[3.] That these laws are holy, just, and good: Eom. vii. 12, 'Where- fore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good.' This is necessary, because, in believing the commandments, not only assent is required, but also consent to them, as the fittest laws we could be governed by : Eom. vii. 16, ' If, then, I do that which I would not, I consent to the law that it is good.' Consent is a mixed act of the judgment and will : they are not only to be known as God's laws, but owned and embraced, not only see a truth, but a worth in them. The mandatory part of the word hath its own loveliness and invitation ; as the promises of pardon and eternal life suit with the hunger and thirst of conscience, and the natural desires of happiness; so the holiness and righteousness of God's laws suit with the natural notions of good and evil that are in man's heart. These laws were written upon man's heart at his first creation, and though somewhat blurred, we know the better how to read a defaced writing when we get another copy or
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transcript to compare with it. Especially when the heart is renewed, when the Spirit hath wrought a suitableness, there must needs be a consenting and embracing : Heb. viii. 10, ' This is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord ; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts.' There is a ready willing heart to obey them and conform to them in the regenerate, therefore an assent is not enough, but a consent ; this is that they would choose and prefer before liberty ; they acquiesce and are satisfied in their rule as the best rule for them to live by. But let us see the three attributes, lioly^just, and good. (1.) They are holy laws, fit for God to give and man to receive. ' When we are convinced of this, it is a great help to bridle contrary inclinations, and to carry us on cheerfully in our work. They are fit for God to give, they become such a being as God is : his laws carry the express print and stamp of his own nature upon them. We may know how agreeable they are to the nature of God by supposing the monstrousness of the contrary. If lie had forbidden us all love, and fear, and trust in himself, all respect and thanks to our creator, or bidden us to worship false gods, or change the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like to a cor- ruptible man, as birds, four-footed beasts, and creeping things, or that we should blaspheme his name continually, or despise his glory shining forth in the work of his hands, and that we should be disobedient to our parents, and pollute ourselves as the beasts with promiscuous lusts, and fill the world with adulteries, robberies, and thefts, or slander and revile one another, and leave the boat to the stream, give over ourselves to our passions, discontents, and the unruly lusts of our cor- rupt hearts ; these are conceits so monstrous that, if the beasts were capable of having such thoughts transfused into them, they would abhor them, and would infer such a manifest disproportion in the soul as it would in the body to walk with our hands and do our work with our feet. And they are fit for man to receive if he would preserve the rectitude of his nature, live as such an understanding creature, keep reason in dominion, and free from being a slave to the appetites of the body. To be just, holy, temperate, humble, meek, chaste, doth not only concern the glory of God and the safety of the world, but the liberty of the reasonable nature, that man may act as a creature that hath a mind to know things that differ, and to keep him from that filthiness and pollution which would be a stain to him, and infringe the glory of his being. There is no middle thing ; either a man must be a saint or a beast, either conform himself to God's will, and look after the interests of his soul, or lose the excellency of his nature, and become as the beasts that perish ; either the beast must govern the man, or the man ride upon the beast, which he doth when he taketh God's counsel. (2.) Just, because it referreth to all God's precepts. I take it here not strictly but largely, how just it is for God to command, and how reasonable it is that we should obey the supreme being. His will is the reason of all things ; and who should give laws to the world but the universal sovereign who made all things out of nothing ? Whatsoever you are, you receive it from the Lord ; and therefore, whatsoever a reasonable creature can do, you owe it to him : you are in continual dependence upon him, for ' in him you live, and move,
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and have your being,' Acts xvii. 28. And he hath redeemed yon, called yon to life by Christ : 1 Cor. vi. 19, 20, ' What, know you not that yonr body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own ? for ye are bought with a price ; therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's.' You owe all your time, and strength, and service unto him, and therefore you should still be doing his will and abounding in his work. (3.) He enjoineth nothing but what is good : Dent. v. 29, ' Oh, that there were such a heart in them that they would fear me, and keep all my commandments always, that it might be well with them, and with their children for ever ; ' Dent. vi. 24, ' And the Lord commanded us to do all these statutes, to fear the Lord our God for our good always, that he might preserve us alive, as it is at this day.' God hath tempered his sovereignty towards the reasonable creature, and ruleth us not with a rod of iron, but with a sceptre of love : * He draweth us with the cords of a man,' Hosea xi. 4 ; that is, with rea- sons and arguments taken from our own happiness, Man being a rational and free agent, he would lead and quicken us to our duty by the consideration of our own benefit ; and when he might say only. Thus shall ye do ; lam the Lord ; yet he is pleased to exhort and persuade us not to forsake our own mercies, or to turn back upon our own happiness, and to propound rewards that we may be encouraged to seek after him iu that way of duty which he hath prescribed to us. The reward is ever- lasting glory, with the mercies of this life in order to it : Heb. xi. 6, ' God is, and he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.'