what the condition of such men is in the other world who lived in invincible ignorance of the True God and of our Saviour Jesus Christ in this This we confess we do not know but believe so well of God that we are verily perswaded could we see what their state is in the other world we should see no reason to quarrel with the Justice or Goodness of God upon their account And have we any reason then to quarrel with God only because we know not how he deals with the ignorant Heathens in the next world If we knew how God dealt with these men and knew that he dealt hardly by them as far as we could judge this would be a difficulty but what Difficulty is there in knowing nothing of the matter For if we know nothing of it we ought to say and judg nothing of it neither Men must be very much inclined to quarrel with God who will raise Objections from what they confess they know nothing of and yet I cannot guess how they should know any thing of the state of ignorant Heathens in the next world since the Scripture says nothing of it and yet this can be known only by Revelation for we cannot look into the other world The plain truth of the case is this Some men without any Authority of Scripture confidently affirm That ignorant Heathens shall suffer the same Condemnation which Christ has threatned aginst wilful Infidels and wicked Christians and then it may well be thought a great Difficulty That God should as severely punish men for not knowing Christ when he was never preached to them and they had no other possible way of knowing him as he will punish those who have had the Gospel of Christ preached to them but refused to believe in him or have professed the Faith of Christ but lived very wickedly This I confess is a great Difficulty but it is a Difficulty of their own making and I should think it much more safe for our selves and much more honourable for God to confess our Ignorance of such matters as we have no possible way to know and to refer all such unknown Cases to the Wisdom Justice and Goodness of God than to pretend to know what we cannot know and from thence to raise such Objections as we cannot answer Whatever Difficulties immediately relate to the state of the other world we must be contented should remain Difficulties till we go thither for we know so little in particular about the other world that it is impossible we should be able either to satisfy our selves or others in such matters but these are not properly Difficulties in Providence for they do not so much concern the government of this world as of the next Thus I have at large shewn not only That the Absolute Power of God makes him Unaccountable as the Sovereign Lord of the World but That his Infinite Wisdom is above the comprehension of our Narrow Understandings he is not bound to give any account of all the Wise Designs of his Providence and we are not capable of receiving it This indeed is so plain at the first hearing to all men who believe God to be Infinitely Wise and are sensible of their own Ignorance that I should have been ashamed to have insisted so long on it did not all men know who know any thing of this Dispute That most of the Objections against Providence are owing wholly to this cause That men will not allow God to do what they cannot understand And the best way I could take to teach these men more Modesty in censuring Providence was to shew them particularly That if God govern the world wisely there are a thousand things which they must of necessity be ignorant of and then it can be no Objection against the Wisdom Justice and Goodness of God in governing the world that they cannot in many cases give a satisfactory account of the Particular Reasons of Providence Fifthly Let us now enquire in what cases this is a reasonable Answer to all the Difficulties of Providence That God giveth no account of his matters That the judgments of God are unsearchable and his ways past finding out And there is great reason for this Enquiry that no man may presume to attribute any thing to God which can never be reconciled with the common Notions of Good and Evil Just and Unjust upon this pretence That the Ways and Judgments of God are unsearchable and unaccountable and that we ought not to demand a reason of them That there are such men in the world is sufficiently known to those who understand any thing of some modern Controversies in Religion I need instance at present only in the Doctrine of Eternal and Absolute Election and Reprobation on which a great many other such like unaccountable Doctrines depend That God created the far greatest part of mankind on purpose to make them eternally miserable or at least as others state it That he Order'd and Decreed or which is the same thing effectually Permitted the Sin and Fall of Adam that he might glorify his Mercy in chusing some few out of the corrupted Mass of Mankind to be Vessels of Glory and to glorify his Justice in the Eternal Punishment of all others even of Reprobated Infants as involved in the Guilt of Adam's sin Now thus far I confess they are in the right that these are very unaccountable Doctrines for to make creatures on purpose to make them miserable is contrary to all the Notions we have of Just and Good But tho we readily confess That the Ways and Judgments of God are unsearchable yet men must not think upon this pretence to attribute what they please to God how absurd unreasonable unjust soever it be and then shelter themselves against all Objections by resolving all into the Unaccountable Will and Pleasure of God for God has no such Unaccountable Will as this is to do such things as manifestly contradict all the Notions which mankind have of good and evil We find in Scripture That God abhors all such Imputations as these as infinitely injurious to him and appeals to the common Notions of what is Just and Equal to justify the general Rules of his Providence The whole 18th Chapter of Ezekiel is a plain proof of this where God complains of that Proverb as reflecting upon the Justice and Equity of his Providence The fathers have eaten sowre grapes and the childrens teeth are set on edge That is that the Children are punished for the sins of their Fathers How unreasonable an Imputation this is God proves from that Equal Right which he hath in Parents and Children which will not admit of such Partiality Behold all souls are mine as the soul of the father so also the soul of the son is mine the soul that sinneth it shall dye And declares this to be the general Rule of his Providence That a good man who does what is just and right shall surely live That if
complain against Providence too when good men suffer and the wicked are prosperous but God has an Absolute Right to the services of all his Creatures both of good and bad men and if he can serve the Wise Ends of his Grace and Providence by the Sufferings of good men or by the Prosperity of the wicked and when he has no farther use of their services rewards or punishes them according as they deserve the Sovereignty of God will justify the present Sufferings of good men and Prosperity of the wicked and their final Rewards and Punishments will vindicate his Justice 2dly But for a fuller Vindication of the Justice of Providence we must consider the Nature of God's Government of this lower world and what Acts of Justice the present Government of the world requires The Justice of Government must be proportioned to the Nature and Ends of Government for all acts of Justice are not proper at all times and it is no Reproach to the Justice of Providence if God do not exercise such acts of Justice as are not proper for the present state of the world for Justice is Rectitude and what is not right and fit in such a state of things is not just The great Objection against the Justice of Providence is That all good men are not rewarded nor all bad men punished according to their deserts in this world But this is no Objection against the Divine Justice to those who believe that there is another world where all good men shall be rewarded and all wicked men punished for if all good and bad men shall be finally rewarded and punished according to their works this is a sufficient Vindication of the Justice of God And as for the Justice of Providence tho every good man is not rewarded nor every bad man punished in this world this is no reasonable Objection if the state of this world will not admit of such a strict and exact Justice Now not to take notice at present of what is commonly said upon this occasion and what I have formerly discoursed more largely That this world is not the place of Judgment but a state of Trial Probation and Discipline where good men many times suffer not so much in Punishment of their sins as to exercise their Faith and Patience and to brighten their Vertues and to prepare them for greater Rewards and bad men are prosperons to lead them to Repentance or to make them Instruments of the Divine Providence in chastising the Wickedness of other men or the more remarkable Examples of the Divine Justice and Vengeance in their final ruin I say not to take notice of these things now I shall only observe That the Justice of Providence is nothing else but the Justice of Government which in the nature of the thing must be distinguished from the Justice of the final Judgment Now to govern the world does not signify to destroy it but to uphold and preserve it and to continue a succession of men in it and to keep it in as good order as the present state of things will admit The Providence of God is that Provident Care which he takes of all his Creatures while he thinks fit to preserve this present Frame of the World but to destroy the World is not properly an Act of Providence but of Judgment and yet if we consider the corrupt and degenerate state of the world did the Justice of Providence require God to punish all bad men according to their deserts he must destroy far the greatest part of mankind in every Age. This earth would soon be little better than a desolate Wilderness if none but good men were suffered to live in it But this kind of Justice God has renounced ever since the Universal Deluge He then indeed exercised such a terrible Justice and Vengeance as some men think can be the only proof of a Providence he destroyed the whole World by Water excepting Noah and his Sons whom he preserved in the Ark but he promised that he would never do so again notwithstanding the great Wickedness of mankind The Lord said in his heart I will not again curse the ground any more for man's sake for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth neither will I again smite any more every living thing as I have done While the earth remaineth seed-time and harvest and cold and heat and summer and winter and day and night shall not cease 8. Gen. 21 22. So that God will no more destroy the world nor all the wicked Inhabitants of it till the day of Judgment and then it is certain all wicked men cannot be punished according to their deserts in this world The Justice of Providence then does not consist in rooting all bad men out of the world or in making them all miserable in it or in rewarding all good men with Temporal Felicity which considering the present state of the world cannot be done without constant Miracles and the visible interposition of a Divine Power for when bad men are so much the greater numbers they will have the greatest share and interest in this world But the Care of Providence is to govern bad men and to protect the good to restrain and govern the Lusts and Passions of bad men to make them the Instruments and Executioners of his just Vengeance on one another and to make some of them in every Age notorious Examples of his Justice to keep the world in awe and to awaken in them a due sense and reverence of the Divine Power and to correct and chastise the Miscarriages of good men and to exercise their Graces and Vertues The Justice of Providence consists in this Not that all good men shall be prosperous in this world and all bad men miserable but that notwithstanding all the Wickedness that is in the world the world is kept in tolerable order and is a tolerable place to live in and that bad men are as often punished and good men as often rewarded as the government of this world requires that no man suffers any thing but what he deserves and what God sees good for him if he will make a wise use of it and that how prosperous soever bad men are there are few of them go out of the world without some Marks and Tokens of a Divine Vengeance tho not always so remarkable as to be observed by the world The Sum is this God is very Just in his Government of the World but the Government of the World does not require the same Acts of Justice that the final Judgment of Mankind does And if we do but consider the Nature of the Divine Justice which is the Justice of a Sovereign and Absolute Lord and the difference between the Justice of Providence and of the final Judgment that is between God's Governing and Judging the World we shall easily answer all the Objections against the Justice of Providence This I take to be a full and true Account of the
who cried against the Altar at Bethel his hand immediatly dried up so that he could not pull it in again 1 Kings 13. 4. And that when Vzziah would have usurped the Priests Office to burn Incense he was immediatly smitten with Leprosy 2 Chron. 26. 19. And there is no other way but this for God by an immediate power to hinder the actual commission of sin to take away mens lives or their natural powers of acting which may be of great use sometimes when God sees fit to work Miracles but ought to be as rare as Miracles are for such a way as this of hindring sin would quickly put an end to the world or to the commerce and conversation of it and is properly to judge the world not to govern it 2dly And therefore though God does take care to prevent a great deal of wickedness which men intend and resolve to commit and watch for opportunities of committing yet he does it not by an immediate Supernatural Power but in Human ways and for this reason commands us not only to do no wickedness our selves but by our Advice and Counsels and Reproofs Authority and Power to hinder other men from doing wickedly and this is one way whereby God hinders the actual commission of many sins by obliging us to hinder the commission of them as much as we can Which shews how men are obliged to hinder the commission of those sins which God is not obliged by an immediate and Supernatural Power to hinder 3dly To be sure for God to permit the actual commission of sin can be no greater blemish to the Holiness of Providence than to permit men to conceive sin in their hearts for therein the moral evil consists when the Will chuses and consents to it The external Action may be a Natural Political or Oeconomical Evil but the moral Evil is in the Will and Choice And therefore the permitting or hindring the external commission of sin does not so properly concern the Holiness as the Justice and Goodness of Providence for to hinder the actual commission of sin does not prevent the guilt of sin for the man has the guilt of those sins which he would but could not commit but it hinders that mischief which the actual commission of sin would have done to other men by murthering their persons or defiling their Wives or robbing them of their Estates and good Names 4thly And therefore there may be wise reasons for God to permit the external commission of many Sins as acts of Judgment and Vengeance on other Sinners or as Acts of Correction and Discipline on Good men For since God very rarely Punishes Bad men or Corrects Good men by an immediate Power and yet Punishments or Corrections are the proper Exercise of Providence it cannot unbecome God to make the Sins of some the Corrections and Punishment of others that it is so is so visible that I need not prove it For few men suffer any great Evils but from other mens Sins And if God take care as most certainly he does to direct the evil which mens Sins do to light upon those who deserve to suffer by them it is a mighty vindication of the Wisdom and Justice of Providence and a sufficient reason why God should permit the external Commission of Sin 5thly Especially considering how many Wise and Good ends God can serve by permitting Sin as to render Sin it self infamous and hateful by the great mischief it does in the World to expose the Sinner himself to shame and punishment which both deters other men from Sin and contributes very much to reform the Sinner Nay many times God brings about great and excellent designs by the Sins of men both for the advancement of his own Glory and the good of Mankind of which many instances may be given were it needful which is no excuse for mens Sins nor any reason why God should order and over-rule men by his Providence to commit such Sins but is a very justifiable reason why God should permit the actual commission of Sin when he can bring good out of evil and serve the Wise ends of his Providence by it 6thly And therefore lastly God does hinder the actual commission of Sin as often as he sees fit to hinder the evil and mischief which such Sins will do as I have already observed sometimes he very remarkably disappoints wicked Designs from taking effect as it was in the case of Haman and Mordecai when the Iews were devoted to destruction And we have as many instances of this nature as we have discoveries of Plots and Treasons against the Lives of Princes and the Peace of Church and State or private designs against the Lives and Fortunes of private men and how much unknown Wickedness the Divine Providence every day prevents we cannot tell but all the Wickedness Mankind would commit but can't must be attributed to the restraints and prevention of Providence and then I doubt not but every Bad man can give a great many instances of such disappointments which he himself has met with that as much Evil as there is committed in the World yet considering the great Wickedness and Degeneracy of Mankind we have reason to believe That God hinders a hundred times more than he permits And considering the Wisdom and Justice of Providence it becomes us to think That God never permits the actual commission of any Sin but he Orders it for some Wise and Good ends And this I hope is sufficient to vindicate the Holiness of Providence notwithstanding so much Wickedness as is daily committed 3dly The Divine Providence is not justly chargeable with any thing that is utterly inconsistent and irreconcilable with the Holiness of Government Now since the permission of Sin is very reconcilable with the Holiness of Providence there can be no other reasonable Objection against it unless we could prove by plain and undeniable evidence that God is the Cause and Author of Sin and this indeed would prove that God does not Govern the World with Holiness if he had any proper efficiency in the Sins of men That is did God tempt men to Sin or by any secret influences and impulses incline and even compel them to Sin But the least thought and imagination of this is a very great Blasphemy and the greater and more unpardonable Blasphemy because there is no temptation to suspect any such thing of God There is no way of knowing this but either by our own Sense and Experience or by Reason or by Revelation As for our own Sense and Experience this can prove nothing For no man finds any other force or impulse but from his own lusts and sinful inclinations Every man is tempted when he is drawn away of his own lust and enticed 1. Iames 14. Those who charge God with inclining mens hearts to Wickedness yet confess that this is done by such secret influences as no man can distinguish from the workings of his own mind which is plainly to
their Sufferings are the punishment of their Sins and the Fore-runners of Future Vengeance except they repent And when we know this it makes a vast difference between the Prosperity and the Sufferings of Good and Bad men and because this is not always visible in external Events God has taken care to reveal it to us But God has made this very visible in most of the ordinary Calamities of life which are the natural effects of Sin of Intemperance Luxury Lust Pride Passion Covetousness Idleness and Prodigality most of those Evils which Bad men suffer are owing to such Vices and all these Good men escape and sometimes their Vertues advance them to Riches and Honours and when they don't yet they make them contented and pleased But when Wickedness makes men great it commonly makes them a mark for Envy and advances them to tumble them down Nay though the Divine Providence does not always make a difference between Good and Bad men as to their external Fortunes yet sometimes God makes a very remarkable difference between them Gives such signal Demonstrations of his Anger against Bad men and of his Care and Protection of the Good that it forces men to acknowledge Verily there is a reward for the righteous verily he is a God that judgeth in the earth 58. Psal. 11. And a few such Examples as these though both Sacred and Prophane Story furnish us with very many are sufficient to make as visible a distinction between the Good and the Bad as the Providence of God in this World requires 4. But yet the Goodness of Providence in a state of Discipline will not allow of greater Evils and Calamities than are necessary to the good government of the World For this is a state of Discipline and Government not of Judgment Good men must suffer no more than what will encrease their Vertue not prove a temptation to sin The rod of the wicked must not always rest on the lot of the righteous lest he also put forth his hand unto iniquity The Sufferings of Bad men who are in a curable state must be only proportioned to their cure unless the evil of the Example requires a severer punishment to warn other Sinners As for hardened and incorrigible Sinners the Goodness of God is not concerned for them but he may serve his Providence on them as he pleases either by making them the Ministers of his Justice to execute such a terrible Vengeance on the World as none but such hardened Sinners would execute or by making them the lasting Monuments of his own Vengeance as he did a hardened and incorrigible Pharaoh for this is for the great good of the World and a state of Discipline requires such Examples And such Sinners are fit to be made Examples of And all such Severities as these are very reconcilable with the Goodness of God in a state of Discipline 5. The Goodness of God in a state of Discipline not only allows but requires great patience long-suffering and goodness to Sinners For this is necessary to reclaim Sinners to give them time for repentance and to invite and encourage them to repent by all the arts and methods of Goodness as well as to overawe them by Judgments and Severities Promises are as necessary to reform Sinners as Threatnings for Hope is as powerful a Principle as Fear and Love and Goodness work more kindly upon Ingenuous minds and melt those whom Judgments cannot bow nor break Thus a kind Parent deals with a Prodigal Son tries him with kindness as well as severity and thus God deals with Sinners He is good to the Evil and to the Good and maketh his Sun to shine and his Rain to fall upon the Just and upon the Unjust And this is such goodness as is proper only for a state of Discipline 6. The Goodness of God even in a state of Discipline requires that there should be a great deal more good than evil in the world For since Goodness governs the World even in this state the Good must be predominant that notwithstanding all the Evils and Calamities there are it may still be very visible that the World is governed by a Good God That this is so I think I need not prove for we all see and feel it The Evils that are in the World bear no proportion at all to the Good There are some few Examples of miserable people but the generality of Mankind are very happy and even these miserable people have great allays of their Miseries and if we take an estimate of their whole Lives have a much greater share of Good than Evil. The Judgments of God are sometimes very terrible but they come but seldom For a years Plague or Famine we enjoy some Ages of Health and Plenty And the Ruins and Desolations of War are recompenced and forgot by a more Lasting and Flourishing Peace But the Goodness of God moves in a constant and uniform round visits all Parts and Corners of the Earth as the Sun does with its Light and Heat That considering how little Mankind deserves of God in this Corrupt and Degenerate State how highly they provoke him every day and how constantly and universally he does good to them instead of complaining of the many Evils that are in the World we have reason to admire the Patience and Goodness of God to Sinners This I take to be a true Account of the Nature and Exercise of God's Goodness as it respects a State of Discipline and so it must be considered in the government of this World and then all the Objections against the Goodness of Providence vanish of themselves Though this World be not so happy as Perfect and Absolute Goodness can make it yet God abounds in all the Expressions of Goodness which a State of Trial and Discipline will allow which is all that we can reasonably expect and all that God can wisely do for us in this State 2dly Especially if we consider in the next place what the true notion of Good and Evil is in a State of Discipline for this is another occasion of most Objections against the Goodness of Providence That men consider Human Nature absolutely and appeal to their Senses for the Notions and Differences of Good and Evil without any regard to the present State of Human Nature that is by Good and Evil they mean only Natural Good and Evil such as Pleasure or Pain a State of Ease and Rest or of Trouble and Labour and Difficulty Riches or Poverty Honour or Disgrace and measure the Goodness of Providence by the Natural Good or Evil that is in the World if Mankind and particular men be happy and prosperous then God does good and they will acknowledge that Providence is good if they be afflicted this is very evil and therefore an Objection against the Goodness of Providence But does not every man know the difference between the good of the End and the good of the Means The End is Happiness which is the
good of Nature and therefore whatever is the Happiness or any part of the Happiness of Man is the good of Nature the good of the End is that which is good to make men happy and the more effectual it is to promote our Happiness the greater Good it is tho it may be a great Natural Evil and whatever will hinder or destroy our Happiness is a great Evil though it may be a great Natural Good In all such Cases things are good or evil with respect to their End or to their Natural or Moral Consequences When we are in health that is good Food which is pleasant and wholsome and will preserve health but the same Diet may be very hurtful and fatal when we are sick Indulgence or Severity to Children is either good or evil in proportion to their Tempers and Inclinations as it is apt either to corrupt their Manners or to train them up to Piety and Vertue And therefore when we speak of Discipline and Government which is the true notion of God's Providence in this World we must not consider so much what is naturally good and evil as what the state of those is who are the Subjects of Discipline and what is good for them in such a State for how many Natural Evils soever there are in the World the Evils of Afflictions and Judgments of Plague and Famine and Sword if such Severities be good for Mankind it is as great an argument of the Goodness of Providence to inflict them as it is for a Parent or a Prince to reclaim and reform his Children or his Subjects by great Severities And an easy and prosperous State when the Wickedness of Mankind require severe Restraints is no more an Act of Kindness and Goodness than the fond Indulgence of Parents is to disobedient Children So that this takes away the very foundation of this Objection against the Goodness of Providence The principal Objection is That there are a great many Evils and Miseries in the World we grant it but then we say That God is very good in it and that these Natural Evils tho they are grievous are not Evils to us because they are and are intended for our good We can neither prove nor disprove the Goodness of Providence merely by external Events especially with respect to particular men For Prosperity is not always good for us nor is Affliction always for our hurt God may make some men prosperous in his Anger and chastise others in great love and goodness and this I take to be the meaning of the Wise-man 9. Eccl. 1 2. No man knoweth either love or hatred by all that is before them For all things come alike to all there is one event to the righteous and to the wicked to the good and to the clean and to the unclean to him that sacrificeth and to him that sacrificeth not as is the good so is the sinner and he that sweareth as he that feareth an oath Which does not signify that the Divine Providence makes no difference between Good and Bad men for God does love Good men and hate the Wicked and his Providence makes a great difference between them though this difference is not always visible in external Events For when the same Event happens to both whether it be a Natural Good or Evil it may be an Act of Favour to Good men and of Judgment to the Wicked For external Prosperity and Adversity in a State of Discipline may either be good or evil and may be good for one when at the same time it is evil to another and therefore the Providence of God may make a difference when the external Event makes none The Wise-man confesses This is an evil among all things that are done under the Sun that there is one event unto all Bad men who look no farther than external Events make a very bad use of it and conclude that God makes no difference when they see none made And thus the heart of the sons of men is full of evil and madness is in their heart while they live and after that they go to the dead 3. v. But those who consider wisely see no reason from external Events from such a promiscuous distribution of good and evil either to deny a Providence or the Goodness and Justice of Providence since good and evil in this State are not in the things themselves but in the End for which they are intended and which they serve It is of great consequence rightly to understand this matter to give us a firm persuasion of the Goodness of God even when he corrects and punishes and to cure our discontent at the Prosperity of the Wicked and therefore I shall briefly represent to you the State of Mankind in this World and what is good in such a State Man has sinned and Man must die but God has in infinite goodness to Mankind sent his own Son into the World to save Sinners who by death hath destroyed him who had the power of Death that is the Devil and hath brought Life and Immortality to light by the Gospel This removes the Scene of Happiness from this World to the next and makes this present Life only a State of Probation for Eternity If we obey the Laws of our Saviour and imitate his Example he has promised to raise us again when our dead Bodies are putrified in the Grave into Immortal Life but has threatned all the Miseries of an Eternal Death against Incorrigible Sinners so that the greatest good that God or Man can do for us in this World is by all the wise methods of Discipline and Government to prepare us for the Happiness of the next and to preserve us from those Eternal Miseries which will be the portion of Sinners Tho there are thousands of foolish Sinners who never consider this yet all Mankind agree that that is best for us in this World which will make us eternally happy in the next and that is a very great Evil which will betray us to Eternal Miseries There are a great many Infidels who believe neither a Heaven nor a Hell but yet these very Infidels are not so void of common Sense as to deny supposing there were a Heaven and a Hell that to be the best Condition for us in this World whatever it be upon other accounts which will carry us to Heaven and keep us out of Hell Now if this be the Case there cannot be so great Evils in this World but what may be good for us and therefore may be an expression of God's Goodness to us For if Pain and Sickness Poverty and Disgrace wean us from this World subdue our Lusts make us Good men and qualify us for Eternal Rewards though they are great Afflictions yet they are very good as the way though a rough and difficult way to Happiness That prosperity does oftentimes corrupt mens Lives and Manners make them proud and sensual regardless of God and of Religion and so fond of
of particular Creatures but of the good of the whole And this in some Cases may make the greatest and most terrible Acts of Severity such as are enough to afright and astonish the World Acts of the greatest Goodness and Mercy too which will vindicate the Goodness of Providence when God seems to be most severe and to have forgot all Goodness and Compassion As to explain this in some particular Cases The good government of the World requires the defence and protection of Mankind from violent and unjust Oppressions and the most exemplary Vengeance executed upon such private or publick Oppressors is a great Act of Goodness and a great deliverance to the Oppressed 136. Psalm the Psalmist exhorts us To give thanks to the Lord for he is good for his mercy endureth for ever And among other Expressions of the Divine Goodness and Mercy he mentions the Plagues of Egypt and the Deliverance of Israel by the overthrow of Pharaoh in the Red-Sea To him that smote Egypt in their first-born for his mercy endureth for ever And brought out Israel from among them for his mercy endureth for ever With a strong hand and with a stretched-out arm for his mercy endureth for ever To him which divided the Red-sea into parts for his mercy c. and made Israel to pass through the midst of it but over-threw Pharaoh and his host in the Red-sea for his mercy c. To him who smote great kings and slew famous kings Sihon king of the Amorites and Og the king of Bashan and gave their land for an heritage even for an heritage to Israel his servant for his mercy endureth for ever This ought to be well considered before we object the Evils and Calamities which befall Bad men against the Goodness of Providence For there are few Bad men who suffer any Remarkable Vengeance but that their Sufferings are a great kindness and deliverance to others and it may be to the Publick in breaking their Power or taking them out of the World And in all such Cases the Psalmist has taught us a very proper Hymn I will sing of mercy and judgment unto thee O Lord will I sing 101. Psal. 1. Thus the good government of the World requires some great and lasting Examples of God's Justice and Vengeance against Sin And as terrible as such Examples are they are a great publick Good to the World Some few such Examples as these will serve to warn an Age nay many succeeding Ages and Generations of men which prevents the more frequent Executions of Vengeance and justifies the Patience and Long-suffering of God to Sinners If such Examples in any measure reform the World as God intends they should it makes this World a much happier place for the better men are the less hurt and the more good they will do and the less evil there is committed in the World the less Mankind will suffer and the greater Blessings God will bestow on them And though there be a great deal of Wickedness committed in the World after such Terrible Warnings as these God may exercise great Patience and Forbearance towards Sinners without the least blemish to his Holiness or Justice For such Frightful Executions convince the World of God's Justice and when God has publickly vindicated the Honour of his Justice he may try gentler Methods and glorify his Mercy and Patience towards Sinners And thus God punishes that he may spare is sometimes very terrible in his Judgments to prevent the necessity of striking often that Sinners may have sufficient warning and that he may be good to Sinners without encouraging them in sin Thus the destruction of the Old World by a Deluge of Water when they were past being reformed is a warning to all Sinners as long as this World lasts and is a publick and standing Confutation of Atheism of such Scoffers as say where is the promise of his coming for since the fathers fell asleep all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation The constant and regular course of Nature without any Supernatural Changes and Revolutions tempts men to think that there is no God in the World who changes Times and Seasons but this St. Peter tells us is visibly confuted by the destruction of the Old World for this they are willingly ignorant of that by the word of God the heavens were of old and the earth standing out of the water and in the water whereby the world that then was being overflowed with water perished And this is reason enough to fear and expect what God has threatned That this present World shall be burnt by fire But the heavens and the earth which are now by the same word are kept in store reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men 2 Peter 3. 5 6 7. Such Destructions as these can be attributed to no Natural Causes but the same Word which made the World destroyed the Old World by Water and will destroy this by Fire which makes it a visible Demonstration of the Power and Justice of God The destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah by Fire from Heaven is not only a general Warning to Sinners but an Example of a Divine Vengeance against all Uncleanness and Unnatural Lusts. As St. Iude tells us Even as Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities about them in like manner giving themselves over to fornication and going after strange flesh are set forth for an example suffering the vengeance of eternal fire v. 7. Thus the Destruction of Ierusalem by the Romans which was attended with the most terrible Circumstances that we ever meet with in Story is a lasting Confutation of Infidelity and a glorious Testimony to Christ and his Religion So that most of the terrible Examples of God's Vengeance how terrible soever they were to those who suffered are Acts of great Goodness to the World and therefore belong to the Goodness of Government by some severe Executions to protect and defend the Innocent and reclaim other Offenders without the necessity of terrifying the World in every Age with such repeated Severities Nay we may observe farther That when the World is grown very corrupt and degenerate and such Sinners if they be suffered to continue in it will certainly propagate their Atheism Infidelity and Lewdness to all Posterity it is great Goodness to all succeeding Generations to cleanse the World of its impure Inhabitants by some great Destruction by Sword or Plague or Famine to lessen the number of Sinners and to possess those who escape with a greater awe and reverence of God's Judgments Nay to observe but one thing more Many times these terrible Shakings and Convulsions of the World are intended by God to open some new and more glorious Scene of Providence Thus it was in the Four Empires which preyed upon each other and were at last swallowed up by the Roman Powers though they made great Destructions in the World yet they carried Learning and Civility into
36. Wo unto you Scribes and Pharisees Hypocrites because ye build the tombs of the prophets and garnish the sepulchres of the righteous and say if we had been in the days of our fathers we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets Wherefore ye be witnesses unto your selves that ye are the children of them which killed the prophets fill ye up then the measure of your fathers sins Wherefore behold I send unto you prophets and wise men and scribes and some of them shall ye kill and crucifie and some of them shall ye scourge in your synagogues and persecute them from city to city That upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zacharias Son of Barachias whom ye slew between the temple and the altar God may wait with patience upon a wicked Nation or a wicked Family but when they sin on from one Generation to another it all aggravates the account and when God sees it time to punish makes the punishment very severe or final 2dly The Righteous Posterity of good men are rewarded also for their Fathers sake for he sheweth mercy to thousands of them that love him and keep his commandments A Wicked Son may receive a great many Temporal Blessings from God for the sake of a Righteous Father for it is evident from Scripture that God shews great Favour and exercises great Patience to bad men for the sake of the good but the Promise is made only to the Righteous Seed of Good men for tho it does not unbecome the Divine Goodness to shew favour to bad men especially when it is for the sake of the righteous which makes it the reward and encouragement of Vertue yet it does not seem fitting to make any general Promise of favour to them which would be an Encouragement of Vice The Righteous Seed then of Good men shall be blessed but so shall the Righteous Seed of Wicked men be and what peculiar Priviledge is this to the Good I answer When God promises to bless the Righteous Posterity of Good men if it contain any thing peculiar which God has not so expresly promised to other good men it must signify a more certain and a more lasting Prosperity in this world All good men are not prosperous in this world nor has God any where promised that they shall be so no more than all wicked men are visibly punished here but as God visits the Iniquities of the Fathers upon their Children by executing a more speedy Vengeance on the Wicked Children of Wicked Parents so the Righteous Children of Righteous Parents shall be more certainly prosperous than other good men and the more uninterrupted successions there are of such Righteous Parents and Righteous Children the deeper root they shall take and be like a tree planted by the rivers of waters that bringeth forth his fruit in his season his leaf also shall not wither and what soever he doth shall prosper 1. Psal. 3. This may suffice for a short Representation of this case and as it is thus stated it is manifest That there is no Injustice in it let us then consider what Wise Ends it serves both with respect to Parents and to Children and to the Justification of Providence 1. As to Parents If they have any Natural Affection to their Children this is a very powerful Argument to restrain them from Vice and to excite them to Virtue Most of the Labour and Toil which men undergo is for the sake of their Children to provide for them while they live and to leave them in easy and happy Circumstances when they dye to raise and perpetuate a Family and to secure them as far as it is possible from all adverse events But how successful soever Bad men may be in raising an Estate they build upon a Sandy Foundation and leave a very perishing Inheritance to their Children especially if they raise an Estate by Injustice and Oppression by defrauding God and the Poor of their Portion which many times makes it moulder away in the hands even of a Righteous Heir The more prosperous a wicked man is the more likely is his Posterity to be miserable if he propagate his Vices to them for God will at one time or other reckon with wicked Families as well as men and that will be a Terrible Account when the wickedness of his father shall be remembred before the Lord and the sin of his mother shall not be blotted out 109. Psal. 14. And what an Encouragement is this to Good men tho they themselves should be unfortunate in the world to know That their Posterity shall reap the Rewards of their Virtue that if their Children should be wicked there is some reason to hope that they may be more gently used and it may be receive many Temporal Blessings for their sakes but if they be Righteous they shall then take root and flourish in the earth that the little which the Righteous man hath righteously got shall prove a better a more lasting and increasing Inheritance than the Riches of many wicked and that a Liberal Charity which some men think is to defraud their Children shall prove like Seed sown in the earth which repays all with a plentiful Harvest It is certain were this firmly believed and well considered it would lay the greatest obligation in the world both on Bad and Good men to take care of the Religious and Vertuous Education of their Children The only way wicked men have to cut off the intail of Misery from their Families and to secure their Children from that Vengeance which their own sins have deserved is to train them up in Piety and Vertue and the only way Good men have to intitle their Children to those Temporal Blessings wherewith God thinks fit to reward their Vertues upon their Posterity which is the best Inheritance they can leave them is to make them Good The wicked Children of wicked Parents have their own and their Fathers sins to hasten and increase their punishments and the Righteous Children of Righteous Parents have their own and their Fathers Vertues to secure and to augment their rewards 2. As for Children What greater obligation than this could be laid on them to avoid the evil Examples and to imitate the Vertues of their Parents The Wickedness of their Fathers makes it more dangerous for them to be wicked for when wickedness is intail'd the punishment of wickedness is intail'd too and the longer Judgment has been delayed the nearer it is and the more severe it is like to be The wicked Son of a wicked Father cannot promise himself to escape so well as his Father did because his Father's sins which he imitates calls for a more speedy Vengeance on him either to put a stop to wickedness or to root out a wicked Family and to pull down the Leprous house But what an encouragement is it to the Children of Righteous
upon mount Zion and on Ierusalem I will punish the fruit of the stout heart of the King of Assyria and the glory of his proud looks 10. Isai. 5 6 7 12. A great many Examples might be given of this nature but these are sufficient to show what different Intentions God and Men have in the same actions and how easily God can defeat what men intend and accomplish by them his own Wise Counsels which they never thought of When God has no particular Ends of Providence to serve by the Lusts and Passions and evil Designs of men he commonly disappoints them that when they intend evil and imagine a mischievous device they are not able to perform it 21. Psal. 11. Or he turns the evil upon their own heads The heathen are sunk down in the pit that they made in the net which they hid is their own foot taken the Lord is known by the judgment which he executeth the wicked is snared in the work of his own hands 9 Psal. 15 16. Or he doubly disappoints their malice not only by defeating the evil they intended but by turning it to the great advantage of those it was intended against which was visible in the case of Haman whose malice against Mordecai and all the Iews for his sake did not only prove his own ruin but the great advancement of Mordecai and the Glory and Triumph of the Iewish Nation Having thus briefly shewn what Government God has both of the Hearts and the Actions of men how easily he can alter their Counsels and manage their Passions make them do what good they never intended and disappoint the evil which they did intend or turn it into good this is a sufficient Demonstration how Absolute the Divine Providence is for he who has such an Absolute Government of Nature of what we call Chance and Fortune and of the Wills and Actions of men can do whatsoever pleaseth him But that we may have the clearer and more distinct apprehension of God's government of mankind to make them the Instruments of his Providence I shall more particularly but very briefly state this matter both with respect to good and to bad men 1. As for Good men there is no difficulty in their case for they are the Ministers of a good and beneficent Providence they do good out of Temper and Inclination and a Habit and Principle of Vertue and out of Reverence to the Divine Laws and are ready to obey every extraordinary impression to excite and determine them to such particular good offices as God thinks fit to employ them in And this is nothing but what is very honourable for God and what becomes good men for to do good is the Glory of Human Nature as well as of the Divine Providence and good men will observe the Laws of Vertue in doing good and while good is done by honest and vertuous means there can be no Objection against Providence 2dly But as Bad men are most difficulty governed so the greatest difficulty is in vindicating Providence in making use of the Ministries of Bad men for it is commonly thought a great blemish to Providence when Glorious and Admirable Designs are brought to pass by the Sins of men Now the Foundation of this Objection is a great mistake as if God could not serve his own Providence by the Sins of men without being the Cause of mens sins for there is no colour nor reasonable pretence of an Objection against God's making the Sins of men serve wise and good ends if he can do this without having any hand in mens sins It is the great Glory of Providence to bring good out of evil and while all the Events of Providence are Just and Righteous and Holy and Wise and such as become a God it is much more admirable to consider that all this should be while there is so much wickedness and disorder in the world The true state of this matter in short is this God never suggests any evil designs to men that is owing to their own wicked hearts or to the Temptations of other wicked men or of wicked Spirits but when men have formed any wicked Designs he sometimes as you have heard changes their purposes or deters them from putting them in execution and when he suffers them to proceed to action he either shamefully disappoints them or serves some wise and good end by what they wickedly do And if Providence consists in the Care and Government of mankind how can God govern mankind better than to permit bad men to do no more hurt than what he can turn to good God does not govern the world by an immediate and miraculous Power but governs men by men and makes them help and defend reward and punish one another and therefore there is no other ordinary way of punishing bad men excepting the Civil Sword which reaches but a few Criminals but to punish them by the Wickedness of other bad men and what can more become the Wisdom and Justice of Providence than to make bad men the Ministers and Executioners of a Divine Vengeance upon each other which is one great End God serves by the Sins of men I 'm sure it is for the great good of the world that God has the government of bad men that they cannot do so much hurt as they would and that the mischief God permits them to do is directed to fall on such persons as either want Correction or deserve Punishment For this is another thing very observable in God's government both of the good and bad actions of men that as in the government of Natural Causes God directs where and when and in what proportion Nature shall exert its Influences that it shall rain upon one City and not upon another so God does not only excite men to do good but directs and determines them where to do it chuses out such persons as they shall do good to and appoints what good they shall do and in what measures and proportions they shall do it And he not only sets bounds to the Lusts and Passions of bad men but when he sees fit to permit their wickedness he directs where the hurt and mischief of it shall light We need no other proof of this but the very Notion of Providence which is God's Care of his Creatures for that requires a particular Application of the good or evil which men do to such particular persons as God thinks fit to do good to or to afflict and punish which is the most material and most necessary exercise both of the Wisdom and Justice and Goodness of Providence For if God suffered men to do good or evil at random without directing them to fit and proper Objects the Fortunes of particular men would depend upon as great a Chance as the mutable Lusts and Passions and Fancies of men The only Use I shall make of this at present is to convince you how perfectly we are in God's hands and how secure we are in his
mankind now is would destroy the good Government of the world and most of the Pleasures and Conveniences of Life and yet without this the Providence of God is not so uniform towards men as it is towards beasts and those who fare worse than others of the same nature with them will still complain If then Providence must not deal alike by all men do they mean by the Uniformity and Stability of Providence That mens Fortunes whatever they are shall always be the same That the Rich and Prosperous shall always be Rich and Prosperous and the Poor always Poor and Beggars and Slaves Unless these Objectors be all Rich and Happy I doubt they will never agree to this for the Poor and Miserable must needs think it hard usage to be always poor without room for better hopes But such a Stability of Providence as this would destroy the Wise and Just Government of the World for how should God restrain and punish Wickedness and reward and encourage Vertue if the Rich must always be Rich and the Poor always Poor Nay how can the Providence of God do this without making men Vertuous and Vicious too by Necessity and Fate When Wantonness and Prodigality Idleness and Folly will spend or lose an Estate and Frugality Prudence and Diligence will get one And when all men in this world must not be equal does it not more become the Wisdom and Justice of Providence that mens own Vertues and Vices shall in a great measure make the distinction and carve out their own Fortunes for them So that when men complain of the Uncertainty and Instability of Fortune as they call it they complain of they know not what and were it put to their own choice what to have in the room of it they would not know how to mend the matter The wise government of free Agents who so often change themselves requires very frequent sudden surprizing Turns of Providence the reasons of which must of necessity be as invisible to us as the thoughts of mens hearts and their most secret intrigues and counsels till we can make men all move alike as regularly and uniformly as the Heavenly Bodies do it is an absurd and unreasonable complaint That Providence does not act regularly and that the Events of Providence are not always the same Another great Complaint against Providence is That good men are not always rewarded nor bad men punished according to their deserts That many bad men are prosperous in this world and some good men great sufferers That all things come alike to all there is one event to the righteous and to the wicked to the good and to the clean and to the unclean to him that sacrificeth and to him that sacrificeth not as is the good so is the sinner and he that sweareth as he that feareth an oath 9. Eccl. 2. This makes the Events of Providence very sudden mysterious and unaccountable that no man knows what course to take to make his life easy and prosperous for whether he be good or wicked he may be happy or miserable as it happens As for the Objection it self I shall consider it more hereafter but at present I will only ask these Objectors Whether to remove these Difficulties and Uncertainties of Providence and that they may the better understand the Reasons of all Events they do in good earnest desire That God would reduce this matter to a Certainty by punishing all bad men and rewarding all good men in this world according to their deserts If they do I must tell them as Christ told the two Brethren who desired that they might sit one on his Right hand and the other on his Left in his Kingdom Ye ask ye know not what They ask the most dangerous thing that could possibly befal mankind and what they ask would be Ten thousand times a greater Objection against Providence than what they complain of Should every Sinner be punished in this world according to his deserts what man is there so just and innocent as to escape the Divine Vengeance If thou Lord shouldest mark iniquity O Lord who shall stand 130. Psal. 3. Were every Sinner punished as he deserves I doubt there would be no good man left to be rewarded for where is the man that doth good and sinneth not What room does this leave for Patience and Forbearance for the Repentance of Sinners for God's Pardoning-Grace and Mercy and what a Terrible Providence is this How contrary to all the Notions we have of God and his kind and gracious Government of his Creatures I grant God may exercise great Patience and Long-suffering towards sinners he may forgive the sins of true Penitents and yet punish sinners and reward good men even in this world these things are very reconcilable in God's Government of the world for thus he does govern the world but they are very irreconcilable with such a Providence and Government as these men desire which requires a present and visible Punishment of every sin as soon as committed and as present and visible a Reward of every good action for unless these Punishments and Rewards are present all the time they are delayed bad men may be prosperous and good men afflicted which is their very Objection against Providence which can never be removed but by speedy and visible Executions which leave no place for the Patience and Forgiveness of God or for the Repentance of Sinners And is it not much more desirable for ever to be ignorant of the Reasons of Providence than to have such Proofs and Demonstrations of Providence as this Let me desire these unthinking Cavillers at Providence to review their Objection over again and consider what is the meaning of every word in it and how upon second thoughts they like it themselves That they may have a plain and certain Reason of God's Judgments they desire that no man may suffer any external Calamity but only for sin and that every sinner may be punish'd in this world according to his deserts and then they will believe That there is a Providence that governs the world tho it is better for the world that they should continue Infidels than be thus convinced Well then who in the first place are these sinners whom they would have punished Do they mean every one who does a wicked action or every impenitent and incorrigible sinner If every one who at any time does any wicked action must be punished for it then it is plain that no man can escape then there is no place for Repentance or Forgiveness but a speedy Vengeance must pursue the sinner and God knows we are all sinners and must all be punished and if this removes one Objection against Providence I 'm sure it will very much encrease another from the many evils and miseries that are in the world which will be many more and much greater if every sin must receive its just punishment If they mean only That impenitent and incorrigible sinners
mens Lusts for did not all Mankind suffer by one another's sins I doubt neither good nor bad men would be so zealously concerned to punish and suppress Vice and therefore the Divine Providence could not have taken a more effectual course to discourage Wickedness than to make all Mankind sensible of the evil of sin by making them all at one time or other feel the evil of sin in what they suffer by their own or other mens sins For were all men convinced and it is strange that their own sense and feeling will not convince them that all the evils and miseries of life are owing to sin and that it is impossible to be happy without reforming themselves and others as far as they can what more powerful Argument could Providence offer to us to reform the world There are another sort of Calamities and very terrible ones too which those who believe a Providence can attribute to nothing else but the just Judgment and Vengeance of God upon a wicked world Such as Plague and Pestilence and Famine Deluges and Earthquakes which destroy Cities and Countries and more ordinary Accidents when they act in such an extraordinary manner as if they were directed and guided by an unseen hand A great many such Instances are recorded in Scripture and expresly ascribed to the Judgment of God God has threatned such Judgments in Scripture and therefore when we see them executed we must conclude That they are inflicted by God as the just Punishment of Sin Nay those very evils and miseries which we suffer by other mens sins are in Scripture attributed to God who has the Supreme Disposal of all Events For as I observed before it is not sufficient proof that these Judgments are not ordered by God that we can find some immediate Causes for them that some of them are owing to Natural Causes others to Men others to some surprizing and unusual or it may be usual Accidents for whoever believes a Divine Providence does not therefore believe that God does every thing immediately by his own Power without the Ministry of any Second Causes either Natural or Free Agents or what we call Accidents but he is only obliged to believe That God governs all Second Causes to produce such Effects as he sees fit That all Nature moves at God's Command That fire and hail snow and vapours wind and storm fulfil his word 148. Psal. 8. v. That both good and bad men are under his Government and the Ministers of his Providence and that what seems perfect Chance to us is directed by his Wisdom and Counsel and then whatever evils we suffer and whatever the immediate Causes of them be we must ascribe them all to God especially when the same kind of Judgments which had the same kind of immediate Causes are attributed to God in Scripture it is reason enough for us whenever such Judgments befal us to ascribe them to the Providence of God But I need not dispute here Whether all those Evils and Calamities which befal sinners are ordered and appointed by God for till they can prove à priori by direct and positive Arguments That there is no God nor a Providence which none of our Modern Atheists pretend to do while they dispute only by way of Objection they must prove that things are not so ordered as they ought to have been ordered did God govern the world and if we can prove that they are their Objection is answered Now with respect to my present Argument to vindicate the Holiness of Providence it is plain beyond all contradiction that things are so ordered for the discouragement of Wickedness and the encouragement of Vertue as if they had been so ordered on purpose by the greatest Wisdom and the most perfect Holiness and therefore we have reason to believe that they were so ordered by a Wise and a Holy Providence As far then as to command and encourage all Holiness and Vertue and to forbid and discourage all Wickedness and Vice is a Proof of the Holiness of Providence I hope I have sufficiently cleared this Point and I must desire you to observe That these are direct and positive Proofs such as every man may understand and cannot avoid the evidence of and therefore are not to be shaken by every Difficulty objected against them For our knowledg is so imperfect that there is nothing almost which we so certainly know but is liable to such Objections as we cannot easily and satisfactorily answer but one plain positive Proof is a better Reason to believe any thing than a hundred Objections against it are not to believe it because since it is confessed on all hands that our knowledg is very imperfect it is no reason to disbelieve what we do know and what we are as certain of as we can be of any thing because there are some things relating to the same subject which we do not know and therefore unless the Objection be as positive and evident as the proof is and I am sure there are no such Objections against the Holiness of Providence we may very reasonably acknowledge that there are some difficulties which we do not understand and yet may very reasonably believe on as we did 2dly Let us now consider What the Holiness of God's Providence and Government does not require of him And I shall name but one thing which some men make a great Objection against Providence viz. That there is so much Sin and Wickedness daily committed in the World Now if the being of Sin in the World or if the Wickedness of men were irreconcilable with the Holiness of Providence this were an unanswerable Objection against it for it cannot be denied but that Mankind are very wicked But what consequence is there in this that God can't be Holy nor his Providence Holy because Men are wicked We may as well prove that there is no God because there is a Devil Such conceits as these tempted some ancient Hereticks to assert Two Principles a Good and a Bad God because they thought that if there were but one God and he very good there could be no such thing as evil in the World But would any man think this a good Argument against the Holiness of a Prince and his Government that he has many Wicked Subjects and how then do the Sins of men come to be an Argument against the Holiness of Providence To state this in a few words When we speak of God's permitting Sin we either mean the internal or the external Acts of Sin 1. The internal Act of sin which is nothing else but the choice of the Will When men chuse that which is wicked and fully resolve and purpose as they have opportunity to do it This is the sin this makes us guilty before God who knows our hearts though Human Laws can take no cognizance of it as our Saviour tells us He that looketh upon a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his
heart He who intends and resolves it and wants nothing but an opportunity to commit adultery is an Adulterer If God then must not permit sin he must not suffer men to will and to chuse any thing that is wicked for this is the sin herein the immorality of the Act consists Consider then what the meaning of this is that God must not leave men to the liberty of their own choice but must always over-rule their minds by an irresistible Power to chuse that which is good and to refuse the evil But will any one say that this is to govern men like men Is this the natural government of free Agents to take away their liberty and freedom of choice Does government signify destroying the nature of those Creatures which are to be governed does this become God to make a free Agent and to govern him by necessity and force This I confess is a certain way to keep Sin out of the world but it thrusts Holiness out of the world too for where there is no liberty of choice there can be neither moral good nor evil and this would be a more reasonable objection against the Holiness of Providence that it banishes Holiness out of the world I grant that God governs the minds of men as well as their external Actions directs and influences their Counsels suggests wise thoughts to them excites good men to great and vertuous Actions and lays invisible restraints upon the Lusts and Passions of Bad men turns their Hearts changes their Counsels and diverts them from ill-laid Designs especially when they have no external restraints on them and the pursuing such Counsels would be very hurtful to the world or to the Church of God nay I deny not but in such cases God may by an irresistible power and influence govern the minds of men not to make them good but to make them the instruments of Providence in doing such good as they have no inclination to do and to chain up their Passions that they may not do that hurt which they intended to do as I have shewn at large above And I see nothing in this which unbecomes the Wise and Soveraign Lord of the world sometimes by an immediate power to govern the minds as well as the bodies of men that they shall no more be able to will and chuse than they are to do what they themselves please For though God has made man a reasonable Creature and free Agent he has not wholly put him out of his own power but that when he sees fit he can lay invisible restraints upon him or clap a counter byass upon his mind which shall lead him contrary to the natural tendency of his own Will and Lusts Thus it is in the natural World though God has endowed all Creatures with natural Vertues and Qualities and in the ordinary course of his Providence suffers them to produce their natural effects yet he has reserved to himself a Sovereign Authority over Nature to reverse its Laws or suspend its influences by an immediate and supernatural Power and I see no reason why God may not do this in the moral as well as in the natural world when the good government of the world requires it But though God may thus sometimes by a Supernatural Power influence the minds of men and chain up their Lusts and Passions yet this is not the natural government of mankind consider'd as free Agents and it would no more become God always to over-rule mens Wills in this manner than it would always to over-power Nature and to govern the natural world not by its natural Vertues and Powers but by constant Miracles And if the ordinary and natural government of mankind considered as reasonable and free Agents requires that God should leave men to the liberty and freedom of their own choice which is the only thing that can be judged and that is capable of Rewards and Punishments then it is no reasonable objection against the Holiness of Providence that God permits men to chuse wickedly that he does not always by an Irresistible and Sovereign Power hinder the internal acts of Sin Especially when we consider that God gives men all those internal assistances of his Grace and lays all those internal restraints upon their Lusts and Passions which are consistent with the liberty of Human Actions Though we know not in what manner the Holy Spirit works upon the minds of men yet this we know if we believe the Gospel of our Saviour That God worketh in us both to will and to do of his own good pleasure That he gives his holy spirit to those who ask him to be a principle of a spiritual life in them And Bad men themselves if they will but confess what they feel must tell you what strugglings they find in their own minds before they can yield to the temptations of sin How in some cases especially at their first entrance upon a sinful course of life natural modesty in others natural pity and compassion in others a natural greatness and generosity of mind gives check to them how at first they blush at the thoughts of any wickedness and are reproached by their own Consciences for it how they tremble at the thoughts of a future Judgment or some present Vengeance to overtake them and can never sin securely till they have laughed away the thoughts of God and of another world Such care God has taken to make Sin uneasy to the minds of men and to reconcile them to the love of Vertue and if after all they will be wicked as free Agents may be if they will this can be no blemish to the Holiness of Providence because it is no fault of Providence to leave free Agents to the freedom of their own choice 2dly As for the external Acts of Sin it must be confessed that God permits a great deal of wickedness to be actually committed such as Thefts Murders Adulteries Perjuries and the like Now this requires a different consideration for in Human Governments this is thought a great miscarriage to suffer any wickedness to be actually committed which we can hinder the commission of No man would be thought innocent much less a Prince who should see a man murthered a Virgin deflowered a Robbery or any other Villanies committed without interposing to hinder the commission of such wickedness when it was in his power to do it and how then can we vindicate the Holiness of Providence which sees and observes and could easily hinder the commission of such wickedness as it daily permits Now rightly to understand this matter we must consider 1. That God cannot always by an immediate Power hinder the actual commission of sin without a perpetual violation of the order of Nature and therefore this does not properly belong to an ordinary Providence which is the government of all Creatures according to their Natures We know indeed That when Ieroboam in great anger stretched out his hand against the Prophet
never become a Holy God to infuse hardness into mens hearts yet when men have hardened themselves and will abuse all the Wise methods of Providence to harden themselves and are now ripe for destruction it very much becomes a Just and Righteous God to exercise them with such Providences as he knows will still harden them till they make themselves such infamous examples of Wickedness as may deserve a more glorious and exemplary Vengeance Which is another thing to be considered in the case of Pharaoh and very necessary to the full understanding this difficult case of God's hardening mens hearts God had peremptorily decreed not only to deliver Israel but to punish Egypt both King and People for the cruel oppression of Israel And therefore he might without any more solemnity have destroyed Pharaoh his People and Land and have carried Israel out of Egypt with a mighty hand But when they had deserved to be Punished and Destroyed and God had resolved to Punish them the manner of their Punishment was at the free disposal of the Divine Wisdom and therefore he chose to Punish them in such a way as might make the Glory and Power of the God of Israel known to the World And this is the very account which God himself gives why he took such a course with Pharaoh as he foresaw would harden and confirm him in his resolutions of not parting with Israel when he could have forced him at the expence of fewer Miracles to have sent them away if he had so pleased I will harden Pharaoh's heart and multiply my signs and wonders in the land of Egypt But Pharaoh shall not hearken unto you that I may lay my hand upon Egypt and bring forth mine armies and my people the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt by great judgments And the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord when I stretch forth my hand upon Egypt and bring out the children of Israel from among them 7. Exod. 3 4 5. The same thing he tells Pharaoh I will at this time send all my plagues upon thy heart and upon thy servants and upon thy people that thou mayest know that there is none like me in all the earth For now I will stretch out my hand that I may smite thee and thy people with pestilence and thou shalt be cut off from the earth And in very deed for this cause have I raised thee up have all this time preserved thee and not cut thee off for to shew in thee my power and that my name may be declared throughout all the earth 9. Exod. 14 15 16. And this reason God gives why he hardened Pharaoh's heart to pursue Israel I will be honoured upon Pharaoh and upon all his host that the Egyptians may know that I am the Lord 14. Exod. 4. This is diligently to be observed to vindicate the Holiness and Justice of Providence For though God infuses no hardness into mens hearts yet if he exercise them with such Providences as he foresees will harden them and does this with an intention and design to harden them this signifies his Will to harden them and such a moral Efficiency in using hardening Providences as will as certainly harden them as if he had infused hardness into them And this makes little difference whether God hardens men by external Providences or by an internal Operation on their minds when he intends such Providences to harden them and knows that they will effectually do it Now I readily grant that tho God infused no hardness into Pharaoh's heart nor did any thing which unbecomes a holy God to do yet he did intend to harden him and did intend to harden him on purpose to multiply his Judgments on Egypt and to destroy him and all his Host in the Red Sea for this is so plainly expressed that we cannot deny it Nay I readily grant that the Providence of God would be justly chargeable with mens Sins did he without any respect to the merit and desert of the Persons by such insensible methods betray them into sin with an intention to harden them For what man is there of such a firm and constant vertue as to be able to resist all Temptations which a long series of Providences chosen and directed for that purpose by a Divine Wisdom could bring him into But yet when men have sinned themselves into such a hardened state as to deserve to be destroyed and when God is so far provoked by their Sins as to resolve to destroy them it becomes the Wisdom and the Justice of God without any impeachment of his Holiness to harden men by external Events and Appearances not in Sin which can never become a Holy God but in such ruinous Courses as their own wicked hearts betray them to and as will bring inevitable ruin on them And this is the true resolution on this Case 1. That God never hardens any men till they have deserved and he is resolved to destroy them 2. That then he does not harden them in Sin but in such Ruinous Counsels as their own Sins betray them to 3. That all this is done not by the natural or moral efficacy but by their own wicked abuse of the Divine Providence 4. To compleat all When God has thus determined to destroy any Person or People he many times inflicts on them a penal blindness and infatuation not to see the things which concern their peace These four Particulars contain a full and easy account of this perplext Doctrine of God's hardening mens hearts and therefore I shall speak distinctly but briefly to them 1. That God never hardens men till they have deserved and he is resolved to destroy them This must be laid as the foundation of all for by what means soever God hardens men how innocent soever they may appear if he intends to harden them not because they deserve and he has determined to destroy them but only that they may deserve to be destroyed and that he may with some fair appearance of Justice destroy them it would be impossible to satisfy equal and impartial Judges of the Justice and Holiness of Providence But if men have hardened themselves in Sin beyond all the ordinary methods of recovery and have so provoked a good and merciful God that he gives them over to ruin and destruction then by what means soever they are hardened which are not directly sinful there can be no just reason to question either the Justice or Goodness or Holiness of God upon this account For when men have sinned to that degree as to deserve immediate destruction and to provoke God to pass a final Sentence on them God may either immediately destroy them or keep them in that hardened state like condemned Malefactors reserved in Chains for a more publick and solemn Execution And this is all that is meant by God's hardening men and this all mankind must allow to be just and holy This was the case of Pharaoh and the Egyptians who
had so grievously oppressed Israel that God was resolved to punish them for it And therefore he sent Moses to inflict a great many Miraculous Judgments on them not intending thereby to convince Pharaoh who had hardened himself against the power of Miracles to convince him and whom he had resolved to destroy but only to lay Egypt waste and to take a signal Vengeance upon that Cruel Persecutor by overthrowing him and his Host in the Red Sea And therefore he so ordered the execution of these Judgments that the hardened heart of Pharaoh should grow more hardened by them Thus when God had determined to cut off Ahab as his grievous Sins had long before deserved he intended to harden him to go up to Ramoth Gilead and fall there and for that purpose suffered a lying Spirit to enter into his Prophets to encourage the King in that Fatal Expedition and as God had foretold they did prevail against Micaiah the Prophet of the Lord who plainly told him that he should fall in it 1 Kings 22. Thus when God was so provoked with the Sins of Iudah that he had resolved to deliver them into the hands of the Chaldaeans who should destroy their City and Temple and carry them captive to Babylon he pronounced this hardening Sentence on them Go and tell this people Hear ye indeed but understand not and see ye indeed but perceive not Make the heart of this people fat and make their ears heavy and shut their eyes lest they see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their hearts and convert and be healed What this means ye shall hear more hereafter all that I observe at present is That this Sentence was not pronounced against them till God had resolved to carry them into captivity and to lay their City and Countrey desolate as the Prophet tells us in the next Verse Then said I Lord how long And he answered until the cities be wasted without Inhabitants and the houses without man and the land be utterly desolate 6. Isaiah 9 10 11. And this was the state of the Iews in our Saviour's days when God had determined the final destruction of the Iewish Nation their City Temple and Polity for their great Sin in crucifying their Messias as Christ tells us 23. Matth. 37 38 39. O Ierusalem Ierusalem Thou that killest the Prophets and stonest them that are sent unto thee how often would I have gathered thy children together even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings and ye would not Behold your house is left unto you desolate For I say unto you ye shall not see me henceforth till ye shall say blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord 19. Luke 41 42 43 44. And when he came near he beheld the city and wept over it saying If thou hadst known even thou in this thy day the things which belong unto thy peace but now they are hid from thine eyes For the days shall come upon thee that thine enemies shall cast a trench about thee and compass thee round and keep thee in on every side and shall lay thee even with the ground and thy children within thee and they shall not leave in thee one stone upon another Because thou knowest not the time of thy visitation Now with respect to this final Sentence which God had pronounced against them though he delayed the execution of it for forty years St. Paul applies to them the Case of a hardened Pharaoh whom God spared also a great while as he did them though he had determined to destroy him by a signal overthrow to shew his power and that his name might be declared throughout all the earth And there was no reason to quarrel with God though he delayed to destroy them for some years after he had determined to destroy them to make them also a more remarkable Example of a just Vengeance and more glorious Power What if God willing to shew his wrath and to make his power known endureth with much long-suffering the vessels of wrath fitted for destruction That is delays for many years the Execution of those whom he has decreed to destroy for their great sins by an irreversible Sentence For such only are the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction 9. Rom. 17 22. And for the same reason he applies to them the Prophesy of Isaiah concerning the judicial blindness and deafness of the Iewish Nation when God had determined to deliver them into the hands of the King of Babylon which was a Prophesy of them also and received its full accomplishment in the final destruction of Ierusalem by the Romans 28. Acts 26 27. So that it is plain from all these Examples and I know no Example in all the Scripture to the contrary that God never hardens men till he has first determined to punish or to destroy them And I shall only add That this hardening which is the effect of God's Decree to punish or to destroy relates only to some Temporal Evils and Calamities which God intends to bring on them not to the Eternal Miseries of the next world God is never said to harden any men that he may eternally damn them that is wholly owing to their own hard and impenitent hearts but God does sometimes harden men in order to take a more exemplary Vengeance on them in this world which serves the wise Ends of Providence and makes his Power and Glory known 2dly This will more evidently appear if we consider That God is never said to harden any men in sin but he only hardens and confirms them in such Ruinous Counsels as will bring that destruction on them which God has ordained and determined for them They harden themselves in sin and make it wise and just for God to punish or destroy them and when God resolves to do so then sometimes he hardens them in such Courses as will bring a Terrible Vengeance on them I need instance only in the Case of Pharaoh which is the most express Text we have for God's hardening men Now what did God harden Pharaoh in Did he harden him against believing Moses and those Miracles which he wrought in the Name and by the Power of the God of Israel No such matter there is no such thing said but he hardened him not to let the People go Pharaoh hardened himself against believing Moses and the Miracles he wrought against owning and submitting to the Power and Sovereign Authority of the God of Israel though when he felt the Judgments inflicted on him they were so uneasy as to make him relent and to promise to send Israel away But his great concernment was how to keep Israel and to get rid of these Plagues and his firm Resolution was never to part with Israel as long as he had any hopes that he might keep them safely Now though it was indeed a very great evil to disbelieve Moses and to disobey God's Command attested and confirmed by
will not see To deceive those with signs and lying wonders and all deceivableness of unrighteousness who do not love the trath but have pleasure in unrighteousness who endeavour to deceive themselves and desire to be deceived For this is all that is meant by sending them strong delusions to believe a lie that God suffers the Man of sin to erect his Kingdom after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders When men are in love with their Sins and therefore do not love the Truth because it discovers and reproves their Sins they are out of the protection of Gods Grace and are delivered up to the Cheats and Impostures of Crafty Men or of Wicked Spirits This is the rule and method of God's Grace he forces truth on no man but those who love the truth shall find it Those who cry after knowledge aud lift up their voice for understanding who seek her as silver and search for her as for hid treasures they shall understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God 2. Prov. 2 3 4 5. But if men wilfully shut their own eyes against the light God suffers the God of this world to blind them as St. Paul teaches 2 Cor. 4. 3 4. But if our gospel be hid it is hid to them that are lost in whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which belive not lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ who is the image of God should shine unto them Which should make us all afraid of prejudice and the love of this world which bar up the mind against truth and by degrees betray us to a judicial blindness There are some other Texts which do indeed attribute the supreme Disposal of all Human Actions to God but without charging his Providence with mens sins 16. Prov. 9. A mans heart deviseth his ways but the Lord directeth his steps 19. 21. There are many devices in a mans heart nevertheless the counsel of the Lord that shall stand 20. 24. Mans goings are of the Lord how then can a man understand his own ways The meaning of which is that men advise and deliberate and choose freely what they intend to do but when they come to action they can do nothing they can bring nothing to pass but what God will God can change their Counsels or can disappoint them when they are ripe for action or can make what they do serve quite another end than what they intended Now this only proves what I have already observed That the Issues and Events of all things are in God's hands as they must be if he governs the World Men may choose what they please but they shall do only what God sees fit and what he orders for wise ends God does not act immediately but makes use of Natural causes or of the Ministries of men both good and bad men Men choose and act freely and pursue their own Designs and Imaginations and therefore the moral Good or Evil of the action is their own and God does as freely with unsearchable Wisdom over-rule all Events which are therefore God's doing as well as mens being directed by him to serve the wise ends of Providence in rewarding or punishing Men or Nations as they deserve Thus I have as briefly as I could examined most of those Texts which have been thought to attribute to God some kind of Causality and Efficiency in the Sins of Men and I hope have made it appear that there is no such thing intended in them And for the conclusion of this Argument concerning the Holiness of Providence I shall only add some few Practical Inferences by way of Application 1. Not to attribute our own or other Mens sins to God Let no man say when he is tempted I am tempted of God for God cannot be tempted with evil neither tempteth he any man But every man is tempted when he is drawn away of his own lust and enticed 1. James 13 14. This is absolutely necessary to be observed for without it there is an end of all Religion If God can influence mens Minds to wicked Purposes and Counsels it is impossible he should hate Wickedness or be so Holy as many Holy men are who would no more incline or tempt other men to sin than they would sin themselves And who will hate sin or think that God will love him ever the less for being a Sinner who believes this If God want the Sins of Men to accomplish his own Counsels they must either be very unholy Counsels which cannot be accomplished without the Sins of Men or he must be a weak or unskilful Being which is down-right Blasphemy for a wise and powerful Being can do whatever is Wise and Holy without the Sins of Men. It is excellent Wisdom indeed when men do and will Sin for God to accomplish his own wise and gracious Counsels by their Sins but to incline or tempt or over-rule or determine men to sin on purpose to serve himself by their Sins this would be a just Impeachment both of his Holiness his Wisdom and his Power and a God who is neither Holy Wise nor Powerful would be no very fit Object of Religious worship To say that God decrees the Sins of men for his own Glory to magnifie his Mercy and Justice in saving some few and in condemning the greatest part of Mankind to eternal Miseries is so sensless a Representation both of the Glory of the Mercy and of the Justice of God as destroys the very Notion of all For if Man be a meer Machine who moves as he is moved how can he deserve either Well or Ill Necessity destroys the very Notion of Vertue or Vice both which suppose a free Choise and Election and if ther be no Vertue nor Vice there can be no Rewards nor Punishments and then there is no place neither for Justice nor Mercy and then God can neither glorify his Mercy nor his Justice in forgiving Sins or in punishing the Sinner How can any man who believes that he is over-ruled by God to do all the Evil he does ever be a true Penitent or heartily beg God's Pardon or reverence his Judgments or endeavour to do better All Religion is founded in this Persuasion That God hates every thing that is wicked for if there be no Essential difference between Good and Evil there is no pretence for Religion and if God makes none there is none and if he can be the Author of what is Evil as well as of what is Good he makes no difference between them 2dly The Holiness of Providence teacheth us never to do any Evil to serve Providence under pretext of doing some great Good by it which we think may be acceptable to God God never needs the Sins of men and can never approve them whatever good ends they are intended to serve God indeed does many times bring Good out of Evil but he allows no Man to do evil that
meaning of it from what Noah had often told them and this must needs convince them of the terrible Justice and Vengeance of God And the gradual increase of the Flood gave them some time to repent in and to beg God's pardon and I 'm sure this makes a glorious representation both of the Goodness and Wisdom of God in the most terrible Judgment that ever was executed upon the world if we had sufficient reason to believe as there want not some fair appearances of it that God intended the Deluge as well to convince and save all that could be brought to repentance in the Old World as to reform the New Thus since God had determined to destroy that wicked Generation of men and to preserve only Noah and his three Sons to destroy the Earth by a Deluge and to shut up Noah in the Ark was as great or a greater mercy to Noah than his preservation was Let us suppose that instead of drowning the world God had at once destroyed all Mankind by Plague or Thunder from Heaven or some other sudden stroke excepting Noah and his Sons who should be Eye-witnesses of this Terrible Execution and live to see the Earth covered with dead Bodies and none left to bury them and their Cities lie waste and desolate without Inhabitants who can conceive what the horror of such a sight would have been who would have been contented to live in such a world to converse only with the Images of Death and with noisome Carkasses But God in great mercy shut up Noah in the Ark that he should not see the Terror and Consternation of Sinners when the Flood came and he washed away all their dead Bodies into the Caverns of the Earth with all the marks and signs of their Old Habitations that when Noah came out of the Ark he saw nothing but a new and a beautiful World nothing to disturb his imagination no marks or remains of that Terrible Vengeance This indeed destroyed all other living Creatures as well as Sinners excepting those that were in the Ark with Noah but this I suppose is no great objection against Providence that the Creatures which were made for man's use were destroyed with man since God preserved some of each Kind for a new increase and yet the Wisdom of God was very visible in this for had the World been full of Beasts when there were but four men in it the whole Earth would quickly have been possessed by Wild and Savage Creatures which would have made it a very unsafe habitation for men To conclude this Argument the sum of it in short is this When the wickedness of Mankind was grown universal and incurable it became the Wisdom of God to put an end to that Corrupt State and to propagate a new Race of men from a Righteous Stock and to take the most effectual course to possess them with a lasting belief of his Being and Providence and with a religious awe of his Justice and Power To this end he destroyed the Old World with a Deluge of Water and preserved Noah and his Sons in the Ark which had all the advantages imaginable to deter men from sin which brought a Deluge upon the Old World and to encourage the practise of true Piety and Vertue which preserved Noah from the Common Ruin We see in this Example that numbers are no defence against the Divine Justice and therefore no security to Sinners when all flesh had corrupted his ways God destroyed them all nay we see that the more wickedness prevails in the world the nearer it is to destruction that the great multitude of Sinners is so far from being a reasonable temptation and encouragement to sin that it is a fair warning to considering men to separate and distinguish themselves from a wicked world by an exemplary Vertue that God may distinguish them also when he comes to Judgment which an universal corruption of manners shews to be very near and it is a dangerous thing to sin with a multitude when the multitude of Sinners will hasten Vengeance Here we see that though Sinners may be very secure they are never safe as our Saviour observes it was in the days of Noah they were eating and drinking marrying and giving in marriages until the day that Noah went into the Ark and knew not until the flood came and took them all away 24. Matth. 37 38 39. God may delay punishment a great while and seem to take no notice of what is done below till Sinners begin to think that he is such a one as themselves but their Judgment all this while neither slumbers nor sleeps there may be the greatest Calm and the serenest days before the most terrible Earthquakes and the longer God has kept silence the more reason have we to expect a severe and surprizing Vengeance which makes the Psalmist's Advice in such Cases very seasonable Now consider this ye that forget God lest I tear you in pieces and there be none to deliver And who would be afraid or be ashamed of Noah's singularity to be good alone and to be the single Example of Piety and Vertue that remembers that he alone with his three Sons were saved from the Deluge and he that would be a Noah in the Ark must be a Noah in a wicked World But this is sufficient to justify the Wisdom of Providence as to Noah's Flood which put an end to the Old World and now let us take a view of the New Notwithstanding that late terrible Example of God's Power and Justice in the destruction of the Old World that new Generation of men began to grow very corrupt as God foresaw they would but resolved to try some new methods and not to drown the world any more When Noah had offered a Burnt-offering to the Lord of every clean beast and of every clean fowl after his coming out of the Ark The Lord smelled a sweet savour and the Lord said in his heart I will not again curse the ground any more for man's sake for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth Neither will I again smite any more every living thing as I have done 8. Gen. 20 21. The first Exploit we hear of them was their building the Tower of Babel which Story is so briefly related by Moses that we cannot give a perfect account of the Reasons and Circumstances of it The most probable Account seems to be this that Nimrod the Son of Cush and Grandson of Ham in which Line True Religion and Piety first decayed affecting an Universal Empire to prevent the dispersion of the People persuaded them to build a magnificent Seat for his Empire which should be a center of Union for them at what distance soever they should be forced to remove That the whole Earth should be but one Kingdom and Babel the Royal Palace Had this Design succeeded the whole world would have been but one People and the Universal Monarchy in the Line of
for God hath concluded them all in unbelief that he might have mercy upon all O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments and his ways past finding out Secondly Let us now consider the Wisdom of Providence in some more common and ordinary Events especially such as are made Objections against Providence I have already upon other Occasions taken notice of several things of this nature but it will give us a more transporting sense of the Divine Wisdom to see as much of it as we can in one view In general whoever considers what it is to govern a World and to take care of all the Creatures that are in it must confess it to be a work of Infinite and Incomprehensible Wisdom The Epicureans for this reason rejected a Providence because they thought it too much trouble for their gods full of care solicitude and distraction to observe all that is done in the World and to over-rule and determine all Events as Wisdom Justice and Goodness should direct and indeed nothing less than an Infinite Mind can do this which sees all things at one view judges infallibly at first sight and orders all things with a powerful thought But my chief design at present is to shew you the Wisdom of Providence in some particular Cases which either are not sufficiently observed or not rightly understood Some of the great Objections against Providence are the troublesome and tempestuous state of this world the uncertainty of all Events the fickleness and inconstancy of Human Affairs the promiscuous dispensation of the good and evil things of this life both to good and to bad men And I have already vindicated not only the Justice and Goodness but the Wisdom of God upon these accounts by shewing what wise ends God serves by them and what a wise use we may make of such Providences And therefore the principal thing I shall now insist on shall be some of those wise Methods God uses in Rewards and Punishments wherein the great Wisdom of Government consists And I shall briefly mention some few 1. That God rewards and punishes men in their Posterity This is so plainly taught in Scripture that it will admit of no dispute though some men venture to dispute the Justice at least of one part of it that God should visit the sins of the Fathers upon the Children which the Iews objected against God in that Prophane Proverb the Fathers have eaten sower grapes and the Childrens teeth are set an edge 18. Ezek. and by the answer God there makes we may learn in what sence God threatens to punish the Posterity of Bad men and to reward the Posterity of Good men for their Fathers sakes which does not extend to the other World where every man shall be Judged according to his own Works and the soul that sinneth it shall dye and as to this World where we may allow more to the Sovereignty of Providence without impeaching the Divine Justice yet God assures us that a Righteous Son shall not be punished merely because he had a Wicked Father nor a Wicked Son be rewarded merely because he had a Righteous Father for thus much the words must signifie if they relate to this Life as they certainly do as well as to a Future State Now if neither a Righteous Son shall suffer for the Wickedness of his Father nor a Wicked Son receive the rewards of his Father's Vertue this can afford no pretence to impeach the Justice of Providence but it gives occasion to inquire in what sence God is said to visit the Sins of the Fathers upon their Children and to Bless and Prosper the Posterity of Good men for their sakes 1. As for the First If God does not punish a Righteous Son for the sins of his Father then to visit the iniquities of the Father upon the Children must be confined only to such Children as inherit the Vices and imitate the Wickedness of their Parents That is God has threatened to punish the Wicked Children of Wicked Parents This you 'll say has nothing extraordinary in it for God has threatned to punish all Wicked men whatever their Parents are and if they are punished only because they are Wicked How is this to visit the iniquities of their Fathers on them But the Answer of this seems as obvious as the Objection that the Wicked Children of Wicked Parents shall be more certainly and more severely punished than other Bad men ordinarily are 1. As for the certainty of their punishment We know a great many Bad men very often escape the Divine Vengeance in this world for all Wicked men are not punished here as their Wickedness deserves The Justice of the Divine Providence as I have already observed does not require a sudden and hasty Execution Bad men may be prosperous many years and be severely punished at last or may be prosperous all their Lives and go down to their Graves in peace and only Answer for their Wickedness in the next World But then God threatens that a more speedy Vengeance shall overtake their Posterity if they are Wicked that God will then remember that they are the wicked Children of wicked Parents and not exercise the same Patience and Long-suffering to them And this is in a proper sence to visit the iniquities of their Fathers on them for though they are punished only for their own sins yet the iniquities of their Fathers are the reason why God punishes them in this world for their sins and makes them the Examples of his Justice while other men as wicked as themselves escape 2. As for the severity of their punishments No man shall be punished more than his own sins deserve but yet the wicked Children of wicked Parents may be and very often are punished more severely than other Wicked men God does not punish all Bad men alike For the punishments of this life are more properly acts of Discipline than acts of Judgment and therefore are not proportioned to the nature of the Crime but to the circumstances and condition of the Person and to the Wise ends of Government and if the wicked Children of wicked Parents are punished though for their own sins yet the more severely for their Fathers sake this is to bear the iniquity of their Fathers To understand this we must observe that the Scripture takes notice of a certain measure of iniquity which is filling up from one Generation to another till a last it makes a Nation or Family ripe for destruction and although those persons on whom this final Vengeance falls suffer no more than their own personal Sins deserved yet because the sins of former Generations which they equal or out do make it time for God utterly to destroy them the punishments due to the sins of many Ages and Generations are all said to fall upon them This account our Saviour gives of the Destruction of Ierusalem 23. Matt. 29 30 31 32 34 35