Discourses upon the Existence and Attributes of God

4. What a folly and boldness is there in Sin, since an eternal God is offended thereby? All Sin is aggravated by Gods Eternity: The blackness of the Heathen Idolatry was in changing the glory of the incorruptible God, ^*erecting resemblances of him contrary to his immortal nature; as if the eternal God, whose life is as unlimited as Eternity, were like those Creatures whose beings are measured by the short Ell of Time, which are of a corruptible nature, and daily passing on to Corruption: They could not really deprive God of his Glory and Immortality, but they did in Estimation. There is in the nature of every sin a tendency to reduce God to a not Being. He that thinks unworthily of God, or acts unworthily towards him, doth (as much as in him lies) fully and destroy these two perfections of his, Immutability and Eternity: 'Tis a carriage, as if he were as contemptible as a Creature that were but of yesterday, and shall not remain in being to morrow. He that would put an end to Gods glory by darkening it, would put an end to Gods life by destroying it. He that should love a Beast with as great an affection as he loves a Man, contemns a rational nature; and he that loves a perishing thing with the same affection he should love an everlasting God, contemns his Eternity; He debaseth the duration of God below that of the World: The low valuation of God speaks him in his esteem, no better than withering Grass, or a Gourd, which lasts for a night; and the Creature which possesses his affection, to be a Good that lasts for ever. How foolish then is every sin, that tends to destroy a Being that cannot destroy or desert himself; a Being, without whose Eternity the Sinner himself could not have had the capacity of a being to affront him? How base is that, which would not let the works of God remain in their established posture? How much more base in not enduring the fountain and glory of all Beings, that would not only put an end to the Beauty of the world, but the Eternity of God?

4. What a folly and boldness is there in Sin, since an eternal God is offended thereby? All Sin is aggravated by Gods Eternity: The blackness of the Heathen Idolatry was in changing the glory of the incorruptible God, ^*erecting resemblances of him contrary to his immortal nature; as if the eternal God, whose life is as unlimited as Eternity, were like those Creatures whose beings are measured by the short Ell of Time, which are of a corruptible nature, and daily passing on to Corruption: They could not really deprive God of his Glory and Immortality, but they did in Estimation. There is in the nature of every sin a tendency to reduce God to a not Being. He that thinks unworthily of God, or acts unworthily towards him, doth (as much as in him lies) fully and destroy these two perfections of his, Immutability and Eternity: 'Tis a carriage, as if he were as contemptible as a Creature that were but of yesterday, and shall not remain in being to morrow. He that would put an end to Gods glory by darkning it, would put an end to Gods life by destroying it. He that should love a Beast with as great an affection as he loves a Man, contemns a rational nature; and he that loves a perishing thing with the same affection he should love an everlasting God, contemns his Eternity; He debaseth the duration of God below that of the World: The low valuation of God speaks him in his esteem, no better than withering Grass, or a Gourd, which lasts for a night; and the Creature which possesses his affection, to be a Good that lasts for ever. How foolish then is every sin, that tends to destroy a Being that cannot destroy or desert himself; a Being, without whose Eternity the Sinner himself could not have had the capacity of a being to affront him? How base is that, which would not let the works of God remain in their established posture? How much more base in not enduring the fountain and glory of all Beings, that would not only put an end to the Beauty of the world, but the Eternity of God?