5S4 GOD'S GOODNESS VINDICATED. frommurdering, but he thinketh meet only to govern them by laws ; will you rather argue, that the gaol is a place of misery, therefore the king is cruel, than, the rest of the kingdom flourish in prosper- ity and peace, therefore the king is wise and gracious. And is not this little dirty spot of earth, the next door to hell, a place de- filed by willful sin, and unfit to be the index of God's benignity, from whence we should take an estimate of it? Quest. 13. ,` Do not all men in the world confess God's good- ness first or last ? ' Do not all true believers, that are themselves, acknowledge that he is infinitely good, and good to them, and that his mercy is over all his works, and endureth forever? And do not the consciences of the damned grind and tear them for the contempt of goodness, and setting against mercy, even mercy to themselves ? This is the fuel that feedeth hell, not by way of de- lusion, but experimental conviction. If the man that doubteth of God's goodness and mercy to hint, do despair or fear damnation, he foolishly contracteteth himself. For hell and damnation is a state 'of misery and torment in the loss, and in the conscience and sense, of refused and abused mercy. If, therefore, God be not merciful to you, then you need not fear being damned for sinning against and refusing mercy. For that which is riot, cannot be sinned against or abused. If God be merciful, you may be saved ifyou will accept this mercy; if he be not, you cannot in justice be damned for rejecting that mercy which was none. And ifGod be not merciful and just, he is not God. And if there be no God, there is none to damn you. But all confess, in heaven and hell, some with joy, and some with self-tormenting anguish, that God was inconceivably good and merciful. Quest. 14. 'What if it werebut one or two in a whole kingdom that were damned, and that only for obstinate, unpersuadable, final refusal of grace and salvation, and all the rest of the world should be saved ; tell me, would you then still suspect God of cruelty, or deny his goodness ?' If not, I further ask you Quest. 15. ' Have you so good an acquaintancewith, the extent ofthe universe, the superior world, thenumber of angels and blessed spirits, as that you are sure that it is proportionably more in the whole universe, that are miserable?' Though some peevish men have wrangled at what I have said of this in my forecited books, I am so far from flattering their self-conceited wisdom that Iwill say it over again : That it is agreed on by philosophers, that the earth, as to the universe, is no bigger than a point or inch is to thewhole earth : we see over our heads a wonderful sun, a multitudeof fix- ed and unfixed stars, of wonderful magnitude, divers of them ma- ny times bigger than all the earth; besides the vast ethereal inter-
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