XXVIII. Who, against hope, believed in hope.- WE have here in appearance, a kind of con tradiction. The mind of Abraham, the father of the faithful, is represented, at the same time, as hoping, and yet abandoning that hope.-But this is a very natural picture of the human mind. Where hope has a great object in view, there will always be fear. If not fear, there will always however be that sort of timorous fluctuation, which distinguishes hope from assurance. It is thus in worldly affairs. When a great good is expected, but not yet possessed, there will always be an apprehension of losing it. It is thus too with every good man, who views the christian dispensation as he ought.When he contemplates the scheme of man's redemption in all its vastness-the wonderful means employed, and the immensity of the views it opens-he recoils at his own insignificance; and thinks it against hope to believe, that such a creature as he feels himself, can ever be the object of such divine beneficence. On the other hand, when he considers the love of God to man in his creation, which could have no end, but man's happiness-when he considers, that the very act of his creation is an assurance of God's future protection-when he reflects on the numerous promises of the gospel, of the truth of which he is clearly convinced by abundant evidence-his diffidence vanishes, and he cannot help, in the language of the text, against hope, believing in hope. 44 XXIX. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind; and thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.-Matthew, xxii. 37. 39. THE strength of these expressions hath led some religious people to make themselves very unhappy at the thoughts of their own deficiencies. They cannot, they conceive, arrive at that height of divine love, which is here prescribed. It hath led others into a contrary extreme. We sometimes meet with very exceptionable language on this subject-luscious expressions of love applied to Christ-and prayers to God, which might be transposed into addresses to a mistress #. In * "It is many years since I read WATTS on the love of "God. His treatises, hymns, &c. on that subject, do not "suit me. He is too much of an enamorato. I do not love "fulsome, luscious divinity. And the Doctor himself allow"ed (in his preface to Mrs. Rowe's Devout Exercises) that many of his composures, in the younger part of his life, were "of that kind, which his maturer judgment disapproved. The "passions should be consecrated to God, and it is desirable our devotion, and love to him, should be fervent; but as "there DD 4 In the same way love to our neighbour hath often gone astray, and formed a criminal connection with carnal love. The ancient christians fell under an early stigma of this kind from their love-feasts, and kiss of charity; which growing into offence, was therefore laid aside.-Modern. enthusiasts also have often been taxed, with carrying their love into the same vicious extreme. These considerations afford sufficient ground for inquiring into the nature of the love both of God and man, "there is so much of the animal in, them, too much stress. "must not be laid upon them." ORTON'S LETTERS to a young Clergyman, p. 109. "To keep God's commandments," says the pious Dr. DODDRIDGE," rather than any of those passionate transports of the mind, on which some are ready to lay so great a stress, is the perfection of love to God." See his improvement on the 2d chap. of 1 JOHN. The addresses of the papists to the Virgin Mary abound with fulsome and passionate expressions of love. She is always represented as a most beautiful woman; and the idea is commonly blended in their devotions. Jesus is represented as a child, and God the father as an old man, both of whom in popish missals are comparatively little esteemed. The same fulsome expressions I have sometimes observed in the devotions of our enthusiasts to Christ. What What is commonly called love, may be defined, a passion acting involuntarily in favour of a pleasing object-often against reason-never in consultation with it. The gratification indeed of this passion may afterwards be subject to the discussion of reason: but our present inquiry goes only to the passion itself. The term has sometimes a larger acceptation. A son loves his parent-a servant loves his master a soldier his officer-and a person who has received benefits, his benefactor. But if we analize this species of love, we shall find it very different from the other. The first respects chiefly the pleasing form; when it respects the moral qualities, it so far becomes esteem.- -But in the other species of love all is moral. It consists chiefly in an admiration of some striking quality -in a sense of gratitude-in a firm trust, reliance, and dependance-that is, we shall find in ⚫it rather what may be called the rational part of love, than the mere passion. Now this seems to be the general idea of the love of God. It is founded on a high admiration of his perfections, which produces adoration and praise on a firm belief in his goodness and promises, which produces trust and dependance→→→→ and in a strong sense of gratitude, which pro duces |