PAST ii. SERMONXII. 17 First, Knowledge. An eternal blissful contemplationof all the infinite beauties, powers, and properties of godhead, and of all the operations of these powers in an inconceivable variety among creatures, is the glorious employment of God. His own knowledge of infinite truths, whether wrapt up in his own nature, or unfolded and displayed in his works, is a pleasure becoming the Deity ; and each sacred person possesses this unknown pleasure. And besides the general glories of the divine nature, we may suppose, that a full and comprehensive knowledge of the sameness, the difference, the special properties, and the mutual relations of the three divine persons, which are utterly incom- prehensible to mortals, and perhaps far above the reach of all created minds, is the incommunicable entertainment of the holy Trinity, andmakes apart of their blessedness. In reference to this mystery, God may be said to dwell in thick darkness; 1 Kings viii. 12. or, which is all one, in light inaccessible ; 1 Tim. vi. 16. We are lost in this glorious, this divineabyss, and over- come with dazzling confusion : But the ever blessed Three be- hold these unities and distinctions in the clearest light. As the Father knoweth nie, so know I the Father, saith Jesus the eternal Son ; John X. 15. And as the spirit of a man knoweth the things of a man, so the things of God are known to his own Spirit, for he searcheth the depths of ,God; 1 Cor. ii. 10, 11. as it is expres- sed in the original, ráßas+, aïi ®EÑ But God's contemplation, or knowledge of himself, is not his only pleasure, for God is love; 1 John iv. S. He has an infinite propensity towards himself; and an inconceivable compla- cence in his own powers and perfections, as well as in all the outgoings of them toward created natures. His love being most wise and perfect, must exert itself toward the most perfect object, and the chiefest good; and that in a degree answerable to its goodness too : Therefore hecan love nothing in the samedegree with himself, because he can find noequal good. May wenot therefore suppose the blessedness of the sacred Three to consist also in mutual love ? May I call it a perpetual delightful tendency, and active propensity toward each other? An eternal approach to each other with infinite complacency? An eternal embraceof each other with arms of inimitable love and with sensations of unmeasurable joy ? Thus said* the Son of God under the character of divine wisdom ; Prov. viii. 23, 30. I was set up from everlastin, from the beginning, or ever the earth was. Then was I by hi-in as one brought up with him, and Iwas daily his delight, rejoicing always before loen. As the Fa- ther loveth the Son, so the Son loveth the Father. As the Fa- ther delights infinitely in his perfect image, so may we not venture N 3
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