The Life of Faith. 171 accidents in the world; fo you mutt abhor the fame crrour in all other inflances : Some wit may confift with the que- ftioningof many plain conclufions : But he is a fool indeed, who faith, Ibere is no Gad, or doubteth of his eicntial pro- perties, Pfal. 14. r, 2. Ran. r. 19, 20, 2 t. Dire& 3. Remember that all our knowledge of God, while we are ïn the body here, ía but enigmatical, and as in a gla fs ; and that aid words which man can fpeakofGod (at leaft except Being and Subffance) are but terms beery him, borrowed from bit Image en the Creatures, and gilt figni ying the fame thing for -, ;nary in God, which they fignifiein ter. If you thank otherwif, you will make an Idol in your conception, inttead of God : And you will debate him, and bring him down to the condition of the creature. And yet it doth not follow that we know nothing of him, or that all Each expreflions of God are vain, or falte, or muff be difufed For thenwe mutt not think or talk of God at all. But we muff (peak of him according to the highefl notions, which we can borrow from the noblcft parts of his Image; confefling ftíll, that they arc but borrowed : And theft mutt be ufed till we-come nearer, and fee as face to face ; and when that which is p::fed is come, then that which is imperfect (hall be done away, a Cor. 13. ao, r r, IL And yet it is (in com parifon of darker revelations) as with opera face that we behold as in aglafs the glory of the Lord; and it is a fight that can change us into the fame Image, as from glory to glory, as by the Spirit of theLord, a Cor. 3. r S. Dire4. 4. Abhor thefurietst ignorance, whichbrandeth every one with the name: ofberefie or blafpbemy, who differ from them in the ufe of fome unwell-iffy metaphor of God, when their diffe- rent pbrafes tend not indeed to his difhonour, andperhaps may have thefamefignification with their own. When we are all forced to confeti, that all our tcarms of God arc improper or metaphorical, and yet men will run thofe metaphors into numerous branches,andcarry them unto greater impropriety, and then rail at all as blafphemers that queft on them ; thisprafkice is (though too chtnmon) ahei- nous fin in them, as it hath direful effeds upon the Church. Should i-recite, thefad hifïorics ofthis iniquity,and thewwhat Z 2 M
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