Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 13
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Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 13
Literature -- Collections
Corol. II. There will be a future state wherein man will have them
according to his capacity. How great a happiness will it be in Heaven
for the saints to enjoy the society of each other, since one may see
so much of the loveliness of Christ in those things which are only
shadows of beings. With what joy are philosophers filled in beholding
the aspectable world. How sweet will it be to behold the proper image
and communications of Christ's excellency in intelligent beings,
having so much of the beauty of Christ upon them as Christians shall
have in heaven. What beautiful and fragrant flowers will those be,
reflecting all the sweetnesses of the Son of God! How will Christ
delight to walk in this garden among those beds of spices, to feed in
the gardens, and to gather lilies!
THE ESSENCE OF TRUE VIRTUE
From 'The Nature of True Virtue,' Chapters i, ii
True virtue most essentially consists in benevolence to being in
general. Or perhaps, to speak more accurately, it is that consent,
propensity, and union of heart to being in general, which is
immediately exercised in a general good-will....
A benevolent propensity of heart to being in general, and a temper or
disposition to love God supremely, are in effect the same thing....
However, every particular exercise of love to a creature may not
_sensibly_ arise from any exercise of love to God, or an explicit
consideration of any similitude, conformity, union or relation to God,
in the creature beloved.
The most proper evidence of love to a created being arising from that
temper of mind wherein consists a supreme propensity of heart to God,
seems to be the agreeableness of the kind and degree of our love to
God's end in our creation, and in the creation of all things, and the
coincidence of the exercises of our love, in their manner, order, and
measure, with the manner in which God himself exercises love to the
creature in the creation and government of the world, and the way in
which God, as the first cause and supreme disposer of all things, has
respect to the creature's happiness in subordination to himself as his
own supreme end. For the true virtue of created beings is doubtless
their highest excellency and their true goodness.... But the true
goodness of a thing must be its agreeableness to its end, or its
fitness to answer the design for which it was made. Therefore they are
good moral agents whose temper of mind or propensity of heart is
agreeable to the end for which God made moral agents....
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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