SERM.III. many We ought to pafs the fame Judgment "Things 4 "Things in the Creation appear to us pro"ductive of evil, and hurtful; and there"fore, because they are not of a Piece with "the reft of God's Works, they cannot be "his Productions;" as pretend to reafon thus: "Such Texts feem unaccountable to us, and therefore we will not allow them to be written under the Direction of an "All-wise Being." Inftead of fuch a precipitate Judgment, it would be much wiser to exprefs ourselves as St. Auftin did: "What "I understand in Scripture, is excellent ; " and I do not question, but what I do not "understand is fo too." We fhould remember, that a Book, which speaks of Things remote from common Apprehenfion, which lays before us the deep Things of God, muft in the Nature of the Thing be more puzzling; than any Compofition, which contains the fhallow Devices of an Understanding like our own. Men may retire into their Closets, and there imagine with themselves, how easy and plain a Book fhould be, which is of a divine Original, without any amazing Facts, without any dark and unintelligible Paffages; and when they find that the Revelation which we have, does not tally with their Y 4 SERM.III. their vain Imaginations, may presume to reject it. And, fhould they, instead of One plain Argument, that God has made fuch a Revelation as we have, should outweigh a thousand plaufible Conjectures brought against it, to shew, that it can be no Revelation from God; and that if it had, it must have been made in Juch a Manner, and no other. The Reafon is as follows: We can can eafily judge of the Strength of those Ar-SERM. III. guments, which prove that God has, in Fact, published his Will to Mankind; for they are clear, full, and obvious: But we are intirely incompetent Judges; how, in what Manner, with what Degree of Clearnefs in every Point, God, whofe Thoughts are not as our Thoughts, fhould publifh his Will, how much Light it was proper he should communicate, and what Intricacies he might fuffer, on Purpose to be the Tests of humble well-difpofed Minds, and to be a Stone of Stumbling, and a Rock of Offence, to the Perverse and Difingenuous. We may conclude from the Uniformity of God's Proceedings, that his revealed Will must bear fome Analogy and Correfpondence to the Conftitution of Nature, as fettled by him. And when every Thing can be accounted for, and is easy to be understood, in the Conduct of his Providence; then, and not till then, we ought to expect, that every Thing fhould be fo too in a divine Revelation. SERMON |