AN

ENQUIRY,

&c. &c.

CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTORY STATEMENTS.

GOD is Love: concentrated, unchanging, perfect Love. Such is the declaration of the Scriptures. Such, objectors affirm, is not the conclusion of research and experience.

We hear and we read discussions on the Divine Benevolence. What is benevolence? It is qualified Love: Love proceeding to a certain degree. Literally, it is good will. Good will implies a degree of friendly regard, a kind feeling, a portion of Love towards the individual contemplated. Yet it does not necessarily imply that the friendly regard, the kind feeling, the portion of Love, is in all cases, or in the

In

particular case, very large. Benevolence not only is capable of gradations, but it is not the spirit of Love without circumscription. It may exist with a warmth of affection and a diffusiveness of expansion falling far short of concentrated and perfect Love; far short of that Love which so characterises a being in whom it dwells as to be justly identified with Him. Writers who contend for the Divine benevolence, according to the usual acceptation of the term, may thus set before themselves a seemingly easier task but they do not contend for the character of God as declared by His Spirit. God dwells Love in immutable perfection: so pervading, if we may thus speak, the whole essence of the Deity, so directing all His counsels and all His operations, that Love may be rightly identified with Him, and He with Love. God is Love. When we speak, therefore, of the benevolence of God, we employ a term lowering the attribute which we design to ascribe to Him; and tending to excite and to establish in our minds indefinite, and inadequate, and therefore unworthy thoughts of the glorious perfection which we profess to extol. Let us take our stand on the ground provided for us