Publisher's Synopsis
Excerpt from The Works of Samuel Hopkins, D.D., First Pastor of the Church in Great Barrington, Mass., Afterwards Pastor of the First Congregational Church in Newport, R. I, Vol. 3 of 3: With a Memoir of His Life and Character
I humbly conceive there has been too little attention to the nature of holiness among divines in general, and that a proper and intelligible definition of it is not easily to be found in bodies of divinity or elsewhere. And most of those who think it a very easy matter to tell what holiness is, and that we are all agreed in this, have been contented with a set of words which express no distinct ideas, but leave the thing wholly in the dark. They will perhaps say, God's holiness is his purity. If it is asked, In what does this purity consist? The common answer is, In that which is opposite to all sin, the greatest impurity. We have now got what, I think, is the most com mon definition of holiness. But who is the wiser? This does not help us to any idea of this purity, unless we know what sin is. But this cannot be known so long as we know not What holiness is; for we do not learn what holiness is by first obtaining the idea of sin, but we must first know what holi ness, or, which is the same, what the divine law is, in order to the knowledge of sin.
Some have attempted to tell what holiness is, by saying, It is not properly a distinct attribute of God, but the beauty and glory of all God's moral perfections. But we get no idea by these words till we are told what is this beauty and glory. To say it is holiness is saying nothing, or that which is no better.
Under a conviction of this too general inattention to the nature of holiness - the great defect in the most common descriptions of it - the importance of distinct and clear ideas of it - that the controversies before us turn chiefly upon this, and will be decided the shortest and best way, by determining what holiness is, I present to the public the following inquiry, hoping it may give some light on the subject, and assist such as are willing to inquire into the nature of holiness, as described in divine revelation; and in the light of this, help them to find on which side the truth lies in the present controversies.
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