A treatise of delighting in God from Psal. xxxvij. 4. Delight thy self also…

2. What an unnatural wickedness is it! To hate thy own original! To disaffect the most bountiful Author of thy Life and Being! What wouldst thou say to it if thy own Son did hate the very sight of thee, and abhor thy presence and converse? especially if thou never gave him the least cause? If thou hast been always kind and indulgent, full of paternal affection towards him, Wouldst thou not think him a vile miscreant? and reckon the Earth too good to bear him? But how little, and in how low a capacity, didst thou contribute to his being in comparison of what the great God did to thine? How little of natural excellency hast thou above him (it may ⟨p. 250⟩be in many things besides this unhappy temper he much excels thee) when thou knowest, in thy Maker is infinite excellency beyond what thou canst pretend unto? And what cause canst thou pretend of disaffection towards him? Many good works hath he done for thee; For which of these dost thou hate him? Whereby hath he ever disobliged thee? With how sweet and gentle allurements hath he sought to win thy heart? And is it not most vilely unnatural that thy spirit should be so sullenly averse to him, who is pleased to be styled the Father of Spirits? And in which respect it may fitly be said to thee, Dost thou thus requite the Lord, O foolish Creature,¹ and unwise? Is not he thy Father—? If thou didst hate thy own self (in a sense besides that wherein it is thy duty, and in which kind thou hast, as thy case is, a just and dreadful cause of self-abhorrence); If thou didst hate thy very life and being, and wert laying daily plots of self-destruction, thou wert not so wickedly unnatural. He is more intimate to thee than thou art to thy self. That natural love which thou owest to thy self, and the nature from whence it springs, is of him, and ought to be subordinate to him; And by a superior Law of Nature, thy very life if he actually require it, ought to be sacrificed and laid down for his sake: Thy hatred towards him, therefore is more prodigiously unnatural, than if it were most directly and implacably bent against thy self.

2. What an unnatural wickedness is it! To hate thy own original! To disaffect the most bountiful Author of thy Life and Being! What wouldst thou say to it if thy own Son did hate the very sight of thee, and abhor thy presence and converse? especially if thou never gave him the least cause? If thou hast been always kind and indulgent, full of paternal affection towards him, Wouldst thou not think him a vile miscreant? and reckon the Earth too good to bear him? But how little, and in how low a capacity, didst thou contribute to his being in comparison of what the great God did to thine? How little of natural excellency hast thou above him (it may