we need enquire no further. Thus much God hath revealed to us for our comfort and encouragement, the reft he hath concealed from us; and it would be a bold intrusion into his fecrets, to pry and search any farther; and if we should, it would be to no purpose. For in things which depend upon divine revelation it is impoffible for us to know any more, than God is pleafed to reveal to us. In matters of pure revelation, we cannot go beyond the word of the Lord; The things of God knoweth no man, but the fpirit of God, or he to whom the fpirit of God fhall reveal them. If one fhould come from a ftrange country, never known and dif covered before, and fhould only tell us in general, that it was a most pleasant and delightful place, and the inhabitants a brave, and generous, and wealthy people, under the government of a wife and great King, ruling by excellent laws; and that the particular delights and advantages of it were not to be imagined by any thing he knew in our own country, and fhould fay no more of it: If we give credit to the perfon that brought this relation, it would create in us a great admiration of the country described to us, and a mighty concern to fee it, and live in it. But it would be a vain curiofity, to reafon and conjecture about the particular conveniences of it; because it would be impoffible, by any difcourfe, to arrive at the certain knowledge of any more, than he who only knew it was pleafed to tell us. This is the cafe as to our heavenly country. Our bleffed Saviour, who came down from heaven, from the bofom of his Father, hath revealed to us a ftate of happiness and glory in general, that there is fuch a kingdom prepared for us; and when he was deaving the world, he told us, that he was going thither by the way of the grave; and when he was rifen again from the dead, and was afcended into heaven, he promifed to come again at the end of the world, and to raife us out of the grave, and to carry us into thofe celeftial manfions, where we shall be for ever with the Lord. And beyond this he hath made no particular difcovery to us of the felicity of that place, he hath given us no punctu al reprefentation of the glory of it; he hath not declared to us in a special manner, what our work and employ

P 3

employment shall be, in what way God will communicate himfelf to us, nor what kind of converfation we fhall have with the bleffed Angels, and with one another, and how far we fhall know, or be known to one another; or whether we shall stand affected in any peculiar manner to those who were our friends, and relations, and acquaintance in this world. Thefe, and perhaps a thousand things more which may concern the glories of that state, and the happinefs and employment of the fpirits of just men made perfect, our Saviour hath told us nothing of, but only in general; and it is impoffible for us with any certainty to make out the rest, any more than children can make a conjecture of the defigns and reasonings of a wife man; not only because it would be of no great use to us, but because the imperfection of human nature, and of our faculties in this ftate of mortality, is not able to bear a full and clear reprefentation of fo great a glory.

When our Saviour was transfigured upon the mount, and a little image of heaven was fhewn to men, the difciples were ftrangely amazed, and knew not what they faid. And St. Paul tells us, that when he was taken up into the third heaven, the things which he faw and heard there, were not to be uttered. So that well might the Apostle fay here in the text, It doth not yet appear what we shall be. Our future ftate is very obfcure to us while we are in this world, as to any diftinct and particular knowledge of it.

There are a fort of idle men in the world, I mean the Schoolmen, who have been very bufy and bold in their enquiries, very peremptory in their determinations of feveral things relating to it but after all our search and study, is is impoffible for us to advance one step farther in the knowledge of it, than God hath been pleafed in his holy word to reveal it to us. And how much God hath revealed, Ishall, in difcourfing of the

Second particular, confider; namely, That thus much we know of it in general, that it fhall confift in the bleffed vifion of God: It doth not yet appear what we shall be; but when he shall appear, we shall fee him as he is. Thus much all Chriftians know, because our Saviour hath plainly revealed it to them, that the blessedness

of

175 of the faints fhould confift in the vifion of God. Matth. v. 8. Blessed are the pure in heart; for they shall fee God. Which the Apoftle expreffeth with a little variation, Heb. xii. 14. Without holiness no man fhall fee the Lord. Here is a great thing expreffed to us in a few words, We fhall fee him as he is: for the better understanding of which, it will be convenient to enquire into thefe three things..

I. What is meant here by feeing God.

II. What by feeing him as he is.

III. The fitness of this metaphor, to exprefs to us the happiness of our future ftate.

I. What is meant by feeing God. The Schoolmen have fpun out abundance of fine cobwebs about this, which in their language they call the beatifick vifion of God; and they generally defcribe and explain it fo as to render it a very dry and fapless thing. They make it to confist in a perpetual gazing upon God, and contemplating the divine effence and perfections, in which, as in a clearer mirror, they fuppofe men to see and know all other things. But this is a very jejune and infipid notion of happiness, but yet fuitable enough to the gust and inclination of thofe that devifed it. And indeed men are naturally apt to form fuch notions of God and heaven to themselves, as are most agreeable to their own appetites and inclinations. So the heathen world framed to themselves Gods after their own image and likenefs, of like paffions, and inclinations, and lufts with themselves; and fuch a heaven as pleafed themselves, and was moft fuitable to their own grofs imaginations of pleasure and happiness; and therefore they defcribed it by pleafant fields, and clear rivers, and fhady walks. So likewife Mahomet framed fuch a paradife, as is most agreeable to our fenfual appetites and lufts. In like manner the Schoolmen, who addicted themselves wholly to contemplation, would have the happinefs of heaven to confift in that which they themselves took most delight in. But furely the fcripture understands fomething more by the fight of God, than a bare contemplation of him. It is a known rule given by divines for the understanding of fcripture; The words that fignify fenfe and knowledge, are very often in fcripture to

be

in us.

be fo underfood, as to comprehend in them thofe affections and effects, which fenfe and knowledge are apt to produce So our knowledge of God doth in fcripture many times import the fum of all religion, the whole duty of man: He that faith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar: And God's knowing of us, fignifies the whole happiness of man; The Lord knoweth them that are his. So tafting and fight are in fcripture put for experience and enjoyment, Pfal. xxxiv. 8. Tafte and fee that the Lord is gracious. Lament. iii 1. I am the man that have feen affliction, that is, that have fuffered it. 1 Pet. iii. 10. He that will love life, and fee good days, that is, enjoy them. And fo we use the word in common fpeech. To fee a friend, is to enjoy the pleasure of his company, and all the advantages of his converfation. So here, the fight of God doth comprehend and take in all the happiness of a future ftate. As to fee the King, includes the court, and all the glo rious circumstances of his attendance; fo to fee God, does take in all that glory, and joy, and happiness, which flows from his prefence.

But we

I grant indeed, that this expreffion primarily and immediately denotes our perfect knowledge of God in the other life, in oppofition to thofe obfcure and more imperfect difcoveries and apprehenfions which we have of him in these earthly bodies: for I think we need make no doubt, but that fight is here taken in a spiritual and intellectual fenfe. We are not to dream that we shall fee God with our bodily eyes; for being a pure fpirit, he cannot be the object of any corporeal fenfe. fhall have fuch a fight of him, as a pure fpirit is capable of; we shall fee him with the eyes of our minds and understanding. And in this fenfe we do in fome degree fee God in this life, by faith and knowledge; but it is but darkly, and, as it were, through a glass that we fee him, as the Apostle expreffeth it. But when we come to heaven, our understandings fhall be raised and cleared to fuch a degree of strength and perfection, that we shall know God after a far more perfect manner, than we are capable of in this ftate of mortality. And this perfect knowledge of him, together with the happy effects of it, thofe affections which it fall raife in us, and

that

that bleffed enjoyment of the chief good which we are not able to exprefs, is that which is called the fight of God.

II. What is here meant by feeing God as he is: we fhall fee him as he is. Now this doth farther and emphatically exprefs our perfect knowledge and enjoyment of God.

1. Our perfect knowledge of him. Not that we are to imagine, that when we come to heaven, our underftanding can, or shall be raised to fuch a pitch, as to be able perfectly to comprehend the infinite nature and perfections of God: for all created understanding being naturally finite, we cannot imagine that it can be ftretched to the comprehenfion of what is infinite, as the divine nature and perfections are. But our knowledge fhall be advanced and raised to fuch degrees of perfection, as a finite and created understanding is capable of.

And we may very reafonably conceive, (and indeed the fcripture leads us to it, without and beyond which, it is not fafe to speak of these things) I fay, we may reasonably conceive the perfection of this knowledge to confift in these three things: in a more immediate, and clear, and certain, knowledge of the divine nature and perfections, than we are capable of in this ftate of mortality.

(1.) We fhall then have an immediate knowledge of God. In this world we fee him by the means and help of his word and works; we fee him as he hath manifested and revealed himself to us in the holy fcriptures, as he hath represented himself to us in the creatures, as the Apostle tells us, Rom. 1. 20. That his eter

nal power and godhead are clearly seen by the things that are made. But thus we do not fee God immediately and directly; but by a reflection of his perfections from the works of creation and providence. We fee him by faith at a great diftance, which the Apoftle calls feeing him as it were through a glass, 1 Cor. xiii. 12. faith in fcripture is moft frequently oppofed to fight, which is a more immediate view and nearer difcovery of a thing. 2 Cor. v. 7. We walk by faith, and not by fight. But in heaven we fhall have an immediate

Now

and