(2.) A love of pity, pitying him who had done so mucli to so little purpose, who lost the benefit of all he did by a vain opinion of his own righteousness. As we pity moderate papists, sober Turks, or infidels, so Jesus Christ might love him with a love of pity. Well, then, it was a love of human affection, as one man loves another for his good qualities ; not a love of familiarity and friendship, but either a love of courtesy or pity, seeing a man so young, so rich, so powerful,
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and in so gi'eat corruption of manners had kept himself so blameless ; this was that for which Jesus loved him,
I observe two points of doctrine from hence —
Doct. 1. There may be some amiable and good qualities in unre- generate men.
Here was a young man without saving grace, yet of a moral con- versation, and as touching the externals of the law blameless.
Now, that there may be such good qualities in them, appears thus —
1. All are created with some inclination to good, though not to good spiritual, yet to good natural and moral. In our decayed condition there are some remainders of right reason, some impressions of equity, some principles of common honesty still left and preserved in us, though as to spiritual endowments, ' We are altogether become filthy and abominable,' Ps. xiv. 2 ; yet some moral inclinations are left, to show what human nature once was ; as in a rifled ])alace, though the rich furniture be gone, the plate and the jewels, and though the fashion of it be much spoiled, yet some of the fabric is left still standing, to show what a magnificent structure it once was. Nature teacheth to deal justly with all, and startles and looks ghastly at some kind of abomina- tions. The dictates of morality and common right are very legible in our conscience : ' The gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law,' Rom. ii. 14. As Job's messengers said, every one of them, 'I alone am escaped to tell thee,' so there are some principles of conscience that are left, and escaped out of the ruins of the fall, to warn us of our duty, and to make us give back at mon- strous and gross impieties, and to leave us without excuse. Though men be born in sin, and are dead to all spiritual good, yet some restraints are left still upon nature, lest man should not show himself to be man.
2. For the good of mankind. God is the patron of human society, and delights in the welfare and preservation of it. He created not man, as he did the angels, to live several and independent from one another. AVe are all multiplied and propagated from one original root, that we might live in mutual society, and converse with one another. It is observed that ravenous and noxious creatures live single and apart, but the useful in herds and flocks ; so man was made by nature a sociable creature. Now, there would be no such thing as human society if there were not some sweetness of nature and moral dispositions yet left in us. The world would be but one great forest of wild beasts if God had not left some authority in conscience to keep men witliin the bounds of honesty. And therefore, to uphold order in the world, there must be some amiable qualities; even in the unre- generate or corrupt state, some are more innocent and unblamable than othere. I will set it forth by this similitude : As Nebuchadnezzar, when he carried the princes and chief men into captivity out of the land of Judea, he left some of the people behind him to till the land, lest it became a wilderness, so, that the world might not become a forest of wild beasts, there are some that observe the common dictates of nature, that men might be commodious and useful one to another ; for did not these impressions bear sway, the world could not subsist, nor justice and hcncsty be maintained.
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3. There are other things besides renewing grace that might cause these amiable qualities.
[1,] Bodily temper may incline men to some good. We see some are of a rougher temper, and others of a sweeter disposition. Some are soft, smooth, and docile, others stiff and stubborn. The scripture takes notice of the different dispositions of Esau and Jacob : Gen. xxv. 27, ' Esau was a cunning hunter, a man of the field, but Jacob was a plain man dwelling in tents.' Look, as blades, though all are made of the same metal, yet they dififer much in goodness by reason of the temper, so there is a great deal of difference between men and men by reason of the temper of their bodies ; some are ingenuous and shamefaced, and not so easily drawn to outrage and sin, but others are of a baser alloy. The complexion of the soul doth very much follow the constitution of the body, and therefore some are better natured and tempered than others, so that there may be amiable qualities in them, and yet with- out grace.