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Complacency then draws into us the traits of the
divine perfections according as we are capable of
receiving them, as the mirror receives the sun's
image, not according to the excellence and amplitude
of that great and admirable luminary, but in
proportion to the capacity and measure of its glass:
so that we thus become conformed to God.
But besides this the love of benevolence brings us to
this holy conformity by another way. The love of
complacency draws God into our hearts, but the love
of benevolence casts our hearts into God, and
consequently all our actions and affections, most
lovingly dedicating and consecrating them unto him:
for benevolence desires to God all the honour, all
the glory, and all the acknowledgment which it is
possible to give him, as a certain exterior good
which is due to his goodness.
Now this desire is practised according to the
complacency which we take in God, as follows. We have
had an extreme complacency in perceiving that God is
sovereignly good, and therefore by the love of
benevolence we desire that all the loves which we can
possibly imagine be employed to love this goodness
properly. We have taken delight in the sovereign
excellency of God's perfection, and thereupon we
desire that he be sovereignly loved, honoured and
adored. We have rejoiced to consider how God is not
only the first beginning but also the last end,
author, preserver, and Lord of all things, for which
reason we desire that all things be subject to him by
a sovereign obedience. We see God's will sovereignly
perfect, right, just and equitable; and upon this
consideration our desire is that it be the rule and
sovereign law of all, things, and that it be
observed, kept and obeyed by all other wills.
But note, Theotimus, that I treat not here of the
obedience due unto God as he is our Lord and Master,
our Father and Benefactor, for this kind of obedience
belongs to the virtue of justice, not to love. No, it
is not this I speak of at present, for though there
were no hell to punish the rebellious, nor heaven to
reward the good, and though we had no kind of
obligation or duty to God (be this said by
imagination of a thing impossible and scarce
imaginable), yet would the love of benevolence move
us to render all obedience and submission to God by
election and inclination, yea by a sweet violence of
love, in consideration of the sovereign goodness,
justice and rectitude of his divine will.
Do not we see, Theotimus, that a maiden by a free
choice, which proceeds from the love of benevolence,
subjects herself to her husband, to whom otherwise
she owed no duty; or that a gentleman submits himself
to a foreign prince's command, or, perhaps, gives up
his will into the hands of the superior of some
religious order which he may join? Even so is our
heart conformed to God's, when by holy benevolence we
throw all our affections into the hands of the divine
will, to be turned and directed as it chooses, to be
moulded and formed to its good liking.
And in this point consists the profoundest
obedience of love, which has no need to be spurred by
menaces or rewards, nor by any law or any
commandment; for it foreruns all this, submitting
itself to God solely for the most perfect goodness
which is in God, whereby he deserves that all wills
should be obedient, subject and submissive to him,
conforming and uniting themselves for ever, in
everything, and everywhere, to his divine intentions.
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