power, _holy_ love. And so it is the very
lustre and glory of His other perfections. He is glorious in holiness.'
(Howe in _Whyte's Shorter Catechism_.) This was the aspect of the Divine
Holiness on which Jonathan Edwards delighted to dwell. 'The mutual love
of the Father and the Son makes the third, the personal Holy Spirit, or
the Holiness of God, which is His infinite beauty.' 'By the
communication of God's Holiness the creature partakes of God's moral
excellence, which is perfection, the beauty of the Divine nature.'
'Holiness comprehends all the true moral excellence of intelligent
beings. So the Holiness of God is the same with the moral excellency of
the Divine nature, comprehending all His perfections, His righteousness,
faithfulness, and goodness. There are two kinds of attributes in God,
according to our way of conceiving Him: His _moral_ attributes, which
are summed up in His Holiness, and His _natural_, as strength,
knowledge, etc., which constitute His greatness. Holy persons, in the
exercise of holy affection, love God in the first place for the beauty
of His Holiness.' 'The holiness of an intelligent creature is that which
gives beauty to all his natural perfections. And so it is in God:
holiness is in a peculiar manner the beauty of the Divine being. Hence
we often read of the beauty of holiness (Ps. xxix. 2, xcvi. 9, cx. 3).
This renders all the other attributes glorious and lovely.' 'Therefore,
if the true loveliness of God's perfections arise from the loveliness of
His Holiness, the true love of all His perfections will arise from the
love of His Holiness. And as the beauty of the Divine nature primarily
consists in God's Holiness, so does the beauty of all Divine things.'

6. In speaking of God's Holiness as denoting the essential good, the
absolute excellence of His nature, some press very strongly the
_ethical_ aspect. The good in God must not be from mere natural impulse
only, flowing from the necessity of His nature, without being freely
willed by Himself. 'What is naturally good is not the true realization
of the good. The actual and living will to be the good He is, must also
have its place in God, otherwise God would only be naturally ethical.
Only in the will which consciously determines itself, is there the
possibility given of the ethical. The ethical has such a power in God
that He is the holy Power, who cannot and will not renounce Himself, who
must be, and would be thought to be, the hol