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SERM,
XI.

1. That God cannot be tempted with (or to) evil. And,

2. That, as the neceffary confequence of this, he doth not tempt. Then, II. To folve fome of the principal difficulties which may feem to lie against it. And,

III. To draw fome inferences from the whole.

To dispatch all these particulars will not be the bufinefs of a fingle difcourfe. And therefore, at present, I fhall only undertake the

I. FIRST of them, namely, to affert the truth of the Text, that God is not, cannot be, the Author of fin; and that by making good these two pofitions,

1. That he cannot be tempted with (or to) evil. And,

2. That, as the neceffary confequence of this, he does not tempt.

1. First, That he cannot be tempted with (or to) evil. There is nothing more infeparable from our notion of God, than the idea of holinefs or purity. For, that God being infinitely perfect must have real good for the object of his will, cannot, I conceive, require a laborious proof. It must be good, because that is abfolutely neceffary to a perfect Being; the absence of this qualification being manifeftly deftructive of

Per

Perfection. And it must be real good; SERM, because that which only appears fo, being XI. evil in itself, must be equally deftructive of perfection and however it may fometimes, through defect of judgment, be mistaken for real, yet fuch mistakes can have no place in an infinitely perfect mind.

Now the measure of good to us is the law of God, whether natural or revealed, And though he, as being the fupream Legiflator, cannot properly be SUBJECT to any law himself, yet what his law is to us, that his own nature is to him; and as he is himself the Supream Good, fo can he neither will nor do any thing that is any way unbecoming or disagreeable to his own perfections. For (to obferve that likewife by the way) the liberty of the Divine Will, altho' in fcripture reprefented as the highest and most perfect freedom, must not yet be fo interpreted, as though it were poflible for him to will any thing inconfiftent with his own nature, and repugnant to his esfential Holinefs or other Attributes. For, could he do this, he would cease to be that infinite perfection, in which his very ef fence confifts, and fo might do what the Apoftle affures us he can never do, deny bimfelf. Hence is he in fcripture called pure and holy; the Seraphim are reprefented as glorifying him continually under that

* 2 Tim, ii, 13.

epithet;

SERM. epithet; this is urged as an argument why XI. they who worship him should be likewife holy nay, and more particularly, to prove the effentiality of this holiness, St. John affures us in the abftract, that God is light, or holiness itself, and in him is no darknefs at all*

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Now, our notion of fin, if confidered in respect of ourselves, who are fubject to laws, and fo accountable to the fupream Lawgiver: I fay, our notion of fin in that refpect is this that it is the tranfgreffion of the Divine law. But if we confider it abftractedly, and by itself, we fhall find it then to be directly oppofite to the Divine nature. For, as the obligation of the Law is founded in the Will of God, who can will nothing (as was obferved before) but what is perfectly agreeable to his own nature and effential attributes; so it appears from hence, that fin, which is an oppofition to his will, muft needs be repugnant to his nature. It is the formal notion of evil, taken in the general, and including all kinds and degrees, that it is the privation of fome due perfection. And therefore it must be the formal notion of moral evil, that it is the privation of that rectitude or perfection, which is proper for a rational crea

ture.

* 1 John i. 5.

From

From all this together it is evident, that SER M. God can never be brought to patronize or XI. confent to any thing that is evil. 'Tis thus the Pfalmift affures us, that the Lord alloweth the righteous, but the ungodly and him that delighteth in wickedness doth his foul abbor; that he is the God that hath no pleasure in wickedness, neither shall any evil dwell with him; for that the righteous Lord loveth righteoufnefs, his countenance will bebold and approve only of the thing that is juft. The reason of the cafe is manifeft; for if God be a Being abfolutely perfect, and evil be privative of fuch perfection, it follows undeniably, that all tendency to, all favourable countenance of evil, muft argue weakness and imperfection, and therefore cannot poffibly have any place in God, who is an absolutely perfect Being. We must first find out a way to reconcile contradictions, and make natural repugnancies confiftent, before we can advance, with any colour of probability, that the pureft and moft perfect Being should approve of fin and imperfection.

And how then should he be tempted with evil, which is fo directly contrary and repugnant to his nature? Can we suppose him mutable, and that he, who is at prefent fo averfe from fin, fhould in a while change his difpofition, and begin to be pleafed and reconciled with it? This again

SERM. is inconfiftent with that notion of perfec XI. tion, which makes up our idea of God. Inconftancy and change may have place in fuch beings as fee not the whole reafon and œconomy of things, but not in the great Author and Upholder of the universe, who cannot be ignorant of any thing that he has made, nor fee reafon to alter any of his meafures, upon account of new difcoveries or freth improvements. Therefore is it made one part of his character in fcripture, that with him there is no variableness, neither shadow of turning *; and it is af figned as the reason why the fons of Jacob were not confumed, that their God was one. who changed not. Can we then suppose him liable to be impofed on by the fubtilty, or overpowered by the force of any tempter whatsoever, that fo he might be either drawn or driven into evil? Either of these again is equally abfurd and impoffible, and plainly iuconfiftent with the notion of a Being of infinite perfections. That perfect Being is the Caufe and Author of all others, and it can imply no less than contradiction to fuppofe him any way outdone by the creatures of his own workmanship, whofe excellencies and endowments (whatfoever they are) are only borrowed and derived from him. The abfurdities of fuch a fuppofition are manifold and various, that James i. 17. + Mal. iii. 6.

6.

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