for every man to use his best endeavours for being, to a certain degree, what God made the first man; a compound of light and love,-of knowledge, devotion and duty? Such was man in his first estate-and though now his degeneracy is great and apparent, though now we have comparatively only maimed strokes of the lovely and perfect picture, yet surely we should be enquiring after, and listening to the probable means of our restoration, we should daily be full of thought how we may again become what we originally were, we should ask is there no possibility of this? And if we are in good earnest in the enquiry, the infallible word of God will resolve the question to our peace and satisfaction, and will tell us that we may be the Friends of God again, and may enjoy again all the blessedness of that relation. Man should be ashamed of his present degenerate state because he was created in a purer and a nobler one. Degradation always implies dishonour and shame. And in the present instance, without our sincere and vigorous attempts for a recovery, and shame will be entailed upon us for Therefore all such as will not be recovered from the common apostacy and be reduced to their allegiance to God, and live in Friendship with him in this preparatory state, are said, when they rise from the dead, 'to awake to shame and everlasting contempt.'* Shame perpetuated under the eye and observation of holy and immortal angels, glorious creatures who must resent men's

ever.

* Daniel xii. 2.

refusal of recovering goodness hereafter; as they rejoice at their repentance and conversion now. It is no shame to a creature which was always mean and ignoble, than it is so at the present moment. But that man, formed after the image of God, should lose that image, and become a part of the serpent's seed, this we should think of with a generous indignation. An excellent person and a philosopher, * struck with the infelicity and depravity of the present state said, "That he in a manner blushed at the recollection of his being in the body.' This shewed a refined and an elevated spirit. A similar sentiment we should adopt; and should blush at reflecting that whereas man was once a holy and a happy being, he is now unholy and depraved, and consequently unhappy; out of Friendship with God, and uncomfortable in himself, and should be enquiring, how what has been lost may be regained, and what is defective be supplied. What an ambition do men discover for regaining the credit of their family, or of their country? Let us be actuated by a still more enlarged zeal,a zeal for the credit and interest of mankind, and under the power of this liberal principle, let us aspire, and urge others to aspire after the renewal of that Friendship with God, the loss of which is the comprehensive misery of the fall. This we shall do, if we have any sense of human greatness any remembrance of our divine original -any breathings of our ancient hope. +

* Plotinus.

+ Mr. Howe.

CHAPTER VIII.

MOTIVES TO FRIENDSHIP WITH GOD.

THE

IT

AMBITION OF IT IS NATURAL, COMMENDABLE. THIS FRIENDSHIP CONFERS TRUE HONOUR. YIELDS THE HIGHEST PLEASURE. TO SEEK AND

CULTIVATE IT IS THE PART OF GRATITUDE. IT IS ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY TO US.

I. THE ambition of Friendship with God is a natural ambition. He is not worthy of being called a man, who is not ambitious of Friendship with God. To forsake our own glorious original, lightly to esteem the God that formed us and to be lightly esteemed of him in return,—these things subject to the very deepest reproach as being repugnant to all the dictates and wishes of pure and uncorrupted nature. What is more natural between parent and children, governor and subjects, the benefactor and such as are obliged to him, than Friendship? The neglect of Friendship, and especially the prevalence of disaffection, where those relations subsist, would fill the world with confusion. How solicitous are men to be approved of the father's of their flesh? and how much more should we covet the approbation and Friendship of the adorable Father of our spirits!

Let us then never be at rest till our spirits tend to God in sincere and strong aspirations after his favour. Let us never be satisfied with the state of our own minds till a desire of divine Friendship prevail over all our other desires, and account ourselves wanting in one capital characteristic of God's creatures and children, until we prefer him above our chief joy. Let us be ashamed of calling ourselves the offspring of God, while, with the unthinking generality, we seek everything more than a mutual complacency between ourselves and our divine parent, or while, with profane and impious sinners, we live as if we meant to put a contempt upon the well pleasedness and love of our maker. Let us account a concern or unconcern about the friendship of heaven, the indication of a natural or unnatural state of mind; and let us try our spirits and be satisfied or dissatisfied with them accordingly. An unnatural state of mind will always be an unhappy one, and such ours will be till the divine Friendship be supremely desired by us.

II. The ambition of divine Friendship is as commendable as it is natural, it will put us upon nothing but what will secure both our honour and our peace; will act in no way, but what both heaven and earth will justify and approve. In seeking the friendship of men there is always pain, and often times guilt, a conformity to them in their humours, their weaknesses or their vices, is too frequently the hard condition of keeping

in their good graces. But God is perfect and holy, and therefore, while we aim at getting or keeping his friendship, we shall do nothing but what is good and great. 'He hath shewed thee O man, what is good, and what doth the Lord thy God require of thee but to do justly and love mercy,'-so doing, thou mayest be said to 'walk with him,' to be his Friend and associate. How strong an incentive is this to a solicitude about God's Friendship, that it will put a man upon nothing but what is in itself excellent! and how much is it to be lamented, that men will seek each other's friendship and favour by a series of foolish and hurtful lusts, which in the end drown them in perdition,-but will not seek the Friendship of Deity, although the means of obtaining and enjoying that are equally successful and reputable. Men may well be confounded at the reflection of their having sought the friendship of their fellow mortals with great uncomfortableness, and perhaps with some dishonourableness, while the ambition of divine favour has been extinguished in their bosoms, or been sacrificed to meaner affections and desires, although the means of obtaining it are (like the fruits of it), noble and glorious.

III. Friendship with God confers the very highest honour and this is a further motive for our cultivation of it. God is the fountain of honour as well as of life and therefore the closer

* Micah vi. 8.

F