earth on which he afterwards trod, his gra cious Maker was pleased to take him from this insensible and unconscious state, and to create him not merely with an animal frame, or a sensitive soul, like the brute species, but himself to breathe into him the breath of life, and to confer on him the singular and inconceivable honour of forming him even after his own image. He made him lord of his creation, putting the fear of him on the beasts of the field, the fowls of the air, and the fishes of the sea. He gave him a companion, from whose society he might derive excessive delight; allowed him not only to survey the glories of his creation, to see and admire them, and to rest there, but to understand them to a great degree; to understand the motions of those glorious and magnificent orbs, the sun and moon; to know the first great Cause of their existence, and of that enchanting and transcendent display of celestial beauty, which the stars exhibit in the blue hemisphere on some fine night,

When not a breath disturbs the deep serene,
And not a cloud o'ercasts the solemn scene.

He allowed, and still allows, man to come into his presence at all times, and to praise

and adore him, like the angels in heaven in kind, though not in degree or perfection. He then placed him in the garden of Paradise, where he was permitted freely (a word of great force in determining God's good-will to man) to eat of every tree, one only excepted; a situation calculated to give health to his body, and the greatest satisfaction and cheerfulness to his mind; a situation expressly designed and adapted to communicate full and complete enjoyment to all his senses. Now surely, when it is considered that man neither did nor could give God any equivalent, shew the least pretension, nor make the least claim to the possession of any one of these numerous instances of God's favour, of so much happiness thus demonstrably conferred on him, no man, when God was thus pleased: to place him in so enviable a rank in his creation, can, with the least shew of reason, pretend to deny, but that this conduct on the part of God is an unequivocal and express proof, that in his deportment towards the human race he is a God of infinite goodness; for otherwise man would have been created quite differently, and most probably would have suffered constant misery, instead of having been created with an evident de-›

sign that he should experience constant and perpetual happiness.

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Of the various proofs, which it has pleased Almighty God to give to the human race, that he is "the Lord, the Lord God, merciful "and gracious, longsuffering, abundant in goodness and truth, pardoning iniquity, “transgression, and sin," certainly the greatest, the most paramount proof of all, is his redemption of man from the dreadful penalty he had incurred by his disobedience. This proof may indeed be considered agmen ipsum, and is an absolute and decisive argument of the goodness of God: for were we to consider God as an omnipotent Being, devoid of goodness, and actuated in his conduct only by rigid justice, and then consider his awful majesty insulted and offended as it was (comparatively speaking) by such a little contemptible animal as man, it is quite reasonable to suppose he would at once have annihilated him in consequence of that disobedience. In what manner can any one think Nero or Caligula would have behaved towards a slave that had wilfully disobeyed an imperial order formally and solemnly enjoined to him? Doubtless he would be of opinion that these emperors, having no good

ness in their nature, and influenced in their conduct only by the suggestion of arbitrary power, would have had no mercy on this slave, but, in consequence of his disobedience, would have immediately sentenced him to die. How differently does the infinite goodness of God prompt him to act, at the very time of man's wilful and deliberate disobedience to a lenient command so much in

his power to have obeyed! God in justice remembers mercy; he is graciously pleased to devise a plan for man's redemption, which, at the same time that it satisfies his justice, gratifies his mercy. He gives man hopes of a restoration to his favour at some future period, by telling him," the seed of the wo“man should bruise the serpent's head;" and though justice requires he should be punished, yet that punishment is measured, and qualified in its infliction as much as it could be, both as to the mind and body of man. For as to the first, a careful obedience on his part in future to the laws and will of God exceedingly lessens that degree, which is inflicted on those who persevere in disobedience: and with respect to the latter, though it is certain we are subject by our nature to some diseases, (such as

the small-pox, measles, &c.) yet for the most part only once in our lives to such as we may reasonably suppose of God's infliction; the rest we chiefly occasion by our own imprudence or intemperance. The same clement and merciful conduct every man experiences from God, more or less, through his whole life, since every man is more or less in the habit of disobeying his commands; and yet how seldom is any immediate vengeance inflicted! How patient and longsuffering is God towards the human race, granting it usually a series of years for repentance; offering man, on his duly imploring it, the assistance of his grace for that purpose; and always telling him, that he has no pleasure in the death of the wicked; entreating him, by reason, conscience, and his holy word, to turn from his evil ways; and that whenever he will do so he will have mercy on him, blot out his transgressions, pardon his sins, and receive him into favour! Can a greater proof than this be given to him that the God he serves, or should serve, is a God of infinite goodness?

The next instance I shall adduce of the goodness of God is his astonishing condescension, in permitting the human race to