of some, and the wealth of others, is an effect of the divine sovereignty, whence God is said to be the Maker of the poor as well as the rich, (Prov. xxii. 2); not only of their persons but of their conditions.

IN RESTRAINING THE PASSIONS OF MEN.

The stilling the principles of commotions in men, and the noise of the sea, are arguments of the divine dominion, neither the one nor the other is in the power of the most sovereign prince without divine assistance. As no prince can command a calm to a raging sea, so no prince can order stillness to a tumultuous people; they are both put together as equally parts of the divine prerogative. Which stills the noise of the sea, and tumults of the people. (Psalm Ixv. 7.) And David owns God's sovereignty more than his own, in subduing the people under him. (Psalm xviii. 47.) In this his empire is illustrious; The Lord sitteth upon the floods, yea, the Lord sitteth King for ever, (Psalm xxix. 10); a King impossible to be deposed; not only on the natural floods of the sea, that would naturally overflow the world; but the metaphorical floods or tumults of the people, the sea in every wicked man's heart, more apt to rage morally than the sea to foam naturally.

When you see the cunningest designs baffled by some small thing intervening; when you see men of profound wisdom infatuated, mistake their way, and grope in the noon-day as in the night, (Job v. 14), bewildered in a plain way; when you see the hopes of mighty attempters dashed into despair, their triumphs turned into funerals, and their joyful expectations into sorrowful disappointments; when you see the weak devoted to destruction victorious, and the most presumptuous defeated in their purposes, then read the divine dominion in the desola

tion of such devices. How often does God take away the heart and spirit of grand designs, and burst a mighty wheel, by snatching but one man out of the world? How often doth he cut off the spirits of princes, (Psalm 1xxvi. 12), either from the world by death, or from the execution of their projects by some unforeseen interruption, or from favouring those contrivances, which before they cherished by a change of their minds! How often has confidence in God and religious prayer, edged the weakest and smallest number of weapons, to make a carnage of the carnally confident! How often hath presumption been disappointed, and the contemned enemy rejoiced in the spoils of the proud expectant of victory!

A SOURCE OF COMFORT.

How is the love of God seen in his condescension below the majesty of earthly governors! He that might command, by the absoluteness of his authority, not only does that, but intreats in the quality of a subject, as if he had not a fulness to supply us, but needed something from us for a supply of himself; As though God did beseech you by us. (2 Cor. v. 20.) And when he may challenge as a due by the right of propriety, what we bestow upon his poor, which are his subjects as well as ours, he reckons it as a loan to him, as if what we had were more our own than his. (Prov. xix. 17.) He stands not upon his dominion so much with us, when he finds us conscientious in paying the duty we owe to him. He rules as a Father by love, as well as by authority ; he enters into a peculiar communion with poor earthly worms; plants his gracious tabernacle among the troops of sinners, instructs us by his word, invites us by his benefits, admits us into his presence,

is more desirous to bestow his smiles, than we to receive them; and acts in such a manner, as if he were willing to resign his sceptre into the hands of any that were possessed with more love and kindness to us than himself. This is the comfort of believers.

Corruptions will certainly be subdued in his voluntary subjects. The covenant, I will be your God, implies protection, government, and relief, which are all grounded upon sovereignty. That, therefore, which is our greatest burden, will be removed by his sovereign power. He will subdue our iniquities. (Micah vii. 19.) If the outward enemies of the church shall not bear up against his dominions, and perpetuate their rebellions unpunished, those within his people shall as little bear up against his throne, without being destroyed by him. The billows of our own hearts, and the raging waves within us, are as much at his beck as those without us. And his sovereignty is more eminent in quelling the corruptions of the heart, than the commotions of the world; in reigning over men's spirits, by changing them, or curbing them, more than over men's bodies, by punishing them. The remainders of Satan's empire will moulder away before him, since he that is in us, is a greater Sovereign than he that is in the world. (1 John iv. 4.)

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XI. THE PATIENCE OF GOD.

DEFINED.

SLOWNESS to anger, or admirable patience, is the

property of the divine nature. As patience signifies suffering, so it is not in God. The divine nature is impassible, incapable of any impair, it cannot be touched by the violences of men, nor the essential glory of it be diminished by the injuries of men ; but as it signifies a willingness to defer, and an unwillingness to pour forth his wrath upon sinful creatures; he moderates his provoked justice, and forbears to revenge the injuries he daily meets with in the world. He suffers no grief by men's wronging him, but he restrains his arm from punishing them according to their merits; and thus there is patience in every cross a man meets with in the world: because though it be a punishment, it is less than is merited by the unrighteous rebel, and less than may be inflicted by a righteous and powerful God.

DIFFERS FROM GOODNESS AND MERCY.

Patience is part of the divine goodness and mercy, yet differs from both. God being the greatest goodness, hath the greatest mildness; mildness is always the companion of true goodness, and the greater the

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goodness, the greater the mildness. Who so holy as Christ, and who so meek? God's slowness to anger is a branch of his mercy. The Lord is full of compasion, slow to anger. (Psalm cxlv. 8.) It differs from mercy in the formal consideration of the object; mercy respects the creature as miserable, patience respects the creaturc as criminal: mercy pities him in his misery, and patience bears with the sin, which engendered that misery, and is giving birth to more.

Goodness respects things in a capacity, or in a state of creation, and brings them forth into creation, and nurseth and supports them as creatures. Patience considers them already created, and fallen short of the duty of creatures; it considers them as sinners, or in relation to sinners. Had not sin entered, patience had never been exercised; but goodness had been exercised, had the creature stood firm in its created state without any transgression; nay, creation could not have been without goodness; because it was goodness to create: but patience had never been known without an object, which could not have been without an injury. Where there is no wrong, no suffering, nor like to be any, patience hath no prospect of any operation. So then goodness respects persons as creatures, patience as transgressors; mercy eyes men as miserable and obnoxious to punishment: patience considers men as sinful, and provoking to punishment.

Since it is a part of goodness and mercy, it is not an insensible patience. What is the fruit of pure goodness, cannot be from a weakness of resentment; he is slow to anger; the prophet does not say, he is incapable of anger, or cannot discern what is a real object of anger; it implies, that he doth consider every provocation, but he is not hasty to discharge his arrows upon the offenders; he sees all, while he bears with them: his omniscience excludes any