as ministering to the necessities of the saints, yea, relieving the
distrest in every kind. And hereby innumerable stars will be added to
their eternal crown. Yet again: there will be an abundant reward in
heaven, for suffering as well as for doing, the will of God: "these
light afflictions, which are but for a moment, work out for us a far
more exceeding and eternal weight of glory." Therefore that event,
which occasioned the entrance of suffering into the world, has thereby
occasioned to all the children of God, an increase of glory to all
eternity. For altho the sufferings themselves will be at an end: altho

The pain of life shall then be o'er,
The anguish and distracting care;
The sighing grief shall weep no more;
And sin shall never enter there:--

yet the joys occasioned thereby shall never end, but flow at God's
right hand for evermore.

There is one advantage more that we reap from Adam's fall, which is
not unworthy our attention. Unless in Adam all had died, being in the
loins of their first parent, every descendant of Adam, every child of
man, must have personally answered for himself to God: it seems to
be a necessary consequence of this, that if he had once fallen, once
violated any command of God, there would have been no possibility of
his rising again; there was no help, but he must have perished without
remedy. For that covenant knew not to show mercy: the word was, "The
soul that sinneth, it shall die." Now who would not rather be on the
footing he is now; under a covenant of mercy? Who would wish to hazard
a whole eternity upon one stake? Is it not infinitely more desirable,
to be in a state wherein, tho encompassed with infirmities, yet we