liar names, that may hold out to our dull senses what we may expect of
him. Therefore he calls himself a Father, a King, a Husband, a Rock, a
Buckler, and Strong Tower, a Mountain, and whatsoever else they may
represent to our hearts, that which may strengthen them in believing. But
there is no creature so directly attributed to God, as light, none used to
express his very nature and being, as abstracted from these relations, but
this,--"God is light," and Christ takes it to himself--"the light of the
world, and the life of men." The truth is, it hath some excellency in it
above all other visible creatures, that it may fitly carry some
resemblance to him. The scripture calls light his garment, Psal. civ. 2.
And truly it is a more glorious robe of Majesty than all the royal and
imperial robes and garments of state that either angels or men could
contrive. The light is, as it were, a visible appearance of the invisible
God. He hath covered his invisible nature with this glorious garment to
make himself in a manner visible to man. It is true, that light is but, as
it were, a shadow of that inaccessible light, umbra Dei. It is the dark
shadow of God, who is himself infinitely more beautiful and glorious. But
yet, as to us, it hath greater glory and majesty in it than any creature
besides. It is the chief of the works of God, without which the world
would be without form, and void. It is the very beauty of the creation,
that which gives lustre and amiableness to all that is in it, without
which the pleasantest paradise would become a wilderness, and this
beautiful structure, and adorned palace of the world, a loathsome dungeon.
Besides the admirable beauty of it, it hath a wonderful swift conveyance,
throughout the whole world, the upper and lower, in a moment, in the
twinkling of an eye. It is carried from the one end of heaven to the other
in a moment, and who can say by what way the light is parted? Job xxxviii.
24. Moreover it carries alongst with it a beautiful influence, and a
refreshing heat and warmness, which is the very life and subsistence of
all the creatures below. And so, as there is nothing so beautiful, so,
nothing so universally and highly profitable. And to all this, add that
singular property of it, that it is not capable of infection, it is of
such absolute purity, that it can communicate itself to the dunghill, as
well as to the garden, without receiving any mixture from it. In all the
impurities it mee