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| God's Love for the Flesh of Man, as Developed in the Grace of Christ Towards It. The Flesh the Best Means of Displaying the Bounty and Power of God.
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Chapter
IX.—God’s Love for the Flesh of Man, as Developed in the
Grace of Christ Towards It. The Flesh the Best Means of Displaying the
Bounty and Power of God.
To recapitulate, then: Shall that very flesh,
which the Divine Creator formed with His own hands in the image of God;
which He animated with His own afflatus, after the likeness of
His own vital vigour; which He set over all the works of His hand, to
dwell amongst, to enjoy, and to rule them; which He clothed with His
sacraments and His instructions; whose purity He loves, whose
mortifications He
approves; whose sufferings for Himself He deems precious;—(shall
that flesh, I say), so often brought near to God, not rise again?
God forbid, God forbid, (I repeat), that He should abandon to
everlasting destruction the labour of His own hands, the care of His
own thoughts, the receptacle of His own Spirit,7343
the queen of His creation, the inheritor of His own liberality, the
priestess of His religion, the champion of His testimony, the sister of
His Christ! We know by experience the goodness of God; from His Christ
we learn that He is the only God, and the very good. Now, as He
requires from us love to our neighbour after love to Himself,7344
so He will Himself do that which He has
commanded. He will love the flesh which is, so very closely and in so
many ways, His neighbour—(He will love it), although infirm,
since His strength is made perfect in weakness;7345
although disordered, since “they that are whole need not the
physician, but they that are sick;”7346
although not honourable, since “we bestow more abundant honour
upon the less honourable members;”7347
although ruined, since He says, “I am come to save that which was
lost;”7348
although sinful,
since He says, “I desire rather the salvation of the sinner than
his death;”7349
although condemned,
for says He, “I shall wound, and also heal.”7350
Why reproach the flesh with those conditions
which wait for God, which hope in God, which receive honour from God,
which He succours? I venture to declare, that if such casualties as
these had never befallen the flesh, the bounty, the grace, the mercy,
(and indeed) all the beneficent power of God, would have had no
opportunity to work.7351
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