any and every benefit or saving work thereof, the whole of the riches of his
grace that is intrinsecal to him doth immediately put forth themselves ; and
without a mercy so infinite and natural to God, none of them would be bestowed or effected. Moreover, look, as if you should deny power to be
in God essentially, because it is put forth by his will and pleasure, and
affirm it to be but a metaphorical attribute, you should thereby make him no God at all ; for a weak God is no God. So, if you take mercy from
him, denying it, in the reality and principle of it, to be in him, you despoil and rob him of his greatest riches, and make but a poor God of him to all
that shall call upon him, and so, in effect, no God at all, either to be feared
or worshipped.
The mistake of the argument proceeds on this, that because acts or * Deus non utitur naturalibus, say they.
110 OF THE OBJECT AND ACTS [BOOK I.
shewing of mercy do hold of his will, therefore his very being merciful, the
principle of those acts, must do so too. We grant his acting graciously to be arbitrary in him, and from his will, but not his being merciful and gra cious ; that depends not on his will, though with his will ; that depends not upon an act of his will, though it be with will.
But the true resolve of all is, that indeed his will (take it for the power of willing, or that whereby he willeth) is the very immediate subject of
mercy, which mercy, as it is in his will, is but a propenseness, a strong and ready inclination in his will, that moves and sways him to those mer
ciful actings, which is not from an act, but an inherent disposition in his
will, and natural to it, that it should be readily so disposed.
Obj. 2. A second objection is, that mercy imports and ariseth from the weakness and deficiency in man s nature,- as from an apprehension that men themselves, being subject to the like miseries, shew mercy to the
miserable, and so mercy is always joined with a passion (which we call
compassion), trouble, or grief, in the heart of a man that is merciful ; all which infirmities and passions man only, not God, is said to be subject to, with difference from God, Acts xiv. 15.
Ans. This is utterly an heathenish imagination, and had its original from them. Aristotle says, that f it is an uncouth, not agreeing to, or
becoming the being of God, to say he loves. He thought it stood not with his greatness, nor was compatible with it. And Epicurus before him
said, the divine nature was not penetrable by mercy or pity, because these
find no entrance into the hearts of men, but through some defect or want.
I may say of them in this point (as Christ of the Sadducees denying the
resurrection), They erred, not knowing the Scriptures, nor the power of God. For whereas they would that mercy and pity should spring out of weakness and deficiency, as in man it doth since his fall, or at least is
always accompanied with it ; such as grief and trouble, and the like
passions ; on the perfect contrary in God it ariseth from and is accom
panied with his infinite power, all-sufficiency, and blessedness. And by how much he is above all and utterly incapable of any defect, the more
able he is to succour and relieve us in misery, and also by so much the more his glorious will is the more disposed and propense to mercy. Kings who live in an higher region, and are not subjicible to the common gusts of innumerable miseries, which their subjects in the lower regions are, yet out of the greatness and generosity of their spirits are oftentimes merci
fully disposed, and forbearing unto those that apply themselves to them under such miseries which themselves never had, and of which they have not the least apprehension that they shall fall under them. The lion s
strength and courage makes him sometimes to spare a poor lamb s life that
lies prostrate at his feet ; which holds a semblance of what is in kings, and
in God more transcendently, though both these indeed are but imperfect shims and glimmerings of what to an infinity is super-eminently in God.
I betake myself, for the proof of this, to Moses his unfolding the mystery of God s joining power and mercy
: Let the power of my Lord be great, as thou hast spoken, The Lord is long-suffering and of great mercy,
forgiving iniquity and transgression
: forgive, I beseech thee, this people ; which is as to say, Let thy mercy, which is thy power, or which proceeds
* Misericordia est compassio super aliena miseria, et in tantum miseretur in quantum dolet. Aquinas 22, q. 30, Art. 2d.
f aronov yhg av si /) ii nc, tpatri <piXt?v rov A /a. Aristot. Mag. Moral, lib. 2,
cap. 11, Tom. 3, oper. Edit. Du Val, Paris, 1639.
CHAP. XII.] OF JUSTIFYING FAITH. Ill
from and is strengthened by the almighty power that is in thee, be shewn
in pardoning ; or, Thou, God, which declarest thy almighty power chiefly
in shewing mercy and pity, forgive thy people.
But be it so, that want, and weakness, and passion, as in man, are
furtherances unto and companions of, yea, and the very rise of mercy in man ; yet that the same must hold in God, so as he cannot be inwardly in
his soul merciful, unless he be merciful from the same principle that man
is, must be denied. How oft is it said, that God is not merciful as man
is, but is infinitely beyond all that the thoughts and apprehensions of man
can reach to, either in his own mercies he thinks himself to shew, yea, or
that he is not able to think what mercy is, or what it should be in God,
* as
they are of such an infinite extent beyond his possible imaginations,
heaven is above the earth ! Shall, then, man s mercies, or the imperfec
tions and passions of them, be made the measure of what mercy itself is in God ? God forbid. Man loveth not without a passion, and therefore shall
not God, who is love (because he loves not as man doth), be said properly
to love his creatures out of a pure and perfect principle of love in himself, as
truly as to love himself or his Son ? It is said, the weakness of God is
stronger than man ; and shall the weakness of man be the measure to him
that is the God and strength of Israel, which in 1 Sam. xv. 29 is so highly
* The strength of Israel is not as man, &c. that
protested against ?
ever the weakness of the creature should have been thought to have been
a rule for the strength of Israel !
Again, in what doth the true substance and reality of mercy lie and con
sist ? Not in an apprehension of one s own self to be subject or exposed to
the like distresses, or in being troubled and grieved as the consequents of that
apprehension, especially if he cannot help. These are but accidental unto
mercy, and but as it is in such or such a subject that is subjected unto
infirmities, as in a man it is, who alone is capable of those fore-mentioned
passions ; for mercy, and that more truly, is in Christ glorified, yea, in the
* spirits of just men made perfect ; and therefore perfect in this
angels and
virtue, but without any of these passions and disturbances as requisites
to move them to be merciful. In what doth the substance, yea, the
height of mercy lie or consist, but in a readiness and promptness of affection
in the will of God to relieve and succour those that are in misery, whom he
loves, joined with fulness of power to relieve them ? "Which latter clause,
with Julness of power, doth especially render him most truly and highly merciful.
I shall further proceed to shew how the parallel of those other attributes,
grace, goodness, and truth, as well as with mercy, will abundantly put to
silence another objection.
Obj. 3r How can that, say they, be an essential attribute in God s nature, which if man had never been miserable had not been in God ? For mercy
speaks a relation unto sin and misery, and if it depend on such a condition
of ours, or the creatures being first miserable, then it must be in God but
contingently and occasionally, and not naturally.
Ans. The answer is from what the parallel of these four attributes afford,
as likewise many other attributes which might be instanced in.
1. Power or might in God relateth unto external effects, as unto the
creation of this frame of heaven and earth, &c., Rom. i. 20. Now before God ever made any of them, or suppose he never had made any, shall we
say he had not essential power inherent in him, whereby he was able to make them, and in respect thereunto was truly a God almighty ?
112 OF THE OBJECT AND ACTS [BOOK I.
2. Again, his power relates unto all he is still able to make or effect, and not to be confined unto what he hath done. There are an infinity of things possible to be done by him, which his power will never produce, but shall remain in a state of mere possibility; and yet his being styled almighty in cludes a jJower to be in him in respect to those, as when it is said, God is able to raise up out of these stones children to Abraham, Mat. xxiv. 53, Luke
xix. 40, Mark xiv. 36. His divine ability is expressly said to extend to
these, and shall we affirm he had no such radical power in respect to these, because he will never put it forth in bringing them to existence ? Nay, it must be said, that things thus possible are only and merely called such in
respect of the power of his nature, but things which he causeth actually do respect his will and good pleasure joining with the power of his nature : Ps. cxv. 3, But our God is in the heavens, he hath done whatso ever he pleased.
3. In like manner the parallel of grace and goodness evinceth the same. Had not God been good (who is goodness itself, both as he is God, and in
respect of a communicative disposition in himself, who is the fountain of
goodness), although yet he had never made a creature to communicate any good things to. Surely yes. Then likewise he is gracious, though his
pleasure had been never to have had one angel or man existed whom he would be gracious unto. The root of this matter had been in him, though never no effect or fruit of it had appeared above ground. His grace must be acknowledged to respect the creature only, for he is no way gracious to
himself; and would he not thus have been, though no creature had been? Must he of necessity have made creatures, if he would be truly gracious ? A man is to be acknowledged one of a liberal disposition, who is so in his natural temper, though he lives alone in a desolate wilderness uninhabited, where there are no poor, nor any one person to bestow his alms, or com municate his riches to. The great element of fire is fire, and ready to burn, though it never yet had any fuel to prey upon. The like is to be said of truth, God cannot lie, Titus i. 2 : and it is impossible, Heb.
vi. 8, it is contrary to his nature ; and therefore truth (the contrary thereto) is his nature ; and this had been so eternally, although he had never given forth one word or promise, of threatening, or the like, for the performance of which he might have been styled true. Now yet it is apparent it was
purely at his will and pleasure whether to have given forth any such word or not. And thus God also was truly and really merciful, and ready to
forgive, although he never had pardoned one sin, nor ever had promised pardon to any one sinner. What need we say more ?
Obj. 4. If any further object that word merciful (QJT1 Rachawi) here used
is a metaphor taken from bowels ; but God hath no bowels, and therefore
it is but a metaphorical attribute ; I answer, Ans. 1. That some, as Polanus, render the word OfT
1 !* Racham, diligere, to love, to be at the root of it ; and to be sure love in God is no metapho rical attribute.
Ans. 2. According to the measure of this argument, because this
almighty power or strength in God is expressed by an arm, as Ps.
Ixxxix. 13, Luke i. 51, or that his all-seeing knowledge is set forth by an
eye, and eyes that run through the earth, 2 Chron. xvi. 9 ; that behold the nations, Ps. Ixvi. 7 ; yea, behold all things in heaven and earth, Ps.
cxiii. 6 ; doth this put any prejudice that power and knowledge in him sig nified thereby should not be essential ? No more doth the ascribing bowels to him exclude mercy from being such. God speaks to us hereby
CHAP. XII.] OF JUSTIFYING FAITH. 113
in our own puerilis, in our own childish language, so to affect us the more,
yet so as there is substantial reality in his heart answering to, yea, trans
cending what metaphors can express. And should he speak these heavenly
things in their own language, we could not receive them, as Christ tells us, John iii. 12. And certainly the psalmist s argument is so convincing, that as himself
prefaceth of it, none of the most brutish among the heathens should be
able to gainsay it, Ps. xciv. 9, namely, why God as God must have an
omnisciency, or an all-knowing power, within himself, which the Scripture
: He that planted the ear, shall not he
expresses by an ear or an eye
hear ? He that framed the eye, shall not he see ? He that teacheth man
knowledge, shall not he understand ? This as certainly holds undeniable
in this point of mercy ; shall not he that planted the inwards of us men, and bowels of mercy and pity in them, a natural storge* in parents to their
children, and hath taught us to love, 1 Thes. iv. 9, and be good, and kind, and merciful to one another after his own example
: Col. iii. 12, 13, Put
on, as the elect of God, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, long-suffering ; forbearing one another, and forgiving one
another, &c. Shall not he have eminently and transcendently the perfec tions of all these towards them he intends to love and make his children ?
* Like as a father pitieth his children, so doth the Lord them that fear
him, Ps. ciii. 18. The foundation of the psalmist s reasoning lies in this, that it is impossible any excellency should be in the creature, of which God is and must be the author, but the same must be virtually and in an
higher reality in God himself. It is true indeed, that God hath neither
eyes nor bowels of flesh, as Job says of him, and to him : Hast thou eyes of flesh ? or seest thou as man sees ? that is, by the means of such organs or instruments of that sense, Job x. 4. So say I, Hath he bowels of flesh ?
that is, such dolorous painful pangs of grief and trouble as we frail men
clothed with flesh use to have, when moved with pity ? or is he merciful
only as man is ? Woe were then to us. I am God, and not man, says
he, Hos. xi. 9, and he speaks it upon occasion of his being moved to mercy, as ver. 8, and yet he professeth himself moved to mercy as God, though not as man ; and yet as infinitely beyond us as the Godhead ; from whence he argues his transcending mercy exceedeth what is in man, as that speech insinuates. So as whilst in ver. 8 he speaks of himself after the manner
of men, as of his heart and bowels being turned within him, yet there,
in the 9th, he avoweth of himself, that he is moved hereunto as God, and
not as man is ; in so high sublime a way as is proper to him alone as God, and yet with a mercy, represented by bowels and heart, which is as infinite
as his Godhead is, yea, it is his very Godhead. For so that speech that he assumes to himself, and this which I have brought forth by way of answer to an objection, I might have improved into two strong arguments for the thing in hand, that mercy is substantially and properly in him.
Ans. 3. That bowels, though a metaphor, yet in its analogy is peculiarly fitted and adapted singularly to express what the inward natural disposition of any one is. For,
1st, It imports a natural affection, for it is put to express that which we
call storgeA or the natural affection that is in parents.
And, 2dly, with all the most inwardness and depth of that affection.
* t. ., ffrogyn. ED.
t Kahuna, quasi visceratus, misericordia, ffrogyr , naturali amore et affectu prosequens. Genebrard upon the word in Ps. ciii. 13. VOL. VIII. H
114 OF THE OBJECT AND ACTS [BOOK I.
The eye that served to express God s omiscience, the arm, his omnipotence, these are outward parts ; but the bowels are of all most inward, and there
fore of all other speak what is most inward in God himself, and imports a
principle of being mercifully moved from within himself.