553 / 674
DSSC.
THE FORETASTE OF HEAVEN.
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meditations
of
the
all-comprehensive
knowledge
of God
to
such
a
degree, as
to lose
and abandon
all
your
former
pride
and
appearances of
knowledge and wisdom,
in
all
the
native
and acquired
riches
of
it,
and
count
them all
as
nothing
in his
sight
?
Have
you
never looked
upward
to the midnight
skies,
and
with
amazement sent your
thoughts upward
to
him who
calls all
the stars
by
their
names,
and
brings them
forth
in
all their sparkling
glow
ries, who
marshals them
in
their
nightly ranks and
or-
ders,
and
then stood overwhelmed
with
sacred
astonish-
ment
at
the
wisdom which
made and ranged
them
ad
in
their proper situations,
and there
appointed
them
to
fulfil
ten
thousand
useful
purposes, and
that
not
only
towards this little ball
of
earth,
but
to
a
multitude
of
upper
planetary
worlds
?
Have
you
never
enquired into
the wonders
of
his
wisdom
in-
framing the
bodies,.
the
limbs,
and
the senses
of
millions
of
animals, birds,
and
beasts,
fishes
and
insects, as
well as
men all
around
this
globe,
and
who
bath
framed
all
their
organs and powers
of
nature
with
exquisite
skill, to
see
and
hear, to ruri
and
fly,
and
swim,
to
produce their
young
in
all
their
proper
forms and
sizes,
furnished
with
their various
powers, and
to feed
and nourish them
in
their innume-
rable
shapes and
colours,
admirable
for
strength and
beauty
?
And_
have you
not
felt
your
souls
filled with
der
vont adoration at
the unspeakable
and
infinite
contri-
vances
of
a
God
?
And
not
only his works
of
creation, but
of
his
pro-
vidence
too,
have
afforded
some
pious souls
such,devout
amazement.
What
astonishing
wisdom
must
that
be
which has
created mankind
on
earth near
six
thousand
years
ago,
and
by his
divine
word, in
every age
con-
tinues to
create
them or
give
them
.being,
with
all
the
sane
natural
powers
and parts, beauties and excellen-
cies
!
That
he
bath
wisely
governed
so
many millions
of
animals
with
living souls or spirits
in
them, so
many
millions
of
intelligent creatures, endued
with
a
free
will
of their
own
to chuse
qr
refuse'
what they
will,
or
will
not
do,
and hath managed
this
innumerable company
of
beings
in all
ages,
notwithstanding
all
their
different
and
clashing
opinions and
customs,
their
crossing humours,
wills
and passions
in
endless variety, and yet
bath made
them
all
subservient
to
his own
comprehensive
designs,
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