treated as a scene of confusion, in which an unequal contest between reason and passion, between duty and transgression, is constantly carried on, will appear a comprehensive plan of harmony and intelligible design. For reasons of which we are confessedly ignorant, God placed us in a state, not of ultimate perfection, but of preparatory probation. To the formation and developement of human character, which was the object of this probation, the existence of moral evil, and the possibility of falling into it, became necessary. The degree of criminality in which some part of the human race is consequently involved, places the whole race in a situation of so much difficulty, that a total escape from the general contagion is rendered impossible. It follows, therefore, that where the inducements to offend were so powerful, if no provisional remedy had been applied to cases of inferior or repentant offenders, the system might have appeared so far defective, as to be irreconcileable with the belief of the goodness of God, which we derive from other sources, though not contrary to the rules of strict justice. Revelation, however, sets aside this difficulty; and acquaints us, that the appointment of this provisional remedy was coeval with the foundation of the system itself; and that the disorders consequent upon the introduction of moral evil, have been all along accompanied and palliated by a vicarious atonement, which reconciles the forgiveness of man to the perfection of the divine attributes, and renders the final happiness of those whose moral character has ultimately borne the test required of them, no less consistent with the justice, than it is agreeable to the benevolence of God. Against this uniform and comprehensive scheme nothing can be advanced, except the presumptuous inquiry, why we were not created heirs to an immortality of gratuitous happiness. This would doubtless have been an act of pure benevolence, highly preferable, as far as we can imagine, to the majority of mankind: but surely it is not pretended that man can justly claim such an existence from his Creator. It would be equally reasonable to arraign the goodness of God, that we are not born possessed of all the strength of manhood, without the delay and dangers of a tedious infancy or that our intellectual faculties are not bestowed upon us perfect, instead of requiring so long a course of industrious culture. It is remarkable indeed, that the arguments which arraign the divine goodness with the difficulties which embarrass virtue on earth, go in direct contradiction to all that we see around us of the divine œconomy. According to that plan, nothing, if I may so speak, is done immediately all is brought about by the instrumentality of means. The world is not peopled by immediate creation. The food by which mankind are supported, is produced by a series of laborious exertions, which constitute no small share of their employment. The human mind itself is possessed of no stores by nature, but acquires whatever it has the capacity of acquiring, by pains and cultivation. these dispensations are akin to the discipline All Why which the human character undergoes, in its progress through the world. Why is not man created in perfect vigour, and able to perform without the waste of a tedious interval, the purposes to which he is destined? does his strength require to be continually recruited? Why is he not gifted from his birth, or by inspiration, with the knowledge requisite to his condition? Why do so many actually leave the world, without having ever attained any considerable degree of that knowledge? These are questions, which, when we venture to inquire respecting divine ordinances, we might ask with the same justice, as when we ask 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 discharges 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 |