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illum tractamus, ita et ille nos*." Though, from the imperfection of history and the want of annals, we cannot trace either the exact degree of the iniquity of mankind, or the exact degree of its punishment; it is equally agreeable to reason as to Scripture to imagine that God has ever dealt thus with the human race, and that the overthrow of empires has arisen, not because empire should travel westward or eastward, northward or southward; it being extremely derogatory to our ideas of God's justice to suppose this; but because such a degree of excessive viciousness and wickedness is engendered in a state, by a long series of prosperity, as fills up that measure of iniquity and guilt which God in mercy to the human race will never suffer to be exceeded on earth. And the reason why the goodness of God induces him to keep all human events in his own hands, or at least a check and control over them, is probably not from a motive of overruling the free agency of man, or because he has absolutely determined the fate of all men, but that he may govern the world wisely and justly, (which, if wholly left to

The Stoics thought every single person had a tutelary genius assigned him by God, as a guardian of his soul, and superintendant of his conduct; and that all virtue and happiness consisted in acting in concert with this genius, with reference to the will of the supreme Director of the universe. Diog. Laert. lib. vii.

man, it certainly would not be,) and that he may punish and reward men according to their deserts, as far as the reasons of his providence and goodness require in this world; and therefore, whenever the scale of vice rises in a nation to a certain degree, that nation becomes necessarily the object of God's vengeance. And surely it is exceedingly happy for the world at large that it does so: for let any one consider the excessive increase of luxury and wickedness in the Roman empire, from the middle of the reign of Tiberius Cæsar to the period of its dissolution; and if that wickedness had been suffered to increase in the same ratio from that time to this, the world would have been flooded with iniquity, and have been in many parts a perfect Pandæmonium. But God knows there is real mercy in punishment as well as in reward, (as was observed in the former proposition,) and that the one is often as actual a proof and demonstration of his goodness as the other. In fact, the lesson that all the empires that have ever been held out to the world is, that a nation is established by righteousness *, and destroyed by iniquity and

This assertion of Solomon's is supported even by Machiavel; who, in his Discourse on Livy, observes, respecting the Romans, that "for several ages together never was the fear of "God more eminently conspicuous than in that Republic, and

that their religion produced good laws, good laws good for" tune, and good fortune a good end in whatever they under"took." And Cicero likewise observes, in his Oration in an

their history is a fine comment, proving the conformity between the promises and the actions of God to mankind; and that though he is abundant in goodness and mercy, he yet will never clear impenitent guilt.

From the character God has been pleased to give of himself, of being "the Lord, the Lord God, "merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abun"dant in goodness and truth; keeping mercy for "thousands, forgiving iniquity, transgression, and "sin," &c. it is impossible to make any other inference, or draw any other conclusion, than that God is ever disposed to be exceedingly kind, gracious, and good to the human race, if they as free agents will allow him to be so; that is, if they will be obedient to his commands, and not thwart his good intentions towards them: for if they will deliberately and wilfully disobey his laws, it is no more to be considered as an imputation on the goodness of God to punish free agents thus wilfully offending, than it is an imputation on a wise and good king to punish such abandoned malefactors as knowingly and wilfully infringe those

swer to the Haruspices, "Nec numero Hispanos, nec robore "Gallos, nec calliditate Pœnos, nec artibus Græcos, nec de"nique hoc ipso hujus gentis et terræ domestico nativoque sensu "Italos ipsos et Latinos; sed pietate ac religione, atque hac una sapientia, quod Deorum immortalium numine omnia regi gubernarique perspeximus; omnes gentes nationesque super"avimus."

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laws he has instituted for the general welfare of himself and his subjects.

The next thing to be considered in this proposition is the laws of God to man, and to observe whether they confirm and corroborate the gracious and merciful character God has been pleased to give of himself, or whether they militate against it, by being in any respect arbitrary, unreasonable, grievous, or beyond the ability of man to accomplish. As God thought proper to create man a free agent, with a mind and intellect capable of adoring, worshipping, and honouring him; at the same time quite equal to the knowledge of the virtue of obedience to the particular injunction first commanded him, and, by the express communication of God himself, well and fully apprised of the criminality of disobeying that injunction; likewise as he was created with feelings of gratitude, and a sense of obligations conferred, it seems by no means incongruous to reason that God should be pleased to make trial of that free agency and portion of intellect which he had bestowed on his new-formed creatures, and that he should put both these to some test, compatible with the powers with which our first parents were endued. And surely, in the situation in which they were placed, no one can think, if God allowed them to eat freely of every tree in Paradise but one, that to abstain from that one

was a test at all grievous, or beyond their power to obey; or, if they considered, and they had full power to consider, that they owed their existence and their entire happiness to God, but that their feelings of gratitude, a sense of their obligations, and especially the fear of that punishment they were told they should incur by their disobedience, might altogether weigh so properly and forcibly on their minds, as to have induced them to resist the violation of an express command of God, and to have rejected a temptation to sin against it, which a being to them unknown impiously suggested, however artfully that suggestion might be made. Notwithstanding what man may think proper rashly and presumptuously to decide on this subject, we have good authority from Scripture to infer, that God himself thought very dif ferently, (" he himself made man from the begin"ning, and left him in the hands of his own counsel*") and that the powers of resistance with which our first parents were endued were quite equal to the trial to which they were appointed; for otherwise it bears infinitely too hard on our ideas. of God's wisdom and goodness to have destined them to it, and much too hard on his justice to inflict a dire and heavy punishment for a conduct they had neither power to obviate

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