170 C H R I S T'S .glarm can fee no filch thing in himfelfe ? J anfwcr this is to derogate from the knowledge of God and to deny the perfeótion of it. True, fin is an evill, yea the greateft evill of all evills ; yet the knowledge of it is good : nay, it were ltrange to fay that God does not know who In againtt him ; that were a pity ; if men be abuled, wee fay it were pity but that they fhould know of it ; and if wce doe love them, wee tell them who they be that abate them, and what the abules are. Certainly God know es who doe abute him, and bow people carry tlemtèlves towards all his Commandements and worfhir ; it is a part of his per - fe&icn to know it. Againe, we our :elves may know fin, and may know fin by the contrary, as wee kn )w what darkneffe is by the contrary, which is light ; and (hall we fay that (god dots not know it ? God data-me; all the wicked, one after an- other for it, and therefore he does know it, nay we lee that. God brings fécret things to light here in this World, when people had thought that no body fhould ever come to know it, yet lice does often bring fécret Clines to Lgltt here in this World ; how much more at the lad day ? And though God knower all that ever he knowe by looking upon himfelfe and tin be not there, but nothing a but good and goodneffe it felfe, yet hee can know it as a Medium to bring good out ()fit ; And fo it is good as he wits it, and therefore bee dcccees it, and therefore he muff needs know it and know it in himfelfe. For the permiflion onely of it is in Linn-elf, and the abfing which is evill is out of himlelte neither does it follow that Gods un- derfianding fhotld become vile by knowing fo many vile things,as Vorftises.and others do blaiphemoufly a$rme, and thence they would conclude their curled Athei(ficall axiomes ; we indeed may make our felvcs vile by looking upon vile and baièthings, b:caufe we cannot keepe our hearts from favour- ing of them ; Whole end is damnation, &c. who minds earthly things, Phil. o. !9. That is , their mince becomes vile by fo doing. Hereby ,people come to be unacquainted with God, and with Heavenly things. They know how to buy and fell, how to earne and get gaine, how to plough and low and filch
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