why the human character is formed for a future state by previous discipline in this.

Again: should it be alleged, that if the object of man's residence on earth is to form and prove the character, in preparation for another state, this world, so full of confusion and wickedness, is ill adapted to serve for such a preparation; the objection must be refuted by an appeal to our own practical experience, in a case remarkably similar. For who would not believe, previous to experience, that the same argument was applicable to the early stages of the earthly existence of mankind? In this outset of life, the helplessness of infancy is succeeded by the perverse waywardness of childhood; childhood is succeeded by the headstrong passions and follies of youth; and the process of education exhibits a continual conflict of indolence against exertion, of licentiousness against discipline, and extravagance against reason. Yet in the midst of this apparent lawlessness and confusion, the character is formed, and the individual is matured, and enters upon the duties of a more advanced period of his existence; which he dis

charges well or ill, and with good or bad consequences to himself, according to the use he has made of his early life and education. To this order of things the whole of man's preparatory state bears a striking analogy. He is prone to error; he is assaulted by temptation; he is hindered by his own weakness, and impeded by obstacles thrown in his way by others; he is urged and agitated by contrary passions, conflicting wishes, fears, and desires. And it is in this tumultuous scene that the moral character expands, and is decided to good or evil; and ultimately takes its place among the innumerable gradations which form the connecting chain between the best and the worst of the human race.

In fact, the very viciousness of the world renders it a state of virtuous discipline, in the degree it is, to good men; and so highly exalts the dignity of those who subject their rebellious nature to the guidance of reason or superior obligation, and look beyond the business or concerns of the present state towards that final destination, of which this world is only the entrance. For, in proportion as the dross

is impure, the metal is refined; and if the admission of evil into the system sinks a vast multitude to a very low state of degradation, it raises the character of virtue to an elevation, which a state affording no temptation or opportunity of failure could never have attained. A being, before whom the views of his real interest had been always so clearly displayed, as to render it morally impossible that he should swerve from them, would not appear so fit a subject of reward, as one conscious of his free agency, sensible of opposite desires, swayed by alternate interests, with passion to impel and reason to direct him. A man thus struggling against the vicious habits with which he is surrounded, is worthier of celestial spectators, than the great admiration of former ages, the man struggling against misfortunes. It is a sufficient justification of the phænomena of the moral world, that the established system of things exhibits such spectacles, and raises man to so sublime a height, superior to the suggestions of the depraved part of his nature, and to the tyranny of bad example. And it must not be omitted, in conclusion, that the obvious effect

of such a state as Revelation represents the life of man to be, is to introduce, in the person who acts up to the faith and precepts of Revelation, that sort of connexion between man and his Creator, of dependence and obedience on the side of man, and of regard and assistance on the part of God, which we conceive will be renewed and perfected in the life to come.

CHAPTER IV.

On the Existence of natural Evils, and those of civil Life.

IF

F we turn from the moral to the natural state of man, we find on that side also a body of evil, which is seized upon as a strong hold by the opponents of the goodness of the Deity. The extent, indeed, of these evils is differently estimated, according, it would seem, to the natural temperament of the person who contemplates them. While Dr. Paley, whose writings bear strong testimony to his sanguine and cheerful mind, maintains that they hold no proportion to the mass of human enjoyment*; another eye sees through another medium, and at once the picture is reversed. "There is no day nor hour," it is

*Paley's Nat. Theol. p. 499. "It is a happy world, after all. The air, the earth, the water, teem with delighted existence. In a spring noon, or a summer evening, on whichever side I turn my eyes, myriads of happy beings crowd upon my view."

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