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could have been placed. He was, no doubt, the subject of a penal infliction for the sin which he committed; but the utter annihilation of love to God which constituted the principle of spiritual life in his soul, and his consequent incapability of performing the functions of a spiritual life, and his total want of relish for spiritual employments, cannot be considered to form a part of that infliction. It was not the production of a divine, irresistible influence upon his mind, but it was not the less painful upon that account. For, whatever notion we may form of the efficient cause of the evil, the concurrent testimony of scripture and experience is, that the annihilated principle cannot be revived but by the operation of Almighty power. How can it be so, since enmity has taken possession of its place? That principle, we know, cannot destroy itself and produce one essentially dif ferent in its nature. We might as well suppose, that the fields of ice in the polar regions are capable of bringing forth the delicious fruits and fragrant flowers which grow in southern climates, under the influence of a mild and genial sky.

Now, what would heaven be to a soul destitute of that love? It would be a place of misery. The society of sinless beings would be intolerable to it; spiritual exercises would be burdensome in the extreme; and the unveiled presence of the Holy One would be a source of exquisite torment. These would be so many restraints upon its inclinations, and afford no gratification to the unsanctified passions which

continued to rage and burn within. All the external objects to which it could turn would mock its desires, and it would find nothing adapted to its tastes and habits. It would feel itself in an element altogether unsuited to its nature. This effect, strange though it may appear to some, is not the result of an arbitrary appointment, it is the result of a general law which seems to operate through every order of sentient beings. Even the irrational animals instinctively choose an element suited to their nature, and exhibit indications of uneasiness and pain when taken out of the one adapted to their constitution; so much so, indeed, that death in many cases, and in a very short time, follows a change in their circumstances.

But the same thing is apparent among the different tribes to which the Creator has assigned the same element. Those whose physical organization and modes of living are similar, invariably seek to associate; and they shun those whose nature and habits are dissimilar to their own. Besides, all the facts which come within the range of our observation and experience in human society seem to confirm the same truth. The rude, untutored savage prefers the society and pursuits of the tribe to which he belongs, to the comforts and enjoyments of civilized life among a race of strangers in a foreign land; and he feels more pleasure in his brutal, sanguinary pastimes, than in the more refined gratifications which wealth affords, or in the finest intellectual employments. Now, why should we expect it to be otherwise in the case under

consideration? The habits of fishes and birds, of the lion and the lamb, the savage and the sage, are not more dissimilar than are the views, the sentiments, and the desires of unrenewed men, and those of the holy beings who dwell in the presence of God. And sooner would the savage, without previous training, at once and for ever, quit his habits and hut, and find his pleasure in the society of men engaged in pursuing the most abstruse speculations of mental and physical science; sooner would the monarch of the desert throw aside the fierceness of his nature, and abandon the wild, solitary haunts where he roams at large in pursuit of his prey, and harmlessly mingle amongst the flock to eat the grass of the field; sooner, indeed, would the inhabitants of the deep leave their native element, and exhibit indications of enjoyment upon the dry land or in the aerial regions, than would an unrenewed man find enjoyment in the glory and pursuits of the upper world. They are unsuited to his nature; and before existence could be tolerable to him there, the whole framework of its society would require to be changed. Other principles would require to be implanted in the minds of its inhabitants, or at least, those which at present regulate their feelings and their intercourse would require to be eradicated; and the Great Eternal would require to shroud his glory in the blackness of darkness, and withdraw from it every visible token of his presence. But if all this were done it would be heaven no more; it would no longer be the land of

of love; it would be bereft of everything which renders it desirable to sinless beings. Yet nothing short of this could render it an abode congenial to the nature and habits of unholy men.

How vain, then, must be the desires and hopes of those who, without love to God, without being renewed in the spirit of their minds, expect to enter heaven when they leave this world! Yet by how many are these desires and hopes cherished! They are based upon ignorance and delusion; for unregenerated men have the elements of perdition within themselves, and in whatever locality in the universe they may be placed, when wholly abandoned to the influence of their depraved passions, they would be their own tormentors. They would endure the gnawing of the worm that shall never die, and the burning of the fire that shall never be quenched.

The implantation of love to God in the soul is indispensable. A man cannot be happy without it in whatever circumstances he may be placed. And if it is generated in his mind at all, it must be so in this world. The production of it by the instrumentality of the word and the agency of the Spirit constitutes the new birth; and without this spiritual regeneration, it is declared upon the highest authority, that no one is fit for the kingdom of heaven. "Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter

the second time into his mother's womb, and be born? Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water, and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth so is every one that is born of the Spirit." Till this change takes place he is incapable of performing the duties or enjoying the pleasures of religion even in this world. He has no relish for them. How then could he relish the pleasures of heaven? The happiness which a Christian enjoys upon earth is similar in its nature to that which is enjoyed in heaven. It differs only in degree. The pure satisfaction aris ing from communion with God, the pleasures connected with the holy longings after a perfect resemblance to the Saviour's image, and the sacred joy produced by contemplating the glories of the divine character, are foretastes of heaven; and the soul who feels them has but to be freed from the encumbrances and imperfections of mortality, and it will naturally wing its way to that region as the place most congenial to its nature; as the place where alone its desires can be fully gratified. And the blessedness which it would enjoy there would be but an increase of the felicity which it tasted in this world, a full draught of the perennial spring of which it but sipped here

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