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nearer that relation is, and the stricter the union, so much the more does it prevail for the acceptance of the person, or the object of respect, for the sake of him to whom he is united; or, in other words, the union, by how much greater and closer it is, by so much more it is a ground of his being accepted, as if he were one with the other, or of the other's being substituted for him, and his merit's being imputed in a greater degree, and more, as if he were the same.

4. If there be any such thing as a union of a person to another, as, for instance, a patron to a client, in such a certain degree, or in such a manner as, that on the account of the degree and manner, it shall be peculiarly fit to look upon them as completely one and the same, as to all that concerns the interest of the client, with relation to the regard of the friend of the patron; then especially may the patron be taken by his friend as the substitute of the client, and his merit be imputed to him.

If it be inquired, what degree or manner of union may be looked upon thus complete :-I answer, When the patron's heart is so united to the client, that when the client is to be destroyed, he, from love, is willing to take his destruction on himself, or what is equivalent thereto, so that the client may escape; then he may be properly accepted as perfectly one with regard to the interest of the client; for this reason, that his love to the client is such as thoroughly puts him into the place of the client in all that concerns his interest, even so as to absorb or swallow up his whole interest: because his love actually puts him in the room of the beloved, in that suffering or calamity which, being his total destruction, does swallow up and consume all his interest, without leaving the least part of it. Therefore, love that will take that destruction, evidently takes in his whole interest. It appears to be an equal balance for it. His love puts him thoroughly in his client's stead. If his love were such as made him willing to put himself in the other's stead, in many cases where his interest was concerned, but yet not in a case where all is concerned, the union is not complete; he is partially, and not thoroughly, united. But when the love of the patron is such as to go through with the matter, and makes him willing to put himself in the other's stead, even in the case of the last extremity, and where the beloved is to be utterly and perfectly destroyed; then he is, as to his love, sufficiently united, so as to be accepted as completely one by his friend, in all that concerns the client's welfare.

5. If a friend that is very dear to any person, and of great merit in the eyes of any person, not only stands in a strict union with another, but also does particularly express a great desire of that other's welfare, and appears much to seek it; it is agreeable to nature, that the welfare of the person united to him should be regarded for his sake, and on his account, as if it were his own welfare. For, by means of this desire of the other's welfare,

his welfare becomes his own. For that good which any one desires, sets his heart upon, and seeks, thereby becomes his own good: it becomes a good that is grateful to him, or which tends to gratify and delight him: for it is grateful to all to have their desires gratified.

In such a case, the dear and worthy person makes the other's interest his own by his explicit choice; by his own act he places his interest in the interest of the other, and so substitutes himself in the other's stead, as to the affair of interest or welfare.

And the greater that desire appears, the more earnestly he seeks the other's welfare, and the greater things he does to obtain it; so much the more does his interest become his own, and so much the more does he substitute himself in the room of the other.

6. Especially is the client's welfare properly and naturally regarded, for the sake of the patron that is very dear and worthy in the eyes of any person, when the way in which the patron expresses the desire of the client's welfare, that he is closely united to, and in which he seeks it, is by suffering and being at expense of his own personal and private welfare in any degree, for the welfare of the client. Expending one's good or interest for another, is properly transferring the interest in the good expended, into the good sought: the expended good, which is the means, is properly set aside and removed, in the regard of him that is at the expense, and whose regard is placed on that good which is the end. The good of the price is parted with, for the good of the thing purchased; and therefore, here is proper substitution of one in the place of the other.

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In such a case therefore, in a more special manner, will it be proper and natural for one in whose eyes the patron is very worthy, and to whom he is very dear, to have regard to the welfare of the client for the patron's sake, or for the sake of the tron's merit: as, suppose the client of the excellent and dear patron be a child or spouse in captivity, and the patron lays out himself exceedingly for the client's redemption, and goes through many and very great hardships, and is at vast expense for the obtaining of it.

7. If the patron who seeks the welfare of the client, in his seeking of it, does particularly and directly apply himself to the person who has so high an esteem and affection for him, expressing his desires of the client's welfare in request to him, and the endeavours that are used with him, and what is expended for the client's welfare be given to him, expended for him, for his sake, promoting his ends, or for something that his friend regards as his own interest; then especially is it natural that the person, of whom his client's welfare is sought, should be ready to grant it for his sake.

8. It is still more highly proper and natural to regard the client's welfare on account of the patron's merit, or to reckon the

merit of the patron to his client's account; if the merit of the patron consists, or especially appears in what he does for his client's welfare; or if the virtues and worthy qualities have their chief exercise, and do chiefly exhibit their amiableness in those excellent and amiable acts which he performs in seeking the good of the client, in the deeds he performs on the account of the interest of the client, and in his applying to his friends for it; in the acts he performs as an intercessor with his friend for it, and the service he does him on this account. In this case, it is peculiarly natural to accept the client, on the account of the merit of the patron for the merit is on his account, and has its existence for the sake of the client.

9. More especially is it natural, when his merit, above all, consists and appears in the very expense the patron is at of his own welfare, for the welfare of the client, or in the act of expending or exchanging the one for the other. For, as was observed before, such expense is properly regarded as a price of the client's welfare; but when such merit is added to the price, this merit becomes the worth, value, or preciousness of the price; preciousness of another kind, besides merely the value of the natural good parted with. It adds a moral good to the price, equal to the natural good expended; so that the worthiness of the patron, and the value expended are offered both together in one, as the price of the welfare of the client.

10. The thus accepting the patron's merit, as being placed to the account of the client, will be more natural still, if the patron puts himself in the place of that client, undertaking to appear for him, to represent him, and act in his stead by an exceeding great change in his circumstances, clothes himself with the form of his client, goes where he is, takes, his place in the universe, puts himself into his circumstances, and is in all things made like unto him, wherein this may be consistent with maintaining his merit inviolable. If the client be unworthy, and an offender, and has deserved ill of the person whose favour he needs, then abating and dismissing resentment, or lessening or withholding the evil deserved, for the sake of the merit of the patron, is equivalent to a positive favour for his sake, in case of no offence and demerit of punishment.

11. If the person that needs favour be an offender and unworthy, then, in order to a proper influence and effect of the union and merit of a patron, to induce his friend to receive him into favour on his account, the union of the patron with his client, and his undertaking and appearing as his patron to seek favour for him, should be in such a manner, and attended with such circumstances, as not to diminish his merit, i. e. so as that his union with, and intercession for the client, shall not in the least infringe on these two things, viz. the patron's own union with his friend, whose favour he seeks for the client, and his merit

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strictly so called, i. e. his own virtue. For if his own worthiness be diminished, by his union with one that is unworthy, then his influence to recommend the client one way, is destroyed one way, at the same time that it is established another. For the recommending influence consists in the two things, viz. his merit, and his union with the client. Therefore, if one of these is diminished or destroyed, as the other is advanced and established; nothing is done on the whole toward recommending the client. Therefore, in order that, on the whole, the client be effectually recommended, it is necessary that the patron's union to an offending unworthy client should be attended with such circumstances, that it shall not be at all consistent with these two things, his regard to his friend, and his regard to virtue or holiness for in these two things consists his merit in the eyes of his friend; and therefore it is necessary, that his appearing united to his unworthy and offending client should be with such circumstances as most plainly to demonstrate, that he perfectly disapproves of his offence and unworthiness, and to show a perfect regard to virtue, and to the honour and dignity of his offended injured friend. There is no way that this can be so thoroughly and fully done, as by undertaking himself to pay the debt to the honour and rights of his injured friend, and to honour the rule of virtue and righteousness the client has violated, by putting himself in the stead of the offender, into subjection to the injured rights and violated authority of his offended friend, and under the violated law and rule of righteousness belonging to one in the client's state; and so, for the sake of the honour of his friend's authority, and the rule of righteousness, suffering the whole penalty due to the offender, and which would bave been requisite to be suffered by him, for the maintaining the honour and dignity of those things; and himself, by such great condescension, and under such selfdenial, honouring those rights and rules by his obedience and pertect conformity to them; hereby giving the most evident testimony to all beholders, that although he loves his client and seeks his welfare, yet he had rather be humbled so low, deny himself so greatly, and suffer so much, than that his welfare should be in the least diminished, his authority weakened, and his honour and his dignity degraded.

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12. If the patron be, in the eyes of him whose favour is sought, of very great dignity, it is agreeable to reason and nature that this should have influence to procure greater favour to the client than if he were of less dignity. And when it is inquired, whether there be a sufficiency in the patron and his relation to his client, to answer such a degree of favour as is proposed to be obtained for him; the dignity of the patron is one thing that is to be estimated and put into the scales, with the degree of favour sought, in order to know whether it be sufficient to countervail it. By dignity, I here intend, not only the degree of virtue and rela

tion to his friend, of whom he seeks favour, but the greatness of the person of the patron.

If, in adjusting this matter, the dignity that is viewed in the patron and his friend's regard to him, be so great, that, considered with the degree of the patron's union with his client, there is a sufficiency to countervail all the favour that the client needs, or the utmost that he is capable of receiving, then there is a perfect sufficiency in the patron for the client, or a sufficiency completely to answer and support the whole interest of the client; or a sufficiency in his friend's regard to the patron, wholly to receive, take in, and comprehend the client, with regard to his whole interest, or all that pertains to his welfare; or, which is the same thing, a sufficiency fully to answer for him as his representative and substitute, in all that pertains to his welfare.

13. If the patron and client are equals as to greatness of being or degree of existence, and the degree of the patron's union with his client should be such (and that were possible) that he regarded the interest of the client equally with his own personal interest; then it would be natural for the patron's friend to regard the client's welfare for the sake of the patron, as much as he regards the patron's own personal welfare: because, when the case is so, the patron is as strictly united to the client as he is to himself, and his client's welfare becomes perfectly, and to all intents and purposes, his own interest, as much as his personal welfare; and therefore as the love of his friend to him disposes him to regard whatever is his interest, to such a degree as it is his interest; so it must dispose him to regard the client's welfare in an equal degree with his own personal interest; because, by the supposition, it is his interest in an equal degree. But this must be here provided or supposed, viz: not only that so strict a union of the patron and client be possible, but also that it be proper, or that there be no impropriety or unfitness in it because if it be unfit, then the patron's being so strictly united to him, diminishes his merit; because merit, at least in part, consists in a regard to what is proper and fit; and if the degree of union be unfit, it diminishes the influence of that union to recommend the client one way, as much as it increases it another.

14. If the patron and client are not equals, but the patron be greater and vastly superior as to rank and degree of existence, it gives greater weight to his union, as to its influence with the friend of the patron, to recommend the client; so that a less degree of union of the patron with the client may be equivalent to a greater union, in case of equality. Therefore, in this case, though the union be not so great as that his regard to the client's interest should be equal with his own personal interest, but may be much less, yet his regard to it may be such, that its recommending influence may be equivalent to that which is fully equal in the case of equality of persons; and therefore may be sufficient

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