Sion fall out of his hands into the power of her old Oppressor Men are more desirous to preserve the Estate they have gotten by sweat than that which is left them by Inheritance and are most careful in settling that which hath cost them more Treasure and more Labour Jacob sets a value upon the Portion he got with his Sword and Bow Gen. 48.22 No less will God upon that Sion he hath wrested out of the world by the Might of his Arm. 5. In regard of Faithfulness His Veracity is ingaged 1. In regard of Faithfulness to Christ the Head The Spirit was promised to Christ Act. 2.33 Having received the promise of the Holy Ghost i. e. the Holy Ghost promised to him by the Father He received that which was promised his receiving it from God implyed the Spirit 's being promised to him by God To what end was this Spirit given him and sent by him To convince the world of righteousness John 16.10 an effect necessary to the building Sion For this end he received it for this end therefore it was promised to him The promise would be vain the performance of the promise in the mission of the Holy Ghost would be to no purpos◠if the end for which he was promised and for which he was sent were not perform'd if there should not be a perpetual number convinced of and imbracing that righteousness of Christ which hath been manifested by his going to the Father God also promised him a great posterity after his making his soul an offering for sin Isa 53.10.11 A seed that he should see therefore stable and perpetual ‖ A posterity was to follow his Sacrifice his Cross was to give them being and his Blood was to give them life because always visible to him God pawn'd his word upon the condition of his death the condition was performed to the full satisfaction of God his Truth therefore hath no evasion no plea to deny the performance of the promise in raising up a multitude of believers in the world and such a multitude as shall always be seen with pleasure by him as good and sound children and the travel of the mothers womb are by the parents The truth of God is oblig'd by Christ's exact performance of the condition as well as by the particular respect he hath to the glory of it it was for the Church Christ gave himself Eph. 5.25 'T is necessary therefore that God should preserve and establish a Church for him to the end of the world that Christ might not by any default of his Father lose the end and design of his death there shall be a generation of believers a little seed lying in the midst of all the chaff so God promised * Psal 72.17 His name shall be continued as long as the world 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 His name shall be propagated in a perpetual birth of Children it shall be sound while the Sun in the Heaven keeps its station 2. In regard of faithfulness to the Church it self How doth the word sparkle with promises to Sion in all her concerns He hath promised an indissolvable marriage the fixing a knot that shall never be untied * Hos 2.19 I will betroth thee unto me for ever and that in judgment righteousness loving kindness mercy faithfulness A marriage that shall never end in widdow-hood so that Judgment righteousness loving kindness mercy faithfulness must first fail before the Church meet with an entire dissolution i. e. God and the glorious perfections of his nature shall fail before the Church be forsaken and left to her enemies She is no less assur'd of continual supplies and nourishment and that by no meaner a hand than that of God himself Isa 27.3 I the Lord do keep it I will water it every moment I will keep it night and day Nor a meaner dew than himself Hos 14.5 Also without the failing her a minute he would water her with doctrine to preserve her verdure and increase her growth He would be her Guardian night and day in the darkness of adversity in the sunshine of prosperity so that Satan should not outwit nor the craft and subtilty of hereticks waste her for it refers to v. 1. wherein God promiseth her to punish the piercing Serpent the crooked Serpent that by various windings and turnings insinuates himself to the destruction of men And he adds v. 4. Fury is not in me he lays by his anger against her as considered in apostate nature the fury of Hell shall not prevail where the anger of God is pacified but her enemies shall be as bryars and thorns before him He hath a consuming fury for her enemies though he hath none for his vineyard Protection is in no less measure promised and that not a temporary one nor a bare defence but with the ruin of her enemies and treading them down as straw is trodden down for the Dunghil Isa 25.10 In this mountain shall the hand of the Lord rest By hand is meant his power and by rest is meant the perpetual motion of it for her and that against the most furious malicious powerful of her Enemies Mat. 16.18 against the gates of hell against the wisdom of Hell gates being the seat of councel against the censures and sentences of Hell gates being the place of judicature against the arms of Hell gates being the place of strength guards When Christ secures against Hell he secures against all that receive their commission from Hell neither Hell it self nor the instruments edg'd and envenomed by Hell shall prevail against her she is secur'd for her assemblies in one part or other when they gather together to hear the Law and to sacrifice And I that am the Lord thy God from the Land of Aegypt will yet make thee to dwell in tabernacles as in the days of Solemn feasts Hos 12.9 't is a promise to the Church it was never yet nor appears like to be performed to the ten tribes as a Nation but to their Posterity as swallowed up in embodied with the Gentiles The conquest of her enemies is secur'd to her Ps 110.1 The promise is made to Christ of making his enemies his footstool But made to him as Davids Lord and consequently as the Lord of his people as King in Sion and therefore made to the whole body of his loyal subjects And all those things are of little comfort without duration and stability which is also secur'd to her Hos 6.3 His going forth i. e. the going forth of God in the Church is prepared as the morning 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Stable His appearance for her and in her is as certain as the dawning of the morning light at the appointed hour All the clouds which threaten a perpetual night cannot hinder it all the workers of darkness cannot prevent it the morning will dawn whether they will or no. Her duration is compared to the most durable things to that of the Cedar the
rank what are the weeds Satan's devices and our thoughts are of the same nature 1 Cor. 2.11 2 Cor. 10.5 and sometimes in Scripture exprest by the same word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 As he hath his devices so have we against the authority of God's Law the power of the Gospel and the Kingdom of Christ The Devils are call'd spiritual wickednesses because they are not capable of carnal sins Eph. 6.12 Prophaneness is an Uniformity with the world and intellectual sins are an Uniformity with the God of it Ephes 2.2 3. There is a double walking answerable to a double pattern in v. 2. Fulfilling the desires of the flesh is a walking according to the course of this world or making the world our copy and fulfilling the desires of the mind is a walking according to the Prince of the power of the air or a making the Devil our pattern In carnal sins Satan is a tempter in mental an actor Therefore in the one we are conformed to his will in the other we are transformed into his likeness In outward we evidence more of obedience to his laws in inward more of affection to his person as all imitations of others do Therefore there is more of enmity to God because more of similitude and love to the Devil a nearer approach to the Diabolical nature implying a greater distance from the Divine Christ never gave so black a character as that of the Devil's children to the prophane world but to the Pharisees who had left the sins of men to take up those of Devils and were most guilty of those high imaginations which ought to be brought into captivity to the obedience of Christ 5. In respect of contrariety and odiousness to God Imaginations were only evil Rom. 8.7 and so most directly contrary to God who is only good Our natural enmity against God is seated in the mind The sensitive part aims at its own gratification and in mens serving their lusts they serve their pleasures but the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Prince in man Titus 3.3 serving divers lusts and pleasures is possest with principles of a more direct contrariety whence it must follow that all the thoughts and counsels of it are tinctured with this hatred They are indeed a defilement of the higher part of the Soul and that which belongs more peculiarly to God And the nearer any part doth approach to God the more abominable is a spot upon it as to cast dirt upon a Prince's house is not so heinous as to deface his Image The understanding the seat of thoughts is more excellent than the will both because we know and judge before we will or ought to will only so much as the understanding thinks fit to be willed and because God hath bestowed the highest gifts upon it adorning it with more lively lineaments of his own Image Col. 3.10 Renewed in knowledge after the Image of Him that created him implying that there was more of the Image of God at the first Creation bestowed upon the understanding the seat of knowledge than on any other part yea than on all the bodies of men distill'd together Father of Spirits is one of God's titles To bespatter His Children then so near a relation Heb. 12.9 the Jewel that he is choice of must needs be more heinous He being the Father of Spirits this spiritual wickedness of nourishing evil thoughts is a cashiering all child-like likeness to him The traiterous acts of the mind are most offensive to God as 't is a greater despite for a Son to whom the Father hath given the greater portion to shut him out of his house only to revel in it with a company of Rioters and Strumpets than in a Child who never was so much the subject of his Father's favour And 't is more heinous and odious if these thoughts which possess our Souls be at any time conversant about some Idea of our own framing It were not altogether so bad if we loved something of God's creating which had a physical goodness and a real usefulness in it to allure us but to run wildly to embrace an Ens rationis to prefer a thing of no existence but what is colour'd by our own imagination of no vertue no usefulness a thing that God never created nor pronounced good is a greater enmity and a higher slight of God 6. In respect of Connaturalness and Voluntariness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Plutarch Moral 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Thales Diog. Laert. They are the imaginations of the thoughts of the heart and they are continually evil They are as natural as the aestuations of the Sea the bubblings of a Fountain or the twinklings of the Stars The more natural any motion is ordinarily the quicker it is Time is requisite to action but thoughts have an instantaneous motion The body is a heavy piece of clay but the mind can start out on every occasion Actions have their stated times and places but these solicit us and are entertain'd by us at all seasons Neither day nor night street nor closet exchange nor temple can priviledge us from them We meet them at every turn and they strike upon our Souls as often as light upon our Eyes There is no restraint for them the Laws of men the constitution of the body the interest of profit or credit are mighty bars in the way of outward profaneness but nothing lays the reins upon thoughts but the Law of God and this man is not subject to neither can be Rom. 8.7 Besides the natural Atheism in man is a special friend and nurse of these few firmly believing either the omniscience of God or his Government of the world which the Scripture speaks of frequently as the cause of most sins among the sons of men †Isa 29.15 Ezek. 9.9 Job 22.13 14 Actions are done with some reluctance and nips of natural conscience Conscience will start at a gross temptation but it is not frighted at thoughts Men may commit speculative folly and their conscience look on without so much as a nod against it Men may tear out their neighbours bowels in secret wishes and their conscience never interpose to part the fray Conscience indeed cannot take notice of all of them they are too subtil in their nature and too quick for the observation of a finite principle They are many †Prov. 19.21 There are many devices in a man's heart Florus l. 2. c. 3. Major aliquanto labor erat invenire quam vincere and they are nimble too like the bubblings of a boyling pot or the rising of a wave that presently slides into its level and as Florus saith of the Ligurians the difficulty is more to find than conquer them They are secret sins and are no more discerned than motes in the air without a spiritual sun-beam whence David cryes out Psal 19.12 Cleanse me from secret sins which some explain of sins of thoughts that were like sudden and
her v. 5. v. 1. His Foundation The Foundation of God i. e. That which God hath founded that Jerusalem which is of God's building is seated in the holy Mountain the City was built before Joshuah conquered Canaan But God is said to be the Founder of it in regard of that peculiar glory to which it was designed to be the rest of his Ark the place of his Worship the Throne of the Types of the Messiah the Seat whence the Evangelick Law was to be publisht to all Nations and the Messiah revealed as the Redeemer and Ruler of the World In the holy Mountains Jerusalem was seated upon high Mountains The Palace of the Kings was built upon Sion and the Temple the House of the Most High was built upon Moriah and encompast with Mountains round about Psal 125.2 an emblem of the strength and stability of the Church * Daillé Melange part 2. page 354. Holy Mountains not that there was any inherent holiness in them more than in the other Mountains of the Earth or that they were naturally more beautiful and stately than other Mountains but because they were separated for the Worship and Service of God and had been ennobled by the performance of a Worship there before the building of the Temple It was upon Moriah that Isaac was designed for a Sacrifice and the most signal act of obedience performed to God by the Father of the Faithful It was there also that David appeased the wrath of God by Sacrifice after it had issued out upon the People in a Plague for the numbring of them And the very name Moriah hath something sacred in it it signifying either God teaching or God manifested which name might be given it by God with respect to the manifestation of Christ who was to come during the standing of the second Temple v. 2. The Lord loves the Gates of Sion By Gates in Scripture is meant the strength or wisdom or justice of a place Gates were the Magazines of Arms and the places of Judicature He had manifested his love to her in chusing that City before all the Cities of Israel and Judah wherein to place his Name and have his Worship celebrated and that place in Jerusalem particularly where his Law should be given by the Spirit to the Apostles upon the day of Pentecost and to apply it to the Gospel-Church it signifies the special respect God bears to her above all the Rites Observancies and Ceremonies of the Judaick Institution It was in this Gospel-Church the true Sion that he desired to dwell and will remain for ever Psal 68.17 Which is a Prophetick Psalm of the Gospel-times and the Ascension of Christ 1. The Stability of the Church is here asserted * Geierus in loc The Church is not built upon the Sand which may fall with a Storm nor upon the Waters that may float with the waves nor spread out as a Tent in the Desert that may be taken up and carried away to another place but upon a Mountain not to be removed * Psal 125.1 Mount Sion cannot be removed 't is built upon a Rock the Rock of Ages upon a Mountain which is not shatter'd by waves or shaken by storms upon Christ who hath the strength of many Mountains in himself 2. The necessity of holiness in a Church What though the Church be a Mountain for strength and eminency have the honour and priviledg of Sacraments and be the Ark of the Oracles of God 't is not established unless it be a holy Mountain Holiness is the only becoming thing in the House of God as it is consecrated to the glory of God so it must be exercis'd in things pertaining to the glory of God As the Foundation is holy so ought the Superstructure to be There was no filth in the framing it there must be no filth in the continuance of it v. 3. He speaks with some kind of astonishment of the glorious things spoken of her or promised to her and concludes it with a note of attention or a mark of eminency Selah * v. 3. Glorious things are spoken of thee O City of God No place enjoy'd an equal happiness with Jerusalem while it remained faithful to its Founder It maintain'd its standing in the midst of its enemies no weapon formed against it was able to prosper Heaven planted it and the dews of Heaven watered it it had a continual succession of Prophets the best Kings that ever were in the world swayed the Scepter in it it was blessed with more miraculous deliverances than any part of the Universe the Nations that loved it not yet feared its power and feared the displeasure of its Guardian It was here the Son of God delivered the Messages of Heaven by the order of his father It was here the spirit first filled the heads and hearts of the Apostles in order to the conversion of a world from Idolatry to the Scepter of God but more glorious things are spoken of the Spiritual Sion than of the material Jerusalem that had Christ in the flesh and the Gospel-Church hath Christ in the spirit he went from thence to heaven but he comes from heaven to visit them with his comforts he hath left the walls of Jerusalem in its ruins but he hath not he will not leave his Spiritual Sion fatherless and comfortless Joh. 14.18 his spirit abides for ever with his Church Glorious things are spoken of it when he pronounced it impregnable and that the gates of Hell the power and policy of all the Apostate Angels and their instruments should not prevail against her when he assured her he would be present with her not to the end of an age or two but till the period of time the consummation of the world priviledges that material Jerusalem could never boast of whatsoever countries have been applauded for secular excellencies or been famous for wisdom none can claym such elogies as Gospel Sion where God hath declared his will publisht himself a God of salvation placed the laws of heaven and poured out that wisdom which comes from above These are glorious things above humane expectations above humane desires The Glorious things mentioned of the Gospel-Church are in v. 4. where he speaks of the enlargement of her bounds the increase of her inhabitants and the numerous muster-rolls of those that shall list themselves in her service * I will make mention of Rahaâ— and Babylon to them that know me Behold Philistia and Tyre with Aethiopâ—â— this man was born there The time shall come when those nations that are most alienated from the profession of truth shall come under her wing and pay allegiance to her empire Strangers shall be brought into her bosom not only Philistia and Tyre nations upon her confines but Aegypt and Aethiopia nations more remote nations born and bred at a distance shall be registred as born from her womb and nurst in her lap distance of place shall not hinder the relation
dream they could scarce believe they were freed when the Enemy felt himself punish'd In all other Plagues God sent Moses as an Herauld with warning to Pharaoh but in this God surprised him and hurried him to destruction without giving him any caution Like chaff that the Tempest carrieth away and is seen no more Job 21.18 So shall the Plagues of spiritual Aegypt come in one day Rev. 18.8 yea in one hour v. 17. And the Church shall be like a Lilly which by the assistance of the Dew flourisheth in the morning when over night it looked as if it were withered 2. Magnificently Sometimes in deliverance God puts the frame of nature in confusion He melts the mountains cleaves the vallies as wax before the fire and as waters poured down a steep place Mic. 1.4 i. e. He wasts the strength and riches of his enemies when he comes to judge When he appears in the generation of the righteous he shall appear in such glory as to make the adversaries in great fear and strike a terrour into them Psal 14.5 God will perform it in a prodigious and unusual way God might have taken off the wheels of the Aegyptian Chariots before they had entred the gap of the Sea and hindred them from approaching so near his beloved people he might have afflicted their hands with the palsy and rendred them uncapable to manage their weapons or might have sent a spirit of aemulation among them and made them sheath their swords in one anothers bowels But though this had secured his people it would not have rendred his operation so illustrious as the making that which was a means of his peoples security to be his Enemies destruction and the waters at once Indulgent to the Israelites and severe to the Aegyptians He magnifies his Judgments and mercies by one and the same stroak and drowns the Enemies in the Sea whereby he delivers the Israelites So he preserved Daniel in the midst of those Lions which devoured his accusers The more contrary things are to an eye of reason the fitter subjects they are for the exaltation of God As Christ the head so the Church the body is raised out of the grave by the glory of God the Father Rom. 6.4 His right hand shall find his enemies Psal 21.8 his right hand shall teach him terrible things Psa 45.4 Then shall he come with a shout as one refreshed with wine recruited with new Spirits and risen from sleep Psa 78.65 He calls upon all creatures to be assistant to Cyrus in the design of his peoples deliverance Isa 45.8 He will perfect it by a way of creation I have created righteousness to deliverance with the manifestation of a creative power he makes things serve against their natural order appointed by God Thus when God shall appear for the final overthrow of spiritual Aegypt he shall come with Voices Thunders and Lightnings an earthquake out of the temple and appear as magnificently in the garb of a Judge as he did on Sinai in that of a Law-giver Rev. 16.19 and make the Ten horns which were the support of the beast to be the Instruments of her desolation Rev. 17.16 3. Severely They sank to the bottom like lead in the mighty waters God sends out the greatest Judgments against those that deal sharply with his people greater than against any other part of the world Zac. 6.6 The black horses the instrument of the execution of his Anger were sent towards Babylon where his people were in Captivity but the bay horses of a mixt colour noting a mixture of Mercy and Judgments are sent towards other parts of the world to walk not to run signifying the patience of God to those parts which had not yet opprest his people God deals not so smartly with those as with them that are Enemies to Israel In such concerns he answers his people by terrible things in righteousness When he appears as a God of Salvation to his people he appears terrible in his righteousness to his Enemies Psa 65.5 By terrible things in righteousness wilt thou answer us O God of our Salvation His Judgments shall be as terrible as they are righteous The executioners of his vengeance ride upon horses to shew their readiness to any warlike ingagement upon red horses of a bloody colour to shew the severity of their commission against the Enemies of God Zac. 1.8 He will pay all arrears together that they shall be forced to say God is true to the word of his threatning as well as that of his promise As the Amalekites in Samuel's time payed the scores of their Ancestors in the time of the Israelites travel through the wilderness 1 Sam. 15.2 I remember that which Amalek did to Israel how he laid wait for him in the way when they came up from Aegypt So when God reckons with Babylon for all the bloud of the Saints Prophets Rev. 18.20 The bloud of all the Prophets and Saints that were slain upon the earth shall be found upon her skirts and avenged on her and gives unto her the cup of the wine of the fierceness of his wrath all that she hath done shall come into his remembrance Rev. 16.19 And how severe it shall be is exprest Rev. 14.19 20. she shall be cast into the great wine-press of the wrath of God as grapes bruised with the greatest strength and crushed in pieces both skin stones And to express it more sensibly to our understandings he speaks of the flowing of the bloud out of the wine-press unto the horse bridles by the space of a 1000 and 600 furlongs two hundred miles not that we should understand it literally but the Spirit of God is so particular in describing the height of the deluge of bloud to the bridles of the horses the length of the floud to the space of two hundred Miles to set before our apprehension the severity of the wrath that shall be poured out upon them And as God never repented of his Judgments upon Aegypt so never will he of those which are to come upon Babylon 4. Vniversally and therefore severely The horse and the rider did God cast into the Sea the Chariots the Host and the chosen Captains were drowned there Exod. 15.1 4. The waters covered the Enemy there was not one of them left Psa 60.11 Exod. 14.28 Not a messenger to carry back the news their floating bodies and wracks were the first that gave notice of the defeat to their remaining countrymen God throws off all tenderness his bowels are silent he strikes like a wrathful Enemy lanceth not like a tender Chyrurgion so shall it be with their partners in their sins every man that worships the Beast and his Image shall drink of the wrath of God which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his Indignation and whoever receiveth the mark of his name Rev. 14.9 10 11. The Sun the political power that defends it shall be darkened the rivers whereby their traffick
this purpose Exod. 34.7 keeping mercy for thousands forgiving inquity c. And is still as full as ever as the sun which hath influenced so many animals and vegetables and expelled so much darkness and cold is still as a strong man able to run the same race and perform by its light and heat the same operations When mercy shews it self in state with all its train it is but to usher in pardoning grace Exod. 34.6.7 not a letter not an attribute that makes up the composition of that name but is a friend and votary of mercy And that latter clause a learned man explains of Gods clemency He will by no means clear the guilty visiting the Iniquity of the Fathers c. which he renders thus He will not utterly cut off and destroy but when he doth visit the sins of the Fathers upon the Children it shall be but to the third or fourth Generation not for ever This name of God is urged by Moses Number 14.17 Now I beseech thee let the power of my Lord be great the Lord is long-suffering and of great mercy forgiving iniquity and transgression and by no means clearing the guilty visiting the iniquity c. Pardon I beseech thee the iniquity of this people according to the greatness of thy mercy Where Moses repeats this clause more particularly than he doth the other parts of his name which surely he would not have done and pleaded it as a Motive to God to pardon Israel if he had not understood it of God's clemency for otherwise he had dwelt more upon the argument of Justice than upon that of mercy which had not been proper to edg his present petition with Nay it is such pure mercy the genuine birth of mercy that it partakes of its very name as Children bear the name of their Father Heb. 8.12 I will be merciful to their iniquity which in the Prophet Jer. 31.34 whence the Apostle quotes it is I will forgive their iniquity That it is so will appear because 1. No attribute could be the first motive of pardon but this His Justice would loudly cry for vengeance and flame out against ungrateful sinners His holiness would make him abhor not only the embraces but the very sight or such filthy creatures as we are His power would attend to receive and execute the Commands of his justice and holiness did not compassion step in to qualify 2. Vnconstrained mercy Men pardon many times because they are too weak to punish But God wants not power to inflict Judgments neither doth man want weakness to sink under it Rom. 5 6. When we were without strength Christ dyed for us God wanted not sufficient reason to justify a severe proceeding both in the quality of sin every sin being a contrariety to the law Soveraignty work glory yea the very being of God now for God to pardon that which would pull him out of his throne hath blemished the creation robs him of his honour must be an act of the richest and purest mercy And in the quantity multitudes of sins of this cursed quality as numerous as motes in the Sun-beams 'T is impossible for the nimblest Angel to write down the extravagancies of men committed in the space of twenty four hours if he could know all the operations of heir Souls as well as their outward actions all those God doth see simul semel and yet is ready to pardon in the midst of numberless provocations 3. Resolv'd and designed mercy 'T is not through inadvertency and insensibleness of the aggravating circumstances of them God must needs know the nature and circumstances of all those sins he himself laid upon Christ Yea God hath an actuated knowledge of all when he is about to pardon Isa 43.22 God reckons up their sins of omissions They had been weary of him and had not brought to him their small Cattle had preferr'd their Lambs and Kids before his Service wearied him with their iniquities endeavoured to tire him out of the Government of the World What could one have expected after this black Scroul but Fire-balls of Wrath Yet he blots them out v. 25. though all those sins were fresh in his memory Nay the Name we have profaned becomes our Solicitor Ezek. 36.22 For my holy Names sake which you have profaned 4 Delightful and pleasant mercy He delights in pardoning mercy as a Father delights in his Children He is therefore called the Father of mercy Micah 7.18 he pardons iniquity and retains not his anger for ever because he delights in mercy Never did we take so much pleasure in sinning as God doth in forgiving Never did any penitent take so much pleasure in receiving as God doth in giving a pardon He so much delights in it that he counts it his wealth Riches of grace riches of mercy glorious riches of mercy no Attribute else is called his riches He sighs when he must draw his Sword Hos 11.8 How shall I give thee up O Ephraim But when he blots out iniquity then it is I even I am he that blots out your transgressions for my Names sake His delight in this is equal to the delight he hath in his Name This is pure mercy to change the Tribunal of Justice into a Throne of Grace to bestow pardons where he might inflict punishments and to put on the deportment of a Father instead of that of a Judge 4. The Act of his Justice Those Attributes which seem contrary are joyned together to produce forgiveness Yet God is not to be considered in pardon only as Judex but paternus Judex there is a composition of Judge and Father in this act Free Grace on God's part but Justice upon the account of Christ That God will accept of a satisfaction is Mercy that he will not forgive without a satisfaction is Justice Mercy forgives it in us though Justice did punish it in Christ Christ by his death paid the debt and God by the Resurrection of Christ discharged the debt and therefore the Justice of God is engaged to bestow pardon upon a Believer God set forth Christ as a propitiation that he might be just and therefore a justifier of him that believes Rom. 3.26 Either the debt is paid or not if not then Christ's Death is in vain if it be then God's Justice is so equitable as not to demand a second payment Therefore another Apostle joyns faithful and righteous it might have been faithful and merciful faithful and loving but faithful and righteous or just takes in the Attribute which is most terrible to man 1 John 1.9 He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Isay joyns both together a just God and a Saviour Isa 45.21 So that here is unspeakable comfort That which engaged God formerly to punish man engageth him now to pardon a Believer That which moved him to punish Christ doth excite him to forgive thee 5. The Act of his Power 'T is a sign of a noble and