514 A SERMON ON PSALM XXXIX. 9.

himself; so, according to our Saviour's own expression, his Lord shall make him ruler over all his goods.

To which our great Lord and Saviour, together with the Father and the Holy Ghost, be rendered and ascribed all praise, might, majesty, and dominion, both now and for evermore. Amen.

I was dumb, I opened not my mouth; because thou didst it. I FORMERLY made an entrance into these words, and observed in them these two parts.

1. David's submissive deportment under a sharp affliction: I was dumb, I opened not my mouth.

2. The ground and reason of such his deportment, which was the procedure of that affliction from God: I opened not my mouth, because thou didst it.

And so I shewed the words were a full lecture of patience, recommending to us a great virtue by a great example, and consequently designed to argue us into an absolute, entire submission to the divine will, in our most pressing and severe distress. The prosecution of them I cast under these two general heads.

I. To give some account of the nature and measures of this submission.

II. To shew the reasons and arguments for it, as the suffering person stands related to God.

The first of these I have already despatched, and proceed now to the second; which is to shew, what reasons and arguments may be produced for the submission here spoken of, as the suffering person stands related to God. And for this, I think, we may lead our way with this general assertion; that

there is no thought, which a man can possibly conceive either of God or of himself aright, but will afford a strong argument to enforce this submission upon us. He that duly considers both what God is, and what he himself is, can need no other demonstration of the infinite folly and absurdity of opposing or contending with him. But yet to give light and life to this general proposition by particular instances, there are six things in God that offer themselves to our consideration; which are so many invincible arguments to quiet and compose all those unruly motions, that are apt to disturb the spirit of a man, when God by any severe passage of his providence calls him to a state of suffering: and this is certain, that every call from God to suffer, is a command also to submit.

(1.) The first is God's irresistible power. And there are some who place God's very right of sovereignty in the boundlessness of his power; affirming, that the great reason why God may do any thing, is because he can do any thing. But far be it from any sober person to discourse of the divine nature and actings upon the stock of such a principle. But yet to illustrate and make out the absurdity of any thing that looks like a non-submission or repugnancy to the afflicting hand of God, were it possible for us to imagine or suppose that God had no right to treat his creature in so severe a manner, yet the surpassing greatness of his power has rendered it impossible for the creature to receive any benefit by demurring to his right. Such a plea being like a poor conquered captive's impleading a victorious sword, absolutely senseless and ridiculous; it being certainly absurd to resist, where it

is impossible to conquer or escape. A good cause itself against an overpowering force, is an impotent, insignificant thing; impotent as to self-support, insignificant as to success. For power is the great disposer of the issues and events of things; and wheresoever there is any effect, it is certain that some power or other is the cause. And therefore all acts of hostility or opposition upon a mischief done or offered suppose, in the person who makes the opposition, an opinion at least of power in himself able to repel or revenge that mischief; and all complaint supposes a likelihood of engaging the strength and power of such as hear it, in the help and vindication of him who makes it; and is indeed used only as a means or instrument to supply the defect of a man's own personal power, by the conjunction of other men's. But now, where neither of these considerations can take place, both resistance and complaint are utterly irrational: as in the case of the divine power's dealing with man, it must needs be. For what is all the world to him that made the world? 1 Cor. x. 22, Do we provoke God to jealousy? are we stronger than he? All the nations, all the armies of the whole earth are to him but as the drop of the bucket, or the small dust of the balance: and can we possibly think or speak of things under a greater disparity? And if so, will reason allow that there should be any contention where there can be no proportion? He has done whatsoever pleased him both in heaven and earth, Psal. cxxxv. 6. As soon as his will gives the word, his power executes. No god can deliver as he can, says Nebuchadnezzar, Dan. iii. 29; nor can any one destroy as he can, says our Saviour, Matth.

x. 28. He gives away kingdoms and empires, disposes of crowns and sceptres, with the breath of his mouth. And after all this, can a pitiful piece of animated dirt be fit to quarrel and expostulate with a power infinitely greater than his very thoughts, and therefore certainly in no degree to be matched by his strengths? But to what purpose is it thus to argue or dispute the matter? to light a candle to the sun? or with much ado to prove a finite no ways equal to an infinite? For that in effect is the thing now before us; while we are disputing, whether a man may contest with, or ought to submit to his Maker; and whether he should be permitted to talk high and loud, who can do nothing; and to be still upon the offending part, who is wholly unable to defend himself. A man so behaving himself is nothing else but weakness and nakedness, setting itself in battle-array against omnipotence; an handful of dust and ashes, sending a challenge to all the host of heaven. For what else are words and talk against thunderbolts? and the weak, empty noise of a querulous rage, against him who can speak worlds, who could word heaven and earth out of nothing, and can when he pleases word them into nothing again?

What can we utter or express greater of the vast distance between God and man, than by a kind of tautology to say, that God is God, and man is man! For it is certain that the first can have no predicate but himself; since he that is pure act, and perfect simplicity, can be said to be nothing, but by an identical repetition; in which both predicate and subject are no more than one and the same thing set forth in two several words: an evident