The pretended _absolute independent fitnesses_, or _unfitnesses_ of actions therefore _in themselves_, are vain _abstractions_, and philosophical _jargon_, serving no ends of morality, but only helping people to wrangle and dispute away that sincere obedience to God, which is their only happiness. But to make these imaginary _absolute fitnesses_ the _common law_ both of God and man, is still more extravagant. For if the _circumstances_ of actions give them their _moral nature_, surely God must first be in our circumstances, before that which is a law to us, can be the same law to him. And if a father may require that of a son, which his son, because of his _different state_, cannot require of his brother; surely that which God may require of us, may be as different from that which a father may require of a son, as God is different from a father. Again, if God is as much under a law as we are, then he is as much under authority; for law can no more be without authority, than without a law-giver. And if God and we are under the _same law_, we must be under the _same authority_. * But as God cannot be under any law in common with us his creatures, any more than he can be of the same rank or order with any ♦of us; so neither can he be under any law at all, any more than he can be under any authority at all. ♦ word omitted in text “of” And though God is not to be looked upon as an _arbitrary being_, in the sense of this author, who will not distinguish arbitrary from _humour_ and _caprice_; yet in a true sense of the word, when applied to God, he must be affirmed to be an arbitrary being, that acts only from himself, from his _own will_, and according to his _own pleasure_. And we have no more reason to be afraid to be left to a God without a law, or to be left to his will and pleasure, than to be left under the protection and care of a being, that is all love, and mercy, and goodness. For as the existence of God, as such, necessarily implies the existence of all perfection; so the will of God, as such, necessarily implies the _willing_ every thing, that _all perfection_ can will. And as the existence of God, because it contains all perfection, cannot for that reason have any external cause; so the will of God, because it is _all perfection_, cannot, for that reason, have any external _rule_ or _direction_. But his own will is wisdom, and his wisdom is his will. His goodness is arbitrary, and his arbitrariness is goodness. But this writer does not only thus bring God into this state of law and obligation with us, but makes farther advances in the same kind of errors. _Hence_, says he, _we may contemplate the great dignity of our rational nature, since our reason for |kind|, tho’ not for degree, is of the |same nature| with |that of| God’s._¹ ¹ Page 24.