ABSTRACT
The affirmation of God's 'perpetual Care' functions as a defence mechanism against non-fulfilment of God's promise of intervention, while the affirmation of God's government of the world functions as a defence mechanism against non-fulfilment of his promise of 'perpetual Care'. Of all the writers on the art of suffering in the seventeenth century, only Nicholas Spinckes in Of trust in God seems consciously to be using his treatise as a vehicle for a defence of God. John Flavel reaffirms the reality of God's special providence towards the saints with reference to the scriptures and to the spiritual and temporal blessings which the saints meet with during the course of their lives. The true good is not material but spiritual good, in the form of union and communion with God in this life and eternal happiness in the next. Popular proof of God's government of the world is based on the historical evidence which is presented in the scriptures.
