DISCOURSE II. 377 as the souls of departed christians. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, Noah, Daniel, and David, Job, Moses and Elijah, dwell in that happy world, with a thousand other spirits of renown in the an- cient church, as well as the spirits of those that have seen the Messiah, and believed in Jesus of Nazareth. What a noble and wondrous assembly ! What an amazing and blissful society of human souls, gathered from various nations, and from all ages, and joined togetherin the heavenly Jerusalem, the family of God above! f shall proceed now to the secondthing I proposed. Sect. II. Of their perfectionin knowledge, holiness, andjoy. --The second enquiry is this, wherein consists the perfection at which these spirits are arrived ? The word perfect cannot be taken here, in its most extensive, absolute, and sublime sense, for in that sense it can belong only to God ; he is and must be the sum and centreof all perfection for ever ; all excellency and all blessedness in a supreme degree meet in him ; none besides him can pretend to absolute perfection, Nor is the word used here in its most sublime sense, in which it may be applied to a crea- ture ; for when the spirits of just men are made never so per- fect, the blessed soul of our Lord Jesus Christ will be more per- fect than they ; for in all things he must have the pre-eminence ; ol. i. 1$. Perfection therefore is taken in a comparative sensehere, áà In many other places of scripture. So St. Paul calls those chris- tians on earth perfect, who are advancedin knowledge and chris- tianity far above their fellows ; as in 1 Cor. ii. O. I speak wisdom among them that areper ect. Phil. iii. 15. Let asmany as areper- fect be thus minded. So that blessed souls above areonly perfect an a comparative sense. They are advanced in every excellency of nature, and every divine priyilege, far above all their fellow saints here on earth. I desire it also to be observed here, That the. word perfec- tion doth not generally imply another sort ofcharacter than what a man possessed before ; but a far more exalted degree of the same character which he was before possessed of. The perfec- tion then of the spirits of the just in heaven, is a glorious and transcendant degreeof those spiritual and heavenlyqualifications and blessings which they enjoyed here on earth in a lower mea- sure implying also, a freedom fromall the defects and disorders towhich they were here exposed, andwhichare inconsistent with their present felicity. If I were to branch it into particulars, I would name but these three, viz. 1. A great increase of knowledge without the mixture of error. 2. A glorious degree of holiness without the .mixture of the least sin. 3. Constant peace and joywithout the mixture of any sorrow or uneasiness. Let us consider themdis
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