ANESSAY 473 evil in things, be always determines to act according to this fit- ness, and this goodness ; for to act an unfit thing would be un- wise, and to act a thing which is evil, would not be good; whereas the blessed God is perfectly wise and perfectly go d his works and his decrees, in his creation and providence, and government of the world; he is faithful to his promises, he is t*ighteous and just in his determinations, he is kind in his con- duct towards his creatures so far as the rides of wisdom and justice admit : Nor is it possible that God should be or act other- wise than according to this fitness, where there is any fitness or goodness in things, since these eternal and unchangeable fitnesses exist in his ideas, and fin God to act against them, would be unfit and unwise, and unbecoming the character and nature of g God. XII For the same reason his will exerting itself in a way of government, determines all the rules of moral virtue and piety for the practice of his creatures, according to the original and eternal fitness ofthings, wheresoever there is such an eternal fitness. As for instance, that God our Creator is to be honoured, and loved, and worshipped, andobeyed; that promises and con- tracts are to be fulfilled ; that one man must not take away ,anothermaan's life or property by force or fraud, ct}-c. All which pre moral propositions of eternal truth. XIII. God has made these moral rules known to men to be lüs will two ways, viz. by reason and by revelation. I. By rea- son, that is, by forming their natural powers of thinking and reasoning in such a manner, that when they set themselves to a careful and due consideration of the relation of God to his crea- tures, and of creatures to one another, they cannot but infer these propositions to be true, and to be Most proper rules to govern their practice ; and that God, who has formed their rea- soning powers in this manner, has hereby made these things their duty. As our reason is so formed, that in natural things it is impossible we should judge otherwise than that three and three make six, or the whole is greater than a part : so in moral things we cannot judge otherwise, when we have the ideaof a God, than that God our Maker is to behonoured andworshipped, 4c. And when our reason judges thus, then it appears to he the will pf God, and we are obliged to perform and obey it as our Maker's will. 2. By revelation, or scripture, God has also manifested these rules of moral virtue or natural religion, and thus con - firmed the law of nature or dictates of reason, and given a dou- ble discovery of these duties to those who live where this revela- tion is published, and a double obligation to the performance of them. Here let it be observed, that I enter not into the contro- versy, Whether these mgrsd propositions about eternal fitnesses
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