DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.75271#0089
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And the scenes are answerable to the a61ors; not even the beau-
tiful gate of the temple, nor any part of the frit temple, nor
probably any building in the world had that beauty, and magnisi-
cence as appears in what we see in the carton of healing the cripple.
Athens, and Lystra appear in these cartons to be beyond what we
can suppose they were when Greece was in its utmost glory: even
the place where the apostles were assembled (in the carton of Ana-
nias) is no common room ;.and though the Reps, and rails which
were made on purpose for them for the exercise of their new
function have something expressive of the poverty, and simplicity
of the infant church, the curtain behind, which also is part of the
apostolical equipage, gives a dignity even to that.
It is true there are some charaders which are not to be improved,
as there are others impossible to be perfeHly conceived, much less
expressed. The idea of God no created being can comprehend, the
divine mind only can, and it is the brightest there. And infinitely
bright! and would be judged to be so even by us, though the diffi-
culties arising from the consideration of the moral, and natural evil
which is in the world were not to be solved by the common expe-
dients. I will only venture to say with respe& to the latter, that
this is so far from being an objection to the infinite goodness of God,
that God could not have been infinitely good if he had not produced
an order of beings, in which there was such a mixture of natural
evils as to be just preponderated by the enjoyments, so as upon the
foot of the account to render being elligible, for without this, one
instance of goodness had been omitted.
No statue, or picture; no words can reach this character. The
Colossean statue of Phidias, the pictures of Rafaelle, are but faint
Shadows of this infinite, and incomprehensible Being. The Thun-
derer, the Best, and Greatest: the Father of Gods and Men, of
Homer; the Elohim, the Jehovah, the I Am that I Am of Moses;
the Lord of Hosts of the Prophets : nay the God and Father of our
Lord
And the scenes are answerable to the a61ors; not even the beau-
tiful gate of the temple, nor any part of the frit temple, nor
probably any building in the world had that beauty, and magnisi-
cence as appears in what we see in the carton of healing the cripple.
Athens, and Lystra appear in these cartons to be beyond what we
can suppose they were when Greece was in its utmost glory: even
the place where the apostles were assembled (in the carton of Ana-
nias) is no common room ;.and though the Reps, and rails which
were made on purpose for them for the exercise of their new
function have something expressive of the poverty, and simplicity
of the infant church, the curtain behind, which also is part of the
apostolical equipage, gives a dignity even to that.
It is true there are some charaders which are not to be improved,
as there are others impossible to be perfeHly conceived, much less
expressed. The idea of God no created being can comprehend, the
divine mind only can, and it is the brightest there. And infinitely
bright! and would be judged to be so even by us, though the diffi-
culties arising from the consideration of the moral, and natural evil
which is in the world were not to be solved by the common expe-
dients. I will only venture to say with respe& to the latter, that
this is so far from being an objection to the infinite goodness of God,
that God could not have been infinitely good if he had not produced
an order of beings, in which there was such a mixture of natural
evils as to be just preponderated by the enjoyments, so as upon the
foot of the account to render being elligible, for without this, one
instance of goodness had been omitted.
No statue, or picture; no words can reach this character. The
Colossean statue of Phidias, the pictures of Rafaelle, are but faint
Shadows of this infinite, and incomprehensible Being. The Thun-
derer, the Best, and Greatest: the Father of Gods and Men, of
Homer; the Elohim, the Jehovah, the I Am that I Am of Moses;
the Lord of Hosts of the Prophets : nay the God and Father of our
Lord