ledge, when it conceived all of him it can, then, as being over come with that dazling. Brightnefs of his Glory, to think him inconceivable, and to exprefs him in fuch Terms as withall expreffes our Ignorance: There is no Name agrees more to God, than that which faith, we cannot name him, we cannot know him, fuch as, invisible, incomprehenfible, infinite, &c. This Socrates, an Heathen, profeft to be all his Knowledge, that he knew he did know nothing, and therefore he preached an unknown God to 'the Athenians, to whom after they erected an Altar with that Infcription, To the unknown God. I confefs, indeed, the moft Part of our Difcourfes, of our Performances, have fuch a writing on them, To the unknown God, because we think we know him, and fo we know nothing; But O that Chriftians had fo much Knowledge of God, fo much true Wif dom, as folidly, and willingly to confess in our Souls our own Ignorance of him, and then I would defire no other Knowledge, and growing in the Grace of God, but to grow more and more in the Believin Ignorance of fuch a Mystery, in the Knowledge of an unknown, unconceivable, and unfearchable God, that in all the Degrees of Knowledge we might ftill conceive we had found lefs, and that there is more to be found than before we apprehended. This is the moft perfect Knowledge of God, that doth not drive away. Darkness, but encrease it in the Soul's Apprehenfion; any Encrease in it doth not declare what God is, or fatisfie one's Admiration in it, but rather fhews him to be more invifible and unfearchable; fo that the Darkness of a Soul's IgnoranceTM is more manifefted by this Light, and not more covered, and one's own Knowledge is rather darkned, and disappears in the glorious Appearance of this Light; for in all new Discoveries, there is no other thing appears: But that this which the Soul is feeking is fupereminently unknown, and still further from Knowledge than ever i. conceived it to be. Therefore whatever you conceive or fee of God, if ye think ye know what ye conceive and fee, it's not God ye fee, but fomething of God's, lefs than God : For it's faid, Eye hath not Seen, nor Ear beard, nor bath it entered into the Heart of Man to conceive, what be bath laid up for them that love Him: Now, certainly, that's Himself he hath laid up for them; therefore, whatever thou conceives of him, and thinks now thou knows him, that is not He; for he hath not entred into Man's Heart to conceive Him. Therefore this must be thy Soul's Exercise and Progrefs in it, to remove all things, all Conceptions from him, as not befeeming his Majefty, and to go ftill forward in fuch a dark negative Difcovery, till thou know not where to feek him, nor find him. Si quis Deum videat & intelligat quod vidit, Deum non vidit, If any fee God, and understand what they fee, God they do not fee; for, God bath no Man feen, 1 John iv. 12. And no Man knows the Father but the Son, and none knows the Son but the Father; it's his own Property, to know Himself, ast to be Himfelf; filent and feeing Ignorance, is our fafeft and higheft Knowledge. Exod. iii. 14. I AM THAT I AM. Pfal. xc. 2. Before the Mountains, &c. from everlasting to everlasting thou art God. Job. xi. 7, 8, 9. Canft thou by searching find out God, &c. THIS HIS is the chief Point of faving Knowledge, to know God: And this is the first Point or Degree of the true Knowledge of God, to difcern how ignorant we are of him, and find him beyond all Knowledge: The Lord gives a Definition of Himself, but fuch a one # is no more clear than Himself to our Capacities; A short one indeed, and you may think it fays not much, I am. What is it that may not fay fo, I am that I am? The leaft and most inconfiderable Creature hath its own Being; Man's Wifdom would have learned him to call Himfelf by fome high Stiles, as the Manner and Cuftom of Kings and Princes is, and fuch as the Flattery of Men attributes unto them; you would think the Superlatives of wife, good, ftrong, excellent, glorious, and fuch like, were more befeeming his Majefty; and yet there is more Majefty in the fimple Stile than in all others; but a natural Man cannot behold it, for it is fpiritually difcerned. Let the potfbeards of the Earth (faith he) Arive with the potfbeards of the Earth, Ifa. xiv. 9. But let them not frive with their Maker. So Ifay, let Creatures compare with Creatures; let them take fuperlative Stiles, in regard of others; let fome of them be called good; and fome better, in the Comparifon among themselves, but God muft not enter in the Comparifon. Paul thinks it an odious Comparifon, to compare prefent Croffes to eternal Glory, I hink them not worthy to be compared, | faith Paul, Rom. viii. But how much more odious is it, to compare God with Creatures. Call Him Higheft, call Him moft Powerful, call Him moft Excellent, Almighty, moft Glorious in respect of Creatures, you do but abafe his Majefty, to bring it down to any Terms of Com parifon with them, which is beyond all the Bounds of Understanding; all thefe do but exprefs Him to be in fome Degree eminently feated above the Creatures, as fome Creatures are above all others, fo you do no more but make Him the Head of all, as fome one Creature is the Head of one Line or Kind under it; but what is that to his Majefty? He speaks other wife of Himfelf, fa. xl. 17. All Nations are before Him as nothing, and they are, accounted to Him less than nothing. Then, certainly, you have not taken up the true Notion of God, when you have conceived him the moft eminent of all Beings, as long as any Being appears. as a Being in his Sight, before whom all Beings conjoyned are as nothing; while. you conceive God to be the best, you still attribute fomething to the Creature, for all Comparatives include the Pofitive in both Extreams: So then, you take up only fome different Degrees between them. who differ fo infinitely, fo incomprehenfibly; the Distance betwixt Heaven and Earth is but a poor Similitude, to exprefs the Distance between God and Creatures. What is the Distance betwixt a Being and nothing? Can you measure it? you imagine it? Suppofe you take the in his Prefence there is no fuch reckoning. his Majefty's breathing upon us, if he should but keep in his Breath, as it were, we' thould vanish into nothing, He looketh upon Man and be is not, Job vii. 8. That' is a ftrange Look, that looks Man not only out of Countenance, but out of Life and Being, He looks him into his first nothing; and then can he fay, I live, I am; no, he muf nity, Before the Mountains were brought forth, from Everlafting to Everlasting be is God, Pfal. xc. 2. Now this is properly to be, and this only deferves the Name of Being, which never was nothing, and never fhall be nothing, which may al ways fay, I am; you know it is fo with nothing elfe but God; the Heavens and Earth, with the Things therein, could not not fay 6000 Years ago, Iam. Adam could once have faid, I am, but now he cannot fay it; for that Self-being and Fountain-being hath faid to him, Return to Duft; and fo it is with all the Generations paft, where are they now? They were, but they are not: And we then were not, and now are; for we are come in their Place, but within a little Time, who of us can fay, I am? No, we flee away and are like a Dream, as when one awaketh: We are like a Tale that is told, that makes a prefent Noife, and it is paft; within few Years this Generation will pafs, and none will, make Mention of us, our Place will not know us, no more than we do now remember those who have been before Chrift faid of John, He was a burning and fining Light, he was, faith he, but now he is not: But Chrift may always fay,I am the Light and Life of Men. Man is,but look a little backward, and he was not; you shall find his Original; and ftep a little forward and he fhall not be, you shall find his End: But God is Alpha and Omega, the Begin must always fay of himself in refpect of God, as Paul of himself in refpect of Christ, I live, yet not I, but Chrift inme; I am, yet not I, but God in me: I live, I am, yet not I, but in God, in whom I live, and bave my Being. So that there is no other thing befide God can fay, I am; becaufe all things are but borrowed Drops of this felf-fufficient Fountain, and Sparkles of this primitive Light; let any thing intervene between the Stream and the Fountain, and it is cut off and dryed up; let any thing be interpofed between the Sun and the Beam, and it evanishes. Therefore this Fountain being, this original Light, this Self being durò or, as Plato called him, deferves only the Name of Being; other Things that we call after that Name are nearer nothing than God, and fo, in regard of his Majefty, may more fitly be called nothing than fomething. You fee then how profound a Myftery of God's abfolute ⚫ felf-fufficient Perfection is infolded in thefe three Letters, I am, or in thefe four (JEHOVAH.) If you ask what is God? There is nothing occurrs better than this, I am, or be that is: If I fhould fay He is the Almighty, the only Wife, the moft Perfect, the moft Glorious, it is all contained in that Word, I am that I am, nempe boc eft ei effe, bac omnia effe; For that is to be indeed, to be all thofe Perfections fimply, abfolutely, and as it were folely; if I fay all that, and should reckon out all the Scripture-Epithets, I add nothing; if I fay no more,, I diminih no-ning and the End. But Oh, who can re thing. As this holds out God's abfolute Perfection, fo we told you that it imports his Eternity and his Unchangeablenefs. You know Pilate's Speech, what I have written I bave written, wherein he meant, that he would not change it, it should ftand fo. So this properly belongs to God's Eter tire fo far backward as to apprehend a Beginning, or go fuch a start forward as to conceive an End in fuch a Being as is the Beginning and End of all Things but without all Beginning and End? Whofe Understanding would it not confound? There is no Way here but to fee into Paul's Sanctuary, O the Heighth and Breadtb Breadth, and Length and Depth! We Number being multiplyed will amount un cannot imagine à Being, but we must first to the greateft that you can conceive. conceive it nothing, and in fome inftant But O, where fhall a Soul find it felf here? receiving its Being; and, therefore canft It is inclofed between Infinitenefs before, thou by Searching find out God? There- and Infinitenefs behind, between two Ever. fore what his Being is, hath not entred in- laftings, which way foever it turns, there to the Heart of Man to confider. If any is no out going; which way foever it looks, Man would live out the Space but of two it muft lofe it felf in an Infiniteness round Generations, he would be a World's Won- about it, it can find no Beginning and no der; but if any had their Days prolonged End, when it hath wearied it felf in fearchas the Patriarchs before the Flood, they ing, which if it find not, it knows not what would be called ancient indeed, but then it is, and cannot tell what it is. Now what the Heavens and Earth are far more An- are we then? O what are we, who fo cient; we may go backward the Space of magnifie our felves? We are but of near 6000 Years in our own Minds, and yesterday, and know nothing, Job viii. yet be as far from his Beginning as we 9. Suppofe that we had endured the were; when we are come to the Beginning Space of 1000 Years, yet faith Mofes, of all Things, a Man's Imagination may yet Pfal. xc. 4. A thousand Years are. extend it felf further, and fuppofe to it felf as but as yesterday in thy Sight; Time many Thousands of Years before the Be-hath no Succeffion to thee, thou beholdest ginning of Time, as all the Angels and Men at once what is not at once, but in feveral of all Nations, and Generations from the Times, all that hath not the Proportion Beginning, if they had been imployed in no of one Day to thy Days: We change in other thing but this, could have fummed our Days, and are not that to-day we up; and then fuppofe a Product to be made were yefterday, but He is the fame Yef of all the feveral Sums of Years, it would terday, and to-day, and for ever, Heb. be vaft and unspeakable, but yet your Imagi- xiii. 8. Every Day we are dying, fome nation could reach further, and multiply Part of our Life is taken away; we leave that great Sum as often into it felf as there ftill one Day more behind us, and what are Unites in it: Now when you have is behind us is gone and cannot be recodone all this, you are never a whit nearer vered: Though we vainly please our selves the Days of the Ancient of Days. Sup- in the Number of our Years, and the Expole then this fhould be the only Exercife tent of our Life, and the Viciffitudes of of Men and Angels throughout all Eternity, Time, yet the Truth is, we are but still all this marvellous Arithmetick would not lofing fo much of our Being and Time, as amount unto the leaft Shadow of the Con- paffeth: Firft, we loft our Child-hood, tinuance of Him who is from Everlast then we lofe our Manhood, and then we ing; all that huge Product of all the Mul- leave our old Age behind us alfo, and tiplications of Men and Angels,hath no Pro- there is no more before us, even the very portion unto that never Beginning, and ne-prefent Day we divide it with Death: But ver ending Duration: The greateft Sum when he moves all Things, he remains that is imaginable hath a certain Proportion immoveable though Days and Years be to the leaft Number, that it containeth it in a continual Flux and Motion about him. fo oft and no oftner, fo that the leaft and |