(2.) He cannot be adored, unless his glory be set forth and demonstrated, or made visible.

(3.) There must be an intelligent creature to behold his glory, and adore his perfections, that are thus demonstrated and displayed.

(4.) Every thing that he does is fit and designed to lead this creature into the knowledge of his glory; and that it is so ordered, is an eminent instance of divine wisdom. We need not travel far to know this, for wherever we look, we may behold how excellent his name is in all the earth and because some are so stupid, that they cannot, or will not, in a way of reasoning, infer his divine perfections from things that are without us, therefore he has instamped the knowledge thereof on the souls and consciences of men; so that, at sometimes, they are obliged, whether they will or no, to acknowledge them. There is something which may be known of God, that is said to be manifest in, and shewn to all; so that the Gentiles who have not the law, that is, the written word of God, do, by nature the things, that is, some things, contained therein, and so are a law unto themselves, and shew the work of the law written in their hearts, Rom. i. 19. chap. ii. 14, 15. And, besides this, he has led us farther into the knowledge of his divine perfections by his word, which he is said to have magnified above all his name, Psal. cxxxvii. 2. therefore having thus adapted his works and word, to set forth his glory, he discovers himself to be infinite in wisdom. (a)

(a) As knowledge is a faculty of which wisdom is the due exercise, the proofs of divine wisdom are so many evidences of the knowledge of God. Wisdom consists in the choice of the best ends, and the selection of means most suitable to attain them. The testimonies of the wisdom of God must therefore be as numerous and various, as the works of his creation. The mutual relations and subserviency of one thing to another; as the heat of the sun, to produce rain; both, to produce vegetation; and all, to sustain life; ensation, respiration, digestion, muscular motion, the circulation of the fluids, and, still more, intelligence, and above all, the moral faculty, or power of distinguishing good and evil, are unequivocal proofs of the wisdom, and consequently of the knowledge, of God.-He that formed the eye, doth he not see: he that planted the ear, &c.

Mortal artificers are deemed to understand their own work, though ignorant of the formation of the materials and instruments they use: but the Creator uses no mean or material which he has not formed. He therefore knows, from the globe to the particle of dust or fluid, and from the largest living creature to the smallest insect. He has knowledge equally of the other worlds of this system, and every system; of all things in heaven, earth, and hell.

Our knowledge is conversant about his works; he knows all things which are known to us, and those things which have not come to our knowledge.

He formed and sustains the human mind, and knows the thoughts: this is necessary to him as our Judge. He knows equally all spiritual creatures, and sustains his holy spirits in holiness.

Our knowledge springs from things; but things spring from his purposes: they are, because he knows them; otherwise they existed before his knowledge, and so independently of him.

2. The wisdom of God appears, in that whatever he does, is in the fittest season, and all the circumstances thereof tend to set forth his own honour, and argue his foresight to be infinitely perfect; so that he can see no reason to wish it had been otherwise ordered, or to repent thereof. For all his ways are judgment, Deut. xxxii. 4. to every thing there is a season and a time, to every purpose under the heaven; and he hath made every thing beautiful in his time, Eccl. iii. 1, 11.

For the farther illustrating of this, since wisdom is known by its effects, we shall observe some of the traces, or footsteps thereof in his works. And,

(1.) In the work of creation. As it requires infinite power to produce something out of nothing; so the wisdom of God appears in that excellent order, beauty, and harmony, that we observe in all the parts of the creation; and in the subserviency of one thing to another, and the tendency thereof to promote the moral government of God in the world, and the good of man, for whose sake this lower world was formed, that so it might be a convenient habitation for him, and a glorious object, in which he might contemplate, and thereby be led to advance the divine perfections, which shine forth therein, as in a glass; so that we have the highest reason to say, Lord, how manifold are thy works; in wisdom hast thou made them all, Psal. civ. 24. He hath made the earth by his power; he hath established the world by his wisdom, and hath stretched out the heavens by his discretion, Jer. x. 12. But since this argument hath been insisted on, with great ingenuity, and strength of reason by others, we shall add no more on that subject, but proceed to consider,

*

*See Ray's Wisdom of God in the Works of Creation, and Derham's PhysicoTheology. See also Fenelon, Newenlyle, Paley, and Adams's Philosophy.

We know but the external appearances, he the intimate nature of things. We inquire into the properties of things by our senses, by comparing them, by analizing, &c but nothing possesses a property which he did not purpose and give; otherwise his hands have wrought more than he intended. We look up through effects unto their causes: he looks down through intermediate causes, and sees them all to be effects from him.

We are furnished with memories to bring up ideas, being only able to contemplate a part at a time; but his comprehension embraces all things.

He never changes; his purposes of the future embrace eternity: all things that are really future are certain, because his purposes cannot fail of accomplishment. But all future things to us are contingent, except as he has revealed their certainty. That the future is known to him, also appears by the accomplishment of every prophecy.

But man's sin receives hereby no apology. He gives the brutal creation the capacity of deriving pleasure from gratification of sense, and provides for such appetites. He offers to man, pleasures which are intellectual: he has tendered him the means, and requires man to seck his spiritual happiness in God. When he refuses and withholds his return of service from God, man is alone to blame. And the more numerous and powerful the motives which he resists, the guilt is the

(2.) The wisdom of God, as appearing in the works of providence, in bringing about unexpected events for the good of mankind, and that by means that seem to have no tendency thereto, but rather the contrary; this will appear in the following instances. As,

1st, Jacob's flying from his father's house, was wisely ordered, as a means not only for his escaping the fury of his brother, and the trial of his faith, and to humble him for the sinful method he took to obtain the blessing; but also for the building up his family, and encreasing his substance in the world, under a very unjust father-in-law and master, such as Laban was.

2dly, Joseph's being sold into Egypt, was ordered, as a means of his preserving not only that land, but his father's house, from perishing by famine; his imprisonment was the occasion of his advancement. And all this led the way to the accomplishment of what God had foretold relating to his people's dwelling in Egypt, and their wonderful deliverance from the bondage they were to endure therein.

3dly, The wisdom of God was seen in the manner of Israel's deliverance out of Egypt, in that he first laid them under the greatest discouragements, by suffering the Egyptians to increase their tasks and burdens; hardening Pharaoh's heart, that he might try his people's faith, and make their deliverance appear more remarkable; and then plaguing the Egyptians, that he might punish their pride, injustice, and cruelty; and, at last, giving them up to such an infatuation, as effectually procured their final overthrow, and his people's safety.

4thly, In leading Israel forty years in the wilderness, before he brought them into the promised land, that he might give them statutes and ordinances, and that they might experience various instances of his presence among them, by judgments and mercies, and so be prepared for all the privileges he designed for them, as his peculiar people, in the land of Canaan.

5thly, We have a very wonderful instance of the wisdom of providence in the book of Esther; when Haman, the enemy of the Jews, had obtained a decree for their destruction, and Mordecai was first to be sacrificed to his pride and revenge, providence turned whatever he intended against him, upon himself, There was something very remarkable in all the circumstances that led to it, by which the church's deliverance and advancement was brought about; when, to an eye of reason, it seemed almost impossible.

(3.) The wisdom of God appears yet more eminently, in the

greater. The divine foreknowledge of this is no excuse for man. When the Lord overpowers man's evil with good, the glory of man's salvation belongs to God.

work of our redemption; this is that which the angels desire to look into, and cannot behold without the greatest admiration; for herein God's manifold wisdom is displayed, 1 Pet. i. 12. Eph. iii. 10. This solves the difficulty, contained in a former dispensation of providence, respecting God's suffering sin to enter into the world, which he could have prevented, and probably would have done, had he not designed to over-rule it, for the bringing about the work of our redemption by Christ; so that what we lost in our first head, should be recovered with great advantage in our second, the Lord from heaven.

But though this matter was determined in the eternal covenant, between the Father and the Son, and the necessity of man seemed to require that Christ should be immediately incarnate, as soon as man fell, yet it was deferred till many ages after; and herein the wisdom of God eminently appeared. For,

1st, God hereby tried the faith and patience of his church, and put them upon waiting for, and depending on him, who was to come; so that though they had not received this promised blessing, yet they saw it afar off; were persuaded of, and embraced it, and, with Abraham, rejoiced to see his day, though at a great distance, Heb. xi. 13. John viii. 56. and hereby they glorified the faithfulness of God, and depended on his word, that the work of redemption should be brought about, as certainly, as though it had been actually accomplished.

2dly, Our Saviour, in the mean time took occasion to display his own glory, as the Lord, and Governor of his church, even before his incarnation, to whom he often appeared in a human form, assumed for that purpose, as a prelibation thereof; so that they had the greatest reason, from hence, to expect his coming in our nature.

3rdly, The time of Christ's coming in the flesh, was such as appeared most seasonable; when the state of the church was very low, religion almost lost among them, and the darkness they were under, exceeding great; which made it very necessary that the Messiah should come: when iniquity almost universally prevailed among them, then the deliverer must come out of Sion, and turn away ungodliness from Jacob, Rom. xi. 26. and when the darkness of the night was greatest, it was the most proper time for the Sun of Righteousness to arise with healing in his wings, Mal. iv. 2. compared with Matt. iv. 16.

(4.) The wisdom of God farther appears in the various methods he has taken in the government of his church, before and since the coming of Christ. For,

1st, God at first, as has been before observed,† left his church without a written word, till Moses's time, that he might take occasion to converse with them more immediately, as an in

† See Page 46.

stance of infinite condescension; and to shew them, that though they had no such method of knowing his revealed will as we have, yet that he could communicate his mind to them another way; and, when the necessity of affairs required it, then his wisdom was seen in taking this method to propagate religion in the world.

2dly, When God designed to govern his church by those rules, which he hath laid down in scripture, he revealed the great doctrines contained therein, in a gradual way; so that the dispensation of his providence towards them, was like the light of the morning, increasing to a perfect day: he first instructed them by various types and shadows, leading them into the knowledge of the gospel, which was afterwards to be more clearly revealed: he taught them, as they were able to bear it, like children growing in knowledge, till they arrive to a perfect manhood: he first gave them grounds to expect the blessings which he would bestow in after-ages, by the manifold predictions thereof; and afterwards glorified his faithfulness in their accomplishment.

3dly, He sometimes governed them in a more immediate way, and confirmed their faith, as was then necessary, by miracles ; and also raised up prophets, as occasion served, whom he furnished, in an extraordinary way, for the service to which he called them, to lead his church into the knowledge of those truths, on which their faith was built.

And, to this we may add, that he gave them various other helps for their faith, by those common and ordinary means of grace, which they were favoured with, and which the gospel church now enjoys, and has ground to conclude that they will be continued until Christ's second coming. Here we might take occasion to consider how the wisdom of God appears in furnishing his church with a gospel-ministry, and how the management thereof is adapted to the necessities of his people; in employing such about this work, who are duly qualified for it, assisting them in the discharge thereof, and succeeding their humble endeavours; and all this in such a way, as that the praise shall redound to himself, who builds his house, and bears the glory; but this we may have occasion to insist on in a following part of this work.*

(5.) The wisdom of God appears in the method he takes to preserve, propagate, and build up his church in the world. Therefore,

1 st, As his kingdom is not of this world, but of a spiritual nature, so he hath ordered that it shall not be promoted by those methods of violence, or carnal policy, by which the secular interests of men are oft-times advanced. He has no where ap

* See Quest. clvi. and clvii.