DISCOURSE II, 406 owing tohis painful and shameful death : When Noah, Abra- ham, and David, and all his pious progenitors shall bow ''and worship Jesus their Son and their Lord : When the holy army ofmartyrs, springing from the dust with palms of victory in their hands, shall ascribe their conquest and their triumph to the Lamb 'that was slain: When he shall present his whole churchbefore the presence of his own and his Father's glory, without spot, andfault- less, with exceeding job! Can we imagine that Christ himself, even the man Jesus, in the midst of all this magnificence and these honours, shall feel no new satisfaction, and have no relish. of all this joy, above what he possessed while his church lay bleeding on earth, and this illustrious company were buried under ground in the chains of death ? And yet you will say Christ in heaven is made perfect in knowledge and in joy, but his perfection admits of improvement. Now ifthe head be not above thecapacity of all growth and addition, surely the memberscan - not pretend to it. But I shall propose several more arguments for this truth in the following section. Sect. IV. Of the increase of the saints above in know- ledge, holiness, and joy.That there is, and hath been, and will be continual progress and improvement in the knowledge and joy of separate souls, may be easily proved many ways, via. from the very nature of human reason itself : From the narrowness, the weakness and limitation evenof our intellec- tual faculties in their best estate; from the immense variety of objects that we shall converse about; from our peculiar concern in some future providences,which it is not likely we should know before they occur; and from the glorious new scenes of the resurrection. 1. We may prove the increase of knowledge amongst the blessed above, from the very nature of human reason itself, which is a faculty ofdrawing inferences, or somenew propositions and conclusions, from propositions or principleswhich we knew before. Now surely we shall not be dispossessed of this power when we cometo heaven. What we learn of God there, and the glories of his nature, or his works, will assist and incline us to draw inferences for his honour, and for our worship of him. And if we could be supposed to have never so many propositionsor newprinciples -of knowledge crouded into our minds at the first entrance into heaven, yet surely our reasoning facultywould still be capable of making some advance by way of inference, or build- ing some superstrueture upon so noble a foundation. And who knows the intense pleasure that will arise perpetually to a con- templative mind, by a progressive and infinité pursuit of truth in this manner, where weare secureagainst the danger of all error andmistake, and every step we take is all light and demonstration. Shall it be objected here, that our reason shall be as it were cc3
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