great abatements, and alter the measures of his guilt. Strong and importunate persuasions have not the nature and formality of force; but they have oftentimes the effect of it: and he that solicits earnestly, sometimes determines as certainly as if he did force. The will of man, brought to sin by the tempter, is like a bowl running down an hill its own weight and figure is, indeed, one cause of the motion; but the hand that threw it, is another. : 2. The next, and perhaps the grand cause, that induced Christ to take upon him the nature and mediation of men, and not of angels, might be this; that, without such a Redeemer, the whole race and species of mankind had perished, as being all involved in the sin of their representative: whereas though many of the angels sinned, yet as many, if not more, persisted in their innocence; so that the whole kind was not cashiered by an universal ruin, nor made unserviceable to their Creator, in the nobler instances of active obedience. Which mankind was, and had so continued, as in that estate; having no other motives to act them, but an horrid despair, and expectation of future torment: the material issue of which could have been nothing but a confirmed malice against God, exerting itself in the lives of men, to the overflowing of the world with an uncontrolled torrent of the highest villainies and enormities. But now, was it not a proportionable object for the designs of divine mercy to rescue so great and noble a part of the creation from a total perdition? Was it not pity, that so fair a writing should be all dashed, and for ever defaced by one blot? that sin should be able to do so much mischief, and, as it were, to counterwork the divine power and goodness, by lopping off one of the masterpieces of his work at a blow! This had been more destructive than a deluge; it had been an universal ruin, without the mitigation of any exception. But this is not the genius and way of God's working, who designs particular mercies in the midst of general judgments. Still he has a reserve of favour; and the flood that drowns the world bears up the ark. Christ saw us ruined in the loins of our first parents; and it moved his compassion to behold our death, earlier than our nativity. Even amongst men, if a woman with child be condemned, there is yet mercy for the unborn infant; and it extends so far as to reprieve the guilty parent. No wonder then, if the divine mercy was not inferior in the methods of salvation, and if the mercies of a judge did not exceed the compassions of a saviour. And now, what can the result and upshot of this whole transaction be, but to quicken, or rather transport us in our returns of gratitude; to advance gratitude into admiration, and admiration into astonishment? Why should the Son of God disrobe himself of his eternal excellencies, to come and wrap himself in dust and ashes, to converse with carcasses, with weakness and mortality, with vile creatures and viler sinners? and all this to rescue and pluck some wretched, smarting firebrands out of the eternal flame, where otherwise they must have lain consuming, but not consumed, for ever. With what face or heart can any one, having this thought fresh upon him, resolve to sin? Has Christ passed over the fallen angels without any commise ration; so that, for want of a redeemer, they are passed into the state of devils? And shall we, by having and abusing a redeemer, make ourselves worse? Still let us remember, that Christ so redeems us from wrath, that he will first redeem us from our vain conversation: and that, by this stupendous incarnation of the divine nature, he made himself the Son of man, that, by the change of our nature, we might become the sons of God. END OF VOL. V. The following alterations have been made by conjecture. P. 183. 1. 25. sin] The original edition reads son - - 185. 1. 6. none] now 193. l. 17. unfixed] fixed (perhaps fired) – 196. 1. 5. their] there - 1. 28. bed] head - - -- - 221. 1. 3 from bottom. superfluous] superstitious - 1. 14. persuasions] preservations -225. 1. 25. intention] intentions - - - - 1. 17. room, laying] room. Laying -241. 1. 22. seniority] sincerity - 242. 1. 13. sense] sins 243. 1. 5. sum] some -247. 1. 31. charge] change -254.1. 3 from bottom. only to their] only their 358. 1. 3 from bottom. in appearance] an appearance - 412. 1. 11. broke; the power] broke the power 453.1. 3. comprehension] comprehensions 489. l. 11. state] Not in the original edition. |