89 / 514
SEAM.
V.1
THE
501VL
DRAWING NEAR
TO GOO.
81
I. There
will be
an inward sense
of
the several glories
of
God, and suitable exercises
of
grace
in
the
soul.
For
when
we
get
near
to
God,
we see him, we
are
in his
presence;
he
is
then,
as
it
were,
before the
eyes
of
the
soul,
even
as
the soul
is
at
all times
before
the
eyes
of
God. There
will
be
something
of
such
a
spiritual
sense
of
the
presence
of God,
as
we
shall have when
our
souls
are
dismissed
from
the prison
of
this
flesh,
and
see him
face
to face,
though
in a
far
less
degree
:
It
is
something
that
resembles the
future
vision
of
God
in the blessed
world
of spirits;
and those
souls who have
had much
intimacy with
God
in
prayer,
will
tell you
that
they
know, in some
measure, what heaven
is.
The
soul,
when
it
gets
near
to
God,
even to his seat,
beholds
se-
veral
of
his
glories displayed
there
;
for
it
is
a seat
of
majesty,
a seat
of
judgment, and
a seat
of
mercy.
Under
these
three characters
is
the
seat
of
God
distinguished in
scripture
;
and because
this
word
is
part of
my
text,
I
shall
therefore a little enlarge upon these heads.
When
the soul
gets
near
to God,
it
sees him,
1.
As
upon
a
seat
of
majesty.
There
he
appears
to
the
soul
in
the
first
notion
of
his
divinity or godhead,
as
self
-
sufficient,
and
the
first
of
beings
:
He appears there
as
the-infinite ocean, the
unmeasurable mountain
of
be-
ing,
and perfection, and blessedness, and the
soul,
in
a due exercise
of
grace, shrinks,
as
it
were,
into
nothing
before
him, as
a drop,
or a
dust,
a mere atom
of
being.
The
soul
is
in
its own eyes
at
that
time,
what it
is
always
in
the
eyes
of
God,
as
nothing,
and
less
than no-
thing
and vanity.
He
appears
then
in
the glory
of
his
all-sufficiente, as
an Almighty
Creator,
giving birth,
and
life,
and
being
to
all
things
;
and
the
soul, in
a due exercise
of
grace,
stands before
him as a
dependent creature,
receiving all
its powers
and
being from
him,
supported
every
moment
by him,
and ready
to
sink
into
utter
nothing,
if
God
withdraw
that support.
Such
is
God, and
such
is
thé
soul, when
the
soul
draws
near
to
God
in
worship.
He appears
again
upon
his
seat
of
majesty
as a
sove-
reign,
in
the
glory
of
his
infinite supremacy,
and the
soul
sees
him as the
supreme
of
beings, owns his
just
sovereignty,
and subjects
itself
afresh,
and
for ever
to
his
high
dominion.
O with
what-
deep humility
an¡l
VOL.
r.