2. As they will not, so they dare not, think of God. They will not, because of the power of their lusts ; they dare not, because of their guilt. No sooner should they begin to think of him in good earnest, but their sin would lose all its desirable forms and appearances, and represent itself in the horror of guilt alone : and in that condition all the properties of the divine nature are suited to increase the dread and terror of the sinner. Adam had heard God's voice before with delight and satisfaction ; but on the hear- ing of the same voice, alter he had sinned, he hid himself.
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and cried that he was afraid. There is a way for men to think of God with the guilt of sin upon them, which they intend to forsake; but none for any to do it with the guilt of sin which they resolve to continue in. Wherefore of all these sorts of persons it may be said, that God is not in all their thoughts, and therefore are they far enough from being spiritually minded. For unless we have many thoughts of God, we cannot be so. Yea, moreover, there are two things required unto those thoughts which we have of God, that there be an evidence of our being so.
1. That we take delight in them, Psal. xxx. 4. * Sing unto the Lord, O ye saints of his, and give thanks at the remembrance of his holiness.' The remembrance of God delighteth and refresheth the hearts of his saints, and stirs them up unto thankfulness.
1. They rejoice in what God is in himself. Whatever is good, amiable, or desirable; whatever is holy, just, and powerful ; whatever is gracious, wise, and merciful, and all that is so, they see and apprehend in God. That ' God is what he is,' is the matter of their chiefest joy. Whatever befalls them in this world, whatever troubles and disquiet- ment they are exercised withal, the remembrance of God is a satisfactory refreshment unto them : for therein they be- hold all that is good and excellent, the infinite centre of all perfections. Wicked men would have God to be in any thing but what he is : nothing that God is really and truly pleaseth them. Wherefore, they either frame false notions of him in their minds, as Psal. 1. 21. or they think not of him at all, at least as they ought, unless sometimes they tremble at his anger and power. Some benefit they suppose maybe had, by what he can do, but how there can be any delight in what he is, they know not : yea, all their trouble ariseth from hence, that he is what he is. It would be a relief unto them, if they could make any abatement of his power, his holiness, his righteousness, his omnipresence ; but his saints, as the psalmist speaks, ' give thanks at the remembrance of his holiness.'
And when we can delight in the thoughts of what God is in himself, of his infinite excellencies and perfections, it gives us a threefold evidence of our being spiritually minded. 1. In that it is such an evidence that we have a gracious
332 THE GRACE AND DUTY OF
interest in those excellencies and perfections, whereon we can say, with rejoicing in ourselves, 'This God,' thus holy, thus powerful, thus just, good, and gracious, * is our God, and he will be our guide unto death.' So the psalmist, under the consideration of his own frailty, and apprehen- sions of death in the midst of his years, comforts and re- fresheth himself with thoughts of God's eternity and immu- tability, with his interest in them ; Psal. cii. 23 — 28. And God himself proposeth unto us, his infinite immutability as the ground whereon we may expect safety and deliver- ance ; Mai. iii. 6. When we can thus think of God, and what he is with delight, it is, I say, an evidence that we have a gracious covenant interest, even in what God is in himself; which none have but those who are spiritually minded.
2. It is an evidence that the image of God is begun to be wrought in our own souls ; and we approve of and rejoice in it more than in all other things whatever. Whatever notions men may have of the divine goodness, holiness, righteousness, and purity, they are all but barren, jejune, and fruitless, unless there be a similitude and conformity unto them wrought in their minds and souls. Without this they cannot rejoice in the thoughts and remembrance of the divine excellencies. Wherefore, when we can do so, when such meditations of God are sweet unto us, it is an evidence that we have some experience in ourselves of the excellency of the image of those perfections, and that we rejoice in them above all things in this world.
3. They are so also, in that they are manifest, that we do discern and judge that our eternal blessedness doth con- sist in the full manifestation, and our enjoyment, of God in what he is, and of all his divine excellencies. This men for the most part take for granted, but how it should be so, they know not. They understand it, in some measure, whose hearts are here deeply affected with delight in them; they are able to believe that the manifestation and enjoyment of the divine excellencies will give eternal rest, satisfaction, and complacency unto their souls. No wicked man can look upon it otherwise than a torment, to abide for ever 'with eternal holiness;' Isa. xxxiii. 14. And we ourselves can have no present prospect into the fulness of future