Page:Sermons preached in the African Protestant Episcopal Church of St. Thomas', Philadelphia.djvu/116

112 of the character of God more proper for the mind to be duly impressed with on an occasion like the present, than the one contained in the text—his forbearing mercy, in connexion with his power and justice. That Jehovah, whose perfections are unlimited, should at any time, in the smallest degree imaginable, be agitated, or disturbed by any inward emotion like mortal man, is impossible. Passion is an attribute that belongs exclusively to imperfect beings, who require some moving principle to excite them to action. But no such necessity can be supposed to exist in the great I AM, without involving the most blasphemous absurdity Hence, those portions of scripture that ascribe anger, wrath, jealousy, or any other passion, to the Deity, are always to be understood in a figurative, not in a literal sense. In every case, it refers to his mode of proceeding, or acting, and not to any inward emotion. As men, when provoked to