PART III. ON THE GOODNESS OF THE CREATOR. CHAPTER I. Proofs of a benevolent Design in the Creator, from the Constitution of Mankind. IT is sublimely declared in the Christian Scriptures, that "God is Love." In truth, to figure to ourselves under any other character a Being of infinite wisdom to conceive, and power to execute his designs, would appal the imagination of his dependent creatures. Neither can we find, in reasoning à priori, and from the nature of things, any foundation for believing that the misery rather than the happiness of those dependent creatures can be desired or devised by a Being who cannot possibly be actuated by any of the motives from which we know that injustice proceeds, as ignorance, selfishness, or partiality; and who can have entertained, so far as we are able to discover, no other object in creating man, except the intention of finally communicating a larger proportion of happiness than misery. These are the principles from which is deduced the necessity of justice and benevolence in the Creator. Arguments of this nature will have more or less effect, according to the constitution of the mind to which they are presented. At the same time it must be conceded, that the works of God generally considered, form the best criterion of his intentions; and that, however indisputable the eternal truths may be which render goodness inseparable from power and wisdom, there will still remain a reasonable inquiry, how far the actual appearance of the world justifies this conclusion. And, in point of fact, many, as was before observed, have denied the moral attributes of God, who have deduced his physical attributes from the works of the creation. It is sufficient to instance Lord Bolingbroke, who has declared, that a self-existent Being, the first cause of all things, infinitely powerful and infinitely wise, is the God of natural theology; but he sees no ground for the assertion, that God is just, and good, and righteous, and holy, as well as powerful and wise an assertion which he evidently thinks inconsistent with the admission of evil.* He will not allow, with some of the ancient theists, that love was the first principle of things, and that it determined God to bring his creatures into existence. He argues, that it cannot be said of the moral attributes which we ascribe to the Supreme Being, that they appear, like his wisdom, in his works; nay, he says, "it cannot be disputed, and all sides agree, that many of the phænomena are repugnant to our ideas of justice and goodness." I have selected the terms of the more modern sceptic but his is, in fact, the same objection. * Phil. Works, v. 315, &c. See also Leland, vol. i. 387, &c. Gibbon transfers the remark even to the Hebrew Scriptures: "The moral attributes of Jehovah may not easily be reconciled to the standard of human virtue; his metaphysical qualities are darkly expressed; but each page of the Pentateuch and of the Prophets is an evidence of his power." History, ch. 50. which has been urged ever since the days of Epicurus, who alleged that the existence of evil, whether natural or moral, must either disprove the omnipotence, or prove the malevolence, of the Deity.* Lord Bolingbroke does not fail in severity against those divines who have ventured to assert that God made man only to be happy. Such an assertion, indeed, it is sufficiently evident, cannot be maintained. But it has been made with more attention to the rules of induction than the contrary conclusion of Lord Bolingbroke. It is at least founded on a comprehensive view of the general laws observed * "Deus aut vult tollere mala, et non potest; aut potest et non vult: aut neque vult neque potest; aut et vult et potest. Si vult et non potest, imbecillis est, quod in Deum non redit: si potest et non vult, invidus, quod æque alienum a Deo. Si neque vult neque potest, et invidus et imbecillis est, idoque neque Deus. Si vult et potest, quod solum Lactant. de Ira Dei, Deo convenit; unde ergo sunt mala?" cap. 13. Lactantius's answer is on the principle of King, in his Origin of Evil, that God could have removed the evil, but, in so doing, would have removed more good than evil. in the constitution of the world, though with too much neglect of the exceptions: whereas Lord Bolingbroke requires us to deduce our conclusion respecting the character of the Deity, in defiance of all just argument, not from those general laws, but from the exceptions themselves. It will be necessary, first, to touch very briefly upon the arguments by which it has been shown, beyond the possibility of contradiction, that the general laws of our system evince that regard for the happiness of mankind which we call goodness in the Deity: and I shall then inquire, at more length, how far the exceptions to which objectors refer, may be accounted for without militating against this conclusion. Government, whether divine or human, proposes to itself some special object; keeps some plan in view, in conformity to which those subject to its influence must move; points out some actions to be done, and others to be shunned. Now, human governments employ the agency of terror, and enforce obedience by VOL. II. P |