But here foolish reason will interpose, and ask how it can stand with the justice of God for a momentary action to cast men into ever- lasting torment ? I answer —
1. God will govern the world by his own reason, and not by our fancies. He hath made a holy law, and that law hath a sanction ; it is established by penalties and rewards. Now if God will make good
256 SERMONS UPON 2 THESSALONIANS I. [SeR. VII.
his threatenings, and bring upon the creature the misery which he hath foretold, wherein lieth the injustice ? What part of the punish- ment would you have to be relaxed, the loss or the pain ? The loss is double — of God's favour and our natural comforts. Would you have God to admit those to the sight and fruition of himself who never cared for him ? or return to their natural comforts, that they may again run riot with them, and use them as an occasion to the flesh, and to beguile and quiet their consciences with these enjoyments, or feeding their carnal mind with these pleasures while they want better things ? or to lessen the pain when the sin and impenitent obstinacy doth still continue ? Should the pain cease ? If there were no pain, yet the loss would be a torment.
2. It is meet for the government of the world that the penalties should be thus stated, to give us the more powerful argument against fleshly lusts, which, being pleasing and suitable to corrupt nature, need to be checked by a terrible commination. Man is a very slave to sensual pleasure, which being born and bred with him, and riveted in his nature, is not easily renounced. Therefore God hath told us that the pleasing of the flesh will cost us dear : ' If ye live after the flesh ye shall die/ &c, Kom. viii. 13. The sinner's paradise is guarded with a flaming sword, and our delight is balanced with our fear, that by setting eternal pains against momentary pleasures, we may the better escape the temptation, Heb. xi. 25. Shall we for a momentary pleasure run the hazard of eternal sorrow ? The pleasures are but for a season, the torments are everlasting ; the fearful end of this flesh- pleasing course may deter us from it. It is agreeable to the wisdom of our lawgiver that things to come should have some advantage above things present ; that the joy and pain of the other world, which is a matter of faith, should be considerably greater than the pleasures and pains of this world, which is a matter of sense ; else things at hand will certainly more prevail with us than things to come, if they he not considerably greater. Therefore here the pain is short, so is the pleasure, but there both are eternal.
3. No law observe th this, that the mora,p<x,ncc, the continuance of the punishment, should be no longer than the mora culpce, or the time of acting the offence. For a fact done in a day or in an hour men suffer loss, shame, exile, imprisonment all their lives. Public right and order is not so easily repaired by the punishment as it is perverted by the offence ; and therefore when in all human procedure the punishment doth continue longer ordinarily than the time wherein the crime is committed, it is unreasonable to tax God's justice upon this account.
4. There are many reasons which justify this appointment ; as — [1.] From the majesty of God, against whom the sin is committed,
which is depreciated and contemned by the creature's offence. What base things are preferred before God, and the felicity we might have in the enjoyment of him ! At how vile a price is his favour sold, and how is his authority despised ! Now those that break the laws of the eternal God are justly punished with eternal punishment.
[2.] From the nature of sin, which is a preferment of a short sensitive good before that which is spiritual and eternal. If men refuse an everlasting kingdom offered to them for a little carnal satisfaction,
VeR. 9.] SERMONS UPON 2 THESSALONIANS I. 257
Heb. xii. 16, eternal life and eternal death is cast upon their choice ; if they be eternally miserable, they have but their own choice.
[3.] From the will of the sinner. He would continue his sins ever- lastingly if he could. They are never weary of sinning, nor ever would have been if they had lived eternally upon earth ; they desire always to enjoy the pleasures of this life, and are rather left by their sins than leave them ; in hell they never heartily repent. If God should take them out of that estate, they would, like metal taken out of the fur- nace, harden again ; and as their impenitency is endless, so is their punishment.
[4.] There is no change of state in the other world. Now we are upon our trial, and God alloweth a remedy whereby we may pass from death to life ; then the door is shut and past opening, Luke xiii. 25 ; the gulf is fixed, Luke xvi. 26, and every man is in termino, in his everlasting estate of misery or happiness.