' " Dei libertati non subjacere," — " is not subject to." — V,\>. 2 Titus i. 5.
» James i. 15. < Jude 0. ^ Horn. i. lb. « Gen. iii. 17. ' 2 Pot. iii. 7.
USES OF THE DOCTRIKE. 619
Yea, forasmuch as, in tliis state of things which we have described as being permitted by the Avill of God, " the creature was made subject to vanity,"'^ there is none of the creatures which, by its confusion, vanity, and inquietude, does not declare this detestable poison, with which it is thoroughly infected, to be exceeding sinful. This is the source and origin of all evils to sinners themselves. Whatever dark- ness, tumult, vanity, slavery, fearful looking for of judgment and fiery- indignation to consume the adversaries, oppresses, tortures, harasses, vexes, burns, corrupts, or kills ; whatever from without, penal, grie- vous, sad, dire, dreadful, even the last unavoidable calamity itself, — is all to be attributed to this prolific parent of miseries. Some one, perhaps, will wonder what this so great a plague is, which perverts the course of the creation; what crime, what kind of inexpiable wickedness, that it hath procured to creatures so very highly exalted, and created in the image of God to share in his glory, after being banished from heaven and paradise, an eternal deprivation of his glory, punishment to Avhich no measure or end is appointed ; wdiat hath so incensed the mind of the most bountiful and merciful Father of all, and imbittered his anger, that he should bring eternal sorrows on the work of his own hands, and " kindle a fire that should burn to the lowest bottom, and inflame the foundations of the mountains." I will tell him in one word.
Is it to be wondered at, that God should be disposed severely to punish that which earnestly wishes him not to he God, and strives to accomplish this with all its might? Sin opposes the divine nature and existence ; it is enmity against God, and is not an idle enemy ; it has even engaged in a mortal war with all the attributes of God. He would not be God if he did not avenge, by the punishment of the guilty, his own injury. He hath often and heavily complained, in his word, that by sin he is robbed of his glory and honour, affronted, exposed to calumny and blasphemy; that neither his holiness, nor his justice, nor name, nor right, nor dominion, is preserved, pure and untainted : for he hath created all things for his own glory, and it belongs to the natural right of God to preserve that glory entire by the subjection of all his creatures, in their proper stations, to him- self And shall we not reckon that sin is entirely destructive of that order, which would entirely ^^ rest that right out of his hands, and a thing to be restrained by the severest punishments? Let sinners, then, be informed that every the least transgression abounds so much with hatred against God; is so highly injurious to him, and as far as is in its power brands him with such folly, impotence, and injustice ; so directly robs him of all his honour, glor}^, and powei', — that if he wills to be God, he can by no means suffer it to escape unpunished.
It was not for nothing that on that day on which he made man a » Eom. Tiii. 20.
620 A DISSERTATION ON DIVINE JUSTICE. [PART II.
living soul, he threatened him with death, even eternal death ; that in giving his law he thundered forth so many dread execrations against this fatal evil ; that he hath threatened it with sucli punish- ment, with so great anger, with fury, wrath, tribulation, and anguish ; that with a view to vindicate his own glory, and provide for the sal- vation of sinners, he made his most holy Son, who was " holy, harm- less, undefiled, and separate from sinners," " sin" and a " curse,"^ and subjected him to that last punishment, the death of the cross, in- cluding in it the satisfaction due to his violated law. All these things divine justice required as necessary to the preservation of his honour, glory, Avisdom, and dominion. Let every proud complaint of smners, then, be hushed, for we know that " the judgment of God is accord- ing to truth against them that do evil."^
But sin, in respect of the creature, is folly, madness, fury, blind- ness, hardness, darkness, stupor, giddiness, torpor, turpitude, unclean- ness, nastiness, a stain, a spot, an apostasy, degeneracy, a wandering from the mark, a turning aside from the right path, a disease, a languor, destruction, — death. In respect of the Creator, it is a dis- grace, an affront, blasphemy, enmity, hatred, contempt, rebellion, — an injury. In respect of its own nature, it is poison, a stench, dung, a vomit, polluted blood, a plague, a pestilence, an abominable, detestable, cursed thing ; which, by its most pernicious power of metamorphos- ing, hath transformed angels into devils, light into darkness, life into death, paradise into a desert, a pleasant, fruitful, blessed world into a vain, dark, accursed prison, and the Lord of all into a servant of servants ; which hath rendered man, the glory of God, an enemy to himself, a Avolf to others, hateful to God, his own destroyer, the de- struction of others, the plague of the world, a monster, and a ruin. Attempting to violate the eternal, natural, and indispensable right of God, to cut the thread of the creature's dependence on the Creator, it introduced with it this world of iniquity.