Discourses upon the Existence and Attributes of God

7. The Goodness of God is abused, when we give up our Souls and Affections to those Benefits we have from God. When we make those things Gods Rivals, which were sent to Woe us for him, and offer those Affections to the Presents themselves, which they were sent to solicit for the Master. This is done, when either we place our trust in them, or glue our choicest Affections to them. This Charge God brings against Jerusalem, the trusting in her own Beauty, Glory, and Strength, though it was a Comeliness put upon her by God^*. When a little Sun-shine of Prosperity breaks out upon us, we are apt to grasp it with so much eagerness and closeness, as if we had no other Foundation to settle our selves upon, no other Being that might challenge from us our sole dependence. And the love of our selves, and of Creatures above God, is very natural to us:^* Lovers of themselves and lovers of Pleasure more than of God. Self-love is the Root, and the love of Pleasures the top Branch, that mounts its head highest against Heaven.^* 'Tis for the love of the World that the dangers of the Sea are past over, that Men descend into the Bowels of the Earth, pass Nights without sleep, undertake Suits without intermission, wade through many inconveniences, venture their Souls, and contemn God; In those things Men glory, and foolishly grow proud by them, and think themselves safe and happy in them. Now to love our selves above God, is to own our selves better than God, and that we transcend him in an amiable Goodness; Or if we love our selves equal with God, it at least manifests, that we think God no better than our selves, and think our selves our own chief good, and deny any thing above us, to out-strip us in goodness, whereby to deserve to be the Centre of our Affections and Actions: And to love any other Creature above him, is to conclude some defect in God, that he hath not so much goodness in his own Nature, as that Creature hath, to complete our felicity; that God is a slighter thing than that Creature. 'Tis to account God, what all the things in the World are, an imaginary happiness, a goodness of Clay, and them what God is, a Supreme Goodness. 'Tis to value the goodness of a Drop above that of the Spring, and the goodness of the Spark above that of the Sun. As if the Bounty of God were of a less alloy, than the advantages we immediately receive from the hands of a silly Worm.