Section II. — The spotless purity of Scripture commands do no less evince their divine extraction. 'God is the Holy One,' Isa. xlii. 16. He alone is perfectly holy; 'The heavens are not clean in his sight,' Job xv. 15. He can charge the angels themselves (who may be the ' heavens' in the aforementioned place) with folly, Job iv. 18; because, though they never sinned, yet it is pos- sible they might sin, as some of their order have done, if not kept from it by confirming grace. And as God is the holy person, so the Scripture is the only holy book : all besides this have their errata, which are corrected by this. ' The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring for ever,' Psa. xix. 2 ; that is, the word of God is clean — called the fear of Isaac, because the object of his fear: the word is clean, and mark, it endureth for ever ; that is, it ever continues, and shall be found so. There are dregs and sediment that will appear in the holiest writings of the best men, when they have stood awhile under the observation of a critical eye ; but the Scripture hath been exposed to the view and censure of all sorts of men, yet could never have the least impurity charged justly upon it. It is so clean and pure, that it makes filthy souls clean : "' Sanctify them through thy truth ; thy word is truth,' John xvii. 17. That which is itself filthy, may make our clothes and bodies clean ; but that which makes our souls pure and clean, must be itself without defilement. And such is the Scripture ; there is nothing there which gratifies the flesh, or affords fuel to any lust. No ; it puts every sin to the sword, and strikes through the loins of all sinners. ' To be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace,' Rom. viii. G. So that, as Athenagoras well said, no man can be wicked that is a Clu-istian, unless he be an liypocrite. For the Scripture, which he pro- fesseth to be his ride of faith and life, will not allow him to embrace any doc- trine that is false, or practise that Avhich is filthy and unholy. This is that which Christianity can alone glory in. The heathens were led into many abominations by their very religion, and the gods whom they worshipped. No wonder they were so beastly and sensual in their lives, when they served drunken and filthy gods ; and the very mysteries of their religion were so horribly unclean, that they durst not let them be commonly known, as having a scent too strong to be endured by any that had not their senses quite stopped, and their foolish minds, by the judgment of God upon them, wholly darkened. But the Christian can charge none of his sins upon his God, who tempteth none to evil, but hateth perfectly both the work, and also the worker of iniquity; nor upon his Bible, which damns eveiy sin to the pit of hell, and all that live therein : Rom. ii. y, ' Tribulation and anguish upon every soul of man that doeth evil, of the Jew first, and also of the Gentile : but glory, honour, and peace, to every man that worketh good, to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile.' O, who could be the author of this blessed book, but the blessed God ! If any creature made it, he was either a wicked creature, or one that was holy. First, no wicked creature could do it ; neither angel nor man. Surely they would never have taken so much pains to pull down their own kingdom of darkness — (the great plot which runs through the Bible from one end of it to the other.) And if it were the birth of their brain, no doubt, as every one loves his own child, so would they have shewn more love to it, than yet they have done. The implacable wrath that the devil and his party of wicked ones in the world have shewn in all ages to the Scriptures, declares sufficiently it never came from them. No, no, it cannot stand with the interest of unclean spirits or wicked men, to ad- vance holiness in the world. The devil, though bold enough, durst never be so impudent, as to lay claim to this holy, heavenly piece ; but if he should, the glorious beauty of holiness that shines on the face of it would forbid any man in his wits to believe that black fiend to be the father of it. It is natural for every creature to beget his like ; and what likeness there is between light and darkness it is easy to judge. Neither can any holy creature be the author of it, be he angel or man. Can we think that any, having the least spark of love to God, or fear of his majesty dwelling in their breast, durst counterfeit his dreadful name, by setting it to their work, and abuse the world with such a blasphemy and prodigious lie, as to say, 'Thus saith the Lord,' and prefix his name all along, when not God, but themselves are the authors' Could this impudence and audacious wickedness proceed from any holy angel or man ? Doubtless il could not. Nay, farther, durst any holy creature put such a cheat
570 ^^^ ^HE SWORD OF THE SPIRIT.