Two dissertations, I. Concerning the end for which God created the world. II. The…

IT may therefore be proper here to observe, that let what will be God's last end, that, he must have a real and proper pleasure in: Whatever be the proper object of his will, he is gratified in. And the thing is either grateful to him in itself; or for something else for which he wills it: And so is his further end. But whatever is God's last end, that he wills for it's own sake; as grateful to him in it self: or which is the same thing; it is that which he truly delights in; or in which he has some degree of true and proper pleasure. Otherwise we must deny any such thing as will in God with respect to any thing brought to pass in time; and so must deny his work of creation, or any work of his providence to be truly voluntary. But we have as much reason to suppose that God's works in creating and governing the world, are properly the fruits of his will, as of his understanding. And if there be any such thing at all, as what we mean by acts of will in God; then he is not indifferent whether his will be fulfilled or not. And if he is not indifferent, then he is truly gratified and pleased in the fulfilment of his will: or which is the same thing, he has a pleasure in it. And if he has a real pleasure in attaining his end, then the attainment of it belongs to his ⟨p. 37⟩happiness. That in which God's delight or pleasure in any measure consists, his happiness in some measure consists. To suppose that God has pleasure in things, that are brought to pass in time, only figuratively and metaphorically; is to suppose that he exercises will about these things, and makes them his end only metaphorically.

3. THE doctrine that makes God's creatures and not himself, to be his last end, is a doctrine the farthest from having a favourable aspect on God's absolute self-sufficiency and independence. It far less agrees therewith than the doctrine against which this is objected. For we must conceive of the efficient as depending on his ultimate end. He depends on this end, in his desires, aims, actions and pursuits; so that he fails in all his desires actions and pursuits, if he fails of his end.—Now if God himself be his last end, then in his dependence on his end, he depends on nothing but himself. If all things be of him, and to him, and he the first and the last, this shows him to be all in all: He is all to himself. He goes not out of himself in what he seeks; but his desires and pursuits as they originate from, so they terminate in himself; and he is dependent on none but himself in the beginning or end of any of his exercises or operations. But if not himself, but the creature, be his last end, then as he depends on his last end, he is in some sort dependent on the creature.