declining to effectuate that which, speaking analogically, as the scriptures so often do, would be an insulated act in the procedure of the Blessed God, alien from the ordinary tendency and character of his government, and which he would not execute without the greatest reluctance, "his strange work."* But under a very different respect in moral consideration, would come the arbitrary taking away of the natural and necessary consequences of sin. These are not inflictions, but they are events and states of things which follow of themselves, according to the general constitutions of the universe, the laws of intellectual and moral nature; constitutions and laws which are essential to the harmony and well-being of God's entire world. To intercept this course of things, which infinite wisdom and goodness have established, to prevent these effects from ensuing, when their proper causes have already occurred, is not a case of forbearing to act; it is the exact reverse, it is a case of acting. It would be an interference of the Deity to suspend the operation of his own laws, to cut off the connexion between the cause and the effect, to change the course of nature: it would be to work a miracle.

XXII. According to universal experience and observation, and the undeviating testimony of history,† every individual of mankind who is capable of reflection, has just reason to consider himself as a

*Isa. xxviii. 21.

A most comprehensive and affecting picture of the evidence of this fact in the moral state of mankind, is in President Edwards on Original Sin, Part I. Chapter I.

transgressor against the Moral Law of God; and therefore guilty of violating the wise and good order of the universe, cut off from the favour of God, involved in the dreadful consequences of transgression, and deservedly exposed to all the penal sufferings which the justice of the divine government may have seen right to denounce.

That which is shewn by fair evidence to belong to all men, so far as observation can reach, is justly to be considered as belonging to men universally.

XXIII. The testimony of the holy scriptures, of whose divine origin and authority we have previous and decisive evidence, confirms the inference from our own experience and observation; and it asserts, in the plainest terms, the universal sinfulness, guilt, and ruin of mankind.

See

Principal passages containing these assertions are Eph. ii. 1-3. Rom. iii. 9-24. v. 6-10. also the scriptural evidence adduced by Mr. Edwards, Part II.

XXIV. The scriptures also, with equal strength and clearness, affirm the certainty and the tremendous effects of the exercise of God's punitive justice upon mankind as sinners.

See the preceding Discourse on the Sacrifice of Christ, page 14 and 32: and add 1 Sam. ii. 25. Ps. xi. 5, 6. ix. 17. Rom. ii. 2-9. i. 18. 2 Thess. i. 69. Rev. xxii. 15.

XXV. Man being in these awful circumstances, the following appear to be the only possible results.

i. That God, by an act of omnipotence, deprive

him of existence. But this supposition is opposed by two considerations.

1. We have no evidence from experiment, analogy, or revelation, that [God ever has annihilated any being which he had brought into existence, material or spiritual; or that he ever will do so. All known facts in natural history, and all analogies from facts, support the reverse of this supposition.

2. The supposition implies that absolute power might be employed to counteract the demands of justice which would be no other than making arbitrary will or mere force to be superior to the claims of rectitude and wisdom: for it has been shewn (Prop. I.-IV.) that the perfect justice, which is essential to the Deity, is the necessary foundation of his moral government; and (Prop. VIII.) that it requires that sin should be adequately punished.

ii. That the Law of God be altered and abated, either in its requirements of obedience, or in its penal sanctions; or in both respects.

1. This would be a constructive acknowledgment on the part of the Supreme Lawgiver, that he had demanded more of the affections and obedience of his creatures than wisdom and equity warranted, or than he could persist in enforcing: in other terms, that his law had been imprudent and unjust, and that he was obliged to retrace his steps upon discovering their consequences :-suppositions so flagrantly inconsistent with the foreknowledge and the moral attributes of God, that to mention them is sufficient for their rejection.

2. As the demands of the law are nothing more than that justice should be done, any receding from those demands would be so far a legalizing of injustice: that is, it would cause the Being whose essential character is infinite rectitude, to be a promoter of sin, and an accessory to his own wrong and to the disparagement of the whole holy universe.

3. An abrogation of the sanction would amount to this; that, though the moral cause, sin, remained, its proper effects should not follow: which is the same as determining that the reasons of justice, though still existing, should not be acted upon, but that the Deity should interpose, by his omnipotence, to protect and patronize sin.

iii. That the proper effects of sin fall upon the sinner, according to the just and natural course of things.

Dreadful but righteous result!-Yet be it recollected that, in whatever instances this case may be ever realized, God will be displayed to the fullest conviction of all upright beings, to have been throughout holy and just, good and glorious.

But this is the case, to avoid which is the great object of our most serious inquiries. "How can man be just with God?-What shall I do, that I may saved?"

be

iv. That some compensative resource be discovered and carried into effect, by which the salvation of the sinner shall be obtained, in consistency with the honours of the divine government.

And THIS, we gratefully believe, HAS BEEN EFFECTED,

BY THE WISDOM AND HOLINESS OF GOD, TO THE PRAISE OF THE GLORY OF HIS GRACE. To communicate the knowledge and enjoyment of this unspeakable gift, is the chief purpose of divine revelation.

Some presumptions might have been argued, in favour of this cheering hope, from the preservation of the human race and the extensive benignity of providence, more and more unfolded in the discoveries of science and the inventions of art, under the admitted circumstances of human depravity and guilt; from the analogy of numerous blessings communicated to men, by instruments of a mediatorial and remedial kind; and from declarations in the scriptures assuring us of Jehovah's gracious readiness to pardon and save sinners, while the same scriptures as strongly asssure us of his unchangeable holiness and justice.

The positive evidence upon which we are enabled to rest our assurance of this heart-reviving truth, and its connexions with the whole process of raising our nature to its highest moral perfection, it is the object of the other parts of this volume to elucidate. The writer will have the greatest reasons to be thankful and happy, if this end be accomplished.

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Knowing, therefore, the terror of the Lord, we persuade men and we are made manifest unto God. By grace ye are saved, through faith; and this is not of yourselves, it is the gift of God."