530 / 674
510
NO
PAIN
AMONG
THE BLESSED.
DISC.
IX.
ply
his
natural wants;
and man might
have
immediately
relieved them
himself,
for the supplies
of
ease were
at
hand, and
this.
sort
of
uneasinesses were
abundantly
com-
pensated
by
the
pleasure of rest and
food,
and
perhaps
they
were in some
measure necessary
to make food and
.rest
pleasant.
But
surely
if
sin
had never been
known
in
our
world,
all the pain
that
arises
from
inward diseases
of
nature, or
from outward
violence, had been a
stranger
to
the hu-
man race, an unknown
evil
among the
sons
of
rnen,
as
it
is
among the
holy angels, the
sons
of
God. There
had
been
nó
distempers
or acute
pains to meet
young
babes
at
their entrance
into this world
;
no
maladies
to
attend
the
sons
and daughters
of
Adam
through
the
journey
of
life
;
and they should have been
translated
to some
higher and
happier
region,
without death, and without
pain.
It
was the
eating of
the tree
of
knowledge
of
good
and
evil,
that
acquainted
Adam
and
his
offspring with the
evil
of
pain.
Or if
pain could
have
attacked
innocence
in
any form or degree, it would have been
but
in
a way
of
trial,
to exercise
and
illustrate
his
virtues
;
and
if
he
had
endured
the
test, and
continued
innocent,
I
am
satisfied
he should never have felt any pain
which
was
not
over-
balanced
with
superior
pleasure, or
abundantly recom-
pensed
by
succeeding rewards and satisfactions.
Some
persons indeed
have
supposed
it
within the reach
of
the
sovereignty
of
God
to
afflict
and torment a
sinless
creature
:
Yet I
think
it
is
hardly
consistent
with
his
goodness, or
his
equity,
to
constrain
an
innocent
being,,
which has no sin,
to
suffer
pain without
his
owa consent,
and without
giving
that
creature equal
or superior plea-
sure as
a recompence.
Both those were
the case
in
the
sufferings
of
our
blessed
Lord
in his
human nature,
who
was
perfectly
innocent
:
It
was
with
his own
consent
that
he
gave
himself up
to be a sacrifice, when
"
it
pleased
the
Father
to
bruise
him
and
put
him to
grief:,' Is.
liii.
10.
and
God
rewarded
him with
transcendent
ho-
nours and
joys after
his
passion, he exalted
him to his
own
right-hand
and
his
throne,
and
gave him
authority
over
all things.
In
general therefore,
we
have sufficient reason
to say,
that
as sin
brought
in
death into
human
nature,
so
it was
sin
that brought
in
pain also
;
and wheresoever
.there
is,
any
pain suffered among thè
sons
and daughters
of
men,