and desolation of his Countrey much less that he should have pursued them into the Red Sea whose fluid Walls threatned him with immediate destruction And this I take to be that blindness which God threatens against Iudah 6. Isaiah 9 10. 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 For here is a double blindness taken notice of in the Text one which they brought upon themselves another which God threatens to inflict on them They did hear but not understand they did see but not perceive that is They stopt their own ears and shut their own eyes against all the Adomonitions and Reproofs of God's Prophets For thus our Saviour expounds it as their own act and wilful voluntary blindness 13. Matth. 14 15. And in them is fulfilled the prophesy of Isaiah for a Prophesy it was as it concerned the Iews in our Saviour's days though it was a description of the actual deafness and blindness of the Iews in the Prophet's days which saith By hearing ye shall hear and shall not understand and seeing ye shall see and shall not perceive For this peoples heart is waxed gross and their ears are dull of hearing and their eyes have they closed lest at any time they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart and should be converted and I should heal them And thus St. Paul represents it 28. Acts 26 27. This is their sinful blindness and deafness which is wholly owing to themselves and for the punishment of which God threatens them with a penal and judicial blindness For when God commands the Prophet to make their heart fat and their ears heavy and to shut their eyes it can signify nothing else but his passping a final Decree and Sentence of Blindness and Deafness on them Not such a Blindness as should betray them to and harden them in sin God may leave men in such a state of Blindness when they have wilfully blinded and hardened themselves but he never inflicts it But such a Blindness as would betray them into that ruin and destruction whcih God had so justly decreed for them For this Blindness and Deafness which was inflicted on them in the Prophet's days was in order to their Captivity in Babylon and the destruciton of their City and Temple by the Chaldaeans that in our Saviour's days was in order to their final destruction by the Romans and our Saviour tells us what kind of Blindness was inflicted on them that the things belonging to their peace which would preserve their Nation from being destroyed were now hid from their eyes 19. Luke 42 And the Story verifies this For certainly never was there a greater infatuation upon any People than upon the Iews at both times who forced both the Chaldaeans and Romans to destroy them whether they would or no and when they intended no such thing And many Examples there are of such a judicial Blindness and Infatuation in every Age of the world There are seldom any great and remarkable Calamities which befall any persons especially Nations but By-standers see how they undo themselves by their own stupid wilfulness and folly As has been long since observed Quos perdere vult Iupiter Prius dementat That God first blinds and infatuates those whom he intends to destroy And this is what the Scripture means by hardening mens hearts and blinding their eyes as I hope appears from what I have now discoursed and no man has any reason to quarrel either with the Justice or Holiness of God upon this account But we have all great reason to take warning by these Examples lest we provoke God so long by our sins by our own wilful blindness and hardness that he inflict this judicial Blindness on us that he shut our eyes not to see the things that belong to our peace whcih we have so many sad symptoms of already among us that it is time to take warning Nothing can be more just than for God to harden those men to their own ruin who harden themselves against his fear So to blind those who will not see nor regard their Duty as to mistake their Interest too And the only way to prevent such a judicial Hardness and Infatuation is to reverence God to have respect to all his Commandments in the first place to take care of our Duty and then to commit our ways unto the Lord in a secure dependance on his Providence There are several other Texts of Scripture alledged to this purpose to charge God with the sins of men but they will receive a shorter Answer As 2dly Those Texts which ascribe what is done by the sins of men to God's doing But the Answer to this is plain for God can and does bring to pass a great many wise and holy Designs by the sins of men without being the Author of their sins and it is only the Event which is attributed to God not the Sin whereby such Events are brought to pass This will appear at the first view by considering some of these Texts Ioseph's Brethren sold him to the Ishmaelites who carried him into Egypt where God advanced him to Pharaoh's Throne Ioseph tells his Brethren That though they sold him it was God that sent him before them into Egypt to preserve their lives So now it was not you that sent me hither but God 45. Gen. 5 7 8. Ioseph does not say That it was from God that his Brethren sold him this was their own Act and all the wickedness of it was their own but it was God who sent him into Egypt which his Brethren never thought of nor intended their only concern being to get rid of him and when God did that which they never intended to do that may well be said to be God's doings who permitted their wickedness and made use of it to accomplish his own wise Counsels as he tells his Brethren As for you ye thought evil against me but God meant it unto good to bring to pass as it is this day to save much people alive 50. Gen. 20. When Iob was plundered by the Sabaeans and Chaldaeans he attributes it to God The Lord gave and the Lord hath taken away 1. Job 21. And so must all men say who believe a Providence that all the good or evil that happens to us in this world whoever be the immediate Instruments of it is ordered and disposed by God but Iob does not therefore attribute the wickedness of the Sabaeans and the Chaldaeans to God as if God could not govern and over-rule the wickedness of Men and Devils without being the Author of their wickdness When David had committed that great sin in defiling Vriah 's Wife and contriving his murther God threatens
Protection what little reason we have to be afraid of men whatever their Power how furious soever their Passions are how vain it is to trust in men and to depend on their favour for they can neither do good nor hurt but as they are directed by God and therefore he alone must be the Supreme Object of our Fear and Trust If God be for us who can be against us If we make him our Enemy who can save us out of his hands So that we have but one thing to take care of and we are safe Let us make God our Friend and he will raise us up Friends and Patrons and Protectors will deliver us out of the hands of our Enemies or make our Enemies to be at peace with us Secondly Having thus explained God's government of Causes let us now consider his government of Events And I think it will be easily granted me That if all those Causes by which all Events are brought to pass are governed by God God must also have the Absolute Government of all Events in his own hands But yet the government of Causes and of Events are of a very different consideration and to represent this as plainly and familiarly as I can I shall 1. shew you What I mean by Events when I attribute the government of all Events to God 2. Wherein God's government of Events consists 3. The Difference between God's Absolute government of all Events and Necessity and Fate 4. That the Exercise of a particular Providence consists in the government of all Events 1. What I mean by Events Now every thing that is done may in a large sense be called an Event and is in some degree or other under the government of Providence as all the actions of men are but when I speak of God's government of Events I mean only such Events as are in Scripture called God's doings as being ordered and appointed by him that is to say all the good or evil which happens to private men or to Kingdoms and Nations in this world Every thing that is done is not God's doing for there is a great deal of evil every day committed which God does not order and appoint to be done but has expresly forbid the doing of it but there is no good or evil which happens to any man or to any Society of men but what God orders and appoints for them and this is God's government of all Events This is the proper exercise of Providence to allot all men their Fortunes and Conditions in the world to dispense Rewards and Punishments to take care that no man shall receive either good or evil but from the Hand and by the Appointment of God this is the Subject of all the Disputes about the Justice and Goodness and Wisdom of Providence and all the Objections against Providence necessarily suppose that thus it is or thus it ought to be if God governs the world For unless Providence be concerned to take care that no men be happy or miserable but as they deserve which cannot be without the Absolute Government of all Events the prosperity of bad men and the sufferings of the good the many miseries that are in the world and the uncertain changes and turnings of Fortune can be no Objection against Providence And indeed were not this the case Providence would be so insignificant a Name that it would not be worth the while to dispute for or against it for a Providence which neither can do us good nor hurt or which cannot always and in all cases do it is worth nothing or worth no more than it can do good or hurt And therefore all the good or evil which does or can befal Men or Kingdoms is in Scripture attributed to Providence and promised or threatned by God as men shall deserve either such as Length of Days or a sudden and untimely Death Health or Sickness Honour or Disgrace Riches or Poverty Plenty or Famine War or Peace the changing Times and Seasons the removing Kings and setting up Kings and with respect to all such Events as these whatever the immediate Causes of them be God is said to do whatsoever pleaseth him 2dly But we shall better understand this by enquiring into the Nature of God's Government Now God's Government of Events consists in ordering and appointing whatever good or evil shall befal men for according to the Scripture we must attribute such a Government to God as makes all these Events his Will and Doing and nothing can be his Will and Doing but what he Wills and Orders Some men think it enough to say That God permits every thing that is done but will by no means allow that God Wills and Orders and Appoints it which they are afraid will charge the Divine Providence with all the evil that is done in the world and truly so it would did God order and appoint the evil to be done but tho God orders and appoints what evils every man shall suffer he orders and appoints no man to do the evil he only permits some men to do mischief and appoints who shall suffer by it which is the short Resolution of this Case To attribute the evils which some men suffer from other mens sins merely to Gods Permission is to destroy the Government of Providence for bare Permission is not Government and those evils which God permits but does not order cannot be called his will and doing and if this be the case of all the evils we suffer from other mens sins most of the evils which men suffer befal them without God's Will and Appointment and yet to attribute all the evil which men do to God's Order and Appointment is to destroy the Holiness of Providence and therefore we must necessarily distinguish between the evils men do and the evils they suffer the first God Permits and Directs the second he Orders and Appoints How God governs men hearts and actions I have already explained and this is the place to consider God's Permission of Evil for Permission relates to actions Mens own wicked hearts conceive and form wicked designs and they execute them by God's Permission but no man suffers by them but by God's Appointment God's Care of his creatures requires that no man should suffer any thing but what God orders for him and if such sufferings be just and righteous how wicked soever the Causes be it is no reproach to Providence to order and appoint them Suppose a man have forfeited his Life or Estate or Reputation to Providence or tho he have made no Criminal Forfeiture of it yet God sees fit for other Wise Reasons to remove him out of the world or to reduce him to Poverty and Contempt is it any fault in Providence to deliver such a man into the hands of Murderers Oppressors Slanderers who are very forward to execute such Decrees when Providence takes off the restraint and sets them at liberty to follow their own lusts And when there are so many that deserve
good may come This St. Paul rejects with the greatest abhorrence and tells us that such mens Damnation is just 3. Rom. 8. for it is the greatest contradiction in the World to do evil in order to do good for how can a Man who can for any reason be persuaded to do evil be a hearty and zealous lover of Goodness It is certain that he who does any evil does not heartily love that goodness to which the evil he does is opposed and he who does not heartily love all goodness is a hearty lover of none There is no reconciling good and evil no more than you can reconcile contradictions a good man will love and do that which is good and an evil man will do that which is evil and though the Divine Wisdom can bring good out of evil yet evil is not and cannot be the natural cause of good no more than Darkness can be the cause of Light and therefore a Good Design can never justify a Bad Action For that Bad Actions should do good is contrary to the nature of Bad Actions and whatever men may intend I 'm sure no man can alter the nature of things and therefore can never justify himself in doing evil that good may come It is certain a Wise and Holy God requires no such thing of us and though he very often brings about great and admirable Designs by mens Sins yet no man knows how to do it nor knows when God will do it nor did ever any man who ventured upon sin in order to do some greater good ever do the good he intended though many times he runs himself into more and greater sins than ever he intended Nay I dare boldly say That no man ever deliberately ventured upon a known sin to do some greater good by it but there was always some base worldly Interest at the bottom coloured over with a pretence of doing good either to deceive the world or sometimes to deceive their own Consciences The Church of Rome among whom there are those who teach and practise this Doctrine are an undeniable Example of it and we have had too many sad Examples of it nearer home This seems to me one reason why those Prophesies which concern future Ages are generally so obscure that no man knows when nor how they shall be fulfilled that no man may be tempted to any sin to serve Providence and to fulfil Prophesies As obscure as these Prophesies are yet we see some heated Enthusiasts very forward to venture on any thing to fulfil Prophesies to pull down Antichrist to set up the Kingdom of Christ especially when they hope to set up themselves with him But God conceals Times and Seasons from us and though he many times fulfils Prophesies by the Sins of men yet he allows no man to sin to fulfil Prophesies And therefore never lets us know when nor by what means Prohesies shall be fulfilled Let us lay down this as a certain Principle That God needs not our Sins and that we can never please him by doing evil whatever the Event be He makes use of the Sins of men to serve his Providence but he will punish them for their Sins CHAP. VII The Goodness of Providence 3. THE next Inquiry is concerning the Goodness of Providence Though methinks it is a more proper Subject for our devout Meditations than for our Inquiries for we need not look far to seek for proofs and demonstrations of the Divine Goodness The earth is full of the goodness of the Lord We see and feel and taste it every day we owe our being our preservation and all the comforts of our lives to it There is not so mean nor so miserable a Creature in this world but can bear its testimony to the Divine Goodness Nay if you would pardon the harshness of the expression I would venture to say That the Goodness of God is one of the greatest Plagues and Torments of Hell I mean the remembrance of God's Goodness and their wicked and ungrateful abuse of it This is that Worm that never dieth those sharp Reflections men make on their Ingratitude and Folly in making themselves miserable by affronting that Goodness which would have made them happy Whatever other Objections fome wanton and sporting Wits make against Providence one would think it impossible that any man who lives in this world and feels what he enjoys himself and sees what a bountiful provision is made for all Creatures should question the Goodness of Providence by which he lives moves and has his being We should think him an extraordinary Benefactor who did the thousandth part for us of what God does and should not challenge his goodness though he did some things which we did not like or did not understand but Atheism is founded in Ingratitude and unless God humour them as well as do them good he is no God for them Nay I cannot but observe here the perverse as well as the ungrateful Temper of Atheists when they dispute against the Justice of Providence then God is much too good for them though he give us Examples enow of his Severity against Sin yet his Patience and Long-suffering to some few Prosperous Sinners is thought a sufficient Argument that God is not just or that he does not govern the world When they dispute against the Goodness of Providence then God is not good enough for them Though they see innumerable Instances of Goodness in the government of the world yet this is not owing to a Good God but to Good Fortune because they think they see some of the careless and irregular Strokes of Chance and Fortune intermixt with it in the many Evils and Calamities of life Now it is impossible for God himself to answer these two Objections to the satisfaction of these men and that I think is a sufficient answer to them both For should God vindicate his Justice to the satisfaction of these men by punishing in this world every sin that is committed according to its desert there would be very little room for the exercise of Goodness If every man must suffer as much as he sins the very best men will be great Sufferers much greater Sufferers than any of them now are tho their Sufferings are made another Objection against Providence and there will be as many formidable Examples of Misery as there are Atheists and Profligate Sinners and this would be an unanswerable Objection against the Goodness of Providence for how good soever God might be if he must punish every sin he has no opportunity to shew his Goodness And on the other hand should God be as good as these men would have him that is that to prove himself good he should not inflict any Evils or Calamities on men whatever their Sins or Provocations are that whereas God planted Paradise only for man in innocence the whole world should be now a Paradise though there is not an innocent man in it this would be as unanswerable an Objection
or need these or such kind of Punishments or Corrections and such vast numbers of bad men who are ready every day to commit such outrages did not God restrain them is it not very visible how easily God can order and appoint such sufferings for men without ordering or appointing any man's sins It requires no more than to bring those whom God appoints for suffering into the reach of such men and to put them into their power and their own malice and wickedness will do the rest It is like exposing Condemn'd Malefactors to Wild Beasts whose nature and inclination is to devour and if God chains up bad men as we do wild beasts that they cannot touch any one but whom God delivers up to them and lets them loose only to execute his own Just and Righteous Judgment can any thing be more Honourable to Providence or a greater Security to Mankind To form an Idea of this in our minds let us suppose this to be the case of an Earthly Prince That he perfectly understood all the Deserts and all the Inclinations of his Subjects and had such an invisible and insensible Authority over them that without giving them any directions or letting them know any thing of his Intentions or offering any violence to their own Inclinations he could determine them to do that hurt which they had a mind to do to those and to those only whom he intended to punish and to do the good they are desirous to do to those and to those only whom he intends to reward in case such a Prince took care that no man should suffer more from the wickedness of others than what he deserved and the Reasons of Government required would any man charge such a Prince with all the Wickedness that is committed in his Kingdom only because he so wisely orders it that some bad men shall execute his Vengeance upon other bad men and serve instead of Judge and Jury and Executioners Nay would not every man say That this is the most Perfect and Absolute Form of Government in the world Earthly Princes indeed cannot do this but this is the Government of God who accomplishes his own Wise Counsels by the Ministries of Men. And this may satisfie us in what sense all the good and all the evil that happens either to private Men or to Kingdoms and Nations is said to be God's will and God's doing and what pleaseth him because no Man or Nation is rewarded or punished but by God's order and appointment That as many good men as there are in the world who are ready to do good to all they can and as many bad men as there are who are ready to do all the mischief they can none of them can do either good or hurt to any but to those whom God has appointed for either which makes God the Absolute Lord and Sovereign of the world since whatever men intend all mens Fortunes and Conditions depend upon his Will And since God absolutely orders and appoints nothing but the Event if the Event be holy just and good that is if men be rewarded and punished according to their works as far as the Justice and Goodness of Providence is concerned in this world there can be no reasonable Objection against Providence for by what wicked means soever men be rewarded or punished if the Reward or Punishment by holy just and good this vindicates the Holiness and Justice and Goodness of Providence of which more hereafter Let mens Wickedness be to themselves for that is their own but that the Wickedness of men is over-ruled by an Invisible Hand to accomplish Wise and Just Decrees that is the Glory of Providence And this suggests another evident Reason why all the good or evil that befals men is called God's will and God's doings because in a strict and proper sense it is not man's Will nor man's Doings What is done is either what those who did it never intended to do or else serves such ends and is ordered by God for such ends as those who did it never thought of which proves men to be only Instruments but God the Supreme Disposer of all Events If we must attribute all things that are done either to God or Men then what is not done by Men must be done by God and Men can't be properly said to do what they never intended and therefore whatever is either beyond or contrary to what Men intended must either be attributed to Chance or to a Divine Providence I observed before what different Intentions God and men have in the same actions what is intended by men is their doing what is intended by God is his doing and wholly his doing when what God intended was not intended by men For this reason Ioseph tells his Brethren that it was not they but God that sent him into Egypt 45. Gen. 4 5 6 7 8. for they thought nothing of sending him into Egypt but this was what God intended when he permitted them to sell him to the Ishmaelites This was their sin as he adds 50. Gen. 20. But as for you ye thought evil against me but the good that was done was wholly God's doings but God meant it unto good And thus it is in other cases which shows us what the Scripture calls God's doings The punishment of sinners and those evils he brings on them is God's doings but not the sins whereby they are punished The Punishment of David's Adultery by the Incest of Absalom was God's doing but not Absalom's Incest The sending Ioseph into Egypt and advancing him into Pharaoh's Throne was God's doing but not the Sin of his Brethren in selling him for a Slave And thus it is throughout the Scripture nothing is called God's Will or God's doing which has any Moral Evil in it all wicked actions are mens own will and own doings which God permits for wise ends but never orders or appoints but the good or evil which is done by mens sins that is God's doing and I hope by this time you all know how to distinguish between God's government of mens Actions and his government of Events and then we may safely attribute all Events to God's order and appointment without danger of charging God with the sins of men whereby such Events are brought to pass 3dly Let us now consider What difference there is between God's Absolute Government of all Events and Necessity and Fate for many men are very apt to confound these two If no good or evil befals any men but what God orders and appoints for them this they think sounds like Fate and Destiny that every man's Fortune is writ upon his Forehead and that it is impossible for any man by all his Care and Industry and Prudence to make his Condition better than what God has decreed it to be in the Irreversible Rolls of Fate And yet an Unrelenting Immutable Fate is so irreconcilable with the liberty of human actions with the nature of good and evil of rewards and