Edwards never doubted that God's end is himself. Since true virtue consists in benevolence to being and “complacence” or delight in moral excellence, and since God is the “chief part” of being and the fount of all excellence, a truly virtuous agent “must necessarily have a supreme love to God, both of benevolence and complacence” (True Virtue, 1765; Edwards 1957–, vol. 8, 551). It follows that God's rectitude and holiness “chiefly consists in a respect or regard to himself, infinitely above his