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that we should be happy in one another, and therefore there must be a change either in God or us, to bring about this likeness. The nature of God is inflexible, fixed and unchangeable; therefore change thyself, sinner, and endeavour to be like God; for since he cannot depart from his holiness and purity, thou must leave thy sins, and be holy as he is holy, if ever thou hopest to be happy, as he is: Every man that hath this hope in him, must purify himSelf, even as he is pure.

Now to this happy and only Potentate, King of kings, and Lord of lords, who only hath immortality, and dwelleth in that light which no man can approach unto, whom no man hath seen, or can fee; to him be honour and power everlasting. Amen.

Do not err, my beloved brethren: Every good gift, and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, nor shadow of turning.

T

HE connexion and dependence of these words upon the former is briefly this; the Apostle had asserted before, that God is not the author of fin and evil, ver. 13, 14. Let no man say, when he is tempted, I am tempted of God; for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man: but every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed: And here in the text he afferts, that God is the fountain and author of all good; Do not err, my beloved brethren; as if he had faid, do not mistake me, though sin and evil be not from God, but from ourselves, and our own corrupt hearts; yet all good is from God, and not from ourselves: though we be the authors of the fins we commit, yet we are not so of the good that we do, that is from God; Every good gift, and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights. Sin, which is nothing but evil and imperfection, is not from God, but wholly from ourselves; whatever is good and perfect, is not from ourselves, but from God; we are neither inclined to that which is good, nor are able of ourselves to perform it; both the inclination and the power are from God, who is the fountain of goodness and perfection, and can never be otherwise, and can never change nor cease to be fo; for with him is no variableness, nor shadow of turning.

Every good gift, and every perfect gift; all that goodness, and all those degrees of perfection, which are in the creatures, in the highest Angels or faints, in the best of the fons of men, whatever there is of excellency and perfection, of goodness or happiness in

any of them, is from above, that is from heaven; it is the gift of God, and cometh down from that perfect, good and glorious Being, whom the Apostle here calls the Father of lights; in allusion to the fun, which is a kind of universal benefactor to the world, and liberally dispenseth his light and heat and influence upon all things here below: but then there is this difference, the fun changeth its habitudes and positions in reference to us, and varies its shadows; it riseth and sets, comes nearer to us, and goes farther from us; but it is otherwise with this intellectual and immaterial Sun, the Father of lights, with whom there is no variableness, nor shadow of turning, παραλλαγὴ ἢ τροπῆς ἀποσκίασμα, which are all astronomical

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nomical words; the first, παραλλαγή, fignifies the various habitudes and positions wherein the fun appears to us every day, at its rifing, in the meridian, and when it fets; τροπή is a word which belongs not to the daily, but to the yearly course of the fun, which is nearer to us, or farther from us, as he approacheth nearer towards the northern or fouthern tropicks; and hence it is that it casts several shadows to people in several countries; and agreeably to this, the word ἀποσκίασμα, cafting of shadows, being joined with τροπή, signifies the variation of the shadows according to the course and motion of the

fun.

But God is an eternal spring of light, which never rifeth nor fets, which hath no mixture of shadow nor darkness, hath no changes nor variations, but is always the fame free and liberal dispenser of good things to his creatures; the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, nor shadow of turning; which words fignify the immutable perfection and goodness of the divine nature; which thall (by God's assistance) be the subject of my present difcourse; in which I shall proceed in this method :

First, I shall briefly explain what is meant by the immutability, or unchangeableness of the divine na

ture.

Secondly, I shall shew that this is a perfection efsential to God, to be immutably what he is, that is, good and perfect.

Thirdly, I shall answer an objection which lies against it, from the mention so often made in scripture of God's repenting himself. And,

Fourthly, Apply the confideration of it to ourselves. I. For the explication of it. By the immutability of God, we mean, that he always is, and was, and to all eternity will be the same; that he undergoes no changes either of his effence and being, or of his properties and perfections. In reference to the unchangeableness of his being, he is faid to be eternal, âncorruptible, and only to have immortality. In re ference to his perfections, he is always the same infinitely wife, and good, and powerful, and holy,

and

and just being; from whence it follows, that he is constant and immutable in all his decrees and counsels, his purposes and promises. We are uncertain and mutable in our very nature and beings, and in all those qualities and perfections which belong to us, in all our purposes, resolutions and actions; we are continually growing or decreasing in this or that quality, and do frequently change from one extreme to another, from that which is more perfect, to the contrary; now knowing, and then ignorant; sometimes wife, and oftner foolish, stronger and weaker, better or worse, as it happens, and as we order ourselves, continually waxing or waining in our knowledge, and wisdom, and goodness, and power; we frequently change our minds, and alter our purposes, and break our promises, and contradict our firmest and most serious resolutions, and speak a thing and do it not, say it, and do not bring it to pass; but God is everlastingly the same in all his perfections, constant to his intentions, steady to his purposes, immutably fixed and persevering in all his decrees and resolutions. I proceed

to the

Second thing I proposed, namely, to shew that this perfection is essential to God, to be unchangeably what he is. And this I shall endeavour to make manifest both from natural reason, and from the divine revelation of the holy scriptures.

1. From the dictates of natural reason, which tell us, that nothing argues greater weakness and imperfection than inconstancy and change. This is the great vanity of all creatures, that they are uncertain, and do not long continue in one state; this is the vanity of the world in general, that the fashion of it passeth away; and of man in particular, that he is liable to fo many natural changes, by age, and difeases, and death; for which reason, he is said by the Pfalmist, to be, in his best estate, altogether vanity; and that he is liable to so many moral changes, to be deluded and deceived in his understanding, and to alter his opinion so often, to be so fickle in his, will, and to change so often his purposes and refolutions,

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lutions, according to the alteration or appearance of things. We attribute change and inconstancy to persons of the weakest age and understanding; as children, who are liable to be toffed to and fro, and carried about with every wind, as the Apostle speaks, Eph. iv. 14.

Now if the divine nature were subject to change, this would cast an universal cloud upon all the divine perfections, and obfcure all other excellencies, and make them like the flower of the field, which, how gay and glorious soever, is fading and perishing; and the greater the divine perfections are, the greater imperfection would mutability be; for as the corruption of the best things is the worst, so the better any thing is, so much the worse it would be to have it liable to corruption and change.

And as mutability in God would darken all his other perfections, so would it take away the foundation and comfort of all religion; the ground of our faith, and hope, and fear, of our love and esteem of God, would be quite taken away. We could have no great honour or esteem for a being that is fickle and inconstant; if his power and justice were uncertain, his threatenings would in a great measure lose their awe and force; if his truth and faithfulness could fail, no promises and declarations, how gracious foever, would be any security, or firm ground of trust and confidence.

And this reasoning is not the result of divine revelation, but clearly founded in the natural notions and suggestions of our minds, as will appear by citing one or two testimonies to this purpose, of those who had no other guide but natural light. Plato, in his Phadrus, enquires, "Whether the most "perfect (that is God) be always the fame, or fome" times, thus, and sometimes otherwise ? that is, (faith he) Whether that which is equality and goodness and bounty itself, receives any the least change at any time, and be not conftant and u"niform, and of itself always the same, Kai daun « ἐδαμῶς ἀλλόωσιν ἐδεμίαν ἐκλέχεται, and is ne"ver in any wife, upon any account, subject to any change

"