to purify us as gold, that we may be vessels of honour, meet for our Master's use. Let us then not be so anxious to get rid of our afflictions, as to obtain from God a sanctified use of them, in brighter manifestations of him, and richer communications from him, and a more entire conformity to him*. Let us but get even a small measure of these benefits, and " our consolations shall abound far above all that our afflictions have abounded b " ]
2. What we are to aim at, in our pursuit of holiness — [It is not any one grace, or any particular set of graces, that we should seek after, but an entire conformity to the image of our God. Now his beauty, as we have seen, consists not in any one perfection, but in an union of all perfections, however opposite to each other. So must there be in us, not such graces only as are suited to the natural temperament of our minds, but an assemblage of all graces, however different from each other ; every one being blended with, and tempered by, its opposite, and all together brought, as occasion may require, into united exercise. God is compared to " light ; " which is an union of rays, exceedingly diverse from each other, and all in simul- taneous motion. Now as some may think that the brighter coloured rays, as the red, the orange, the yellow, would make a better light if divested of those which bear a more sombre aspect, as the blue, the indigo, and the violet ; so many imagine, that God would be more lovely, if justice were separated from his attributes, and mercy were to shine unalloyed by that more formidable perfection. But as neither can light part with any of its rays, nor, God with any of his perfections, so neither must the Christian dispense with any grace whatever : if he rejoice, it must be with trembling : if he walk in faith, he must be also in the fear of the Lord all the day long. If he be bold, he must also be meek and lowly of heart, and resemble him, who " was led as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so opened not he his mouth." This union of opposite graces it is which constitutes the beauty of holiness : as David, after the most exalted strains of adoration, says, " O worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness : fear before him all the earth c."
Let me earnestly entreat the professors of religion to be attentive to this matter. Nothing is more common than for persons of this description to value themselves on account of some particular grace or set of graces, when they are offen- sive, and, I had almost said, odious in the eyes both of God and man, for want of those graces which ought to temper, and to moderate the actings of their mind. Distortion in the human frame is not more disgusting than such distorted piety as this. Even without any particular blemish in the human frame, it is
a ver. 15. b 2 Cor. i. 5. c Ps. xcvi. 7 — 9.
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not any one feature that constitutes beauty ; but a regular and harmonious set of features : so it is not faith, or fear, or zeal, or prudence, or any other separate grace, that will assimilate us to the Deity, but every grace in its proper measure, and its combined exercise ; or rather every grace borrowing from its opposite its chief lustre, and all harmoniously exercised for the glory of God.
Were this subject better understood, we should see, as in Christ, so in all his followers also, the God and the man, the lion and the lamb.]
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