a 214 THE WORLD TO COME. tained with it, even to extasy and rapture ? " I behold, says 'he, in divine meditation, I behold this huge structure of the universe rising out of nothing at the voice of his command ; I behold the several planets in their various orders set a moving by the same word of power. With what delightful surprize do I hear him pronouncing the words, Let there be light, and lo, the light ap- pears ; Gen. i. 3. Let there be earth and seas ; let there be clouds and heavens ; let there be sun, moon and stars, and to the heavens, and the dry land, and the waters appear, the clouds and the stars in their various order and situation, and all the parts of the creation arise, all replenished with proper ornaments and animals according to his word. At his command nature exists in all its regions with all its furniture ; the beasts, and birds, and fishes in all their forms arise, and at once they obey the several almighty orders he gave, and by the unknown and inconceivable force of such a word they leap out into existence in ten thousand forms. " Again, what divine pleasure is it to hear a God beginning the work of his providence, and speaking those wonderous words of power to every plant and animal, be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth; Gen. i. 22. and 10 itì a long succession of near six thousand years the earth has been covered all over with herbs and plants, with shrubs and tall trees in all their beauty and dimensions. The air bath been filled with birds and insects, the seas and rivers with fish, and the dry land with beasts and men even to this present clay. When all this philosophy is changed into devotion, it must also be transformed into divine and unutterable Joy " Nor are these things too low and mean for the contempta- ticn of heavenly beings : For God is seen in all of them : There is not a spire of grass but the power and wisdom of a God are visible therein. And it is certain the heavenly beings must be sometimes employed in the contemplation of many of these lower wonders. The plants and beasts in desolate regions where no man inhabits, and in distant and foreign oceans and rivers, where the fishy shoals in all their variety and numbers, in all their suc- cessions and generations for near six thousand years were never seen nor known by any of the sons of men : these seem to have been created in vain, if no heavenly beings are acquainted with them, nor raise a revenue of glory to him that made them. " This almighty power therefore which made this huge uni- verse, which sustains the frame of it every moment, and secures it from dissolving, this power which brings forth the stars in their order, and worms and creeping things in their innumerable millions, and governs all the motions of them to the purposes of divine glory, must needs affect a contemplative soul with raptures of pleasing meditation ; and in these sublime meditations, by the
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