exercised about that which is most suitable to them; when they are not only determined to such objects as are most agreeable to their natures, but do also act upon and exert themselves towards them with the greatest sprightliness and vigour.

These things I thought meet to premise concerning happiness in the general, as being very needful to the clearer resolution of the present inquiry, viz. wherein consists the heaven or happiness of a man. In short therefore, the proper heaven and happiness of a man, considered as a rational being, consists in the constant, free, and sprightful exercise of his faculties about such objects as are most convenient to his rational nature, which consisting wholly of understanding and will, that is, of a faculty of knowing, and a faculty of choosing, the most suitable objects of it are such, as are most worthy to be known, and most worthy to be chosen. When therefore the understanding is always vigorously exercised in seeing and contemplating the most glorious and excellent truths, and the will is always vigorously employed in choosing and embracing the most desirable goods, then is the whole rational nature happy. Now if you cast abroad your thoughts over the whole extent of being, you will presently find that there is nothing in it so worthy to be known and chosen as God, whose power being the source and fountain of all truth, that is, of all that either is or is possible, and whose nature being the subject of all rational perfection, wherein it originally resides, and from whence it is derived to all the rational creation; you must upon these accounts necessarily allow him to be infinitely the most worthy object in all the world of beings, for our understanding to contemplate,

and our will to choose. And if so, then the very life and quintessence of the heaven of a man, considered as a reasonable being, must needs consist in a close and intimate knowledge of God, and a free and uncontroverted choice of him.

But that we may more fully comprehend the nature of this happiness, it will be needful that we should more distinctly explain what these two essential acts of it do import, and what happiness is included in them. And,

I. The happiness of a man consists in a free and intimate knowledge of God. For our understanding hath naturally as strong an appetite to truth, as our stomach hath to food, and as grateful a relish of it, when it hath once discovered it, as an hungry man hath of a pleasant morsel. And though in this life its appetite is many times palled and deadened, partly through the difficulty of knowing, occasioned either by the natural indispositions of its organs, or the inveterate prejudices of a bad education; and partly by being continually employed in secular cares and pursuits, which do perpetually divert, and so by degrees wean it from its natural inclination to truth: yet when we go from this world, and leave these causes behind us, which give such a check to its appetite, doubtless its hunger after knowledge will immediately revive, and there will be no possibility of ever satisfying it without it.

Suppose we then the future world to be inhabited with a company of intellectual beings, that do all most vehemently gasp after the knowledge of truth : what can there be imagined more grateful to them, than to be admitted to the very fountain of all truth and reality, there to quench their thirst, and satisfy

their infinite desires, with the free and easy, but still fresh discoveries of his infinite glories and perfections? Where will they be able to fix their greedy eyes with comparably that pleasure and delight, as upon the mysterious Triune Divinity, which is the eternal author of all being, the root of all good, and the rule and source of all perfections? But then supposing, what is the case of these blessed contemplators, that their minds are so raised, and their apprehensions are rendered so unspeakably quick and sagacious, as that they can all know whatsoever they have a mind to, without the difficulty of study; and presently discern the dependence and connexion of things, without any puzzling discourse, or laborious deduction with what incomparable satisfaction must they needs peruse that infinite volume of the divine being and perfections?

Now that in that blessed state they have unspeakably clearer and more perspicuous apprehensions of things than ever they had here, that noble passage of St. Paul assures us, 1 Cor. xiii. 12. For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face : now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known: that is, now our knowledge of divine things is very obscure and imperfect, they being shewn us, as it were, through a glass, on purpose to give us but a glimpse of them; but when we come to heaven, we shall look close upon them, and have a far clearer and more distinct apprehension of them. Then we shall know God as truly as he knows us, and have as real and certain apprehensions of his all-glorious being, as he hath of ours. So that in heaven, you see, the eyes of those blessed minds that inhabit it are so invigorated, that they

can gaze upon the sun without dazzling; contemplate the pure and immaculate glories of the Deity without being confounded with their brightness; and their understanding being thus exalted, they must needs apprehend more at one single view, than we can do in volumes of discourse, and tedious long trains of deduction.

And then enjoying, as they do, a most perfect repose, both from within and without them, they are never disturbed in their eager contemplations; which having such a vast horizon of truth and glory round about them, are still discovering farther and farther, and so continually entertained with fresh wonders and delights. What an infinite deal of pleasure then must that all-glorious object afford to such raised and elevated minds, which, like transparent windows, let in, without any labour or difficulty, all that divine and heavenly light which freely offers itself unto, and shines for ever round about them; and which, by every new discovery of God, and of these bottomless secrets and mysteries of his nature, are still enlarged to discover more, and still have new discoveries offering themselves, as fast as they are enlarged to receive them. This, of itself, is so great a part of heaven, that St. John himself seems to be at a loss how to imagine any heaven beyond it, 1 John iii. 2. Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him, that is, in glory and happiness, for we shall see him as he is. But then,

II. The heaven or happiness of a man consists also in a free and undistracted choice of God; that is, in choosing him for the rule and pattern of our

natures, and for the object of our love, adoration, and dependence; all which (as I shall shew hereafter) are beatifical acts, and do abundantly contribute to the happiness of reasonable creatures. For happiness (as hath been premised) consists not in rest, but in motion; and there is no motion can contribute to the happiness of any being, but what is suitable to its own nature. Now, what motion can be more suitable to the nature of a reasonable creature, than to love and adore the author of its being and wellbeing; to bow to the will of the Almighty Sovereign; and to imitate the perfections of the supreme standard and pattern of all reasonable beings ; to rely and depend on his infinite power, that is always conducted by his infinite wisdom and goodness; all which are founded upon so many strong, evident, and undeniable reasons, that the very naming of them is sufficient to justify them to our faculties, and demonstrate them to be infinitely agreeable to the most fundamental principles of our reasonable nature. And being so, it is impossible but that of themselves they should be exceeding joyous and blissful for as the sensitive nature is most gratified with those acts that have most of sense in them, so is the rational with those that have most of reason in them. And certainly those have most reason in them, which are terminated upon objects which most deserve them; and what objects can so well deserve to be acted upon by reasonable beings, as God? Or what acts can they so reasonably exert upon him, as those of love and adoration, homage and imitation, trust and dependence? But as no acts of sense can be very grateful to our sensitive nature, so long as we exert them either with re