The reasons of the Christian religion the first part, of godliness, proving by natural…

And that our Obedience to God shall not be mens final loss and ruin, needeth no proof but this; that he hath made our self-love a Principle inseparable from our nature, and maketh use of it in the Government of the World; and ⟨p. 137⟩commandeth nothing but what is finally for our good;¹ and so conjoineth the pleasing of him and our own felicity inseparably in our end: His Regiment is paternal, His Glory which he seeketh by us, is the Glory of his Goodness communicated and accumulated on us. This taken in with the Wisdom and Goodness of his Nature, will tell any man, that to be a loser finally by our Obedience to God, is a thing that no man need to fear: He doth not serve himself upon us to our hurt; nor command us that which will undo us. He neither wanteth Power, Wisdom, nor Goodness, to make us gainers by our duty. It is the desire of natural Justice in all, ut bonis bene sit, & malis male: If I find but any duty commanded me by God, my Conscience and my sense of the Divine perfections, will not give me leave to think that I shall ever prove finally a loser by performing it,² though he had never made me any promise of reward: so far the Law of Nature hath a kind of Promise in it, that if he do but say, Do this, I will not doubt but the doing of it is for my good! And if he bid me but use any means to my own happiness, I should blaspheme if I suspected it would tend to my loss and misery, and was made my snare.

And that our Obedience to God shall not be mens final loss and ruine, needeth no proof but this; that he hath made our self-love a Principle inseparable from our nature, and maketh use of it in the Government of the World; and ⟨p. 137⟩commandeth nothing but what is finally for our good;¹ and so conjoyneth the pleasing of him and our own felicity inseparably in our end: His Regiment is paternal, His Glory which he seeketh by us, is the Glory of his Goodness communicated and accumulated on us. This taken in with the Wisdom and Goodness of his Nature, will tell any man, that to be a loser finally by our Obedience to God, is a thing that no man need to fear: He doth not serve himself upon us to our hurt; nor command us that which will undo us. He neither wanteth Power, Wisdom, nor Goodness, to make us gainers by our duty. It is the desire of natural Justice in all, ut bonis bene sit, & malis male: If I finde but any duty commanded me by God, my Conscience and my sense of the Divine perfections, will not give me leave to think that I shall ever prove finally a loser by performing it,