AND SMOKING FI... AX. 81 / None ever hated his own flesh. Can the head forget the members? Can Christ forget himself? We are his fullness, as he is ours. He was love itself clothed with man's nature, which he united so near to himself, that he might communicate his goodness the more freely unto us. He took not our nature when it was at the best, but when it was abased, with all natural and ·. common infirmities to which it was subject. Let us therefore abhor all suspicious thoughts as are either cast in or cherished by that evil spirit, who, as he laboured to divide between the Father and the Son by jealousies- " If thou be the Son of God ; -" so his . daily study is to divide betwixt the Son and us, by breeding suspicions in us of Christ, as if there were not such tender love in him to such as we are. It was his art from the beginning, to discredit God with man, by calling God's love into question, with our first father Adam: his success then makes him ready at that weapon still. ' But for all this, I find not Christ to be thus to me,' saith the smoking flax, ' but rather the contrary. He seemeth to G
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