Existence and Attributes of God

. And God intimates, that they had such a thought when he asserts his presence in Heaven and Earth, in opposition to the Temple they built as his House, and the place of his Rest . And the Idolaters among them, thought their God's might be at a distance from them, which Elias intimates in the scoff he puts upon them , Cry aloud, for he is a God, meaning Baal; either he is talking, or he is pursuing, or he is in a journey; and they follow his advice, and cried louder, v. 28. whereby it is evident, they looked not on it as a mock, but as a truth. And the Syrians called the God of Israel the God of the hills, as though his presence were fixed there, and not in the valleys ; and their own God's in the Valleys, and not in the Mountains; they fancied every God to have a particular Dominion, and presence in one place, and not in another; and bounded the Territories of their God's, as they did those of their Princes. And some thought him tied to, and shut up in their Temples and Groves wherein they worshipped him . Some of them thought God to be confined to Heaven, and therefore sacrificed upon the highest Mountains, that the steam might ascend nearer Heaven, and their Praises be heard better in those places which were nearest to the Habitation of God. But the wiser Jews acknowledged it; and therefore called God place , whereby they denoted his immensity; he was not contained in any place, every part of the World subsists by him: He was a place to himself, greater than anything made by him. And the wiser Heathens acknowledged it also.

One calls God a mind passing through the universal nature of things; Another, That he was an infinite and immense Air ; Another, That it is as natural to think God is everywhere, as to think that God is: Hence they called God the Soul of the World; that as the Soul is in every part of the Body, to quicken it, so is God in every part of the World, to support it.

And there are some resemblances of this in the World, though no Creature can fully resemble God in any one perfection; for then it would not be a Creature, but God. But Air and Light are some weak resemblances of it: Air is in all the spaces of the World, in the Pores of all Bodies, in the Bowels of the Earth, and extends itself from the lowest Earth, to the highest Regions; and the Heavens themselves are probably nothing else but a refined kind of Air; and Light diffuseth itself through the whole Air, and every part of it is truly Light, as every part of the Air is truly Air; and though they seem to be mingled together, yet they are distinct things, and not of the same Essence; so is the Essence of God in the whole World, not by diffusion as Air or Light; not mixed with any Creature; but remaining distinct from the Essence of any Created Being. Now when this hath been owned by men instructed only in the School of Nature, 'tis a greater shame to any acquainted with the Scripture to deny it. For the understanding of this, there shall be some Propositions premised in general.

1. This is Negatively to be understood. Our Knowledge of God is most by withdrawing from him, or denying to him in our conceptions any weaknesses or imperfections in the Creature. As the infiniteness of God, is a denial of limitation of Being, so Immensity or Omnipresence is a denial of limitation of place: And when we say, God is totus in every place, we must understand it thus, That he is not everywhere by parts, as Bodies are, as Air and Light are; He is everywhere, i. e. his Nature hath no bounds, he is not tied to any place, as the Creature is, who when he is present in one place, is absent from another. As no place can be without God, so no place can compass and contain him.

2. There is an influential Omnipresence of God.

1. Universal with all Creatures. He is present with all things by his Authority, because all things are subject to him: By his power, because all things are sustained by him: By his Knowledge, because all things are naked before him. He is present in the World, as a King is in all parts of his Kingdom Regally present: Providentially present with all, since his Care extends to the meanest of his Creatures. His Power reacheth all, and his Knowledge pierceth all.

As everything in the World was Created by God, so everything in the World is preserved by God; and since Preservation is not wholly distinct from Creation, 'tis necessary God should be present with everything while he preserves it, as well as present with it when he Created it. Thou preservest man and Beast. He upholds all things by the word of his Power. There is a virtue sustaining every Creature, that it may not fall back into that nothing from whence it was elevated by the Power of God. All those natural Virtues we call the Principles of Operation, are Fountains springing from his Goodness and Power; all things are acted and managed by him, as well as preserved by him; and in this sense God is present with all Creatures; for whatsoever acts another, is present with that which it acts, by sending forth some virtue and influence, whereby it acts: If free Agents do not only live, but move in him, and by him , much more are the motions of other natural Agents, by a virtue communicated to them, and upheld in them in the time of their acting: This virtual presence of God, is evident to our sense, a presence we feel; his essential presence is evident in our Reason: This influential presence may be compared to that of the Sun, which though at so great a distance from the Earth, is present in the Air and Earth by its Light, and within the Earth by its influence in concocting those Metals which are in the Bowels of it, without being substantially either of them. God is thus so intimate with every Creature, that there is not the least particle of any Creature, but the marks of his Power and Goodness are seen in it, and his Goodness doth attend them, and is more swift in its effluxes, than the breakings out of Light from the Sun, which yet are more swift than can be declared; but to say he is in the World only by his Virtue, is to acknowledge only the effects of his Power and Wisdom in the World, That his Eye sees all, his Arm supports all, his Goodness nourisheth all, but Himself and his Essence at a distance from them ; and so the Soul of man according to its measure would have in some kind a more excellent manner of Presence in the body, than God according to the Infiniteness of his Being with his Creatures; for that doth not only communicate Life to the Body, but is actually present with it, and spreads its whole Essence through the Body and every Member of it: All grant, That God is efficaciously in every Creek of the World; but some say he is only substantially in Heaven.

2. Limited to such Subjects that are capacitated for this or that kind of Presen • e. Yet it is an Omnipresence, because it is a Presence in all the Subjects capacitated for it; thus there is a special Providential Presence of God with some, in assisting them when he sets them on work as his Instruments for some special Service in the World: As with Cyrus , I will go before thee; and with Nebuchadnezzar, and Alexander, whom he Protected and Directed to execute his Counsels in the World; such a presence Judas and others that shall not enjoy his glorious Presence, had in the working of Miracles in the world: Besides as there is an effective Presence, of God with all Creatures, because he produced them, and preserves them; so there is an objective Presence of God with rational Creatures, because he offers himself to them, to be known and loved by them: He is near to Wicked men in the offers of his Grace, call ye upon him while he is near; Besides, there is a gracious Presence of God with his People in whom he dwells, and makes his abode, as in a Temple Consecrated to him by the Graces of the Spirit. We will come, i. e. the Father and the Son, and make our abode with him. He is present with all by the Presence of his Divinity, but only in his Saints by a Presence of a gracious Efficacy; he walks in the midst of the Golden Candlesticks, and hath Dignifi'd the Congregation of his People with the Title of Jehovah Sbammah, The Lord is there: In Salem is his Tabernacle, and his dwelling place in Zion . As he filled the Tabernacle, so he doth the Church with the Signs of his Presence; this is not the Presence wherewith he fills Heaven and Earth. His Spirit is not bestowed upon all, to reside in their hearts, enlighten their minds, and bedew them with refreshing Comforts: When the Apostle speaks of God's being Above all, and through all; Above all in his Majesty, Through all in his Providence; he doth not appropriate that, as he doth what follows, and in you all; in you all by a special Grace; as God was specially present with Christ by the Grace of Union, so he is specially present with his People by the Grace of Regeneration. So there are several manifestations of his Presence; he hath a Presence of Glory in Heaven, whereby he Comforts the Saints; a Presence of Wrath in Hell, whereby he Torments the Damned; in Heaven he is a God spreading his Beams of Light; in Hell, a God distributing his Strokes of Justice; by the one he fills Heaven, by the other he fills Hell; by his Providence and Essence he fills both Heaven and Earth.

3. There is an Essential Presence of God in the World. He is not only everywhere, by his Power upholding the Creatures, by his Wisdom understanding them, but by his Essence containing them. That anything is essentially present anywhere, it hath from God; God is therefore much more present everywhere, for he cannot give that which he hath not.

1. He is Essentially present in all places . 'It is as reasonable to think the Essence of God to be everywhere, as to be always; Immensity is as rational as Eternity; That indivisible Essence which reaches through all times, may as well reach through all places: 'It is more excellent to be always, than to be everywhere; for to be always in duration is Intrinsical; to be everywhere is Extrinsick; If the greater belongs to God, why not the less? As all times are a Moment to his Eternity, so all places are as a Point to his Essence; As he is larger than all time, so he is vaster than all place: The Nations of the World are to him as the Dust of the Ballance, or Drop of a Bucket . The Nations are accounted as the small Dust; the Essence of God may well be thought to be present everywhere with that which is no more than a grain of Dust to him, and in all those Isles, which if put together, are a very little thing in his hand: Therefore saith a Learned Jew , If a man were set in the highest Heavens, he would not be nearer to the Essence of God than if he were in the Center of the Earth. Why may not the Presence of God in the World be as noble as that of the Soul in the Body, which is generally granted to be essentially in every part of the body of man, which is but a little World, and animates every Member by its actual presence, though it exerts not the same operation in every part ? the World is less to the Creator, than the Body to the Soul; and needs more the Presence of God, than the Body needs the presence of the Soul. That glorious body of the Sun visits every part of the Habitable Earth in 24 hours by its beams; which reaches the Troughs of the lowest Valleys, as well as the Pinnacles of the highest Mountains; must we not acknowledge in the Creator of this Sun an infinite greater proportion of Presence? Is it not as easy with the Essence of God to over-spread the whole body of Heaven and Earth, as it is for the Sun to pierce and diffuse its self through the whole Air between it and the Earth, and send up its light also as far to the Regions above? Do we not see something like it in Sounds and Voices? Is not the same Sound of a Trumpet, or any other Musical Instrument, at the first breaking out of a Blast, in several places within such a compass, at the same time? Doth not every Ear that hears it, receive alike the whole sound of it? And fragrant Odors scented in several places at the same time, in the same manner; and the Organ proper for Smelling takes in the same in every person within the compass of it: How far is the noise of Thunder heard alike to every Ear, in places something distant from one another? And do we daily find such a manner of presence in those things of so low a concern, and not imagine a kind of Presence of God greater than all those? Is the sound of Thunder, the Voice of God, as it is called, everywhere in such a compass, and shall not the Essence of an Infinite God be much more everywhere? Those that would confine the Essence of God only to Heaven, and exclude it from the Earth, run into great inconveniencies. It may be demanded, whether he be in one part of the Heavens, or in the whole vast body of them? If in one part of them, his Essence is bounded; if he moves from that part, he is mutable, for he changes a place wherein he was, for another wherein he was not. If he be always fixed in one part of the Heavens, such a notion would render him little better than a living Statue : If he be in the whole Heaven, why cannot his Essence possess a greater space than the whole Heavens which are so vast? How comes he to be confined within the compass of that, since the whole Heaven compasseth the Earth? If he be in the whole Heaven, he is in places farther distant one from another, than any part of the Earth can be from the Heavens; since the Earth is like a Center in the midst of a Circle, it must be nearer to every part of the Circle, than some parts of the Circle can be to one another: If therefore his Essence possesses the whole Heavens, no reason can be rendered why he doth not also possess the Earth, since also the Earth is but a little point in comparison of the vastness of the Heavens; If therefore he be in every part of the Heavens, why not in every part of the Earth?

The Scripture is plain , Whither shall I go from thy Spirit? Or whither shall I fly from thy Presence? If I ascend up to Heaven, thou art there; If I make my Bed in Hell, behold thou art there; If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the Sea, even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall uphold me. If he be in Heaven, Earth, Hell, Sea, he fills all places with his Presence; his Presence is here asserted in places the most distant from one another; all the places then between Heaven and Earth are possessed by his Presence: 'It is not meant of his Knowledge, for that the Psalmist had spoken of before, ver. 2.3. Thou understandest my thoughts afar off, thou art acquainted with all my ways. Besides, Thou art there, not thy wisdom or knowledge; but Thou, thy Essence, not only thy Virtue. For having before spoken of his Omniscience, he proves that such Knowledge could not be in God, unless he were present in his Essence in all places, so as to be excluded from none: He fills the depths of Hell, the extension of the Earth, and the heights of the Heavens. When the Scripture mentions the Power of God only, it expresseth it by Hand or Arm; but when it mentions the Spirit of God, and doth not intend the Third Person in the Trinity, it signifies the Nature and Essence of God: And so here, when he saith, Whither shall I go from thy Spirit? he adds exegetically, Whither shall I fly from thy Presence, or Heb. Face? and the Face of God in Scripture signifies the Essence of God ; Thou canst not see my face, and my face shall not be seen; the effects of his Power, Wisdom, Providence, are seen, which are his Back-parts, but not his face: The effects of his Power and Wisdom are seen in the World, but his Essence is invisible; and this the Psalmist elegantly expresseth. Had I Wings endued with as much quickness as the first Dawnings of the morning light, or the first darts of any Sun-beam that spreads its self through the Hemisphere, and passes many Miles in as short a space as I can think a Thought, I should find thy presence in all places before me, and could not fly out of the infinite compass of thy Essence.

2. He is Essentially present with all Creatures. If he be in all places, it follows that he is with all Creatures in those places; as he is in Heaven, so he is with all Angels; as he is in Hell, so is he with all Devils; as he is in the Earth and Sea, he is with all Creatures inhabiting those Elements: As his Essential Presence was the ground of the first Being of things by Creation, so it is the ground of the continued Being of things by Conservation. As his Essential Presence was the Original, so it is the support of the existence of all the Creatures. What are all those magnificent expressions of his Creative virtue, but Testimonies of his Essential Presence at the laying the Foundation of the World ? when he measured the Waters in the hollow of his hand, meted out Heaven with the Span, and comprehended the Dust of the Earth in a Measure, and weighed the Mountains in Scales, and the Hills in a Ballance. He sets forth the Power and Majesty of God in the Creation and Preservation of things, and every Expression testifies his Presence with them: The Waters that were upon the face of the Earth at first, were no more than a drop in the palm of a man's hand, which in every part is touched by his hand. And thus he is equally present with the blackest Devils, as well as the brightest Angels; with the lowest Dust, as well as with the most sparkling Sun. He is equally present with the Damned and the Blessed, as he is an Infinite Being, but not in regard of his Goodness and Grace. He is equally present with the Good and the Bad, with the scoffing Athenians, as well as the believing Apostles, in regard of his Essence, but not in regard of the breathing of his Divine Virtues upon them to make them like himself : He is not far from everyone of us; for in him we live, and move, and have our Being: The Apostle includes all; he tells them they should seek the Lord; the Lord that they were to seek, is God essentially considered: We are indeed to seek the Perfections of God, that glitter in his works, but to the end that they should direct us to the seeking of God himself in his own Nature and Essence : And therefore what follows, In him we live, is to be understood not of his Power and Goodness, perfections of his Nature, distinguished according to our manner of conception, from his Essence; but of the Essential Presence of God with his Creatures. If he had meant it of his efficacy in preserving us, it had not been any proof of his nearness to us. Who would go about to prove the body or substance of the Sun to be near us because it doth warm and enlighten us, when our sense evidenceth the distance of it? We live in the beams of the Sun, but we cannot be said to live in the Sun, which is so far distant from us. The Expression seems to be more emphatical than to intend any less than his Essential Presence: But we live in him not only as the efficient cause of our Life, but as the foundation sustaining our lives and motions, as if he were like Air, diffused round about us. And we move in him, as Austin saith, as a Spunge in the Sea, not containing him, but being contained by him: He compasseth all, is encompassed by none; he fills all, is comprehended by none. The Creator contains the World, the World contains not the Creator: As the hollow of the hand contains the water, the water in the hollow of the hand contains not the hand; and therefore some have chose to say rather, That the World is in God, it lives and moves in him, than that God is in the World: If all things thus live and move in him, then he is present with every hing that hath Life, and Motion; and as long as the Devils and Damned have life, and motion, and being, so long is he with them; for whatsoever lives and moves, lives and moves in him.

But now this Essential Presence is

1. Without any mixture. I fill Heaven and Earth; not, I am mixed with Heaven and Earth; his Essence is not mixed with the Creatures; it remains entire in its self. The Spunge retains the nature of a Spunge, though encompassed by the Sea, and moving in it; and the Sea still retains its own nature. God is most simple; his Essence therefore is not mixed with anything. The Light of the Sun is present with the air, but not mixed with it, it remains light, and the air remains air; the light of the Sun is diffused through all the Hemisphere, it pierceth all transparent bodies, it seems to mix itself with all things, yet remains unmixed and undivided; the light remains light, and the air remains air; the air is not light though it be enlightened. Or, take this similitude; When many Candles are lighted up in a Room, the light is all together, yet not mixed with one another; every Candle hath a particular light belonging to it, which may be separated in a moment, by removing one Candle from another; but if they were mixed, they could not be separated, at least so easily. God is not formally one with the World, or with any Creature in the World by his Presence in it: Nor can any Creature in the World, no, not the Soul of man, or an Angel, come to be Essentially one with God, though God be Essentially present with it.

2. The Essential Presence is without any division of himself. I fill Heaven and Earth, not part in Heaven, and part in Earth; I fill one as well as the other: One part of his Essence is not in one place, and another part of his Essence in another place, he would then be changeable; for that part of his Essence which were now in this place, he might alter it to another, and place that part of his Essence which were in another place, to this; but he is undivided everywhere. As his Eternity is one indivisible point, though in our conception we divide it into past, present and to come. So the whole World is as a point to him, in regard of place as before was said; 'tis as a small Dust, and grain of Dust: 'It is impossible that one part of his Essence can be separated from another, for he is not a Body, to have one part separable from another. The light of the Sun cannot be cut into parts, it cannot be shut into any place and kept there, 'tis entire in every place; shall not God who gives the light that power, be much more present himself? whatsoever hath parts is finite, but God is infinite, therefore hath no parts of his Essence. Besides, if there were such a Division of his Being, he would not be the most simple and uncompounded Being, but would be made up of various parts; he would not be a Spirit, for parts are evidences of composition; and it could not be said that God is here or there, but only a part of God here, and a part of God there. But he fills Heaven and Earth, he is as much a God in the Earth beneath as in Heaven above ; entirely in all places, not by scraps and fragments of his Essence.

3. This Essential Presence is not by Multiplication. For that which is infinite cannot multiply itself, or make itself more or greater than it was.

4. This Essential Presence is not by extension or diffusion. As a piece of Gold may be beaten out to cover a large compass of ground; no, if God should Create Millions of Worlds he would be in them all, not by stretching out his Being, but by the Infiniteness of his Being; not by a new growth of his Being, but by the same Essence he had from Eternity: Upon the same reasons mentioned before, his Simplicity and Indivisibility.

5. But Totally. There is no space, not the least, wherein God is not wholly according to his Essence, and wherein his whole Substance doth not exist; not a part of Heaven can be designed wherein the Creator is not wholly; as he is in one part of Heaven, he is in every part of Heaven. Some kind of resemblance we may have from the water of the Sea, which fills the great space of the World, and is diffused through all; yet the Essence of Water is in every drop of Water in the Sea, as much as the whole; and the same quality of Water, though' it comes short in quantity; and why shall we not allow God a nobler way of Presence without diffusion, as is in that? Or take this resemblance, since God likens himself to Light in the Scripture , he covereth himself with Light; A Crystal Globe hung up in the Air hath Light all about it, all within it, every part is pierced by it, where ever you see the Crystal you see the Light; the Light in one part of the Crystal cannot be distinguished from the Light in the other part; and the whole Essence of Light is in every part; and shall not God be as much present with his Creatures, as one Creature can be with another ? God is totally everywhere by his own simple substance.

Proposition 4. God is present beyond the World. He is within and above all places, though places should be infinite in number; as he was before and beyond all Time, so he is above and beyond all place; being from Eternity before any real time, he must also be without as well a within any real space; if God were only confined to the World, he would be no more infinite in his Essence than the World is in quantity; as a moment cannot be conceived from Eternity, wherein God was not in Being, so a space cannot be conceived in the mind of man, wherein God is not present; he is not contained in the World nor in the Heavens. But will God indeed dwell on the Earth? Behold the Heaven of Heavens cannot contain Thee. Solomon wonders that God should appoint a Temple to be erected to him upon the Earth, when he is not contained in the vast Circuit of the Heavens; his Essence is not straitened in the limits of any Created work, he is not contained in the Heavens, i. e. in the manner that he is there; but he is there in his Essence, and therefore cannot be contained there in his Essence. If it should be meant only of his Power and Providence, it would conclude also for his Essence; if his Power and Providence were infinite, his Essence must be so too; for the infiniteness of his Essence is the ground of the infiniteness of his Power: It can never enter into any thought, that a finite Essence can have an infinite Power, and that an infinite Power can be without an infinite Essence; it cannot be meant of his Providence, as if Solomon should say, the Heaven of Heavens cannot contain thy Providence; for naming the Heaven of Heavens, that which encircles and bounds the other parts of the World, he could not suppose a Providence to be exercised where there was no object to exercise it about; as no Creature is mentioned to be beyond the uttermost Heaven, which he calls here the Heaven of Heavens: Besides, to understand it of his Providence, doth not consist with Solomon 's admiration: He wonders that God, that hath so immense an Essence, should dwell in a Temple made with hands; he could not so much wonder at his Providence in those things that immediately concern his Worship. Solomon plainly asserts this of God, That he was so far from being bounded within the rich Wall of the Temple, which with so much Cost he had framed for the Glory of his Name, that the richer Palace of the Heaven of Heavens could not contain him; 'tis true, it could not contain his Power and Wisdom, because his Wisdom could contrive other kind of Worlds, and his Power erect them: But doth the meaning of that wise King reach no farther than this? Will the Power and Wisdom of God reside on the Earth? He was too wise to ask such a question, since every object that his eyes met with in the World resolved him, That the Wisdom and Power of God dwelt upon the Earth, and glitter'd in everything he had Created; and Reason would assure him, That the Power that had framed this World, was able to frame many more: But Solomon considering the immensity of God's Essence, wonders that God should order a House to be built for him, as if he wanted Roofs, and Coverings, and Habitation, as bodily Creatures do. Will God indeed dwell in a Temple, who hath an Essence so immense as not to be contained in the Heaven of Heavens? 'tis not the Heaven of Heavens that can contain Him, his Substance. Here he asserts the immensity of his Essence, and his Presence not only in the Heaven, but beyond the Heavens; he that is not contained in the Heavens, as a man is in a Chamber, is without, and above, and beyond the Heavens; 'tis not said they do not contain him, but it is impossible they should contain him; they cannot contain him. 'It is impossible then but that he should be above them; he that is without the compass of the World, is not bounded by the limits of the World; as his Power is not limited by the things he hath made, but can Create innumerable Worlds, so can his Essence be in innumerable spaces; for as he hath power enough to make more Worlds, so he hath Essence enough to fill them, and therefore cannot be confined to what he hath already Created; innumerable Worlds cannot be a sufficient place to contain God, he can only be a sufficient place to himself ; He that was before the World and place, and all things, was to himself a World, a Place and everything : He is really out of the World in himself, as he was in himself before the Creation of the World: As because God was before the Foundation of the World, we conclude his Eternity; so because he is without the bounds of the World, we conclude his Immensity, and from thence his Omnipresence. The World cannot be said to contain him, since it was Created by him; it cannot contain him now, who was contained by nothing before the World was: as there was no place to contain him before the World was, there can be no place to contain him since the World was.

God might create more Worlds circular and round as this, and those could not be so contiguous, but some spaces would be left between; as take three round Balls, lay them as close as you can to one another, there will be some spaces between; none would say but God would be in these spaces, as well as in the World he had created, though' there were nothing real and positive in those spaces: Why should we then exclude God from those imaginary spaces without the World? God might also create many Worlds, and separate them by distances, that they might not touch one another, but be at a great distance from one another; and would not God fill them as well as he doth this? if so, he must also fill the spaces between them: For if he were in all those Worlds, and not in the spaces between those Worlds, his Essence would be divided; there would be gaps in it, his Essence would be cut into parts, and the distance between every part of his Essence would be as great as the space between each World: The Essence of God may be conceived then well enough to be in all those infinite spaces where he can erect new Worlds.

I shall give one place more to prove both these Propositions, viz. That God is Essentially in every part of the World, and Essentially above ours without the World.

The Heaven is my Throne and the Earth is my Foot-stool. He is Essentially in every part of the World; he is in Heaven and Earth at the same time; as a man is upon his Throne and his Foot-stool. God describes himself in a Human Shape, accommodated to our Capacity; as if he had his Head in Heaven and his Feet on Earth; doth not his Essence then fill all intermediate spaces between Heaven and Earth? as when the head of a man is in the upper part of a Room, and his Feet upon the floor, his body fills up the space between the Head and his Feet; this is meant of the Essence of God, 'tis a Similitude drawn from Kings sitting upon the Throne, and not their Power and Authority, but the Feet of their persons are supported by the Foot-stool; so here it is not meant only of the Perfections of God, but the Essence of God: Besides, God seems to tax them with an erroneous conceit they had, as though' his Essence were in the Temple, and not in any part of the World; therefore God makes an Opposition between Heaven and Earth, and the Temple; Where is the House that you built unto me? and where is the place of my Rest? Had he understood it only of his Providence, it had not been anything against their mistake; for they granted his Providence to be not only in the Temple, but in all parts of the World? Where is the House that you Build to me; to Me, not to my Power or Providence, but think to include Me within those Walls.

Again, It shows God to be above the Heavens, if the Heavens be his Throne; he sits upon them, and is above them as Kings are above the Thrones on which they sit; so it cannot be meant of his Providence, because no Creature being without the Sphere of the Heavens, there is nothing of the Power and the Providence of God visible there; for there is nothing for him to employ his Providence about. For Providence supposeth a Creature in actual being; It must be therefore meant of his Essence, which is above the world, and in the world.

And the like proof you may see, Job 11.7, 8. 'It is as high as heaven, what canst thou do? deeper than Hell, what canst thou know? the measure thereof is longer than the Earth, and broader than the Sea. Where he intends the unsearchableness of God's wisdom, but proves it by the infiniteness of his Essence, Hebr. He is the height of the Heavens, he is the top of all the Heavens; so that when you have begun at the lowest part, and traced him through all the Creatures, you will find his Essence filling all the Creatures to be at the top of the World, and infinitely beyond it.

5. Fifth Proposition. This is the property of God, incommunicable to any Creature. As no Creature can be eternal and immutable, so no Creature can be immense, because it cannot be infinite; nothing can be of an infinite nature, and therefore nothing of an immense Presence but God: It cannot be communicated to the Human Nature of Christ, though' in Union with the Divine ; some indeed argue, that Christ in regard of his human nature is everywhere, because he sits at the right hand of God; and the right hand of God is everywhere: His fitting at the right hand of God signifies his Exaltation, and cannot with any reason be extended to such a kind of arguing; The Hearts of Kings are in the hand of God; are the heart of Kings everywhere, because God's hand is everywhere? The Souls of the Righteous are in the hand of God, is the Soul therefore of every Righteous man everywhere in the World? The right hand of God is from Eternity, is the Humanity of Christ therefore from Eternity, because it sits at the right hand of God? The right hand of God made the World, did the Humanity of Christ therefore make Heaven and Earth? the Humanity of Christ must then be confounded with his Divinity; be the same with it, not united to it. All Creatures are distinct from their Creator, and cannot inherit the Properties Essential to his Nature; as Eternity, Immensity, Immutability, Omnipresence, Omniscience, no Angel, no Soul, no Creature can be in all places at once; before they can be so, they must be Immense, and so must cease to be Creatures, and commence God; this is impossible.

II Reasons to prove God's Essential Presence.

1st Reason. Because he is infinite. As he is infinite, he is everywhere; as he is Simple, his whole Essence is everywhere; for in regard of his Infiniteness, he hath no bounds; in regard of his Simplicity, he hath no parts: And therefore those that deny God's Omnipresence, though' they pretend to own him Infinite, must really conceive him Finite.

1. God is Infinite in his Perfections. None can set bounds to terminate the greatness and excellency of God . His greatness is unsearchable, Sept. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 there is no end, no limitation; what hath no end is infinite; his Power is infinite , which doth great things and unsearchable, no end of those things he is able to do; His Wisdom infinite . He understands all things past, present, and to come; what is already made, what is possible to be made; his duration infinite *. The number of his Years cannot be searched out, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 . To make a finite thing of nothing, is an Argument of an infinite Virtue; Infinite power can only extract something out of the Barren Womb of nothing, but all things were drawn forth by the Word of God, the Heavens and all the Host of them; the Sun, Moon, Stars, the rich embellishments of the World appeared in Being, at the Breath of his Mouth , the Author therefore must be infinite: And since nothing is the cause of God, or of any Perfection in him; since he derives not his Being, or the least spark of his glorious nature from anything without him, he cannot be limited in any part of his nature by anything without him; and indeed the infiniteness of his Power and his other Perfections is asserted by the Prophet, when he tells us that the Nations are as a Drop of a Bucket, or the Dust of the Ballance, and less than nothing and Vanity , they are all so in regard of his Power, Wisdom, &c. Conceive what a little thing a grain of Dust or Sand is to all the Dust that may be made by the rubbish of a House, what a little thing the heap of the rubbish of a House is to the vast heap of the rubbish of a whole City, such a one as London; how little that also would be to the Dust of a whole Empire; how inconsiderable that also to the Dust of one quarter of the World, Europe or Asia; how much less that still to the Dust of the whole World; the whole World is composed of an inconceivable number of Atoms, and the Sea of an inconceivable number of Drops; Now what a little grain of Dust is in comparison of the Dust of the whole World; a Drop of Water from the Sea, to all the Drops remaining in the Sea, That is the whole World to God. Conceive it still less, a mere nothing, yet is it all less than this, in comparison of God; there can be nothing more magnificently expressive of the infiniteness of God to a human conception, than this expression of God himself in the Prophet.

In the Perfection of a Creature, something still may be thought greater to be added to it; But God containing all Perfections in himself formally, if they be mere Perfections; and eminently, if they be but Perfections in the Creature, mixed with imperfection; nothing can be thought greater, and therefore everyone of them is infinite.

2. If his Perfections be Infinite, his Essence must be so. How God can have infinite Perfections, and a finite Essence is inconceivable by a Human or Angelical understanding; an infinite Power, an infinite Wisdom, an infinite Duration, must needs speak an infinite Essence; since the infiniteness of his Attributes is grounded upon the infiniteness of his Essence: To own infinite Perfections in a finite Subject, is contradictory. The manner of Acting by his Power, and Knowing by his Wisdom, cannot exceed the manner of Being by his Essence. His Perfections flow from his Essence, and the Principle must be of the same rank with what flows from it; and if we conceive his Essence to be the cause of his Perfections; 'tis utterly impossible that an infinite effect should arise from a finite Cause; but indeed his Perfections are his Essence, for though' we conceive the Essence of God as the subject, and the Attributes of God as faculties and qualities in that Subject according to our weak model, who cannot conceive of an infinite God without some manner of likeness to ourselves; who find Understanding, and Will, and Power in us distinct from our Substance; yet truly and really there is no distinction between his Essence and Attributes; one is inseparable from the other; his Power and Wisdom are his Essence; and therefore to maintain God Infinite in the one, and Finite in the other, is to make a Monstrous God, and have an unreasonable notion of the Deity; for there would be the greatest disproportion in his nature, since there is no greater disproportion can possibly be between one thing and another, than there is between finite and infinite: God must not only then be compounded, but have parts of the greatest distance from one another in nature; but God being the most Simple Being without the least composition, both must be equally infinite: If then his Essence be not infinite, his Power and Wisdom cannot be infinite, which is both against Scripture and Reason.

Again, how should his Essence be finite, and his Perfections be infinite; since nothing out of himself gave them either the one or the other?

Again, either the Essence can be infinite, or it cannot; if it cannot, there must be some cause of that impossibility; that can be nothing without him; because nothing without him can be as powerful as himself, much less too powerful for him; nothing within him can be an Enemy to his highest Perfection; since he is necessarily what he is, he must be necessarily the most perfect Being, and therefore necessarily infinite; since to be something infinitely, is a greater Perfection than to be something finitely ; if he can be infinite, he is infinite; otherwise he could be greater than he is, and so more Blessed and more Perfect than he is, which is impossible; for being the most perfect Being, to whom nothing can be added, he must needs be infinite.

3. If therefore God have an Infinite Essence, he hath an infinite Presence. An infinite Essence cannot be contained in a finite place; as those things which are finite have a bounded space, wherein they are; so that which is infinite hath an unbounded space; for as finiteness speaks limitedness; so infiniteness speaks unboundedness; and if we grant to God an infinite duration, there is no difficulty in acknowledging an infinite Presence: Indeed the infiniteness of God is a property belonging to him in regard of time and place; he is bounded by no place, and limited to no time.

Again, Infinite Essence may as well be everywhere, as infinite power reach everything; it may as well be present with every Being, as infinite power in its working may be present with nothing to bring it into Being. Where God works by his Power he is present in his Essence; because his Power and his Essence cannot be separated; and therefore his Power, Wisdom, Goodness, cannot be anywhere, where his Essence is not: His Essence cannot be severed from his Power, nor his Power from his Essence; for the Power of God is nothing but God acting, and the wisdom of God nothing, but God knowing. As the power of God is always, so is his Essence; as the power of God is everywhere, so is his Essence; whatsoever God is, he is always, and everywhere: To confine him to a place, is to measure his Essence; as to confine his actions, is to limit his power; his Essence being no less infinite than his Power and his Wisdom, can be no more bounded than his Power and Wisdom; but they are not separable from his Essence, yea they are his Essence; if God did not fill the whole World, he would be determined to some place, and excluded from others; and so his substance would have bounds and limits, and then something might be conceived greater than God; for we may conceive that a Creature may be made by God of so vast a greatness as to fill the whole World; for the power of God is able to make a body that should take up the whole space between Heaven and Earth, and reach to every corner of it; but nothing can be conceived by any Creature greater than God; he exceeds all things, and is exceeded by none; God therefore cannot be included in Heaven, nor included in the Earth; cannot be contained in either of them; for if we should imagine them vaster than they are, yet still they would be finite; and if his Essence were contained in them, it could be no more infinite than the World which contains it; As water is not of a larger compass than the Vessel which contains it. If the Essence of God were limited either in the Heavens or Earth, it must needs be finite, as the Heaven and Earth are; But there is no proportion between finite and infinite; God therefore cannot be contained in them: If there were an infinite body, that must be everywhere; certainly then an infinite Spirit must be everywhere: Unless we will account him finite, we can render no reason why he should not be in one Creature as well as in another; if he be in Heaven, which is his Creature, why can he not be in the Earth, which is as well his Creature as the Heavens.

2. Reason. Because of the continual operation of God in the World. This was one reason made the Heathen believe that there was an infinite Spirit in the vast body of the World, acting in everything, and producing those admirable motions which we see everywhere in Nature: That cause which acts in the most perfect manner, is also in the most perfect manner present with its effects.

God preserves all, and therefore is in all; the Apostle thought it a good induction ; He is not far from us: for in him we live. For being as much as because, shows that from his operation he concluded his real presence with all: 'It is not his virtue is not far from everyone of us; but He, his Substance, himself; for none that acknowledge a God, will deny the absence of the virtue of God from any part of the World. He works in everything, everything lives and works in him; therefore he is present with all : or rather if things live, they are in God, who gives them life. If things live, God is in them, and gives them life: If things move, God is in them, and gives them motion: If things have any Being, God is in them, and gives them Being; if God withdraws himself, they presently lose their Being; and therefore some have compared the Creature to the impression of a Seal upon the water, that cannot be preserved but by the Presence of the Seal. As his Presence was actual with what he Created, so his Presence is actual with what he preserves, since Creation and Preservation do so little differ; if God creates things by his Essential Presence, by the same he supports them; If his substance cannot be disjoin'd from his preserving Power, his power and wisdom cannot be separated from his Essence; where there are the marks of the one, there is the presence of the other; for it is by his Essence that he is powerful and wise; no man can distinguish the one from the other in a simple Being: God doth not preserve and act things by a virtue diffused from him. It may be demanded whether that virtue be distinct from God? if it be not, 'tis then the Essence of God; if it be distinct, 'tis a Creature, and then it may be asked how that virtue which preserves other things, is preserved itself? it must be ultimately resolved into the Essence of God, or else there must be a running in infinitum: or else, is that virtue of God a substance or not? Is it endued with understanding or not? If it hath understanding, how doth it differ from God? If it wants understanding, can any imagine that the support of the World, the guidance of all Creatures, the wonders of Nature can be wrought, preserved, managed by a virtue that hath nothing of understanding in it? If it be not a substance, it can much less be able to produce such excellent Operations, as the preserving all the kinds of things in the World, and ordering them to perform such excellent ends; this Virtue is therefore God himself, the infinite Power and Wisdom of God; and therefore wheresoever the effects of these are seen in the World, God is essentially present; some Creatures indeed act at a distance by a virtue diffused; but such a manner of acting comes from a limitedness of nature, that such a nature cannot be everywhere present, and extend its substance to all parts; To act by a virtue, speaks the Subject finite, and it is a part of indigence: Kings act in their Kingdoms by Ministers and Messengers, because they cannot act otherwise; but God being infinitely perfect, works all things in all immediately ; Illumination, Sanctification, Grace, &c. are the immediate Works of God in the heart, and immediate Agents are present with what they do; 'tis an Argument of the greater Perfection of a Being, to know things immediately, which are done in several places, than to know them at the second hand by Instruments: 'tis no less a Perfection to be everywhere, rather than to be tied to one place of action; and to act in other places by Instruments, for want of a Power to act immediately itself: God indeed acts by means and second causes in his Providential Dispensations in the World, but this is not out of any Defect of Power to Work all immediately himself; but he thereby accommodates his way of acting to the nature of the Creature, and the Order of Things which he hath settled in the World; And when he Works by means, he acts with those means, in those means, sustains their faculties and virtues in them, concurs with them by his Power; so that God's acting by means, doth rather strengthen his Essential Presence than weaken it; since there is a necessary dependence of the Creatures upon the Creator in their Being and Acting; and what they are, they are by the Power of God; what they act, they act in the Power of God, concurring with them; they have their Motion in him as well as their Being; and where the Power of God is, his Essence is, because they are inseparable; and so this Omnipresence ariseth from the simplicity of the Nature of God; the more vast anything is, the less confined. All that will acknowledge God so great, as to be able to work all things by his Will, without an Essential Presence, cannot imagine him upon the same reason, so little as to be contained in, and bounded by any place.

3. Reason. Because of his Supreme Perfection.

No Perfection is wanting to God; but an unbounded Essence is a Perfection; a limited one is an Imperfection. Tho' it be a Perfection in a man to be Wise, yet it is an Imperfection that his Wisdom cannot rule all the things that concern him; though' it be a Perfection to be present in a place where his affairs lie, yet is it his Imperfection that he cannot be present everywhere, in the midst of all his Concerns; if any man could be so, it would be universally owned as a prime Perfection in him above others; Is that which would be a Perfection in man, to be denied to God ? as that which hath life, is more perfect than that which hath not life; and that which hath sense is more perfect than that which hath only life, as the Plants have; and what hath reason, is more perfect than that which hath only life and sense, as the Beasts have; so what is everywhere, is more perfect than that which is bounded in some narrow confines; if a Power of motion be more excellent than to be Bed-rid; and swiftness in a Creature, be a more excellent endowment than to be slow and Snail like; Then to be everywhere without motion, is inconceivably a greater excellency than to be everywhere successively by motion. God sets forth his readiness to help his People and punish his Enemies; or his Omnipresence, by swiftness, or flying upon the Wings of the Wind : the Wind is in every part of the Air, where it blows; it cannot be said that it is in this or that Point of the Air where you feel it, so as to exclude it from another part of the Air where you are not; it seems to possess all at once.

If the Divine Essence had any bounds of place, it would be imperfect, as well as if it had bounds of time; where anything hath limitation, it hath some defect in Being; and therefore if God were confined or concluded, he would be as good as nothing in regard of Infiniteness: Whence should this restraint arise? there is no Power above him to restrain him to a certain space; if so, then he would not be God, but that power which restrained him would be God: Not from his own nature, for the being everywhere, implies no contradiction to his nature; if his own Nature determined him to a certain place, then if he removed from that place, he would act against his Nature; to conceive any such thing of God, is highly absurd. It cannot be thought God should voluntarily impose any such restraint or confinement upon himself; this would be to deny himself a Perfection he might have; if God have not this Perfection, it is either because it is inconsistent with his nature; or, because he cannot have it; or, because he will not. The former cannot be; for if he hath imprest upon Air and Light a resemblance of his Excellency, to diffuse themselves and fill so vast a space; Is such an Excellency inconsistent with the Creator more than the Creature? whatsoever Perfection the Creature hath, is eminently in God . Understand, O ye brutish among the people; and ye fools when will you be wise? He that planted the ear, shall he not hear? he that formed the eye, shall he not see? he that teacheth man knowledge, shall not he know? By the same reason he that hath given such a Power to those Creatures, Air and Light, shall not he be much more filling all spaces of the World? 'It is so clear a Rule, that the Psalmist fixes a folly and brutishness upon those that deny it; 'tis not therefore inconsistent with his Nature, it were not then a Perfection, but an Imperfection; but whatsoever is an Excellency in Creatures, cannot in a way of eminency be an Imperfection in God; if it be then a Perfection, and God want it, 'tis because he cannot have it; Where then is his Power? How can he be then the Fountain of his own Being? If he will not, where is his love to his own Nature and Glory? since no Creature would deny that to itself which it can have, and is an Excellency to it; God therefore hath not only a Power or fitness to be everywhere, but he is actually everywhere.

4. Reason. Because of his Immutability.

If God did not fill all the spaces of Heaven and Earth, but only possess one, yet it must be acknowledged that God hath a Power to move himself to another: It were absurd to fix God in a part of the Heavens, like a Star in an Orb, without a power of motion to another place. If he be therefore Essentially in Heaven, may he not be upon the Earth if he please, and transfer his Substance from one place to another? to say he cannot, is to deny him a Perfection which he hath bestowed upon his Creatures; the Angels his Messengers are sometimes in Heaven, sometimes on the Earth; the Eagles, meaner Creatures, are sometimes in the Air out of Sight, sometimes upon the Earth. If he doth move therefore and recede from one place, and settle in another, doth he not declare himself mutable by changing places? by being where he was not before, and in not being where he was before? He would not fill Heaven and Earth at once, but successively; no man can be said to fill a Room, that moves from one part of a Room to another; if therefore any in their imaginations, stake God to the Heavens, they render him less than his Creatures; If they allow him a power of motion from one place to another, they conceive him changeable; and in either of them they own him no greater than a finite and limited Being; limited to Heaven, if they fix him there; limited to that space to which they imagine him to move.

5. Reason. Because of his Omnipotency.

The Almightiness of God is a Notion settled in the minds of all, That God can do whatsoever he pleases, everything that is not against the purity of his Nature, and doth not imply a contradiction in its self; he can therefore create Millions of Worlds greater than this; and Millions of Heavens greater than this Heaven he hath already Created; if so, he is then in inconceivable spaces beyond this World, for his Essence is not less and narrower than his Power; and his Power is not to be thought of a further extent than his Essence; he cannot be excluded therefore from those vast spaces where his Power may fix those Worlds if he please; if so, 'tis no wonder that he should fill this World; and there is no reason to exclude God from the narrow space of this World, that is not contained in infinite spaces beyond the World. God is wheresoever he hath a Power to act, but he hath a power to act everywhere in the World, everywhere out of the World; he is therefore everywhere in the World, everywhere out of the World. Before this World was made, he had a Power to make it in the space where now it stands; Was he not then unlimitedly where the World now is, before the World received a Being by his powerful Word? Why should he not then be in every part of the World now? Can it be thought that God who was immense before, should after he had Created the World, contract himself to the limits of one of his Creatures, and tie himself to a particular place of his own Creation, and be less after his Creation than he was before?

This might also be prosecuted by an Argument from his Eternity. What is eternal in duration, is immense in essence; the same reason which renders him eternal, renders him immense; That which proves him to be always, will prove him to be everywhere.

The third thing is, Propositions for the further clearing this Doctrine from any exceptions.

1. This truth is not weakened by the expressions in Scripture, where God is said to dwell in Heaven, and in the Temple.

1. He is indeed said to sit in heaven , and to dwell on high ; but he is nowhere said to dwell only in the heavens, as confined to them. 'It is the Court of his Majestical presence, but not the Prison of his Essence. For when we are told, that the heaven is his throne, we are told with the same breath, that the earth is his footstool . He dwells on high in regard of the excellency of his nature; but he is in all places in regard of the diffusion of his presence. The soul is essentially in all parts of the body, but it doth not exert the same operations in all; the more noble discoveries of it are in the Head and Heart: In the Head, where it exerciseth the chiefest senses for the enriching the understanding. In the Heart, where it vitally resides, and communicates life and motion to the rest of the body. It doth not understand with the foot or toe, though' it be in all parts of the body it informs. And so God may be said to dwell in Heaven, in regard of the more excellent and majestic representations of himself both to the Creatures that inhabit the place, as Angels and blessed spirits; and also in those marks of his greatness which he hath planted there, those spiritual natures which have a nobler stamp of God upon them, and those excellent bodies, as Sun and Stars, which as so many Tapers light us to behold his glory , and astonish the minds of men when they gaze upon them. 'It is his Court, where he hath the most solemn Worship from his Creatures, all his Courtiers attending there with a pure love, and glowing zeal. He reigns there in a special manner, without any opposition to his government; 'tis therefore called his holy dwelling-place : The Earth hath not that title, since sin cast a stain, and a ruining curse upon it. The Earth is not his Throne, because his government is opposed. But Heaven is none of Satan's precinct, and the Rule of God is uncontradicted by the Inhabitants of it. 'It is from thence also he hath given the greatest discoveries of himself: Thence he sends the Angels his Messengers, his Son upon Redemption, his Spirit for Sanctification. From Heaven his gifts drop down upon our heads, and his grace upon our hearts . From thence the chiefest blessings of Earth descend. The motions of the heavens fatten the earth; and the heavenly bodies are but stewards to the earthly comforts for man by their influence. Heaven is the richest, vastest, most steadfast and majestic part of the visible Creation. 'It is there where he will at last manifest himself to his people in a full conjunction of grace and glory, and be forever open to his people in uninterrupted expressions of goodness, and discoveries of his presence, as a reward of their labor and service. And in these respects it may peculiarly be called his Throne. And this doth no more hinder his essential presence in all parts of the earth, than it doth his gracious presence in all the hearts of his people. God is in heaven in regard of the manifestation of his glory: in hell by the expressions of his justice: in the earth by the discoveries of his Wisdom, Power, Patience and Compassion: in his people by the monuments of his grace; and in all in regard of his substance.

2. He is said also to dwell in the Ark and Temple. 'It is called Psal. 26.8. The habitation of his house, and the place where his honor dwells; and to dwell in Jerusalem as in his holy Mountain; The Mountain of the Lord of Hosts , in regard of publishing his Oracles, answering their prayers, manifesting more of his goodness to the Israelites, than to any other Nation in the world, erecting his true Worship among them, which was not settled in any part of the world besides; and his worship is principally intended in that Psalm. The Ark is the place where his honor dwells; the worship of God is called the glory of God, They changed the glory of God into an image made like to corruptible man , i. e. they changed the worship of God into dolatry; and to that also doth the place in Zechariah refer.

Now because he is said to dwell in heaven, is he essentially only there? Is he not as essentially in the Temple and Ark, as he is in Heaven, since there are as high expressions of his habitation there, as of his dwelling in heaven? If he dwell only in heaven, how came he to dwell in the Temple? both are asserted in Scripture, one as much as the other. If his dwelling in heaven did not hinder his dwelling in the Ark, it could as little hinder the presence of his essence on the earth. To dwell in heaven, and in one part of the earth at the same time, is all one as to dwell in all parts of heaven, and all parts of earth. If he were in Heaven, and in the Ark and Temple, it was the same essence in both, though' not the same kind of manifestation of himself. If by his dwelling in heaven be meant his whole essence, why is it not also to be meant by his dwelling in the Ark? It was not sure part of his essence that was in heaven, and part of his essence that was on earth, his essence would then be divided; and can it be imagined, that he should be in Heaven and the Ark at the same time, and not in the spaces between? Could his essence be split into fragments, and a gap made in it, that two distant spaces should be filled by him, and all between be empty of him. So that God's being said to dwell in Heaven, and in the Temple, is so far from impairing the truth of this doctrine, that it more confirms and evidences it.

2. Nor do the Expressions of God's coming to us, or departing from us, impair this Doctrine of his Omnipresence.

God is said to hide his face from his People ; to be far from the Wicked; and the Gentiles are said to be afar off, viz. from God and upon the manifestation of Christ made near; These must not be understood of any distance or nearness of his Essence, for that is equally near to all persons and things; but of some other special way and manifestation of his Presence. Thus God is said to be in Believers by Love, as they are in him ; He that abides in love, abides in God, and God in him: He that loves is in the thing beloved; and when two love one another, they are in one another; God is in a Righteous man by a special grace, and far from the Wicked in regard of such special Works; and God is said to be in a place by a special manifestation, as when he was in the Bush ; or manifesting his Glory upon Mount Sinai ; The Glory of the Lord abode upon Mount Sinai: God is said to hide his face, when he withdraws his comforting Presence, disturbs the repose of our hearts, flasheth Terror into our Consciences, when he puts men under the smart of the Cross, as though' he had ordered his Mercy utterly to depart from them; or when he doth withdraw his special assisting Providence from us in our affairs; so he departed from Saul, when he withdrew his direction and Protection from him in the concerns of his Government ; The Spirit of the Lord departed from Saul, i. e. the Spirit of Government. God may be far from us in one respect, and near to us in another; far from us in regard of Comfort, yet near to us in regard of Support, when his Essential Presence continues the same; this is a necessary consequent upon the infiniteness of God, the other is an act of the Will of God; so he was said to forsake Christ, in regard of his obscuring his Glory from his Human Nature, and inflicting his Wrath; though' he was near to him in regard of his Grace, and preserved him from contracting any spot in his Sufferings. We do not say the Sun is departed out of the Heavens when it is be-misted; it remains in the same part of the Heavens, passes on its course, though' its Beams do not reach us by reason of the Bar between us and it: The Soul is in every part of the Body, in regard of its Substance, and constantly in it, though' it doth not act so spritely and vigorously at one time as at another in one and the same Member, and discover itself so sensibly in its Operations; so all the various effects of God towards the Sons of men, are but divers Operations of one and the same Essence: He is far from us, or near to us, as he is a Judge or a Benefactor; when he comes to Punish, it notes not the approach of his Essence, but the stroke of his Justice; when he comes to Benefit, 'tis not by a new access of his Essence, but an efflux of his Grace; he departs from us when he leaves us to the Frowns of his Justice; he comes to us when he encircles us in the Arms of his Mercy; but he was equally present with us in both dispensations, in regard of his Essence: And likewise God is said to come down , And the Lord came down to see the City; when he doth some signal and wonderful Works which attract the minds of men to the acknowledgment of a Supreme Power and Providence in the World, who judged God absent and careless before.

3. Nor is the Essential Presence of God with all Creatures any disparagement to him. Since it was no disparagement to Create the Heaven and the Earth, 'tis no disparagement to him to him to fill them; if he were Essentially present with them when he created them, 'tis no dishonor to him to be Essentiall present with them, to support them; if it were his Glory to Create them by his Essence, when they were nothing; Can it be his disgrace to be present by his Essence, since they are something, and something good, and very good in his Eye ? God saw everything, and behold it was very good; or mighty good; all ordered to declare his Goodness, Wisdom, Power, and to make him adorable to man, and therefore took complacency in tehm: There is a Harmony in all things, a Combination in them for those glorious Ends for which God Created them; and is it a disgrace for God to be present with his own Harmonious composition? Is it not a Musicians Glory to touch with his fingers the Trebble, the least and tenderest string, as well as the strongest and greatest Base? Hath not everything some Stamp of God's own Being upon it, since he eminently contains in himself the Perfections of all his Works? whatsoever hath Being, hath a Foot-step of God upon it, who is all Being; everything in the Earth is his Foot-Stool, having a mark of his Foot upon it; all declare the Being of God, because they had their Being from God; and will God account it any disparagement to him to be present with that which confirms his Being, and the glorious Perfections of his nature to his intelligent Creatures? the meanest things are not without their Virtues, which may boast God's being the Creator of them; and rank them in the midst of his Works of Wisdom as well as Power. Doth God debase himself to be present by his Essence, with the things he hath made, more than he doth to know them by his Essence? Is not the least thing known by him? How? not by a faculty or act distinct from his Essence; but by his Essence itself: How is anything disgraceful to the Essential Presence of God, that is not disgraceful to his Knowledge by his Essence? Besides, would God make anything that should be an invincible reason to him to part with his own infiniteness, by a contraction of his own Essence into a less compass than before? it was Immense before, it had no bounds; and would God make a World that he would be ashamed to be present with, and continue it to the diminution and lessening of himself, rather than annihilate it to avoid the disparagement? This were to impeach the Wisdom of God, and cast a blemish upon his infinite Understanding, that he knows not the consequences of his Work, or is well contented to be impaired in the immensity of his own Essence by it. No man thinks it a dishonor to Light, a most excellent Creature, to be present with a Toad or Serpent; and though' there be an infinite disproportion between Light, a Creature, and the Father of Lights the Creator: Yet God being a Spirit, knows how to be with Bodies as if they were not Bodies. And being jealous of his own Honor, would not, could not do anything that might impair it.

4. Nor will it follow, That because God is Essentially everywhere, that everything is God. God is not everywhere by any conjunction, composition or mixture with anything on Earth; when Light is in every part of a Crystal Globe, and encircles it close on every side, do they become one? No, the Crystal remains what it is, and the Light retains its own nature: God is not in us as a part of us, but as an efficient and preserving Cause; 'tis not by his Essential Presence, but his efficacious Presence that he brings any person into a likeness to his own Nature: God is so in his Essence with things, as to be distinct from them as a Cause from the Effect; as a Creator different from the Creature, preserving their Nature, not communicating his own; his Essence touches all, is in conjunction with none; Finite and Infinite cannot be join'd; he is not far from us, therefore near to us; so near that we live and move in him ; Nothing is God because it moves in him, anymore than a Fish in the Sea, is the Sea, or a part of the Sea, because it moves in it; Doth a man that holds a thing in the hollow of his hand, transform it by that action, and make it like his hand? The Soul and Body are more straitly united, than the Essence of God is by his Presence with any Creature: The Soul is in the Body as a form in matter, and from their Union doth arise a man; yet in this near conjunction, both Body and Soul remain distinct; the Soul is not the Body, nor the Body the Soul; they both have distinct natures and essences; the Body can never be changed into a Soul, nor the Soul into a Body; no more can God into the Creature, or the Creature into God. Fire is in heated Iron in every part of it, so that it seems to be nothing but Fire; yet is not Fire and Iron the same thing. But such a kind of arguing against God's Omnipresence, that if God were Essentially present, everything would be God; would exclude him from Heaven as well as from Earth. By the same reason, since they acknowledge God essentially in Heaven, the Heaven where he is, should be changed into the nature of God; and by arguing against his Presence in Earth, upon this ground they run such an inconvenience, that they must own him to be nowhere, and that which is nowhere is nothing. Doth the Earth become God, because God is Essentially there, anymore than the Heavens, where God is acknowledged by all to be Essentially present?

Again, if where God is Essentially, that must be God, then if they place God in a Point of the Heavens, not only that Point must be God, but all the World; because if that point be God, because God is there, then the Point touched by that Point must be God, and so consequently as far as there are any Points touched by one another. We live and move in God, so we live and move in the Air; we are no more God by that, than we are mere Air because we breathe in it, and it enters into all the Pores of our Body: Nay, where there was a straiter Union of the Divine Nature to the Human in our Savior, yet the Nature of both was distinct, and the Humanity was not changed into the Divinity, nor the Divinity into the Humanity.

5. Nor doth it follow, that because God is everywhere, therefore a Creature may be worshipped without Idolatry. Some of the Heathens who acknowledged God's Omnipresence, abused it to the countenancing Idolatry; because God was resident in everything, they thought everything might be Worshipped; and some have usd it as an Argument against this Doctrine; the best Doctrines may by men's corruption be drawn out into unreasonable and pernicious conclusions. Have you not met with any, That from the Doctrine of God's Free Mercy, and our Savior's satisfactory Death, have drawn Poison to feed their Lusts, and consume their Souls? a Poison composed by their own corruption, and not offered by those Truths. The Apostle intimates to us, that some did, or at least were ready to be more lavish in sinning, because God was abundant in Grace ; Shall we continue in Sin, that Grace may abound? when he prevents an Objection that he thought might be made by some: But as to this Case; since though' God be present in everything, yet everything retains its nature, distinct from the Nature of God; therefore it is not to have a Worship due to the Excellency of God: As long as anything remains a Creature, 'tis only to have the respect from us, which is due to it in the rank of Creatures. When a Prince is present with his Guard, or if he should go Arm in Arm with a Peasant, is therefore the Veneration and Honor due to the Prince, to be paid to the Peasant, or any of his Guard? would the Presence of the Prince excuse it, or would it not rather aggravate it? he acknowledged such a person equal to me, by giving him my Rights, even in my Sight. Tho' God dwelt in the Temple, would not the Israelites have been accounted guilty of Idolatry, had they Worshipped the Images of the Cherubims, or the Ark, or the Altar, as objects of Worship, which were erected only as means for his Service? Is there not as much reason to think God was as Essentially present in the Temple, as in Heaven; since the same Expressions are used of the one and the other? the Sanctuary is called the Glorious High Throne ; and he is said to dwell between the Cherubims , i. e. the two Cherubims that were at the two ends of the Mercy Seat, appointed by God as the two sides of his Throne in the Sanctuary, Exod. 25.18. where he was to dwell, ver. 8. and meet and commune with his people, ver. 22. Could this excuse Manasseh 's Idolatry in bringing in a Carved Image into the House of God ? had it been a good Answer to the Charge, God is present here, and therefore everything may be Worshipped as God? if he be only Essentially in Heaven, would it not be Idolatry to direct a Worship to the Heavens, or any part of it as a due object, because of the Presence of God there? Though we look up to the Heavens, where we Pray and Worship God, yet Heaven is not the object of Worship, the Soul abstracts God from the Creature.

6. Nor is God defiled by being present with those Creatures which seem filthy to us. Nothing is filthy in the Eye of God as his Creature; he could never else have pronounced all good; whatsoever is filthy to us, yet as it is a Creature, it owes itself to the Power of God: His Essence is no more defild by being present with it, than his Power by producing it: No Creature is foul in itself, though' it may seem so to us: Doth not an Infant lie in a Womb of filthiness and rottenness? yet is not the Power of God present with it, in working it curiously in the lower parts of the Earth? are his eyes defiled by seeing the Substance when it it is yet imperfect? or his hand defiled by writing every Member in his Book ? Have not the vilest and most noisome things, excellent Medicinal Virtues? How are they endued with them? How are those qualities preserved in them? by anything without God, or no? every Artificer looks with Pleasure upon the work he hath wrought with Art and Skill; can his Essence be defiled by being present with them, anymore than it was in giving them such virtues, and preserving them in them? God measures the Heaven and the Earth with his hand, is his hand defiled by the evil influences of the Planets, or the Corporeal Impurities of the Earth? nothing can be filthy in the Eye of God but Sin, since everything else owes its Being to him. What may appear deformed and unworthy to us, is not so to the Creator; he sees Beauty where we see Deformity; finds goodness where we behold what is nauseous to us. All Creatures being the effects of his Power, may be the objects of his Presence; Can any place be more foul than Hell, if you take it either for the Hell of the Damned, or for the Grave where there is rottenness? yet there he is . When Satan appeared before God, and God spake with him , Could God contract any impurity by being present where that filthy Spirit was, more impure than any corporeal, noisesome, and defiling thing can be? No, God is purity to himself in the midst of noysomness; a Heaven to himself in the midst of Hell: Who ever heard of a Sunbeam stained by shining upon a Quag mire, anymore than sweetened by breaking into a Perfum'd Room ? Tho' the Light shines upon pure and impure things, yet it mixes not its self with either of them; so though' God be present with Devils and Wicked men, yet without any mixture; he is present with their essence to sustain it and support it; not in their defection, wherein lies their defilement; and which is not a Physical, but a Moral evil; Bodily filth can never touch an incorporeal substance. Spirits are not present with us in the same manner that one body is present with another; bodies can by a touch only, defile bodies; Is the Glory of an Angel stained by being in a Coal-mine? or could the Angel that came into the Lions Den, to deliver Daniel, be anymore disturbed by the stench of the place, than he could be scratched by the Paws, or torn by the Teeth of the Beasts? their Spiritual nature secures them against any infection when they are ministering Spirits to Persecuted Believers in their nasty Prisons . The Soul is straitly united with the Body, but it is not made white or black, by the whiteness or blackness of its habitation; is it infected by the corporeal impurities of the Body, while it continually dwells in a Sea of filthy Pollution? If the Body be cast into a Common-shore, is the Soul defiled by it? Can a Diseased body derive a Contagion to the Spirit that animates it? Is it not often the purer by Grace, the more the body is infected by nature? Hezekiah 's Spirit was scarce ever more fervent with God, than when the Sore, which some think to be a Plague Sore, was upon him ; How can any Corporeal filth impair the purity of the Divine Essence? it may as well be said, That God is not present in Battels and Fights for his People , because he would not be disturbed by the noise of Canons and clashing of Swords, as that he is not present in the World because of the ill scents: Let us therefore conclude this with the Expression of a Learned man of our own ; To deny the Omnipresence of God, because of ill scented places, is to measure God rather by the nicety of Sense, than by the sagacity of Reason.

IV. USE.

I. Of Information.

1. Christ hath a divine nature. As Eternity and Immutability, two incommunicable properties of the Divine nature, are ascribed to Christ; so also is this of Omnipresence or Immensity . No man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven. Not which was, but which is; He comes from heaven by incarnation, and remains in heaven by his Divinity. He was, while he spake to Nicodemus, locally on earth, in regard of his humanity; but in heaven according to his Deity, as well as upon earth in the union of his divine and human nature. He descended upon earth, but he left not heaven; He was in the World before he came in the flesh. He was in the world, and the world was made by him. He was in the world, as the light that enlightens every man that comes into the world. In the world as God, before he was in the world as man. He was then in the world as man, while he discoursed with Nicodemus; yet so, that he was also in heaven as God. No creature but is bounded in place, either circumscribed as body, or determined as Spirit to be in one space, so as not to be in another at the same time; to leave a place where they were, and possess a place where they were not. But Christ is so on earth, that at the same time he is in heaven; he is therefore infinite. To be in heaven and earth at the same moment of time, is a property solely belonging to the Deity, wherein no creature can be a partner with him. He was in the world before he came to the world, and the world was made by him . His coming was not as the coming of Angels, that leave heaven, and begin to be on earth, where they were not before; but such a presence as can be ascribed only to God, who fills heaven and earth. Again, If all things were made by him, then he was present with all things which were made: for where there is a presence of power, there is also a presence of essence; and therefore he is still present: for the right and power of Conservation, follows the power of Creation. And according to this divine nature, he promiseth his presence with his Church. There am I in the midst of them. And I am with you always, even to the end of the world, i. e. by his Divinity: for he had before told them, that they were not to have him always with them, i. e. according to his Humanity; but in his Divine nature he is present with, and walks in the midst of the golden Candlesticks. If we understand it of a presence by his spirit in the midst of the Church, doth it invalidate his essential presence? No, he is no less than the Spirit whom he sends; and therefore as little confined as the Spirit is, who dwells in every believer: and this may also be infer'd from Joh. 10.30. My father and I are one; not one by consent, though' that be included; but one in power: for he speaks not of their consent, but of their joint power in keeping his people. Where there is a Unity of Essence, there is a Unity of Presence.

2. Here is a confirmation of the spiritual nature of God. If he were an infinite body, he could not fill heaven and earth, but with the exclusion of all creatures. Two bodies cannot be in the same space; they may be near one another, but not in any of the same points together. A body bounded he hath not, for that would destroy his Immensity; he could not then fill heaven and earth, because a body cannot be at one and the same time in two different spaces; but God doth not fill heaven at one time, and the earth at another, but both at the same time. Besides, a limited body cannot be said to fill the whole earth, but one particular space in the earth at a time. A body may fill the earth with its virtue, as the Sun, but not with its substance. Nothing can be everywhere with a corporeal weight and mass; but God being infinite, is not tied to any part of the World, but penetrates all, and equally acts by his infinite power in all.

3. Here is an argument for Providence. His presence is mentioned in the Text, in order to his government of the affairs of the world. Is he everywhere, to be unconcerned with everything? Before the World had a being, God was present with himself; since the World hath a being, he is present with his creatures, to exercise his Wisdom in the ordering, as he did his Power in the production of them. As the Knowledge of God is not a bare contemplation of a thing, so his Presence is not a bare inspection into a thing. Were it an idle careless Presence, it were a Presence to no purpose, which cannot be imagined of God. Infinite Power, Goodness, and Wisdom being everywhere present with his Essence, are never without their exercise. He never manifests any of his perfections, but the manifestation is full of some indulgence and benefit to his Creatures. It cannot be supposed God should neglect those things, wherewith he is constantly present in a way of efficiency and operation. He is not everywhere, without acting everywhere. Wherever his Essence is, there is a power and virtue worthy of God everywhere dispensed. He governs by his presence, what he made by his power; and is present as an Agent with all his works. His Power and Essence are together, to preserve them while he pleases, as his Power and his Essence were together to create them when he saw good to do it. Every creature hath a stamp of God, and his presence is necessary to keep the impression standing upon the creature. As all things are his works, they are the objects of his cares; and the wisdom he employed in framing them, will not suffer him to be careless of them. His presence with them, engageth him in honor not to be a negligent Governor. His Immensity fits him for government; and where there is a fitness, there is an exercise of government, where there are objects for the exercise of it. He is worthy to have the Universal rule of the World, he can be present in all places of his Empire, there is nothing can be done by any of his subjects, but in his sight. As his Eternity renders him King always, so his Immensity renders him King everywhere. If he were only present in heaven, it might occasion a suspicion that he minded only the things of heaven, and had no concern for things below that vast Body; but if he be present here, his Presence hath a tendency to the government of those things with which he is present. We are all in him as Fish in the Sea; and he bears all creatures in the womb of his Providence, and the arms of his Goodness. 'It is most certain that his Presence with his people is far from being an idle one; for when he promises to be with them, he adds some special Cordial, as, I will be with thee, and bless thee. I am with thee, and I will strengthen thee: I will help thee, I will uphold thee . Infinite goodness will never countenance a negligent Presence.

4. The Omnipotence of God i • infer'd from hence. If God be present everywhere, he must needs know what is done everywhere. 'It is for this end he proclaims himself a God filling heaven and earth, in the Text. Can any hide himself in secret places, that I shall not see him, saith the Lord? I have heard what the Prophets say, that prophesy lies in my Name: If I fill heaven and earth, the most secret thing cannot be hid from my sight. An Intelligent Being cannot be everywhere present, and more intimate in everything, than it can be in itself; but he must know what is done without, what is thought within. Nothing can be obscure to him, who is in every part of the world, in every part of his creatures. Not a thought can start up but in his sight, who is present in the souls and minds of everything. How easy is it with him, to whose Essence the world is but a point, to know and observe everything done in this world, as any of us can know what is done in one point of place where we are present? If Light were an understanding being, it would behold and know everything done, where it diffuseth itself. God is light (as light in a Crystal glass, all within it, all without it) and is not ignorant of what is done within and without; no ignorance can be fastened upon him who hath an Universal Presence.

Hence by the way we may take notice of the wonderful Patience of God, who bears with so many provocations; not from a Principle of Ignorance, for he bears with Sins that are committed near him, in his sight, Sins that he sees, and cannot but see.

5. Hence may be inferred the Incomprehensibility of God. He that fills Heaven and Earth, cannot be contained in anything; he fills the Understandings of Men, the Understandings of Angels, but is comprehended by neither; 'tis a rashness to think to find out any bounds of God; there's no measuring of an infinite Being, if it were to be measured it were not infinite; but because it is infinite, it is not to be measured. God sits above the Cherubims , above the fullness, above the brightness, not only of a human, but a created understanding: Nothing is more present than God, yet nothing more hid; he is Light, and yet obscurity ; his Perfections are visible, yet unsearchable; We know there is an infinite God, but it surpasseth the compass of our minds; we know there is no Number so great, but another may be added to it; but no man can put it in practice without losing himself in a maze of Figures. What is the reason we comprehend not many, nay most things in the World? partly from the Excellency of the object, and partly from the Imperfection of our understandings. How can we then comprehend God who exceeds all, and is exceeded by none; contains all, and is contained by none; is above our understanding, as well as above our sense? as considered in himself infinite; as considered in comparison with our understandings, incomprehensible; who can with his eye measure the breadth, length and depth of the Sea, and at one cast view every dimension of the Heavens: God is greater, and we cannot know him ; he fills the understanding as he fills Heaven and Earth; yet is above the understanding as he is above Heaven and Earth: He is known by Faith, enjoyed by love, but comprehended by no mind. God is not contained in that one Syllable, God; by it we apprehend an excellent and unlimited nature; himself only understands himself, and can unveil himself.

6. How wonderful is God, and how nothing are Creatures! Ascribe the Greatness to our God ; He is admirable in the consideration of his Power, in the extent of his understanding, and no less wonderful in the immensity of his Essence; That as Austin saith, he is in the World, yet not confined to it; he is out of the World, yet not debar'd from it; he is above the World, yet not elevated by it; he is below the World, yet not deprest by it; he is above all, equal'd by none; he is in all, not because he needs them, but they stand in need of him; this as well as Eternity, makes a vast disproportion between God and the Creature: The Creature is bounded by a little space, and no space is so great as to bound the Creator. By this we may take a prospect of our own nothingness; as in the consideration of God's Holiness we are minded of our own impurity; and in the thoughts of his Wisdom have a view of our own folly; and in the meditation of his Power, have a sense of our weakness; so his Immensity should make us according to our own nature, appear little in our own eyes. What little, little, little things are we to God? less than an Atom in the Beams of the Sun; poor drops to a God that fills Heaven and Earth, and yet dare we to strut against him, and dash ourselves against a Rock? If the consideration of ourselves in comparison with others, be apt to puff us up, the consideration of ourselves in comparison with God, will be sufficient to pull us down; if we consider him in the greatness of his Essence, there is but little more proportion between him and us, than between being and not being, than between a Drop and the Ocean. How should we never think of God without a Holy Admiration of his Greatness, and a deep sense of our own littleness! and as the Angels cover their faces before him; with what awe should creeping Worms come into his Sight! and since God fills Heaven and Earth with his Presence, we should fill Heaven and Earth with his Glory; for this end he Created Angels to Praise him in Heaven, and men to Worship him on Earth, that the Places he fills with his Presence may be filled with his Praise: We should be swallowed up in admirations of the Immensity of God, as men are at the first sight of the Sea, when they behold a mass of Waters, without beholding the bounds and immense depth of it.

7. How much is this Attribute of God forgotten or contemned! We pretend to believe him to be present everywhere, and yet many live as if he were present nowhere.

1. 'It is commonly forgotten, or not believed. All the extravagancies of men may be traced to the forgetfulness of this Attribute, as their Spring. The first Speech Adam spake in Paradise after his fall, testified his unbelief of this ; I heard thy Voice in the Garden, and I hid myself; his ear understood the voice of God, but his mind did not conclude the Presence of God; he thought the Trees could shelter him from him, whose eye was present in the minutest parts of the Earth; he that thought after his Sin, that he could hide himself from the Presence of his Justice, thought before that he could hide himself from the Presence of his Knowledge; and being deceived in the one, he would try what would be the fruit of the other: In both he forgets, if not denies this Attribute; either corrupt notions of God, or a slight belief of what in general men assent unto, gives Birth to every Sin. In all Transgressions there is something of Atheism; either denying the Being of God, or a dash upon some Perfection of God; a not believing his Holiness to hate it, his Truth that threatens, his Justice to punish it, and his Presence to observe it. Tho' God be not afar off in his Essence, he is afar off in the apprehension of the Sinner . There is no wicked man, but if he be an Atheist, he is a Heretic; and to gratify his Lust, will fancy himself to be out of the Presence of his Judge: His reason tells him, God is present with him, his Lust presseth him to embrace the season of a sensual Pleasure; he will forsake his Reason, and prove a Heretic, that he may be an undisturbed Sinner; and Sins doubly both in the error of his mind, and the vileness of his practice; he will conceit God with those in Job , Vail'd with thick Clouds, and not able to pierce into the lower World; as if his Presence and Cares were confined to Celestial things, and the Earth were too low a Sphere for his Essence to reach, at least with any Credit. 'It is forgotten by good men, when they fear too much the designs of their Enemies; Fear not, for I am with thee . If the Presence of God be enough to strengthen against fear, then the prevailing of fear issues from our forgetfulness of it.

2. This Attribute of God's Omnipresence is for the most part contemned. When men will commit that in the presence of God which they would be afraid or ashamed to do before the eye of man. Men do not practice that Modesty before God, as before men. He that would restrain his tongue out of fear of men's eye, will not restrain either tongue or hands out of fear of God's; What is the language of this, but that God is not present with us, or his presence ought to be of less regard with us, and influence upon us, than that of a creature? Ask the Thief why he dares to steal? Will he not answer, No eye sees him? Ask the Adulterer why he strips himself of his Chastity, and invades the Rights of another? Will he not answer, No eye sees me? He disguiseth himself to be unseen by man, but slights the all-seeing eye of God. If only a man know them, they are in terror of the shadow of death, they are Planet-struck; but stand unshaken at the presence of God. Is not this to account God as limited as man, as ignorant, as absenting, as if God were something less than those things which restrains us? 'It is a debasing God below a creature. If we can forbear sin from an awe of the presence of man, to whom we are equal in regard of Nature; or from the presence of a very mean man, to whom we are superior in regard of condition; and not forbear it because we are within the ken of God; We respect him not only as our inferior, but inferior to the meanest man or child of his Creation, in whose sight we would not commit the like action. 'It is to represent him as a sleepy, negligent, or careless God; as though anything might be concealed from him, before whom the least fibres of the heart are anatomiz'd and open, who sees as plainly midnight as noon-day sins. Now this is a high aggravation of sin: To break a Kings Laws in his sight, is more bold than to violate them behind his back; as it was Haman 's offense when he lay upon Esther's bed, to force the Queen before the Kings face. The least iniquity receives a high tincture from this. And no sin can be little that is an affront in the face of God, and casting the filth of the creature before the eyes of his holiness. As if a Wife should commit Adultery before her Husbands face, or a Slave dishonor his Master, and disobey his commands in his presence. And hath it not often been thus with us? Have we not been disloyal to God in his sight, before his eyes, those pure eyes that cannot behold iniquity without anger and grief? Ye did evil before my eyes. Nathan chargeth this home upon David. Thou hast despised the commandment of the Lord, to do evil in his sight. And David in his repentance, reflects upon himself for it, Against thee, thee only have I sinned, and done this evil in thy sight. I observed not thy presence, I neglected thee while thy eye was upon me. And this consideration should sting our hearts in all our confessions of our Crimes. Men will be afraid of the presence of others, whatsoever they think in their heart. How unworthily do we deal with God, in not giving him so much as an eye-service, which we do man?

8. How terrible should the thoughts of this Attribute be to sinners! How foolish is it, to imagine any hiding-place from the Incomprehensible God, who fills and contains all things, and is present in every point of the World! When men have shut the door, and made all darkness within, to meditate or commit a Crime, they cannot in the most intricate recesses be sheltered from the presence of God. If they could separate themselves from their own shadows, they could not avoid his company, or be obscured from his sight. Hypocrites cannot disguise their sentiments from him, he is in the most secret nook of their hearts. No thought is hid, no lust is secret, but the eye of God beholds this, and that, and the other. He is present with our heart when we imagine, with our hands when we act. We may exclude the Sun from peeping into our solitudes, but not the eyes of God from beholding our actions. The eyes of the Lord are in every place, beholding the evil and good . He lies in the depths of our souls, and sees afar off our designs before we have conceived them. He is in the greatest darkness, as well as the clearest light; in the closest thought of the mind, as well as the openest expressions. Nothing can be hid from him, no not in the darkest Cells, or thickest Walls. He compasseth our path wherever we are, and is acquainted with all our ways. He is as much present with wicked men to observe their sins, as he is to detest them. Where he is present in his Essence, he is present in his Attributes: His Holiness to hate, and his Justice to punish, if he please to speak the word. 'It is strange men should not be mindful of this, when their very sins themselves might put them in mind of his presence. Whence ha •• thou the power to act? who preserves thy being, whereby thou art capable of committing that evil? Is it not his Essential presence that sustains us, and his Arm that supports us? And where can any man fly from his presence? Not the vast Regions of Heaven could shelter a sinning Angel from his eye: How was Adam ferreted out of his hiding-places in Paradise? Nor can we find the depths of the Sea a sufficient covering to us. If we were with Jonah closeted up in the belly of a Whale; if we had the wings of the morning, as quick a motion as the light at the dawning of the day, that doth in an instant surprise and overpower the regions of darkness; and could pass to the utmost parts of the earth or hell, there we should find him, there his eye would be upon us, there would his hand lay hold of us, and lead us as a Conqueror triumphing over a captive . Nay, if we could leap out of the compass of heaven and earth, we should find as little reserves from him. He is without the World in those infinite spaces which the mind of man can imagine. In regard of his Immensity, nothing in being can be distant from him, wheresoever it is.

2d. Use is for Comfort. That God is present everywhere, is as much a Comfort to a good man, as it is a Terror to a wicked one. He is everywhere for his people, not only by a necessary perfection of his nature, but an immense diffusion of his goodness. He is in all creatures as their preserver, in the damned as their terror, in his people as their Protector. He fills hell with his severity, heaven with his glory, his people with his grace. He is with his people as light in darkness, a fountain in a garden, as Manna in the Ark. God is in the World as a spring of preservation, in the Church as his Cabinet, a spring of grace and consolation. A man is present sometimes in his field, but more delightfully in his garden. A Vineyard, as it hath more of cost, so more of care, and a watchful presence of the Owner. Isa. 27.3. I the Lord do keep it, viz. his Vineyard; I will water it every moment: lest any hurt it, I will keep it night and day. As there is a presence of Essence, which is natural; so there is a presence of Grace, which is foederal; A presence by Covenant, I will not leave thee, I will be with thee; this later depends upon the former; for take away the Immensity of God, and you leave no foundation for his universal gracious presence with his people in all their emergencies, in all their hearts. And therefore where he is present in his essence, he cannot be absent in his grace from them that fear him. 'It is from his filling heaven and earth he proves his knowledge of the designs of the false prophets; and from the same Topic may as well be infer'd the employment of his power and grace for his people.

1. The Omnipresence of God is a comfort in all violent temptations. No fiery dart can be so present with us, as God is present both with that and the marks-man. The most raging Devils cannot be so near us, as God is to us and them. He is present with his people to relieve them, and present with the Devil to manage him to his own holy purposes: So he was with Job, defeating his enemies, and bringing him triumphantly out of those pressing trials. This presence is such a terror, that whatsoever the Devil can despoil us of, he must leave this untouched. He might scratch the Apostle with a thorn, but he could not rifle him of the presence of divine grace, which God promised him. He must prevail so far as to make God cease to be God, before he can make him to be distant from us: and while this cannot be, the Devils and men can no more hinder the emanations of God to the Soul, than a Child can cut off the Rays of the Sun from imbellishing the Earth; 'tis no mean support for a good man, at any time buffeted by a Messenger of Satan, to think God stands near him and beholds how ill he is used. It would be a satisfaction to a Kings favourite in the midst of the Violence some Enemies might use to him upon a Surprise, to understand that the King who loves him, stands behind a Curtain, and through a hole sees the injuries he suffers; and were the Devil as considering as he is malicious, he could not but be in great fear at God's being in the Generation of the Righteous, as his Serpentine Seed is : There were they in great fear, for God is in the generation of the Righteous.

2. The Omnipresence of God is a comfort in sharp Afflictions. Good men have a Comfort in this Presence in their nasty Prisons, oppressing Tribunals; in the overflowing Waters or scorching Flames, he is still with them ; and many times by his Presence keeps the Bush from Consuming, when it seems to be all in a Flame: In afflictions God shows himself most present, when Friends are most absent; When my Father and Mother forsake me, then the Lord shall take me up , then God will stoop and gather me into his Protection; or, Hebr. shall gather me, alluding to those Tribes that were to bring up the Rear in the Israelites March, to take care that none were left behind, and exposed to Famine or wild Beasts, by reason of some Disease that disennabled them to keep pace with their Brethren; He that is the Sanctuary of his People in all Calamities, is more present with them to support them, than their Adversaries can be present with them to afflict them , A present help in the time of Trouble; He is present with all things for this end; though' his Presence be a necessary Presence, in regard of the Immensity of his Nature; yet the end of this Presence, in regard that it is for the good of his People, is a voluntary Presence. 'It is for the good of man he is present in the lower World, and principally for the good of his People, for whose sake he keeps up the World ; His eyes run to and fro throughout the whole Earth, to show himself strong in the behalf of them whose heart is perfect towards him. If he doth not deliver good men from Afflictions, he will be so present as to manage them in them, as that his Glory shall issue from them, and their Grace be brightned by them .

What a man was Paul when he was lodged in a Prison, or dragged to the Courts of Judicature, when he was torn with Rods, or laden with Chains! then did he show the greatest Miracles, made the Judge Tremble upon the Bench, and brake the Heart, though' not the Prison of the Jailor; so powerful is the Presence of God in the pressures of his People. This Presence outweighs all other Comforts, and is more valuable to a Christian than Barns of Corn, or Cellars of Wine can be to a Covetous man : It was this Presence was David's Cordial in the mutinying of his Soldiers . What a Comfort is this in Exile, or a forced desertion of our Habitations! Good men may be Banish'd from their Country, but never from the Presence of their Protector; Ye cannot say of any corner of the Earth, or of any Dungeon in a Prison, God is not here; if you were cast out of your Country 1000 Miles off, you are not out of God's Precinct; his Arm is there to cherish the good as well as to drag out the wicked; 'tis the same God, the same Presence in every Country, as well as the same Sun, Moon and Stars; and were not God everywhere, yet he could not be meaner than his Creature, the Sun in the Firmament, which visits every part of the habitable World in 24 hours.

2. The Omnipresence of God is a Comfort in all Duties of Worship. He is present to observe, and present to accept our Petitions, and answer our Suits. Good men have not only the Essential Presence, which is common to all, but his gracious presence; not only the presence that flows from his nature, but that which flows from his Promise; his Essential Presence makes no difference between this and that man in regard of Spirituals, without this in conjunction with it; his nature is the cause of the Presence of his Essence; his Will engaged by his Truth, is the cause of the Presence of his Grace. He promised to meet the Israelites in the place where he should set his name, and in all places where he doth Record it . In all places where I Record my Name, I will come unto thee, and I will Bless thee; in every place where I shall manifest the special Presence of my Divinity. In all places, hands may be lifted up, without doubting of his ability to hear; he dwells in the contrite Hearts, wherever it is most in the exercise of contrition; which is usually in times of special Worship , and that to revive and refresh them. Habitation notes a special Presence; though' he dwell in the highest Heavens in the sparklings of his Glory, he dwells also in the lowest Hearts in the beams of his Grace; as none can expel him from his Dwelling in Heaven; so none can reject him from his residence in the heart. The Tabernacle had his peculiar Presence fixed to it ; his Soul should not abhor them as they are washed by Christ, though' they are loathsome by Sin: In a greater dispensation there cannot be a less Presence, since the Church under the New Testament, is called the Temple of the Lord, wherein he will both dwell and walk ; Or. I will indwell in them; as if he should say, I will dwell in and in them; I will dwell in them by Grace, and walk in them by exciting their Graces; he will be more intimate with them than their own Souls, and converse with them as the Living God, i. e. as a God that hath Life in himself, and Life to convey to them in their Converse with him; and show his Spiritual Glory among them in a greater measure than in the Temple; since that was but a heap of Stones, and the figure of the Christian Church, the mystical Body of his Son. His presence is not less in the Substance than it was in the Shadow; this Presence of God in his Ordinances, is the Glory of a Church; as the Presence of a King is the Glory of a Court; the Defense of it too, as a Wall of Fire ; alluding to the Fire Travelers in a Wilderness made to fright away wild Beasts. 'It is not the meanness of the place of Worship can exclude him; the second Temple was not so magnificent as the first of Solomon 's Erecting; and the Jews seem to despond of so glorious a Presence of God in the second, as they had in the first; because they thought it not so good for the entertainment of him that inhabits Eternity; but God comforts them against this conceit again and again ; Be strong, Be strong, Be strong, I am with you; the meanness of the place shall not hinder the grandeur of my Presence; no matter what the Room is, so it be the Presence-Chamber of the King, wherein he will favor our Suits; he can everywhere slide into our Souls with a perpetual sweetness, since he is everywhere, and so intimate with everyone that fears him: If we should see God on Earth in his amiableness, as Moses did, should we not be encouraged by his Presence, to present our Requests to him, to Echo out our Praises of him? and have we not as great a ground now to do it, since he is as really present with us, as if he were visible to us? he is in the same room with us, as near to us as our Souls to our Bodies; not a word but he hears, not a motion but he sees, not a breath but he perceives; he is through all; he is in all.

4. The Omnipresence of God is a comfort in all special Services. God never puts any upon a hard task, but he makes Promises to encourage them and assist them; and the matter of the Promise is that of his Presence; so he did assure the Prophets of Old when he set them difficult tasks; and strengthened Moses against the Face of Pharaoh, by assuring him he would be with his Mouth ; and when Christ put his Apostles upon a Contest with the whole World, to Preach a Gospel that would be Foolishness to the Greeks, and a stumbling Block to the Jews; he gives them a Cordial only composed of his Presence , I will be with you; 'tis this presence scatters by its Light the darkness of our Spirits; 'It is this that is the cause of what is done for his Glory in the World; 'tis this that mingles its self with all that is done for his Honor; 'tis this from whence springs all the assistance of his Creatures, marked out for special purposes.

5. This Presence is not without the special Presence of all his Attributes. Where his Essence is, his Perfections are; because they are one with his Essence; yea, they are his Essence, though' they have their several degrees of manifestation. As in the Covenant, he makes over himself as our God, not a part of himself, but his whole Deity; so in promising of his Presence, he means not a part of it but the whole, the Presence of all the Excellencies of his nature to be manifested for our good. 'It is not a piece of God is here, and another parcel there; but God in his whole Essence and Perfections; in his Wisdom to guide us, his Power to protect and support us, his Mercy to pity us, his Fulness to refresh us, and his Goodness to relieve us: He is ready to sparkle out in this or that Perfection, as the necessities of his People require, and his own Wisdom directs for his own Honor: So that being not far from us in any excellency of his nature, we can quickly have recourse to him upon any emergency; so that if we are miserable, we have the presence of his Goodness; if we want direction, we have the presence of his Wisdom; if we are weak, we have the presence of his Power; and should we not rejoice in it, as a man doth in the Presence of a Powerful, Wealthy and Compassionate Friend?

3. USE of Exhortation.

1. Let us be much in the actual Thoughts of his Truth. How should we enrich our understandings with the knowledge of the Excellency of God, whereof this is none of the least; nor hath less of Honey in its Bowels, though' it be more Terrible to the Wicked than the Presence of a Lyon; 'tis this that makes all other excellencies of the Divine Nature sweet: What would Grace, Wisdom, Power signify at a distance from us? Let us frame in our minds a strong Idea of it; 'tis this makes so great a difference between the actions of one man and another; one maintains actual thoughts of it, another doth not; though' all believe it as a Perfection pertaining to the infiniteness of his Essence. David, or rather a greater than David, had God always before him; there was no time, no occasion wherein he did not stir up some lively thoughts of him . Let us have right notions of it; imagine not God as a great King, sitting only in his Majesty in Heaven; acting all by his Servants and Ministers. This, saith one, is a Childish and unworthy conceit of God, and may in time bring such a conceiver by degrees to deny his Providence; the denial of this Perfection is an Axe at the Root of Religion; if it be not deeply imprinted in the mind, personal Religion grows faint and feeble; who would fear that God that is not imagined to be a Witness of his actions? Who would worship a God at a distance both from the Worship and Worshipper ? Let us believe this Truth, but not with an idle Faith, as if we did not believe it; Let us know, that as wheresoever the Fish moves, it is in the Water; wheresoever the Bird moves, it is in the Air; so wheresoever we move, we are in God: as there is not a moment but we are under his Mercy; so there is not a moment that we are out of his Presence: Let us therefore look upon nothing, without thinking who stands by, without reflecting upon him in whom it Lives, Moves, and hath its Being. When you view a man, you fix your eyes upon his Body, but your mind upon that invisible part that acts every member by life and motion, and makes them fit for your converse. Let us not bound our thoughts to the Creatures we see, but pierce through the Creature to that boundless God we do not see; we have continual remembrancers of his Presence, the Light whereby we see, and the Air whereby we live, give us perpetual notices of it, and some weak resemblance; why should we forget it? yea, what a shame is our unmindfulness of it, when every cast of our Eye, every motion of our Lungs, jogs us to remember it? Light is in every part of the Air, in every part of the World, yet not mixed with any, both remain entire in their own substance. Let us not be worse than some of the Heathens, who pressed this notion upon themselves for the spiriting their actions with Virtue, That all places were full of God: This was the means Basil used to prescribe, upon a Question was asked him, How shall we do to be serious? Mind God's Presence. How shall we avoid distractions in Service? Think of God's Presence. How shall we resist Temptations? Oppose to them the Presence of God.

1. This will be a Shield against all Temptations. God is present, is enough to blunt the Weapons of Hell; this will secure us from a ready compliance with any base and vile attractives, and curb that head-strong Principle in our nature, that would join hands with them; the Thoughts of this would, like the powerful Presence of God with the Israelites, take off the Wheels from the Chariots of our sensitive Appetites, and make them perhaps, more slower, at least towards a Temptation. How did Peter fling off the Temptation which had worsted him, upon a look from Christ? the actuated faith of this would stifle the Darts of Satan; and fire us with an anger against his solicitations, as strong as the Fire that inflames the Darts. Moses his Sight of him that was Invisible, strengthened him against the costly Pleasures and Luxuries of a Princes Court : We are utterly senseless of a Deity, if we are not moved with this Item from our Consciences, God is Present. Had our first Parents actually considered the nearness of God to them, when they were Tempted to Eat of the Forbidden Fruit, they had not probably so easily been overcome by the Temptation: What Soldier would be so base as to revolt under the Eye of a tender and obliging General? Or what man so negligent of himself, as to Rob a House in the Sight of a Judge? Let us consider, That God is as near to observe us, as the Devil to solicit us, yea nearer; the Devil stands by us, but God is in us; we may have a Thought the Devil knows not, but not a Thought but God is actually present with, as our Souls are with the Thoughts they think; nor can any Creature attract our heart, if our minds were fixed on that invisible Presence that contributes to that excellency, and sustains it, and considered that no Creature could be so present with us as the Creator is.

2. It will be a Spur to Holy Actions. What man would do an unworthy action, or speak an unhandsom Word in the Presence of his Prince? the Eye of the General inflames the Spirit of a Soldier. Why did David keep God's Testimonies ? because he considered that all his ways were before him; because he was persuaded his ways were present with God, God's Precepts should be present with him. The same was the cause of Jobs Integrity Doth he not see my ways? to have God in our Eye is the way to be sincere ; walk before me as in my Sight, and be thou perfect. Communion with God consists chiefly in an ordering our Ways as in the Presence of him that is Invisible. This would make us spiritual, raised and watchful in all our Passions, if we considered that God is present with us in our Shops, in our Chambers, in our Walks, and in our Meetings, as present with us as with the Angels in Heaven; who though' they have a Presence of Glory above us, yet have not a greater measure of his Essential Presence than we have: What an awe had Jacob upon him when he considered God was present in Bethel ! If God should appear visibly to us when we were alone, should we not be reverent and serious before him? God is everywhere about us, he doth encompass us with his Presence; should not God's seeing us, have the same influence upon us, as our seeing God? He is not more essentially present if he should so manifest himself to us, than when he doth not; Who would appear besmear'd in the presence of a great person? or not be ashamed to be found in his Chamber in a nasty posture, by some visitant? Would not a man blush to be catched about some mean action, though' it were not an immoral Crime? If this Truth were imprest upon our Spirits, we should more blush to have our Souls daub'd with some loathsome Lust, swarms of Sin, like Egyptian Lice and Frogs, creeping about our Heart in his Sight. If the most sensual man be ashamed to do a dishonest action in the sight of a grave and holy man, one of great reputation for Wisdom and Integrity; how much more should we lift up ourselves in the ways of God, who is Infinite and Immense, is everywhere, and infinitely superior to man, and more to be regarded! We could not seriously think of his Presence, but there would pass some intercourse between us; we should be putting up some Petition upon the sense of our Indigence; or sending up our Praises to him upon the sense of his Bounty. The actual thoughts of the Presence of God is the Life and Spirit of all Religion; we could not have sluggish Spirits, and a careless Watch, if we considered that his Eye is upon us all the day.

3. It will quell Distractions in Worship. The actual thoughts of this would establish our thoughts, and pull them back when they begin to rove; The mind could not boldly give God the slip, if it had lively thoughts of it; the consideration of this would blow off all the Froth that lies on the top of our Spirits. An eye taken up with the presence of one object, is not at leisure to be filled with another: He that looks intently upon the Sun, shall have nothing for a while but the Sun in his Eye. Oppose to every intruding Thought the Idea of the Divine Omnipresence, and put it to silence by the awe of his Majesty. When the Master is present, Scholars mind their Books, keep their Places, and run not over the Forms to play with one another; The Masters Eye keeps an idle Servant to his Work, that otherwise would be gazing at every Straw, and prating to every Passenger. How soon would the remembrance of this, dash all extravagant fancies out of Countenance, just as the News of the approach of a Prince would make the Courtiers bustle up themselves, huddle up their vain sports, and prepare themselves for a Reverent Behaviour in his sight. We should not dare to give God a piece of our heart, when we apprehended him present with the whole; we should not dare to mock one that we knew were more inwards with us than we are with ourselves, and that beheld every motion of our mind, as well as action of our body.

2. Let us endeavor for the more special and influential Presence of God. Let the Essential Presence of God be the ground of our Awe, and his gracious influential Presence the Object of our Desire. The Heathen thought themselves secure if they had their little petty Household-God's with them in their Journeys; such seem to be the Images Rachel stole from her Father to company her Travel with their Blessings; she might not at that time have cast off all respect to those Idols, in the acknowledgment of which she had been Educated from her Infancy; and they seem to be kept by her, till God called Jacob to Bethel, after the Rape of Dinah , when Jacob called for the strange God's, and hid them under the Oak. The •••• cious Presence of God we should look after in our actions; as Travelers that 〈◊〉 a Charge of Money or Jewels, desire to keep themselves in Company that may protect them from Highway men that would rifle them. Since we have the concerns of the Eternal Happiness of our Souls upon our hands, we should endeavor to have God's Merciful and Powerful Presence with us in all our ways ; In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy Paths; acknowledge him before any action, by imploring; acknowledge him after, by rendering him the Glory; acknowledge his Presence before Worship, in Worship, after Worship: 'It is this Presence makes a kind of Heaven upon Earth, causeth affliction to put off the nature of misery. How much will the Presence of the Sun out-shine the Stars of lesser Comforts, and fully answer the want of them! The Ark of God going before us, can only make all things successful: It was this led the Israelites over Jordan, and settled them in Canaan. Without this we signify nothing, though' we live without this, we cannot be distinguished forever from Devils; his Essential Presence they have, and if we have no more we shall be no better. 'It is the enlivening, fructifying presence of the Sun, that revives the languishing Earth; and this only can repair our ruined Soul. Let it be therefore our desire, That as he fills Heaven and Earth by his Essence, he may fill our Understandings and Wills by his Grace; that we may have another kind of Presence with us, than Animals have in their brutish state, or Devils in their Chains: His Essential Presence maintains our Beings, but his gracious Presence confers and continues a Happiness.

A DISCOURSE UPON God's Knowledge.

'TIS uncertain who was the Author of this Psalm, and when it was Penn'd; some think after the return from the Babylonish Captivity: 'It is a Psalm of Praise, and is made up of matter of Praise from the beginning to the end; God's benefits to the Church, his Providence over his Creatures; the Essential excellency of his Nature.

The Psalmist doubles his Exhortation to Praise God, v. 1. Praise ye the Lord, sing Praise to our God; to praise him from his Dominion as Lord, from his Grace and Mercy as our God; from the Excellency of the Duty itself, 'tis good, 'tis comely: some read it comely, some lovely or desirable, from the various derivation of the Word.

Nothing doth so much delight a gracious Soul, as an opportunity of Celebrating the Perfections and Goodness of the Creator.

The highest Duties a Creature can render to the Creator are pleasant and delight-lightful in themselves, 'tis comely. Praise is a Duty that affects the whole Soul.

The Praise of God is a decent thing; the Excellency of God's nature deserves it, and the Benefits of God's grace requires it.

'It is comely when done as it ought to be, with the Heart as well as with the Voice: a Sinner Sings ill though' his Voice be good; the Soul in it is to be elevated above Earthly things.

The first matter of Praise, is God's erecting and preserving his Church, v. 2. The Lord doth build up Jerusalem, he gathers together the outcasts of Israel: The Walls of demolished Jerusalem are now re-edified; God hath brought back the Captivity of Jacob, and reduced his People from their Babylonish Exile, and those that were dispersed into strange Regions, he hath restored to their Habitations. Or it may be Prophetick of the calling of the Gentiles, and the gathering the outcasts of the Spiritual Israel, that were before as without God in the World, and strangers to the Covenant of Promise. Let God be praised, but especially for Building up his Church, and gathering the Gentiles, before counted as outcasts ; he gathers them in this World to the Faith, and hereafter to Glory.

Obs. 1. From the two first Verses observe.

1. All People are under God's Care: but he has a particular regard to his Church. This is the Signet on his hand, as a Bracelet upon his arm; this is his Garden which he delights to dress; if he prunes it, it is to purge it; if he Digs about his Vine, and wounds the Branches, 'tis to make it more Beautiful with new Clusters, and restore it to a fruitful Vigour.

2. All great deliverances are to be ascribed to God, as the principal Author, whosoever are the Instruments. The Lord doth build up Jerusalem, he gathers together the out ••• s of Israel. This great deliverance from Babylon, is not to be ascribed to Cyrus or Darius, or the rest of our favorers; 'tis the Lord that doth it; we had his Promise for it, we have now his Performance. Let us not ascribe that which is the effect of his Truth, only to the good Will of men; 'tis God's act, not by Might, nor by Power, nor by Weapons of War, or strength of Horses, but by the Spirit of the Lord. He sent Prophets to comfort us while we were exiles; and now he hath stretched out his own Arm to work our deliverance, according to his Word; blind man looks so much upon Instruments, that he hardly takes notice of God, either in Afflictions or Mercies, and this is the cause that robs God of so much Prayer and Praise in the World.

Verse 3. He heals the broken in heart, and binds up their Wounds. He hath now restored those who had no hope but in his Word; he hath dealt with them as a tender and skillful Chirurgeon; he hath applied his curing Plaisters, and dropped in his Sovereign Balsams; he hath now furnished our fainting hearts with refreshing Cordials, and comforted our Wounds with strengthening Ligatures.

How gracious is God, that restores Liberty to the Captives, and Righteousness to the Penitent? man's misery is the fittest opportunity for God to make his Mercy illustrious in itself, and most welcome to the Patient.

He proceeds verse 4. Wonder not that God calls together the outcasts, and singles them out from every corner, for a return; why can he not do this, as well as tell the number of the Stars, and call them all by their Names ?

There are none of his People so despicable in the eye of man, but they are known and regarded by God; though' they are clouded in the World, yet they are the Stars of the World; and shall God number the inanimate Stars in the Heavens, and make no account of his living Stars on the Earth? no, wherever they are dispersed, he will not forget them; however they are afflicted, he will not despise them; the Stars are so numerous, that they are innumerable by man; some are visible and known by men, others lie more hid and undiscovered in a confused Light, as those in the Milkyway, man cannot see one of them distinctly.

God knows all his People. As he can do what is above the power of man to perform, so he understands what is above the skill of man to discover; shall man measure God by his scantiness? Proud man must not equal himself to God, nor cut God as short as his own Line.

He tells the number of the Stars, and calls them all by their Names. He hath them all in his List; as Generals the Names of their Soldiers in their Muster-Roll, for they are his Host, which he Marshals in the Heavens, as Isa. 40.26. where you have the like Expression; he knows them more distinctly than man can know anything, and so distinctly as to call them all by their Names: He knows their Names, that is, their natural offices, influences, the different degrees of heat and light, their order and motion; and all of them, the least glimmering Star as well as the most glaring Planet; this man cannot do; Tell the Stars if thou be able to number them, Gen. 15.5. saith God to Abraham (whom Josephus represents as a great Astronomer ) yea they cannot be numbered, Jer. 33.22. and the uncertainty of the Opinions of men, evidenceth their ignorance of their number; some reckoning 1022, others 1025, others 1098, others 7000, besides those that by reason of their mixture of Light with one another, cannot be distinctly discerned, and others perhaps so high, as not to be reached by the eye of man. To impose Names on things, and Names according to their Natures, is both an Argument of Power and Dominion, and of Wisdom and Understanding: from the imposition of Names upon the Creatures by Adam, the Knowledge of Adam is generally concluded; and it was also a fruit of that Dominion God allowed him over the Creatures. Now he that Numbers and Names the Stars that seem to lie confused among one another, as well as those that appear to us in an unclouded Night, may well be supposed accurately to know his People, though' lurking in secret Caverns, and know those that are fit to be Instruments of their deliverance; the one is as easy to him as the other; and the Number of the one as distinctly known by him, as the Multitude of the other.

For great is our Lord, and of great Power, his Understanding is Infinite . He wants not Knowledge to know the objects, nor Power to effect his Will concerning them. Of great Power . Much Power, plenteous in Power; so the word 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 is rendered Psal. 5.15 . a multitude of Power, as well as a multitude of Mercy; a Power that exceeds all Created Power and Understanding.

His Understanding is Infinite. You may not imagine how he can call all the Stars by Name; the multitude of the visible being so great, and the multitude of the invisible being greater; but you must know, that as God is Almighty, so he is Omniscient; and as there is no end of his Power, so no account can exactly be given of his Understanding; His Understanding is Infinite . No number or account of it; and so the same Words are rendered Joel 1.6. a Nation strong, and without number: No end of his Understanding; Syriac, no measure, no bounds †. His Essence is Infinite, and so is his Power and Understanding; and so vast is his Knowledge, that we can no more comprehend it, than we can measure spaces that are without limits, or tell the minutes or hours of Eternity. Who then can fathom that whereof there is no number, but which exceeds all, so that there is no searching of it out ? he knows Universals, he knows Particulars: We must not take understanding here, as noting a faculty, but the use of the understanding in the knowledge of things, and the Judgment in the consideration of them, and so it is often used.

In the Verse there is a description of God.

1. In his Essence, great is our Lord.

2. In his Power, of great Power.

3. In his Knowledge, his Understanding is Infinite; his Understanding is his Eye, and his Power is his Arm. Of his Infinite Understanding, I am to Discourse.

Doctrine. God hath an Infinite Knowledge and Understanding. All Knowledge. Omnipresence which before we spake of, respects his Essence; Omniscience, respects his Understanding, according to our manner of Conception.

This is clear in Scripture; hence God is called a God of Knowledge, 1 Sam. 2.3. The Lord is a God of Knowledge, Heb. Knowledges in the Plural Number, of all kind of Knowledge; 'tis spoken there to quell man's Pride in his own reason and parts; what is the Knowledge of man but a spark to the whole Element of Fire, a grain of Dust, and worse than nothing, in comparison of the Knowledge of God, as his Essence is in comparison of the Essence of God? All kind of Knowledge. He knows what Angels know, what Man knows, and infinitely more; he knows himself, his own operations, all his Creatures, the notions and thoughts of them; he is understanding above understanding, mind above mind, the mind of minds, the light of lights; this the Greek word 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 signifies in the Etimology of it, of 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 to see, to contemplate; and 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 of 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 scio. The Names of God signify a nature viewing and piercing all things; and the attribution of our senses to God in Scripture, as Hearing and Seeing, which are the Senses whereby Knowledge enters into us, signifies God's Knowledge.

1. The Notion of God's Knowledge of all things lies above the ruins of Nature; it was not obliterated by the Fall of Man. It was necessary offending man was to know that he had a Creator whom he had injured, that he had a Judge to Try and Punish him; since God thought fit to keep up the World, it had been kept up to no purpose, had not this notion been continued alive in the minds of men; there would not have been any practice of his Laws, no bar to the worst of Crimes. If men had thought they had to deal with an Ignorant Deity, there could be no practice of Religion: Who would lift up his eyes, or spread his hands towards Heaven, if he imagined his Devotion were directed to a God as blind as the Heathens imagined Fortune? To what boot would it be for them to make Heaven and Earth resound with their Cries, if they had not thought God had an Eye to see them, and an Ear to hear them? And indeed the very notion of a God at the first blush, speaks him a Being endued with Understanding; no man can imagine a Creator void of one of the noblest Perfections belonging to those Creatures that are the Flower and Cream of his Works.

2. Therefore all Nations acknowledge this, as well as the Existence and Being of God. * No Nation but had their Temples, particular Ceremonies of Worship, and presented their Sacrifices, which they could not have been so vain as to do, without an acknowledgment of this Attribute. This notion of God's Knowledge owed not its rise to Tradition, but to natural implantation; it was born and grew up with every rational Creature. Though the several Nations and men of the World agreed not in one kind of Deity, or in their Sentiments of his Nature or other Perfections, some judging him Clothed with a fine and pure Body; others judging him an uncompounded Spirit; some fixing him to a seat in the Heavens; others owning his Universal Presence in all parts of the World; yet they all agreed in the Universality of his Knowledge; and their own Consciences reflecting their Crimes, unknown to any but themselves, would keep this notion in some vigor whether they would or no. Now this being implanted in the minds of all men by nature, cannot be false; for nature imprints not in the minds of all men an assent to a falsity. Nature would not pervert the reason and minds of men: Universal notions of God are from Original, not lapsed Nature, and preserved in mankind in order to a restoration from a lapsed state. The Heathens did acknowledge this: in all the solemn Covenants, solemniz'd with Oaths and the invocation of the Name of God, this Attribute was supposed. They confessed Knowledge to be peculiar to the Deity; Scientia Deorum vita, saith Cicero. Some called him 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , men's, mind, pure understanding, without any note 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , the inspector of all. As they called him Life, because he was the Author of Life; so they called him intellectus, because he was the Author of all Knowledge and Understanding in his Creatures; And one being asked, Whether any man could be hid from God? no saith he, not so much as thinking: Some call him the Eye of the World ; and the Egyptians represented God by an Eye on the top of a Scepter, because God is all Eye, and can be ignorant of nothing.

And the same Nation made Eyes and Ears of the most excellent Metals, Consecrating them to God, and hanging them up in the midst of their Temples, in signification of God's seeing and hearing all things; hence they called God Light, as well as the Scripture, because all things are visible to him.

For the better understanding of this, we will inquire,

• 1. What kind of Knowledge or Understanding there is in God.
• 2. What God knows.
• 3. How God knows things.
• 4. The proof, that God knows all things.
• 5. The Use of all to ourselves.

I. What kind of Understanding or Knowledge there is in God?

The Knowledge of God in Scripture hath various Names, according to the various relations or objects of it: In respect of present things, 'tis called Knowledge or Sight; in respect of things past, Remembrance; in respect of things future, or to come, 'tis called Fore-Knowledge or Prescience, 1 Pet. 1.2. in regard of the Universality of the Objects, it is called Omniscience; in regard of the simple Understanding of things 'tis called Knowledge; in regard of acting and modelling the ways of acting, 'tis called Wisdom and Prudence, Eph. 1.8. He must have Knowledge, otherwise he could not be Wise; Wisdom is the Flower of Knowledge, and Knowledge is the Root of Wisdom.

As to what this Knowledge is; if we know what Knowledge is in man, we may apprehend what it is in God, removing all Imperfection from it, and ascribing to him the most eminent way of understanding; because we cannot comprehend God, but as he is pleased to condescend to us in his own ways of Discovery; that is, under some way of similitude to his perfectest Creatures; therefore we have a notion of God by his Understanding and Will; Understanding, whereby he conceives and apprehends things; Will, whereby he extends himself in acting according to his Wisdom, and whereby he doth approve or disapprove: Yet we must not measure his Understanding by our own, or think it to be of so gross a Temper as a Created mind; that he hath Eyes of Flesh, or sees or knows as man sees . We can no more measure his Knowledge by ours, than we can measure his Essence by our Essence: As he hath an incomprehensible Essence, to which ours is but as a Drop of a Bucket; so he hath an incomprehensible Knowledge, to which ours is but as a grain of Dust, or mere Darkness: his thoughts are above our thoughts, as the Heavens are above the Earth.

The Knowledge of God is variously divided by the Schools, and acknowledged by all Divines.

1. A Knowledge visions & simplicis intelligentiae; the one we may call a Sight, the other an Understanding; the one refers to sense, the other to the mind.

1. A Knowledge of Vision or Sight; Thus God knows himself and all things that really were, are, or shall be in time; all those things which he hath Decreed to be, though' they are not yet actually sprung up in the World, but lie couchant in their Causes.

2. A Knowledge of Intelligence, or simple Understanding; the object of this is not things that are in Being, or that shall by any Decree of God ever be existent in the World; but such things as are possible to be wrought by the Power of God, though' they shall never in the least peep up into Being, but lie forever wrapped up in Darkness and nothing . This also is a necessary Knowledge to be allowed to God, because the object of this Knowledge is necessary. The possibility of more Creatures than ever were or shall be, is a conclusion that hath a necessary Truth in it; as it is necessary that the power of God can produce more Creatures, though' it be not necessary that it should produce more Creatures; so it is necessary that whatsoever the Power of God can work, is possible to be. And as God knows this possibility, so he knows all the objects that are thus possible; and herein doth much consist the Infiniteness of his Knowledge, as shall be shewn presently.

These two kinds of Knowledge differ; That of Vision, is of things which God hath Decreed to be, though' they are not yet. That of Intelligence, is of things which never shall be; yet they may be, or are possible to be, if God please to Will and Order their Being; one respects things that shall be; the other, things that may be, and are not repugnant to the Nature of God to be: The Knowledge of Vision follows the Act of God's Will, and supposeth an Act of God's Will before, Decreeing things to be. (If we could suppose any first or second in God's Decree, we might say God knew them as possible before he Decreed them; he knew them as future because he Decreed them.) For without the Will of God Decreeing a thing to come to pass, God cannot know that it will infallibly come to pass. But the Knowledge of Intelligence stands without any Act of his Will, in order to the Being of those things he knows; he knows possible things only in his Power; he knows other things both in his Power, as able to effect them; and in his Will, as determining the Being of them; such Knowledge we must grant to be in God, for there is such a kind of knowledge in man; for man doth not only know and see what is before his eyes in this World, but he may have a conception of many more Worlds, and many more Creatures, which he knows are possible to the Power of God.

2. Secondly, There is a speculative and practical knowledge in God.

1. A speculative knowledge is, when the truth of a thing is known without a respect to any working or practical operation. The knowledge of things possible is in God only speculative, and some say God's knowledge of himself is only speculative, because there is nothing for God to work in himself: and though' he knows himself, yet this knowledge of himself doth not terminate there, but flowers into a love of himself, and delight in himself; yet this love of himself, and delight in himself, is not enough to make it a practical knowledge, because it is natural, and naturally and necessarily flows from the knowledge of himself and his own Goodness: he cannot but love himself, and delight in himself, upon the knowledge of himself. But that which is properly practice, is where there is a dominion over the action, and it is wrought not naturally and necessarily, but in a way of freedom and counsel. As when we see a beautiful Flower or other thing, there ariseth a delight in the mind; this no man will call Practice, because it is a natural affection of the Will, arising from the virtue of the object, without any consideration of the Understanding in a practical manner by counseling, commanding, &c.

2. A Practical knowledge, which tends to operation and practice, and is the principle of working about things that are known; as the knowledge an Artificer hath in an Art or Mystery. This knowledge is in God: the knowledge he hath of the things he hath decreed, is such a kind of knowledge; for it terminates in the act of Creation, which is not a natural and necessary act, as the loving himself, and delighting in himself is, but wholly free: for it was at his liberty whether he would create them or no; this is called discretion, Jer. 10.12. He hath stretched out the heavens by his discretion. Such also is his knowledge of the things he hath created, and which are in being, for it terminates in the government of them for his own glorious ends. 'It is by this knowledge the depths are broken up, and the clouds drop down their dew . This is a knowledge whereby he knows the essence, qualities, and properties of what he creates and governs in order to his own glory, and the common good of the World over which he resides; so that speculative knowledge is God's knowledge of himself and things possible, practical knowledge is his knowledge of his creatures and things governable; yet in some sort this practical knowledge is not only of things that are made, but of things which are possible, which God might make, though' he will not: for as he knows that they can be created, so he knows how they are to be created, and how to be governed, though' he never will create them. This is a practical knowledge: for it is not requisite to constitute a knowledge practical, actually to act, but that the knowledge in itself be referrible to action .

3. There is a knowledge of approbation, as well as apprehension. This the Scripture often mentions: words of understanding are used to signify the acts of affection. This knowledge adds to the simple act of the understanding, the complacency and pleasure of the will; and is improperly knowledge, because it belongs to the Will, and not to the Understanding; only it is radically in the understanding, because affection implies knowledge; men cannot approve of that which they are ignorant of. Thus knowledge is taken, Amos 3.2. You only have I known of all the families of the earth. And 2 Tim. 2.19. The Lord knows who are his, that is, he loves them; he doth not only know them, but acknowledge them for his own: it notes not only an exact understanding, but a special care of them; and so is that to be understood, Gen. 1. God saw everything that he had made, and behold it was very good: that is, he saw it with an eye of approbation, as well as apprehension. This is grounded upon God's knowledge of Vision, his sight of his creatures; for God doth not love or delight in anything but what is actually in being, or what he hath decreed to bring into being. On the contrary also, when God doth not approve, he is said not to know, Mat. 25.12. I know you not: and Mat. 7.23. I never knew you: he doth not approve of their Works: 'tis not an ignorance of Understanding, but an ignorance of Will; for whiles he saith he never knew them, he testifies that he did know them, in rendering the reason of his disapproving them, because he knows all their Works: so he knows them, and doth not know them, in a different manner: he knows them so as to understand them; but he doth not know them so as to love them.

We must then ascribe an universal knowledge to God. If we deny him a speculative knowledge, or knowledge of intelligence, we destroy his Deity, we make him ignorant of his own Power: if we deny him Practical knowledge, we deny ourselves to be his creatures: for as his creatures, we are the fruits of this his discretion discovered in Creation: if we deny his knowledge of Vision, we deny his governing Dominion. How can he exercise a Sovereign and uncontrollable Dominion, that is ignorant of the nature and qualities of the things he is to govern? If he had not Knowledge, he could make no Revelation; he that knows not, cannot dictate; we could then have no Scripture. To deny God Knowledge, is to dash out the Scripture, and demolish the Deity.

God is described in Zech. 3.9. with seven eyes, to show his perfect Knowledge of all things, all Occurrences in the World; and the Cherubims, or whatsoever is meant by the Wings, are described to be full of Eyes, both before and behind , round about them; much more is God all Eye, all Ear, all Understanding. The Sun is a natural Image of God, if the Sun had an Eye, it would see; if it had an Understanding, it would know all visible things; it would see what it shines upon, and understand what it influenceth in the most obscure Bowels of the Earth. Doth God excel his Creature the Sun in Excellency and Beauty, and not in Light and Understanding? certainly more than the Sun excels an Atom or grain of Dust.

We may yet make some representation of this Knowledge of God by a lower thing, a Picture, which seems to look upon everyone, though' there be never so great a multitude in the Room where it hangs; no man can cast his Eye upon it, but it seems to behold him in particular, and so exactly as if there were none but him upon whom the eye of it were fixed; and every man finds the same cast of it; shall Art frame a thing of that Nature, and shall not the God of Art and all Knowledge, be much more in reality than that is in imagination? Shall not God have a far greater capacity to behold everything in the World, which is infinitely less to him than a wide Room to a Picture?

II. The second thing, what God knows? how far his Understanding reaches?

1. God knows himself, and only knows himself. This is the first and original knowledge, wherein he excels all Creatures: No man doth exactly know himself; much less doth he understand the full nature of a Spirit; much less still the Nature and Perfections of God; for what proportion can there be between a finite faculty and an infinite object? Herein consists the Infiniteness of God's Knowledge, That he knows his own Essence, that he knows that which is unknowable to any else. It doth not so much consist in knowing the Creatures which he hath made, as in knowing himself who was never made. 'It is not so much infinite, because he knows all things which are in the World, or that shall be; or things that he can make, because the number of them is finite; but because he hath a perfect and comprehensive knowledge of his own infinite Perfections . Tho' it be said that Angels see his Face, Math. 18.10. that sight notes rather their immediate Attendance, than their exact Knowledge; they see some signs of his Presence and Majesty, more illustrious and express than ever appeared to man in this Life; but the Essence of God is invisible to them, hid from them in the secret place of Eternity; none knows God but himself, 1 Cor. 2.11. what man knows the things of a man save the spirit of a man? so the things of God knows no man but the spirit of God; the spirit of God searches the deep things of God; searcheth, that is, exactly knows, thoroughly understands, as those who have their eyes in every Chink and Crevis, to see what lies hid there; the word search, notes not an Enquiry, but an exact Knowledge, such as men have of things upon a diligent scrutiny; as when God is said to search the Heart and the Reins, it doth not signify a precedent ignorance, but an exact Knowledge of the most intimate corners of the hearts of men. As the Conceptions of men are unknown to any but themselves; so the depths of the Divine Essence, Perfections and Decrees, are unknown to any but to God himself; he only knows what he is, and what he knows, what he can do, and what he hath Decreed to do.

1. For first, If God did not know himself, he would not be perfect. 'It is the Perfection of a Creature to know itself, much more a Perfection belonging to God. If God did not comprehend himself, he would want an Infinite Perfection, and so would cease to be God, in being defective in that which intellectual Creatures in some measure possess. As God is the most perfect Being, so he must have the most perfect Understanding: If he did not understand himself, he would be under the greatest Ignorance, because he would be ignorant of the most excellent object. Ignorance is the Imperfection of the Understanding; and ignorance of ones self is a greater Imperfection than ignorance of things without. If God should know all things without himself, and not know himself, he would not have the most perfect Knowledge, because he would not have the knowledge of the best of objects.

2. Without the Knowledge of himself, he could not be blessed. Nothing can have any complacency in itself, without the Knowledge of itself. Nothing can in a rational manner enjoy itself, without understanding itself. The Blessedness of God consists not in the knowledge of anything without him, but in the knowledge of himself and his own excellency, as the principle of all things; If therefore he did not perfectly know himself and his own happiness, he could not enjoy a happiness; for to be, and not to know to be, is as if a thing were not. He is God blessed forever, Rom. 9.5. and therefore forever had a Knowledge of himself.

3. Without the Knowledge of himself he could Create nothing. For he would be ignorant of his own Power, and his own Ability; and he that doth not know how far his Power extends, could not act: If he did not know himself, he could know nothing; and he that knows nothing, can do nothing; he could not know an Effect to be possible to him, unless he knew his own Power as a Cause.

4. Without the Knowledge of himself, he could govern nothing. He could not without the knowledge of his own Holiness and Righteousness, prescribe Laws to men, nor without a knowledge of his own nature, order himself a manner of Worship suitable to it.

All Worship must be congruous to the dignity and nature of the object worshipped; he must therefore know his own Authority whereby Worship was to be enacted, his own Excellency to which Worship was to be suited, his own Glory to which Worship was to be directed. If he did not know himself, he did not know what to punish, because he would not know what was contrary to himself: not knowing himself, he would not know what was a contempt of him, and what an adoration of him; what was worthy of God, and what was unworthy of him. In fine, he could not know other things, unless he knew himself: unless he knew his own Power, he could not know how he created things: unless he knew his own Wisdom, he could not know the beauty of his Works: unless he knew his own Glory, he could not know the end of his Works: unless he knew his own Holiness, he could not know what was evil: and unless he knew his own Justice, he could not know how to punish the Crimes of his offending creatures. And therefore,

1. God knows himself, because his Knowledge with his Will is the cause of all other things that can fall under his cognizance: he knows himself first, before he can know any other thing; that is, first according to our conceptions; for indeed God knows himself and all other things at once; He is the first Truth, and therefore is the first object of his own understanding. There is nothing more excellent than himself, and therefore nothing more known to him than himself. As he is all Knowledge, so he hath in himself the most excellent object of Knowledge. To understand is properly to know ones self. No object is so intelligible to God as God is to himself; nor so intimately and immediately joined with his Understanding as himself: for his Understanding is his Essence, himself.

2. He knows himself by his own Essence. He knows not himself and his own Power, by the effect, because he knows himself from Eternity, before there was a World, or any effect of his Power extant. 'It is not a knowledge by the Cause, for God hath no cause; nor a knowledge of himself by any species or anything from without: If it were anything from without himself, that must be created or uncreated; if uncreated, it would be God; and so we must either own many God's, or own it to be his Essence, and so not distinct from himself: If created, then his knowledge of himself would depend upon a creature; he could not then know himself from eternity, but in time, because nothing can be created from eternity, but in time. God knows not himself by any faculty, for there is no composition in God, he is not made up of parts, but is a simple being; some therefore have called God, not intellectus, understanding, because that savors of a faculty; but intellectio, intellection. God is all act in the knowledge of himself, and his knowledge of other things.

3. God therefore knows himself perfectly, comprehensively. Nothing in his own nature is concealed from him, he reflects upon everything that he is . There is a positive comprehension, so God doth not comprehend himself; for what is comprehended, hath bounds; and what is comprehended by itself, is finite to itself: and there is a negative comprehension, God so comprehends himself; nothing in his own nature is obscure to him, unknown by him. For there is as great a perfection in the understanding of God to know, as there is in the Divine nature to be known. The Understanding of God, and the Nature of God, are both infinite, and so equal to one another; his Understanding is equal to himself; he knows himself so well, that nothing can be known by him more perfectly, than himself is known to himself. He knows himself in the highest manner, because nothing is so proportioned to the Understanding of God as himself: He knows his own Essence, Goodness, Power, all his Perfections, Decrees, Intentions, Acts, the infinite capacity of his own Understanding, so that nothing of himself is in the dark to himself. And in this respect some use this expression, That the Infiniteness of God is in a manner finite to himself, because it is comprehended by himself.

Thus God transcends all Creatures; thus his Understanding is truly Infinite, because nothing but himself is an infinite Object for it: What Angels may understand of themselves perfectly, I know not; but no Creature in the World understands himself: Man understands not fully the excellency and parts of his own nature; upon God's knowledge of himself depends the Comfort of his People, and the Terror of the Wicked; this is also a clear Argument for his Knowledge of all other things, without himself; he that knows himself, must needs know all other things less than himself, and which were made by himself: When the knowledge of his own Immensity and Infiniteness is not an object too difficult for him; the knowledge of a finite and limited Creature in all his actions, thoughts, circumstances, cannot be too hard for him. Since he knows himself who is Infinite, he cannot but know whatsoever is Finite; this is the Foundation of all his other Knowledge; the knowledge of everything present, past, and to come, is far less than the knowledge of himself. He is more incomprehensible in his own nature, than all things Created, or that can be Created, put together can be: If he then have a perfect comprehensive knowledge of his own nature, any knowledge of all other things is less than the knowledge of himself; this ought to be well considered by us, as the Fountain whence all his other knowledge flows.

2. Therefore God knows all other things, whether they be possible, past, present, or future.

Whether they be things that he can do, but will never do; or Whether they be things that he hath done, but are not now; things that are now in Being, or things that are not now existing, that lie in the Womb of their proper and immediate Causes ; If his understanding be Infinite, he then knows all things whatsoever that can be known, else his Understanding would have bounds, and what hath limits is not infinite, but finite; if he be ignorant of any one thing that is knowable, that is a bound to him, it comes with an exceptions, a but, God knows all things but this, a bar is then set to his Knowledge. If there were anything, any particular circumstance in the whole Creation, or Non-Creation, and possible to be known by him, and yet were unknown to him, he could not be said to be Omniscient. As he would not be Almighty, if any one thing that implied not a repugnancy to his Nature, did transcend his Power.

1. First, all things possible. No Question but God knows what he could create, as well as what he hath created: what he would not Create, as well as what he resolved to Create; he knew what he would not do, before he willed to do it; this is the next thing which declares the Infiniteness of his Understanding: For as his Power is infinite, and can Create innumerable Worlds and Creatures; so is his Knowledge infinite, in knowing innumerable things possible to his Power. Possibles are infinite; that is, there is no end of what God can do, and therefore no end of what God doth know; otherwise his Power would be more Infinite than his Knowledge: If he knew only what is Created, there would be an end of his Understanding, because all Creatures may be numbered, but possible things cannot be reckoned up by any Creature: There is the same reason of this in Eternity; when never so many numbers of Years are run out, there is still more to come, there still wants an end; and when Millions of Worlds are Created, there is no more an end of God's Power, than of Eternity: Thus there is no end of his Understanding; that is, his Knowledge is not terminated by anything.

This the Scripture gives us some accompt of; God knows things that are not, for he calls things that are not, as if they were, Rom. 4.17. he calls things that are not, as if they were in Being; what he calls is not unknown to him: If he knows things that are not, he knows things that may never be; as he knows things that shall be, because he Wills them; so he knows things that might be, because he is able to effect them: He knew that the Inhabitants of Kelah would betray David to Saul, if he remained in that place, 1 Sam. 23.11. he knew what they would do upon that occasion, though' it was never done; as he knew what was in their Power and in their Wills, so he must needs know what is within the compass of his own Power: As he can permit more than he doth permit; so he knows what he can permit, and what upon that permission would be done by his Creatures; so God knew the possibility of the Tyrians Repentance, if they had had the same means, heard the same Truths, and beheld the same Miracles which were offered to the Ears, and presented to the Eyes of the Jews, Matth. 11.21.

This must needs be so, because

1. Man knows things that are possible to him, though' he will never effect them. A Carpenter knows a House in the model he hath of it in his head, though' he never build a House according to that model: A Watch-maker hath the frame of a Watch in his mind, which he will never work with his Instruments: Man knows what he could do, though' he never intends to do it . As the Understanding of man hath a virtue, that where it sees one man, it may imagine Thousands of men of the same shape, stature, form, parts; yea taller, more vigorous, spritely, intelligent than the man he sees; because it is possible such a number may be. Shall not the understanding of God much more know what he is able to effect, since the understanding of man can know what he is never able to produce, yet may be produced by God, viz. that he who produced this man which I see, can produce a Thousand exactly like him? If the Divine Understanding did not know infinite things, but were confined to a certain number; it may be demanded whether God can understand anything farther than that number, or whether he cannot? If he can, then he doth actually understand all those things which he hath a power to understand; otherwise there would be an increase of God's knowledge, if it were actually now, and not before, and so he would be more perfect than he was before; if he cannot understand them, then he cannot understand what a human mind can understand; for our understandings can multiply Numbers in infinitum; and there is no number so great, but a man can still add to it; We must suppose the Divine Understanding more excellent in Knowledge. God knows all that a man can imagine, though' it never were, nor never shall be; he must needs know whatsoever is in the Power of man to imagine or think, because God concurs to the support of the faculty in that Imagination; and though' it may be replied, an Atheist may imagine that there is no God; a man may imagine that God can Lie, or that he can be destroyed; doth God know therefore that he is not? or that he can Lie, or cease to be? No, he knows he cannot; his Knowledge extends to things possible, not to things impossible to himself; he knows it as imaginable by man, not as possible in itself; because 'tis utterly impossible, and repugnant to the nature of God, since he eminently contains in himself all things possible, past, present and to come; he cannot know himself without knowing them.

2. God knowing his own power, knows whatsoever is in his power to effect. If he knows not all things possible, he could not know the extent of his own power, and so would not know himself, as a cause sufficient for more things than he hath Created: How can he comprehend himself, who comprehends not all effluxes of things possible that may come from him and be wrought by him? How can he know himself as a cause, if he know not the Objects and Works which he is able to produce ? Since the power of God extends to numberless things, his Knowledge also extends to numberless objects; as if a Unite could see the numbers it could produce, it would see Infinite numbers; for a Unite is, as it were, all Number. God knowing the fruitfulness of his own Virtue, knows a numberless multitude of things which he can do, more than have been done, or shall be done by him; he therefore knows innumerable Worlds, innumerable Angels, with higher Perfections than any of them which he hath Created, have: So that if the World should last many Millions of Years, God knows that he can every day Create another World more capacious than this; and having Created an inconceivable number, he knows he could still Create more: So that he beholds infinite Worlds, infinite numbers of Men and other Creatures in himself, infinite kinds of things, infinite species and individuals under those kinds, even as many as he can Create, if his Will did order and determine it ; for not being ignorant of his own Power, he cannot be ignorant of the effects wherein it may display and discover itself. A comprehensive knowledge of his own Power doth necessarily include the objects of that power; so he knows whatsoever he could effect, and whatsoever he could permit, if he pleased to do it.

If God could not understand more than he hath created, he could not create more than he hath created: for it cannot be conceived how he can create any thing that he is ignorant of; what he doth not know, he cannot do: he must know also the extent of his own goodness, and how far anything is capable to partake of it: so much therefore as any detract from the Knowledge of God, they detract from his Power.

3. 'It is further evident that God knows all possible things, because he knew those things which he has created, before they were created, when they were yet in a possibility. If God knew things before they were created, he knew them when they were in a possibility, and not in actual reality. 'It is absurd to imagine that his Understanding did lacquy after the creatures, and draw knowledge from them after they were created. 'It is absurd to think that God did create, before he knew what he could or would create. If he knew those things he did create when they were possible, he must know all things which he can create, and therefore all things that are possible.

To conclude this, We must consider that this Knowledge is of another kind than his knowledge of things that are or shall be. He sees possible things as possible, not as things that ever are or shall be. If he saw them as existing or future, and they shall never be, this knowledge would be false, there would be a deceit in it, which cannot be. He knows those things not in themselves, because they are not, nor in their causes because they shall never be: he knows them in his own Power, not in his Will: He understands them as able to produce them, not as willing to effect them. Things possible he knows only in his Power, things future he knows both in his Power and his Will, as he is both able and determined in his own good pleasure to give being to them. Those that shall never come to pass, he knows only in himself, as a sufficient cause; those things that shall come into being, he knows in himself as the efficient cause, and also in their immediate second causes.

This should teach us to spend our thoughts in the admirations of the excellency of God, and the divine Knowledge; his Understanding is infinite.

2. God knows all things past. This is an argument used by God himself to elevate his Excellency above all the commonly adored Idols, Isa. 41.22. Let them show the former things, what they be, that we may consider them, and know the latter end of them. He knows them as if they were now present, and not past: for indeed in his Eternity there is nothing past or future to his knowledge. This is called remembrance in Scripture, as when God remembered Rachel's prayer for a child, Gen. 30.22. and he is said to put tears into his bottle, and write them in his Book of Accompts, which signifies the exact and unerring knowledge in God of the minute circumstances past in the World; and this knowledge is called a book of remembrance, Mal. 3.16. signifying the perpetual presence of things past, before him. There are two elegant expressions, signifying the certainty and perpetuity of God's knowledge of sins past, Job 14.17. My transgression is sealed up in a bag, and thou sowest up my iniquity. A Metaphor taken from men that put up in a bag the money they would charily keep, tie the bag, sow up the holes, and bind it hard that nothing may fall out; or a vessel wherein they reserve liquors, and daub it with pitch and glutinous stuff, that nothing may leak out, but be safely kept till the time of use. Or else, as some think, from the bags Attorneys carry with them, full of Writings, when they are to manage a Cause against a person. Thus we find God often in Scripture calling to men's minds their past actions, upbraiding them with their ingratitude, wherein he testifies his remembrance of his own past benefits, and their Crimes. His knowledge in this regard hath something of infinity in it, since though' the sins of all men that have been in the World are finite in regard of number, yet when the sins of one man in thoughts, words, and deeds, are numberless in his own account, and perhaps in the count of any creature, the sins of all the vast numbers of men that have been, or shall be, are much more numberless, it cannot be less than infinite knowledge that can make a collection of them, and take a survey of them all at once.

If past things had not been known by God, how could Moses have been acquainted with the Original of things? How could he have declared the former transactions, wherein all Histories are silent but the Scripture? How could he know the cause of man's present misery so many ages after, wherewith all. Philosophy was unacquainted? How could he have writ the order of the Creation, the particulars of the sin of Adam, the circumstances of Cain's murder, the private speech of Lamech to his Wives, if God had not revealed them? And how could a Revelation be made, if things past were forgotten by him? Do we not remember many things done among men, as well as by ourselves, and reserve the forms of divers things in our minds, which rise as occasions are presented to draw them forth? And shall not God much more, who hath no cloud of darkness upon his understanding? A man that makes a curious Picture, hath the form of it in his mind before he made it; and if the fire burn it, the form of it in his mind is not destroyed by the fire, but retained in it. God's memory is no less perfect than his understanding: If he did not know things past, he could not be a righteous Governor, or exercise any judicial act in a righteous manner; he could not dispense Rewards and Punishments according to his promises and threatenings, if things that were past could be forgotten by him; he could not require that which is past , if he did not remember that which is past.

And though' God be said to forget in Scripture, and not to know his People, and his People pray to him to remember them, as if he had forgotten them : This is improperly ascribed to God . As God is said to repent, when he changes things according to his Counsel beyond the expectation of men; so he is said to forget, when he defers the making good his Promise to the Godly, or his Threatenings to the Wicked; this is not a defect of Memory belonging to his mind, but an act of his Will: When he is said to remember his Covenant, 'tis to Will Grace according to his Covenant; when he is said to forget his Covenant, 'tis to intercept the influences of it, whereby to punish the Sin of his People; and when he is said not to know his People, 'tis not an absolute forgetfulness of them, but withdrawing from them the Testimonies of his Kindness, and clouding the Signs of his favor; so God in Pardon is said to forget Sin, not that he ceaseth to know it, but ceaseth to punish it: 'It is not to be meant of a simple forgetfulness, or a lapse of his Memory, but of a Judicial Forgetfulness; so when his People in Scripture Pray, Lord Remember thy Word unto thy Servant; no more is to be understood, but Lord fulfil thy Word and Promise to thy Servant.

3. He knows things Present. Heb. 4.13. All things are naked and opened unto the Eyes of him with whom we have to do; This is grounded upon the Knowledge of himself; 'tis not so difficult to know all Creatures exactly, as to know himself, because they are finite, but himself is infinite; he knows his own Power, and therefore everything through which his Omnipotence is diffused, all the acts and objects of it; not the least thing that is the Birth of his Power, can be concealed from him; he knows his own Goodness, and therefore every object upon which the warm beams of his Goodness strike; he therefore knows distinctly the properties of every Creature, because every Property in them is a Ray of his Goodness; he is not only the efficient, but the exemplary cause; therefore as he knows all that his Power hath wrought, as he is the efficient, so he knows them in himself as the pattern: As a Carpenter can give an account of every part and passage in a House he hath built, by consulting the Model in his own mind, whereby he built it. He looked upon all things after he had made them, and pronounced them good, Gen. 1.3. full of a natural goodness he had endowed them with; he did not ignorantly pronounce them so, and call them good, whether he knew them or not; and therefore he knows them in particular, as he knew them all in their first Presence. Is there any reason he should be ignorant of everything now present in the World, or that anything that derives an existence from him as a free cause, should be concealed from him? If he did not know things present in their particularities, many things would be known by man, yea by Beasts, which the infinite God were ignorant of; and if he did not know all things present, but only some; 'tis possible for the most Blessed God to be deceived and be miserable: Ignorance is a Calamity to the Understanding: He could not prescribe Laws to his Creatures, unless he knew their Natures, to which those Laws were to be suited; no, not natural Ordinances to the Sun, Moon, and Heavenly Bodies, and inanimate Creatures, unless he knew the vigor and virtue in them, to execute those Ordinances; for to prescribe Laws above the nature of things, is inconsistent with the Wisdom of Government; he must know how far they were able to obey; whether the Laws were suited to their ability: And for his rational Creatures, Whether the Punishments annexed to the Law, were proper, and suited to the Transgression of the Creature.

1. First, He knows all Creatures from the highest to the lowest, the least as well as the greatest. He knows the Ravens and their young ones ; the Drops of Rain and Dew which he hath begotten , every Bird in the Air, as well as any man doth what he hath in a Cage at home, Psal. 50.11. I know all the Fowls in the Mountains, and the wild Beasts in the Field; which some read creeping things. The Clouds are numbered in his Wisdom, Job 38.37. every Worm in the Earth, every drop of Rain that falls upon the ground, the flakes of Snow, and the knots of Hail, the Sands upon the Sea-shore, the Hairs upon the Head; 'tis no more absurd to imagine that God knows them, than that God made them; they are all the effects of his Power, as well as the Stars, which he calls by their Names, as well as the most glorious Angel and blessed Spirit; he knows them as well, as if there were none but them in particular for him to know; the least things were framed by his Art as well as the greatest; the least things partake of his goodness as well as the greatest; he knows his own Arts, and his own Goodness, and therefore all the Stamps and Impressions of them upon all his Creatures; he knows the immediate causes of the least, and therefore the effects of those causes. Since his knowledge is infinite, it must extend to those things which are at the greatest distance from him, to those which approach nearest to not Being; since he did not want Power to Create, he cannot want Understanding to know everything he hath Created, the dispositions, qualities, and virtues of the minutest Creature.

Nor is the Understanding of God embas'd, and suffers a diminution by the Knowledge of the vilest and most inconsiderable things: Is it not an imperfection to be ignorant of the nature of anything? and can God have such a defect in his most perfect Understanding? Is the Understanding of man of an impurer Alloy by knowing the nature of the rankest Poysons? by understanding a Fly? or a small Insect? or by considering the deformity of a Toad? Is it not generally counted a note of a Dignified mind, to be able to Discourse of the Nature of them? Was Solomon, who knew all from the Cedar to the Hyssop, debas'd by so Rich a Present of Wisdom from his Creator? Is any Glass defiled by presenting a Deformed Image? Is there anything more vile than the imaginations, which are only evil, and continually? doth not the mind of man descend to the mud of the Earth, play the Adulterer or Idolater with mean objects, suck in the most unclean things? yet God knows these in all their circumstances, in every appearance, inside and outside. Is there anything viler than some thoughts of men? than some actions of men? their unclean Beds and Gluttonous Vomiting, and Luciferian Pride? yet do not these fall under the Eye of God, in all their Nakedness? The Second Person 's taking Human Nature, though' it obscured, yet it did not disparage the Deity; or bring any disgrace to it: Is Gold the worse for being formed into the Image of a Fly? doth it not still retain the nobleness of the Metal? When men are despised for descending to the knowledge of mean and vile things, 'tis because they neglect the knowledge of the greater; and Sin in their enquiries after lesser things, with a neglect of that which concerns more the Honor of God and the Happiness of themselves; to be ambitious of such a Knowledge, and careless of that of more concern, is criminal and contemptible. But God knows the greatest as well as the least; mean things are not known by him to exclude the knowledge of the greater; nor are vile things governed by him to exclude the order of the better. The Deformity of Objects known by God doth not deform him, nor defile him; he doth not view them without himself, but within himself, wherein all things in their Ideas are Beautiful and Comely: Our knowledge of a Deformed thing, is not a Deforming of our Understanding, but is beautiful in the Knowledge, though' it be not in the object; nor is there any fear that the Understanding of God should become material by knowing material things, anymore than our Understandings lose their Spirituality by knowing the nature of Bodies; 'tis to be observed therefore that only those senses of men, as seeing, hearing, smelling, which have those qualities for their objects that come nearest the nature of spiritual things, as Light, Sounds, fragrant Odours, are ascribed to God in Scripture; not Touching or Tasting, which are senses that are not exercised without a more immediate commerce with gross matter; and the reason may be, because we should have no gross thoughts of God, as if he were a body, and made of matter, like the things he knows.

2. As he knows all Creatures, so God knows all the actions of Creatures. He counts in particular all the ways of men. Doth he not see all my ways, and count all my steps? Job 31.4. He tells their wanderings, as if one by one, Psal. 56.8. His eyes are upon all the ways of man, and he sees all his goings, Job. 34.21. a Metaphor taken from men, when they look wistly, with fixed Eyes upon a thing, to view it in every circumstance, whence it comes, whether it goes, to observe every little motion of it. God's Eye is not a wandering, but a fixed Eye; and the ways of man are not only before his eyes, but he doth exactly ponder them ; as one that will not be ignorant of the least Mite in them, but weigh and examine them by the Standard of his Law; he may as well know the motions of our Members, as the Hairs of our Heads; the smallest actions before they be, whether Civil, Natural or Religious, fall under his Cognizance; what meaner than a man carrying a Pitcher, yet our Savior foretells it, Luke 22.10. God knows not only what men do, but what they would have done, had he not restrained them; what Abimelech would have done to Sarah, had not God put a Bar in his way, Gen. 20.6. What a man that is taken away in his Youth, would have done, had he lived to a riper Age; yea he knows the most secret words as well as actions; the words spoken by the King of Israel in his Bed-Chamber, were revealed to Elisha, 2 Kings 6.12. and indeed how can any action of man be concealed from God? Can we view the various actions of a heap of Ants or a Hive of Bees in a glass, without turning our Eyes; and shall not God behold the actions of all men in the World, which are less than Bees or Ants in his Sight, and more visible to him than an Ant-Hill or Be-Hive can be to the acutest eye of man?

3. As God knows all the actions of Creatures, so he knows all the Thoughts of Creatures. The thoughts are the most closetted acts of man, hid from men and Angels, unless disclos'd by some outward Expressions; but God descends into the depths and abysses of the Soul, discerns the most inward contrivances; nothing is impenetrable to him; the Sun doth not so much enlighten the Earth, as God understands the Heart; all thoughts are as visible to him, as Flies and Motes enclosed in a body of transparent Crystal; this man naturally allows to God. Men often speak to God by the motions of their minds and secret Ejaculations; which they would not do, if it were not naturally implanted in them, that God knows all their inward motions; the Scripture is plain and positive in this, He tries the Heart and the Reins, Psal. 7.9. as men by the use of Fire discern the drossy and purer parts of Metals: The secret intentions and aims, the most lurking affections seated in the Reins; he knows that which no man, no Angel is able to know, which a man himself knows not, nor makes any particular reflection upon; yea he weighs the Spirit, Prov. 16.2. he exactly numbers all the devices and inclinations of men, as men do every piece of Coyn they tell out of a heap. He discerns the Thoughts and intents of the heart, Heb. 4.12. all that is in the mind, all that is in the affections, every stirring and purpose; so that not one thought can be withheld from him, Job. 42.2. yea Hell and Destruction are before him, much more then the Hearts of the Children of men? Prov. 15.11. he works all things in the Bowels of the Earth, and brings forth all things out of that Treasure, say some: but more naturally, God knows the whole state of the dead, all the receptacles and Graves of their bodies, all the bodies of men consumed by the Earth, or devoured by living Creatures; things that seem to be out of all Being; he knows the Thoughts of the Devils and Damned Creatures, whom he hath cast out of his care forever, into the arms of his Justice, never more to cast a delightful glance towards them; not a secret in any Soul in Hell, (which he hath no need to know, because he shall not judge them by any of the Thoughts they now have, since they were condemned to punishment) is hid from him; much more is he acquainted with the Thoughts of living men, the counsels of whose hearts are yet to be manifested, in order to their Trial and Censure; yea, he knows them before they spring up into actual being, Psal. 139.2. thou understandest my Thoughts afar off; my Thoughts, that is, every Thought; though' innumerable Thoughts pass through me in a day, and that in the Sourse and Fountain, when it is yet in the Womb, before it is our Thought; if he knows them before their Existence, before they can be properly called ours; much more doth he know them when they actually spring up in us; he knows the tendency of them, where the Bird will light when it is in flight; he knows them exactly, he is therefore called a discerner or criticizer of the Heart, Heb. 4.12. As a Critick discerns every Letter, Point, and Stop; he is more intimate with us than our Souls with our Bodies, and hath more the Possession of us than we have of ourselves; he knows them by an inspection into the heart, not by the Mediation of second causes, by the looks or gestures of men, as men may discern the Thoughts of one another.

1. God discerns all good motions of the Mind and Will. These he puts into men, and needs must God know his own act; he knew the Son of Jeroboam to have some good thing in him towards the Lord God of Israel, 1 Kings 14.13. and the integrity of David and Hezekiah; the freest motions of the Will and Affections to him. Lord, thou knowest that I love thee saith Peter, John 21.17. Love can be no more restrained, than the Will itself can. A man may make another to grieve and desire, but none can force another to Love.

2. God discerns all the evil motions of the Mind and Will. Every imagination of the Heart, Gen. 6.5. the vanity of men's thoughts, Psal. 94.11. their inward darkness and deceitful disguises: No wonder that God who fashioned the heart, should understand the motions of it, Psal. 33.13, 15. He looks from Heaven and beholds all the Children of men: he fashioneth their hearts alike, and considers all their Works. Doth any man make a Watch, and yet be ignorant of its motion? Did God fling away the Key to this secret Cabinet, when he framed it, and put off the power of unlocking it when he pleased? He did not surely frame it in such a posture as that anything in it should be hid from his Eye; he did not fashion it to be Priviledged from his Government; which would follow, if he were ignorant of what was Minted and Coined in it.

He could not be a Judge to punish men, if the inward frames and Principles of men's actions were concealed from him; an outward action may glitter to an outward eye, yet the secret spring be a desire of applause, and not the Fear and Love of God. If the inward frames of the heart did lie covered from him in the secret recesses of the heart; those plausible acts, which in regard of their Principles, would merit a Punishment, would meet with a Reward; and God should bestow Happiness where he had denounced Misery. As without the knowledge of what is just, he could not be a Wise Law-giver; so without the knowledge of what is inwardly committed, he could not be a Righteous Judge; acts that are rotten in the spring, might be judged good by the fair color and appearance.

This is the glory of God at the last day, to manifest the secrets of all hearts, 1 Cor. 4.5. and the Prophet Jeremiah links the power of Judging, and the Prerogative of trying the Hearts together, Jer. 11.20. but thou, O Lord of Hosts, that Judgest Righteously, that tryest the Reins and the Heart: and Jer. 17.10. I the Lord search the Heart, I try the Reins; to what end? even to give every man according to his way, and according to the fruit of his doings. And indeed his binding up the whole Law with that command of not coveting, evidenceth that he will Judge men by the inward affections and frames of their hearts. Again, God sustains the mind of man in every act of thinking; In him we have not only the Principle of Life, but every motion, the motion of our minds as well as of our members: In him we live and move, &c. Acts 17.28. Since he supports the vigor of the faculty in every act, can he be ignorant of those acts which spring from the faculty, to which he doth at that instant communicate power and ability?

Now this knowledge of the Thoughts of men is,

1. An incommunicable Property, belonging only to the Divine Understanding. Creatures indeed may know the thoughts of others by Divine Revelation, but not by themselves; no Creature hath a Key immediately to open the minds of men, and see all that lodgeth there; no Creature can Fathom the heart by the Line of Created Knowledge . Devils may have a conjectural Knowledge, and may guess at them, by the acquaintance they have with the Disposition and Constitution of men, and the Images they behold in their Fancies; and by some marks which an inward imagination may stamp upon the Brain, Blood, Animal Spirits, Face, &c. But the knowing the Thougnts merely as Thought, without any Impression by it, is a Royalty God appropriates to himself, as the main secret of his Government, and a Perfection declarative of his Deity, as much as any else, Jer. 17.9, 10. the heart of man is desperately wicked, who can know it? yes, there is one, and but one, I the Lord search the Heart, I try the Reins. Man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks upon the Heart, 1 Sam. 16.7. where God is distinguished by this Perfection from all men whatsoever; others may know by Revelation, as Elisha did, what was in Gehazi 's heart, 2 Kings 5.26. But God knows a man more than any man knows himself; What person upon earth understands the windings and turnings of his own heart, what reserves it will have, what contrivances, what inclinations? all which God knows exactly.

2. God acquires no new Knowledge of the thoughts and heart, by the Discovery of them in the actions. He would then be but equal in this part of Knowledge to his Creature; no man or Angel but may thus arrive to the Knowledge of them; God were then excluded from an absolute Dominion over the prime work of his lower Creation; he would have made a Creature superior in this respect to himself, upon whose Will to discover, his knowledge of their inward intentions should depend; and therefore when God is said to search the heart, we must not understand it as if God were ignorant before, and was fain to make an exact scrutiny and enquiry, before he attained what he desired to know; but God condescends to our capacity in the expression of his own Knowledge, signifying that his Knowledge is as complete as any man's Knowledge can be, of the designs of others, after he hath sifted them by a strict and through examination, and wrung out a discovery of their intentions; that he knows them as perfectly as if he had put them upon the rack, and forced them to make a discovery of their secret Plottings. Nor must we understand that in Gen. 22.12. where God saith, after Abraham had stretched out his hand to Sacrifice his Son, Now I know that thou fearest God, as though God was ignorant of Abraham's gracious disposition to him; did Abraham's drawing his Knife, furnish God with a new Knowledge? no, God knew Abraham's pious inclinations before, Gen. 18.19. I know him that he will command his Children after him, &c. Knowledge is sometimes taken for approbation; then the sense will be, now I approve this Fact as a Testimony of thy fear of me; since thy affection to thy Isaac is extinguished by the more powerful flame of affection to my Will and Command; I now accept thee, and count thee a meet subject of my choicest Benefits; or now I know, that is, I have made known and manifested the Faith of Abraham to himself and to the World. Thus Paul uses the word know, 1 Cor. 2.2. I have determined to know nothing; that is to declare and teach nothing, to make known nothing but Christ Crucified; or else, now I know, that is, I have an evidence and experiment in this noble fact, that thou fearest me. God often condescends to our capacity in speaking of himself after the manner of men, as if he had (as men do) known the inward affections of others by their outward actions.

4. God knows all the Evils and Sins of Creatures.

1. God knows all Sin. This follows upon the other. If he knows all the actions and thoughts of Creatures, he knows also all the Sinfulness in those acts and thoughts: This Zophar infers from God's punishing men, Job 11.11. for he knows vain man, he sees his wickedness also; he knows every man, and sees the wickedness of every man: He looks down from Heaven, and beholds not only the filthy persons, but what is filthy in them , all Nations in the World, and every man of every Nation, none of their iniquity is hid from his eyes; He searches Jerusalem with Candles, Jer. 16.17. God follows Sinners step by step, with his eye; and will not leave searching out till he hath taken them; a Metaphor taken from one that searches all Chinks with a Candle, that nothing can be hid from him. He knows it distinctly in all the parts of it, how an Adulterer rises out of his Bed to commit Uncleanness, what contrivances he had, what steps he took, every circumstance in the whole progress; not only evil in the bulk, but everyone of the blacker spots upon it, which may most aggravate it. If he did not know Evil, how could he permit it, order it, punish it or pardon it? Doth he permit he knows not what? Order to his own holy ends what he is ignorant of? Punish or pardon that which he is uncertain whether it be a Crime or no? Cleanse me, saith David, from my secret faults, Ps. 19.12. secret in regard of others, secret in regard of himself; how could God cleanse him from that whereof he was ignorant? He knows Sins before they are committed, much more when they are in act; he foreknew the Idolatry and Apostasy of the Jews; what God's they would serve, in what measure they would provoke him, and violate his Covenant ; he knew Judas his Sin long before Judas his actual existence, foretelling it in the Psalms; and Christ predicts it before he acted it. He sees Sins future in his own permitting Will; he sees Sins present in his own supporting act. As he knows things possible to himself, because he knows his own power; so he knows things practicable by the Creature, because he knows the Power and Principles of the Creature . This Sentiment of God is naturally writ in the fears of Sinners, upon Lightning, Thunder, or some Prodigious operation of God in the World; what is the Language of them, but that he sees their Deeds, hears their words, knows the inward sinfulness of their hearts; that he doth not only behold them as a mere Spectator, but considers them as a just Judge. And the Poets say, that the Sins of men leapt into Heaven and were writ in Parchments of Jupiter , scelus in terram geritur, in coelo scribitur: sin is acted on Earth, and recorded in Heaven. God indeed doth not behold Evil with the approving eye; he knows it not with a practical knowledge to be the Author of it, but with a speculative Knowledge, so as to understand the sinfulness of it; or a knowledge simplicis intelligentiae, of simple intelligence, as he permits them, not positively wills them; he knows them not with a knowledge of assent to them, but dissent from them. Evil pertains to a dissenting act of the mind, and an aversive act of the Will; and what though' evil formally taken, hath no distinct Conception, because it is a privation; a Defect hath no Being, and all knowledge is by the apprehension of some Being; would not this lie as strongly against our own knowledge of Sin? Sin is a privation of the rectitude due to an act; and who doubts man's knowledge of Sin? by his knowing the act, he knows the deficiency of the act; the subject of evil hath a Being, and so hath a conception in the mind; that which hath no Being cannot be known by itself, or in itself; but will it follow that it cannot be known by its contrary? as we know darkness to be a privation of light, and folly to be a privation of wisdom. God knows all good by himself, because he is the Sovereign good; Is it strange then, that he should know all evil, since all evil is in some natural good?

2. The manner of God's knowing Evil, is not so easily known. And indeed, as we cannot comprehend the Essence of God, though' it is easily intelligible that there is such a Being; so we can as little comprehend the manner of God's Knowledge, though' we cannot but conclude him to be an intelligent Being, a pure Understanding, knowing all things: As God hath a higher manner of Being than his Creatures, so he hath another and higher manner of knowing; and we can as little comprehend the manner of his knowing, as we can the manner of his Being. But as to the manner,

Doth not God know his own Law, and shall he not know how much any action comes short of his Rule? he cannot know his own Rule without knowing all the deviations from it. He knows his own Holiness, and shall he not see how any action is contrary to the Holiness of his own nature? Doth not God know everything that is true? and is it not true that this or that is evil? and shall God be ignorant of any Truth? How doth God know that he cannot lie, but by knowing his own Veracity? How doth God know that he cannot Dye, but by knowing his own Immutability? and by knowing those, he knows what a Lye is, he knows what Death is; so if Sin never had been, if no Creature had ever been, God would have known what Sin was, because he knows his own Holiness; because he knew what Law was fit to be appointed to his Creatures if he should Create them, and that that Law might be transgressed by them. God knows all good, all goodness in himself; he therefore hath a foundation in himself to know all that comes short of that goodness, that is opposite to that Holiness: As if Light were capable of Understanding, it would know Darkness only by knowing itself; by knowing itself, it would know what is contrary to itself. God knows all Created goodness which he hath planted in the Creature; he knows then all defects from this goodness, what Perfection an act is deprived of; what is opposite to that goodness, and that is evil. As we know Sickness by Health, Discord by Harmony, Blindness by Sight, because it is a privation of Sight; whosoever knows one contrary knows the other; God knows unrighteousness by the Idea which he hath of Righteousness, and sees an act deprived of that rectitude and goodness which ought to be in it; he knows evil because he knows the causes whence evil proceeds . A Painter knows a Picture of his own framing, and if any one dashes any base color upon it, shall not he also know that? God by his hand Painted all Creatures, imprest upon man the fair stamp and color of his own Image; the Devil defiles it, man daubs it; Doth not God that knows his own Work, know how this Piece is become different from his Work? Doth not God that knows his Creatures goodness, which himself was the Fountain of, know the change of this goodness? Yea, he knew before, that the Devil would sow Tares where he had sown Wheat; and therefore that Controversy of some in the Schools, Whether God knew evil by its opposition to Created or Uncreated goodness, is needless. We may say God knows Sin as it is opposite to Created goodness, yet he knows it radically by his own goodness, because he knows the goodness he hath communicated to the Creature by his own Essential goodness in himself. To conclude this head:

The knowledge of Sin doth not bespot the Holiness of God's nature; for the bare knowledge of a Crime doth not infect the mind of man with the Filth and Pollution of that Crime; for then every man that knows an act of Murder committed by another, would by that bare knowledge be tainted with his Sin; yea and a Judge that condemns a Malefactor, may as well Condemn himself if this were so: The Knowledge of Sins infects not the understanding that knows them, but only the Will that approves them. 'It is no discredit to us to know evil, in order to pass a right Judgment upon it; so neither can it be to God.

4. God knows all future things, all things to come. The differences of time cannot hinder a knowledge of all things by him, who is before time, above time, that is not measured by hours, or days, or years; If God did not know them, the hindrance must be in himself, or in the things themselves, because they are things to come: Not in himself; If it did, it must arise from some impotency in his own nature, and so we render him weak; or from an unwillingness to know, and so we render him lazy, and an Enemy to his own Perfection; for simply considered, the knowledge of more things is a greater Perfection than the knowledge of a few; and if the knowledge of a thing includes something of Perfection, the ignorance of a thing includes something of Imperfection: The knowledge of future things is a greater Perfection than not to know them, and is accounted among men a great part of Wisdom, which they call fore-sight; 'tis then surely a greater Perfection in God to know •• ure things than to be ignorant of them. And would God rather have something of imperfection than be possessor of all Perfection? Nor doth the hindrance lie in the things themselves, because their futurition depends upon his Will; for as nothing can actually be without his Will, giving it existence; so nothing can be future without his Will, designing the futurity of it. Certainly if God knows all things possible, which he will not do, he must know all things future, which he is not only able, but resolved to do, or resolved to permit. God's perfect knowledge of himself, that is, of his own infinite Power and concluding Will, necessarily includes a foreknowledge of what he is able to do, and what he will do.

Again, If God doth not know future things, there was a time when God was ignorant of most things in the World; for before the Deluge he was more ignorant than after; the more things were done in the World, the more Knowledge did accrue to God, and so the more Perfection; then the Understanding of God was not perfect from Eternity, but in Time; nay, is not perfect yet, if he be ignorant of those things which are still to come to pass; he must tarry for a Perfection, he wants till those futurities come to be in act, till those things which are to come, cease to be future, and begin to be present. Either God knows them or desires to know them; if he desires to know them and doth not, there is something wanting to him; all desire speaks an absence of the object desired, and a sentiment of want in the person desiring: If he doth not desire to know them, nay, if he doth not actually know them, it destroys all Providence, all his Government of Affairs; for his Providence hath a concatenation of means with a prospect of something that is future: As in Joseph 's Case, who was put into the Pit, and sold to the Egyptians in order to his future advancement, and the Preservation both of his Father and his envious Brethren. If God did not know all the future inclinations and actions of men, something might have been done by the Will of Potiphar, or by the Free-will of Pharaoh, whereby Joseph might have been cut short of his advancement, and so God have been interrupted in the track and method of his designed Providences. He that hath decreed to govern man for that end he hath designed him, knows all the means before, whereby he will govern him; and therefore hath a distinct and certain knowledge of all things; for a confused knowledge is an imperfection in Government; 'tis in this the infiniteness of his Understanding is more seen than in knowing things past or present; his eyes are a flame of fire, Revel. 1.14. in regard of the penetrating virtue of them into things impenetrable by any else.

To make it further appear, that God knows all things future, consider,

1. First, Every thing which is the object of God's Knowledge without himself, was once only future. There was a moment when nothing was in Being but himself; he knew nothing actually past, because nothing was past; nothing actually present, because nothing had any existence but himself; therefore only what was future; and why not everything that is future now, as well as only what was future and to come to pass just at the beginning of the Creation? God indeed knows everything as present, but the things themselves known by him were not present but future; the whole Creation was once future, or else it was from Eternity; if it begun in time, it was once future in itself, else it could never have begun to be; Did not God know what would be Created by him, before it was Created by him ? Did he create he knew not what, and knew not before, what he should Create? Was he ignorant before he acted, and in his acting, what his operation would tend to? or did he not know the nature of things, and the ends of them, till he had produced them, and saw them in Being? Creatures then did not arise from his Knowledge, but his Knowledge from them; he did not then Will that his Creatures should be, for he had then willed what he knew not, and knew not what he willed; they therefore must be known before they were made, and not known because they were made; he knew them to make them, and he did not make them to know them. By the same reason that he knew what Creatures should be before they were, he knows still what Creatures shall be before they are ; for all things that are, were in God, not really in their own nature, but in him as a cause; so the Earth and Heavens were in him, as a Model is in the mind of a Work man, which is in his Mind and Soul, before it be brought forth into outward act.

2. The Predictions of future things evidence this. There is not a Prophecy of anything to come, but is a spark of his fore-knowledge, and bears Witness to the Truth of this assertion, in the punctual accomplishment of it; this is a thing challenged by God as his own peculiar, wherein he surmounts all the Idols that man's inventions have Godded in the World, Isa. 41.21, 22. Let them bring forth (speaking of the Idols,) and show us what shall happen, or declare us things to come: show the things that are to come hereafter, that we may know that you are God's. Such a fore-knowledge of things to come, is here ascribed to God by God himself, as a distinction of him from all false God's; such a Knowledge, that if any could prove that they were possessors of, he would acknowledge them God's as well as himself; that we may know that you are God's; He puts his Deity to stand or fall upon this account, and this should be the point which should decide the controversy, whether he or the Heathen Idols were the true God; the dispute is managed by this medium. He that knows things to come, is God; I know things to come, ergo, I am God; the Idols know not things to come, therefore they are not God's; God submits the Being of his Deity to this Trial. If God know things to come no more than the Heathen Idols, which were either Devils or men, he would be in his own account, no more a God than Devils or men; no more a God than the Pagan Idols he doth scoff at for this defect. If the Heathen Idols were to be stripped of their Deity for want of this foreknowledge of things to come, would not the true God also fall from the same excellency, if he were defective in Knowledge? he would in his own judgment no more deserve the Title and Character of a God than they. How could he reproach them for that, if it were wanting in himself? It cannot be understood of future things in their causes, when the effects necessarily arise from such causes, as Light from the Sun, and Heat from the Fire; many of these, men know; more of them, Angels and Devils know; if God therefore had not a higher and farther Knowledge than this, he would not by this be proved to be God, anymore than Angels and Devils, who know necessary effects in their causes. The Devils indeed did predict some things in the Heathen Oracles; but God is differenced from them here by the infiniteness of his Knowledge, in being able to predict things to come that they knew not, or things in their particularities, things that depended on the liberty of man's Will, which the Devils could lay no claim to a certain knowledge of. Were it only a conjectural knowledge that is here meant, the Devils might answer, they can conjecture, and so their Deity were as good as God's; for though' God might know more things, and conjecture nearer to what would be, yet still it would be but conjectural, and therefore not a higher kind of Knowledge than what the Devils might challenge. How much then is God beholden to the Socinians for denying the knowledge of all future things to him, upon which here he puts the trial of his Deity? God asserts his knowledge of things to come, as a manifest evidence of his Godhead; those that deny therefore the Argument that proves it, deny the conclusion too; for this will necessarily follow, that if he be God because he knows future things, then he that doth not know future things is not God; and if God knows not future things but only by conjecture, then there is no God; because a certain knowledge so as infallibly to predict things to come, is an inseparable Perfection of the Deity: It was therefore well said of Austin, that it was as high a madness to deny God to be, as to deny him the foreknowledge of things to come.

The whole Prophetick part of Scripture declares this Perfection of God; every Prophets Candle was lighted at this Torch, they could not have this foreknowledge of themselves; Why might not many other men have the same insight, if it were by nature? it must be from some superior Agent; and all Nations owned Prophecy as a Beam from God, a fruit of Divine Illumination: Prophecy must be totally expunged if this be denied; for the subjects of Prophecy are things future; and no man is properly a Prophet, but in Prediction; now Prediction is nothing but foretelling, and things foretold are not yet come; and the foretelling of them, supposeth them not to be yet, but that they shall be in time; several such Predictions we have in Scripture, the event whereof hath been certain. The years of Famine in Egypt foretold that he would order second causes for bringing that Judgment upon them; the Captivity of his People in Babylon, the calling of the Gentiles, the rejection of the Jews. Daniel's Revelation of Nebuchadnezzar's Dream; that Prince refers to God as the revealer of Secrets, Dan. 2.47. By the same reason that he knows one thing future by himself, and by the infiniteness of his Knowledge before any causes of them appear, he doth know all things future.

3. Some future things are known by men; and we must allow God a greater Knowledge than any Creature. Future things in their Causes may be known by Angels and men, (as I said before); whosoever knows necessary causes, and the efficacy of them, may foretell the effects; and when he sees the meeting and concurrence of several causes together, he may presage what the consequent effect will be of such a concurrence: So Physicians foretell the Progress of a Disease, the increase or diminution of it by natural Signs; and Astronomers foretell Eclipses by their observation of the motion of Heavenly Bodies, many years before they happen , can they be hid from God, with whom are the reasons of all things ? an expert Gardener by knowing the Root in the depth of Winter, can tell what Flowers and what Fruit it will bear, and the Month when they will peep out their heads; and shall not God much more that knows the Principles of all his Creatures, and is exactly privy to all their natures and qualities, know what they will be, and what operations shall be from those Principles? Now if God did know things only in their causes, his Knowledge would not be more excellent than the knowledge of Angels and men, though' he might know more than they of the things that will come to pass, from every cause singly, and from the concurrence of many. Now as God is more excellent in Being than his Creature; so he is more excellent in the objects of his Knowledge and the manner of his Knowledge; well then, shall a certain knowledge of something future, and a conjectural knowledge of many things, be found among men; and shall a determinate and infallible knowledge of things to come, be found nowhere, in no Being? If the conjecture of future things savors of ignorance, and God knows them only by conjecture, there is then no such thing in Being as a perfect intelligent Being, and so no God.

4. God knows his own Decree and Will, and therefore must needs know all future things. If anything be future, or to come to pass, it must be from itself or from God; not from itself, then it would be independent and absolute; if it hath its futurity from God, then God must know what he hath decreed to come to pass; those things that are future in necessary causes, God must know, because he willed them to be causes of such effects; he therefore knows them, because he knows what he willed: The knowledge of God cannot arise from the things themselves, for then the knowledge of God would have a cause without him; and Knowledge, which is an eminent Perfection, would be conferred upon him by his Creatures. But as God sees things possible in the glass of his own power, so he sees things future in the Glass of his own Will; in his effecting Will, if he hath Decreed to produce them; in his permitting Will, as he hath Decreed to suffer them and dispose of them: Nothing can pass out of the rank of things merely possible into the order of things future, before some Act of God's Will hath passed for its futurition .

'It is not from the infiniteness of his own Nature simply considered, that God knows things to be future; for as things are not future because God is infinite (for then all possible things should be future) so neither is anything known to be future only because God is infinite, but because God hath Decreed it; his declaration of things to come, is founded upon his appointment of things to come . In Isa. 44.7. it is said, and who, as I, shall call and declare it, since I appointed the ancient people and the things that are coming ? Nothing is Created or ordered in the World, but what God Decreed to be Created and ordered. God knows his own Decree, and therefore all things which he hath Decreed to exist in time; not the minutest part of the World could have existed without his Will, not an action can be done without his Will; as Life the Principle, so Motion the fruit of that Life, is by and from God; as he decreed Life to this or that thing, so he decreed motion as the effect of Life, and Decreed to exert his Power in concurring with them, for producing effects natural from such causes; for without such a concourse they could not have acted anything, or produced anything; and therefore as for natural things, which we call necessary causes, God foreseeing them all particularly in his own Decree, foresaw also all effects which must necessarily flow from them, because such causes cannot but act when they are furnished with all things necessary for action: He knows his own Decrees, and therefore necessarily knows what he hath Decreed, or else we must say things come to pass whether God will or no; or, that he Wills he knows not what; but this cannot be, for known unto God are all his Works from the beginning of the World, Acts 15.18. Now this necessarily flows from that Principle first laid down, That God knows himself, since nothing is future without God's Will; if God did not know future things, he would not know his own Will; for as things possible could not be known by him, unless he knew the fullness of his own Power; so things future could not be known by his Understanding, unless he knew the resolves of his own Will.

Thus the Knowledge of God differs from the Knowledge of men; God's knowledge of his Works precedes his Works, man's knowledge of God's works follows his works; just as an Artificers knowledge of a Watch, Instrument or Engine, which he would make, is before his making of it; he knows the motions of it, and the reason of those motions before it is made, because he knows what he hath determined to Work; he knows not those motions from the consideration of them after they were made, as the Spectator doth, who by viewing the Instrument after it is made, gains a knowledge from the sight and consideration of it, till he understands the reason of the whole; so we know things from the consideration of them after we see them in being, and therefore we know not future things: But God's Knowledge doth not arise from things because they are, but because he Wills them to be, and therefore he knows everything that shall be, because it cannot be without his Will, as the Creator and maintainer of all things; knowing his own substance he knows all his Works.

5. If God did not know all future things, he would be mutable in his Knowledge.

If he did not know all things that ever were or are to be, there would be upon the appearance of every new object, an addition of Light to his Understanding, and therefore such a Change in him, as every new knowledge causes in the mind of a man, or as the Sun works in the World upon its rising every morning, scattering the darkness that was upon the face of the Earth; if he did not know them before they came, he would gain a knowledge by them when they came to pass, which he had not before they were effected; his Knowledge would be new according to the newness of the objects, and multiplied according to the multitude of the objects. If God did not know things to come as perfectly as he knew things present and past, but knew those certainly, and the others doubtfully and conjecturally, he would suffer some Change, and acquire some Perfection in his Knowledge, when those future things should cease to be future, and become present; for he would know it more perfectly when it were present, than he did when it was future, and so there would be a Change from Imperfection to a Perfection; But God is every way immutable.

Besides that Perfection would not arise from the Nature of God, but from the Existence and Presence of the thing; but who will affirm that God acquires any Perfection of Knowledge from his Creatures, anymore than he doth of Being? he would not then have had that Knowledge, and consequently that Perfection from Eternity, as he had when he Created the World, and will not have a full Perfection of the Knowledge of his Creature till the end of the World, nor of Immortal Souls, which will certainly act as well as live to Eternity; and so God never was, nor ever will be perfect in Knowledge; for when you have conceived millions of years, wherein Angels and Souls live and act, there is still more coming than you can conceive, wherein they will act. And if God be always changing to Eternity, from Ignorance to Knowledge, as those acts come to be exerted by his Creatures, he will not be perfect in Knowledge, no not to Eternity, but will always be changing from one degree of Knowledge to another; a very unworthy Conceit to entertain of the most Blessed, Perfect and Infinite God!

Hence then it follows that,

1. God foreknows all his Creatures. All kinds which he determined to make, all particulars that should spring out of every species, the time when they should come forth of the Womb, the manner how, In thy Book all my Members were written, Psal. 139.16. Members is not in the Heb. whence some refer all, to all living Creatures whatsoever, and all the parts of them which God did foresee; he knew the numbers of Creatures with all their parts, they were written in the Book of his fore-knowledge; the duration of them, how long they shall remain in Being, and act upon the Stage; he knows their strength, the links of one cause with another, and what will follow in all their Circumstances, and the series and combination of effects with their causes.

The duration of everything is foreknown, because determined, Job 14.5. seeing his days are determined, the number of his months are with thee, thou hast appointed his bounds that he cannot pass; bounds are fixed, beyond which none shall reach; he speaks of days and months, not of years, to give us notice of God's particular foreknowledge of everything, of every day, month, year, hour of a man's life.

2. All the acts of his Creatures are foreknown by him. All natural acts because he knows their causes; voluntary acts I shall speak of afterwards.

3. This foreknowledge was certain. For it is an unworthy notion of God to ascribe to him a conjectural Knowledge; if there were only a conjectural knowledge, he could but conjecturally foretell anything; and then it is possible the events of things might be contrary to his Predictions. It would appear then that God were deceived and mistaken, and then there could be no rule of trying things whether they were from God or no; for the Rule God sets down to discern his Words from the Words of false Prophets, is the event and certain accomplishment of what is Predicted. Deut. 18.21. to that question, How shall we know whether God hath spoken or no? he answers, That if the thing doth not come to pass, the Lord hath not spoken. If his Knowledge of future things were not certain, there were no stability in this Rule, it would fall to the ground: We never yet find God deceived in any Prediction, but the event did answer his fore-Revelation; his foreknowledge therefore is certain and infallible. We cannot make God uncertain in his Knowledge, but we must conceive him fluctuating and wavering in his Will; but if his Will be not Yea and Nay, but Yea, his Knowledge is certain, because he doth certainly Will and Resolve.

4. This foreknowledge was from Eternity. Seeing he knows things possible in his Power, and things future in his Will; if his Power and Resolves were from Eternity, his Knowledge must be so too; or else we must make him ignorant of his own Power, and ignorant of his own Will from Eternity; and consequently not from Eternity Blessed and Perfect. His knowledge of possible things must run Parallel with his Power, and his Knowledge of future things run Parallel with his Will. If he Willed from Eternity, he knew from Eternity what he Willed; but that he did Will from Eternity, we must grant, unless we would render him changeable, and conceive him to be made in time of not Willing, Willing. The Knowledge God hath in time, was always one and the same, because his Understanding is his proper Essence, as perfect as his Essence, and of an immutable nature.

And indeed the actual existence of a thing is not simply necessary to its being perfectly known; we may see a thing that is past out of Being, when it doth not actually exist; and a Carpenter may know the House he is to Build, before it be built, by the model of it in his own mind; much more we may conceive the same of God whose Decrees were before the Found • tion of the World ; and to be before time was, and to be from Eternity, hath no difference. As God in his Being exceeds all beginning of time, so doth his Knowledge all motions of time.

5. God foreknows all things as present with him from Eternity. As he knows mutable things with an immutable and firm Knowledge, so he knows future things with a present Knowledge; not that the things which are produced in time, were actually and really present with him in their own Beings from Eternity; for then they could not be produced in time; had they a real existence, then they would not be Creatures, but God; and had they actual Being, then they could not be future, for future speaks a thing to come that is not yet: If things had been actually present with him, and yet future, they had been made before they were made, and had a Being before they had a Being; but they were all present to his Knowledge as if they were in actual Being, because the reason of all things that were to be made, was present with him.

The reason of the Will of God that they shall be, was equally Eternal with him, wherein he saw what, and when, and how he would Create things, how he would govern them, to what ends he would direct them. Thus all things are present to God's Knowledge, though' in their own nature they may be past or future, not in esse reali, but in esse intelligibili, objectively; not actually present ; for as the unchangeableness and infiniteness of God's Knowledge of changeable and finite things, doth not make the things he knows immutable and infinite, so neither doth the Eternity of his Knowledge, make them actually present with him from Eternity; but all things are present to his Understanding, because he hath at once a view of all successions of times; and his knowledge of future things is as perfect as of present things, or what is past; 'tis not a certain knowledge of present things, and an uncertain knowledge of future; but his knowledge of one is as certain and unerring as his knowledge of the other; as a man that beholds a Circle with several lines from the Center, beholds the lines as they are joined in the Center, beholds them also as they are distant and severed from one another, beholds them in their extent and in their point all at once, though' they may have a great distance from one another: He saw from the beginning of time to the last minute of it, all things coming out of their causes, marching in their order according to his own appointment; as a man may see a multitude of Ants, some creeping one way, some another, employed in several businesses for their Winter Provision. The eye of God at once runs through the whole Circle of Time; as the eye of man upon a Tower sees all the Passengers at once, though' some be past, some under the Tower, some coming at a farther distance: God, saith Job, looks to the end of the earth, and sees under the whole Heaven, Job 28.24. the Knowledge of God is expressed by sight in Scripture, and futurity to God is the same thing as distance to us; we can with a Perspective-glass make things that are afar off, appear as if they were near; and the Sun, so many Thousand miles distant from us, to appear as if it were at the end of the Glass; Why should then future things be at so great a distance from God's Knowledge, when things so far from us may be made to approach so near to us?

God considers all things in his own simple Knowledge, as if they were now acted; and therefore some have chosen to call the knowledge of things to come, not prescience or foreknowledge, but Knowledge, because God sees all things in one instant, scientiâ nunquam deficientis instantiae . Upon this account things that are to come, are set down in Scripture as present, and sometimes as past, Isa. 9.6. Unto us a Child is Born, though' not yet Born; so of the Sufferings of Christ, Isa. 53.4. &c. he hath born our griefs, he was wounded for our transgressions, he was taken from Prison, &c. not shall be; and Psal. 22.18. they part my Garments among them, as if it were present; all to express the certainty of God's fore-knowledge, as if things were actually present before him.

6. This is proper to God, and incommunicable to any Creature. Nothing but what is Eternal can know all things that are to come: Suppose a Creature might know things that are to come, after he is in Being; he cannot know things simply as future, because there were things future before he was in Being. The Devils know not men's hearts, therefore cannot foretell their actions with any certainty; they may indeed have a knowledge of some things to come, but it is only conjectural, and often mistaken; as the Devil was in his Predictions among the Heathen, and in his presage of Job 's Cursing God to his face upon his pressing Calamities, Job 1.11. Sometimes indeed they have a certain knowledge of something future by the Revelation of God, when he uses them as Instruments of his Vengeance, or for the Trial of his People, as in the Case of Job, when he gave him a Commission to strip him of his Goods; or as the Angels have, when he uses them as Instruments of the deliverance of his People.

7. Tho' this be certain, that God foreknows all things and actions; yet the manner of his knowing all things before they come, is not so easily resolved. We must not therefore deny this Perfection in God, because we understand not the manner how he hath the Knowledge of all things: It were unworthy for us to own no more of God than we can perfectly conceive of him; we should then own no more of him than that he doth exist. Canst thou, saith Job, by searching, find out God? canst thou find out the Almighty unto Perfection? Job 11.7. Do we not see things unknown to inferior Creatures, to be known to ourselves? Irrational Creatures do not apprehend the nature of a man, nor what we conceive of them when we look upon them; nor do we know what they fancy of us when they look wistly upon us; for ought as I know, we understand as little the manner of their imaginations, as they do of ours; and shall we ascribe a darkness in God as to future things, because we are ignorant of them, and of the manner how he should know them ? shall we doubt whether God doth certainly know those things which we only conjecture? as our Power is not the measure of the Power of God, so neither is our Knowledge the Judge of the Knowledge of God, no better nor so well as an irrational nature can be the Judge of our Reason: Do we perfectly know the manner how we know? shall we therefore deny that we know anything? we know we have such a faculty which we call Understanding, but doth any man certainly know what it is? and because he doth not, shall he deny that which is plain and evident to him? Because we cannot ascertain ourselves of the causes of the ebbing and flowing of the Sea, of the manner how Minerals are engendered in the Earth, shall we therefore deny that which our eyes convince us of?