The GOSPEL TRUTH

LECTURES ON THE

MORAL GOVERNMENT OF GOD.

 By

 NATHANIEL W. TAYLOR, D. D.,

1859

VOLUME I

 

SECTION II:

THE MORAL GOVERNMENT OF GOD

AS KNOWN

BY THE LIGHT OF NATURE.

 

LECTURE I:

 

Thesis to be established In three leading propositions. -- First, God administers a Moral Government In some sense; for, 1, men are moral beings; 2, God has given them a law. -- Shown from the manifestation of the tendencies of action to good and evil. -- No opposing evidence. -- Perversion of a design does not disprove the reality of the design; nor the fact that such perversion was foreseen; nor that the perversion is universal--The perversion observed may be temporary. Tendency to wrong, not greater than to right action. -- Cause of the certainty but not of the necessity of such perversion. -- The only proper method of reasoning. -- Conclusion.

 

 

My object in Several lectures on the subject proposed, is to establish the proposition, that --

 

GOD IS ADMINISTERING A PERFECT MORAL GOVERNMENT OVER MEN.

 

For this purpose I propose:

 

I. To show that God is administering a moral government over men in Some proper import of the language.

II. To prove the equity of his administration; and --

III. To prove his rightful authority.

 

In proving the first of these propositions, we shall show that God is administering a moral in distinction from a providential government. In proving the second, i.e., the equity of his administration, we shall show that he has given to men the best law; that he strictly adheres to the principles of equity in its administration, and will sustain its perfect authority.

 

In proving the third, i.e., his rightful authority, we shall show his benevolence or absolute moral perfection. And when these things are shown, the perfection of his moral government is proved.

 

In the present lecture, I enter on the proof of the first of these propositions, viz.:

 

I. God is administering a moral government over men in

some proper import of the phrase.

 

I have already defined moral government to be the influence of authority on moral beings, exercised by a moral governor, through the medium of law. To support the proposition now before us, it is necessary only to show that men are moral beings, that God has given them a law, and that he enforces conformity to his law by the influences of authority.

 

1. Men are moral beings; that is, they possess the powers of moral action, and are placed in the circumstances requisite for their exercise. The fact that men are moral agents, I shall here take for granted; having given what I deem sufficient proof of it in other lectures, and also because I suppose it will not be denied.

 

2. God has given to men a law, which is a decisive expression of a moral governors preference of some action to its opposite.

 

That God has given a law to men, I argue, from the fact that he has made them moral beings; in other words, from their constitution and the circumstances of their existence.

 

Whatever may be the design of our constitution, and the circumstances of our being, of that design God is the author. What I claim then is, that God in creating men moral beings, and placing them in circumstances requisite to moral action, clearly manifests his will or preference, that men should act morally right rather than morally wrong. The proof of this position rests on this obvious and undeniable principle, that the clear manifestation of adaptation or tendency to an end in the structure or nature of any thing which is made, is decisive proof that this end was designed by the maker, provided there is no opposing evidence.

 

I will now state as briefly as may be, the argument from man's constitution and condition as a moral being, and then show that there is no opposing evidence.

 

It is then impossible in the nature of things that God should create a moral being, without placing him under a stronger motive--a far higher inducing influence to the performance of right, than to the performance of wrong moral action. Whether a moral agent be created or not, depends on the will of God. But that right moral action is the necessary means of the highest happiness of a moral agent, is eternal truth--truth which no more depends on the will of God, than the equality of all straight lines from the center to the circumference of a circle. Right moral action is benevolent; wrong moral action is selfish. According therefore to the essential and immutable nature of things, right moral action, be the limited temporary self-sacrifice it may involve what it may, tends to secure the highest happiness of the agent, as well as that of others; and wrong moral action, afford what limited temporary enjoyment it may, tends to secure the highest misery of the agent and of others. These ideas enter into our necessary conceptions of right and wrong moral action as their essential elements. As we cannot conceive of matter without solidity and extension, no more can we conceive of right and wrong moral action, without conceiving of the one as tending to secure the highest happiness, and of the other, the highest misery of a moral being.

 

There is another philosophy, which maintains that the highest happiness of the individual may come into competition, and so be inconsistent with, the highest happiness of the whole, and that therefore the individual may be bound to sacrifice his own to the general good. This philosophy, endorsed as it is by great names, I regard as absurd and self-contradictory, though admitting that a moral being may be under obligation to sacrifice much and even all of what may be called his own happiness, for the sake of the general good. But there are two facts here which must not be forgotten. The one is, that there must be some motive to this voluntary, sacrifice of his own happiness, for there can no more be choice without a motive than an effect without a cause, and there can no more be motive except in the form of good or happiness to the agent, than there can be motive which is not motive. To suppose a being then voluntarily to sacrifice absolutely all his own happiness for the sake of the general good, is to suppose him to act without a motive, that is, to act with a motive and without a motive at the same time, which is a contradiction and an ab. surdity.

The other fact will explain the mystery. This is, that whatever degree of the agent's own happiness may come into competition with the general good, and which for this reason he may be bound to sacrifice for it, still his own happiness, in one respect--even his own highest happiness--can never come into competition with general good. This is the happiness of being good and doing good; the happiness of promoting the general good, which he can never be required to sacrifice. This is not only his own highest happiness, but it will ever be great in proportion to the sacrifice. Nay more; just and adequate views of the nature of a moral being, and the true tendencies of action on his part, show that if perfectly benevolent, he must be perfectly blessed. To such a being, under every loss of happiness possible to him, there are fountains remaining, adequate to fill every capacity of happiness, even the fountains opened amid the throne of God and the Lamb. Or in the language of philosophy, such is the nature of a moral being, that perfection in character is perfection in blessedness. This is the fact which gives such peculiar grandeur and glory to a moral agent. Moral agency in its very nature, involves a power so to occupy the mind, so to bless the moral being with the right object of affection, that any loss or sacrifice of good which is possible in the case shall be accounted as nothing. Paul understood this, when he spoke of "suffering the loss of all things, and counting them as dung that he might win Christ," "as having nothing and yet possessing all things."

 

Such then is the nature of man as a moral being, that his perfection in happiness depends on the use he makes of his powers; in other words, on his moral character. And if it be not true from the very nature which God has given him as a moral being, that one kind of moral action will secure his perfection in happiness, and another produce his perfect misery, then is the eternal distinction between right and wrong action annihilated. I claim Alien, that the obvious and undeniable facts in the nature and condition of man as a moral being supposing no evidence to the contrary--are the most decisive manifestations and proofs that the will of God is, that man should always act morally right rather than morally wrong.

 

Indeed it is inconceivable, on the supposition of no opposing evidence. that there should be any single source of proof so decisive as this, any so fitted to place the fact of the divine preference of right to wrong moral action on the part of man, beyond all denial and doubt. If the design of the Maker can be discovered from that which is made, if the structure and position of an eye or a tooth show this, then do the nature and condition of man as a moral being, show that he is made to act morally right rather than morally wrong. It is then--on the supposition of no opposing evidence--the will of our Maker, it is the law of God, that man should always act in the exercise of the great principle of love or benevolence.

 

Our argument is thus far hypothetical. I proceed now to inquire--is there any opposing evidence to set aside or weaken that which has been adduced? All that can be offered is furnished in the fact of the universal perversion of moral agency on the part of man.

 

All that can be necessary here is to ascertain and apply the correct principle of Judging in such a case. I maintain it to be this--that the perversion of a design clearly manifested in the structure and condition of a thing, which perversion can be easily accounted for consistently with the reality of the design, is no evidence against its reality.

 

To test the correctness of this principle, let us suppose a watchmaker to have made a number of watches of exquisite workmanship, foreseeing that in the wisest and best disposal of them he can make, they will be so perverted or misused as to defeat temporarily the end to which they are so perfectly adapted. Let it be further supposed, that by giving the requisite information and direction, he shows a most decided preference of the right to the wrong use of them, and with ample skill and power to repair the machinery, and thus in a great degree to redress the foreseen evil, he actually adopts a course of measures which insures such a result. I ask, is the supposed perversion in such a case to be traced to the will of the watchmaker? Is it not rather manifest, that the supposed perversion is a direct contravention of his preference? Do not the perfect structure of the watches, and his directions respecting them, furnish indisputable proof that in every instance he prefers the right to the wrong use of them?

 

On precisely the same principle of reasoning, I claim that the perversion of moral agency on the part of man, does not furnish the least opposing evidence to that given by his constitution and condition, that God prefers right moral action to wrong. I shall hereafter attempt to show, by the best kind of moral evidence, that he will in fact repair in a great degree the evil done, having actually adopted a course of measures perfectly fitted to such an end. All however that my present purpose requires is, to say that these things may be true. This cannot be controverted. It is possible that the greatest good required exactly the present system, but not the perversion of moral agency in a single instance, under the present system it may be true, that it is impossible that God should adopt the best moral system and prevent the perversion of moral agency in any greater degree than he does prevent it; it maybe better, that moral agency should in every instance be rightly used rather than perverted under the present system; and of course it may be true that the Creator, notwithstanding the actual perversion of moral agency, prefers that every human being should act morally right rather than morally wrong.

 

If it be said that God might so have increased the tendencies to right action as to have prevented moral evil, either wholly or partially, I answer; this cannot be proved as I have already shown, and is therefore entitled to no consideration. Besides, to have altered the system in one iota, might have been to change it for the worse, and produced more sin than it would have prevented. The fact then that God did not increase the tendencies to right action, is no proof that he does not in every instance prefer right to wrong action under the system as it is.

 

Is it further said that the omniscient Creator foresaw the universal perversion of the moral agency, and therefore must have intended or purposed its actual existence? This is readily admitted, admitted as the only truth which can form a basis for confidence, submission and joy, in view of such an amount of evil as exists under the divine government. But I have said the perversion of moral agency may be in respect to divine prevention, incidental to the best system. God then may have purposed the existence of the evil, rather than not adopt the best system to which the evil may be thus incidental. But this fact would give no shadow of proof that he does not prefer right to wrong moral action under this system.

 

Is it still further said, that all this would be quite credible, were moral agency perverted only by an individual moral agent, but not so in view of its universal perversion by a world? I answer, that the perversion of moral agency by a single world may sustain the same relation to its non-perversion in other worlds, which its perversion by a single individual would sustain to its non-perversion by all other individuals, even the relation of an infinitesimal to infinitude. Of course this perversion by a world affords no more proof that the Creator does not prefer right to wrong moral action in every instance, than would its perversion by a single individual.

 

But not to rest the argument on the hypothesis of other worlds. It is sufficient for my present purpose to say, that there may be a future state of existence for man, and that the present may be one of probation in relation to future allotments, even under a redemptive system. The results may show, supposing this to be the only world of sentient creatures, that the greatest good required, not indeed the perversion of moral agency rather than the right use of it under this system, but the very system under which the perversion takes place. Of course it may be true, as I have before shown, that God prefers the right use of moral agency to its perversion, in every instance of moral action under the present system.

 

It may be still further said on this point: the perfection or imperfection of a moral system is not to be decided, merely by what are or may be only its temporary results in obedience or disobedience, but by its nature, its adaptations, tendencies and probable issues. The reason is, that a moral government may be perfect, and yet result in the temporary disobedience of its subjects. Such possibility is inseparable from its nature as a moral system. It may be in a high degree imperfect, and yet result in temporary obedience; such possibility being also inseparable from its nature. Effects which are good or bad, and which are connected with their causes by a physical necessity, may be the just criteria of the nature of the causes. It is not so however in respect to the supposed results of a system of moral government.

 

Temporary obedience merely, is no proof of the perfection of a system of moral government, nor is temporary disobedience proof of its imperfection; for such obedience may exist under an imperfect, and such disobedience under a perfect system of moral government. If therefore, from our knowledge of the system itself--its law, its subjects, its author, his providence or conduct toward his subjects--we have no means of forming a judgment respecting the tendencies and final issues of the system, then plainly we have no sufficient data for any conclusion respecting its perfection. It is indeed quite supposable, that such premises should exist in the case, as not only to warrant, but to demand a conclusion. Be this however as it may, and momentous as the question is, what may prove in the end under a moral government, to be merely temporary results in obedience or disobedience, are an utterly insufficient basis for any conclusion respecting its perfection. If these are the only sources of evidence on the question, then there is none. All that we can say is, the system may be perfect and it may not be. And yet philosophers have derived their principal, not to say their sole objection against the perfection of God's government and God's character, and in this way against his revelation and against all religion, from the existence of moral evil in the world. But who of them all knows whereof he affirms? Who in his ignorance, is certain that any degree of moral evil in this world is inconsistent with such issues of the system in a future state, as shall show, in brightest manifestation, the perfection of the system and the character of its Author?

 

But it may, here be said, that there is a greater tendency, under the present system, to wrong than to right moral action on the part of all men, and that the author of the system designed that it should be so. That the alleged greater tendency exists under the present system is denied, as involving an absolute impossibility in the nature of things. The objection concedes that men are capable of moral action, and are of course moral beings. But a moral being is one whose highest happiness depends, and who knows that it does, on acting morally right. There can be no tendency to moral action in a moral being, except ultimately to obtain happiness by acting; and the greater the happiness known by the agent to depend on one kind of moral action, the greater the tendency to that action. When he knows as a moral agent must, that his highest happiness depends on his acting morally right, there is of course a greater tendency in his case to act morally right, than to act morally wrong. To suppose a greater tendency in his case to act morally wrong than morally right, is to suppose that his highest happiness depends, and he knows it, on his acting morally wrong, when his highest happiness does not depend on his so acting, and when he knows that it does not--which is a twofold contradiction, and an absolute impossibility in the nature of things. I am not saying, that a moral being, with that knowledge which is necessary to constitute him such, may not act morally wrong. But I maintain that if he does, he so acts, having the knowledge that his highest happiness consists in acting morally right; and that therefore in so doing, he does not act according to the greater tendency. Nor am I saying, that when a moral agent acts morally wrong, there is not a previous certainty of his so doing; nor that there is not a cause, ground, or reason of such previous certainty. But I maintain that there is nothing in these, which, when speaking reflectively for the purposes of philosophic truth, can be properly called a greater tendency to wrong than right moral action--provided any thing more be meant by the language, than that there is that in the nature of the motive--which in distinction from power is the cause of the wrong moral act compared with the motive to right moral action, that gives the certainty of the wrong instead of the right moral action. I have no occasion to say, that the phrase may not be properly, or according to common usage, applied to the cause of wrong moral action in a further meaning than that now specified, nor do I admit that it can be. It seems to me to be applied, in a further meaning, by none but philosophers, and only by that class of philosophers and divines who maintain the doctrine of necessity as opposed to moral liberty, and to be therefore not a proper, but a mere sectarian or partisan usage. Granting however that common usage sanctions the propriety of speaking of a stronger tendency to wrong than to right moral action, still, as we have before shown, it is in every such case, the language of appearance, and in its actual meaning when thus employed, entirely false. And what if usage sanctions the propriety of the language of appearance, in its false meaning in certain cases and for certain purposes, does this show that it is to be employed for scientific uses? What if, for the ordinary purposes of life, it is proper to speak of the sun as rising and setting; is the astronomer to adopt this language for the purposes of science?

 

But it may be asked--if there are two opposing tendencies and one prevails over the other, is not the former a greater or stronger tendency than the latter? I answer, that while this may be said with propriety and with truth in respect to physical or natural phenomena, it cannot in the same meaning be said respecting moral phenomena. In the one case, the opposing tendencies result from the opposing powers of opposing antecedents, as when we speak of the greater force or stronger arm prevailing over the weaker. But in respect to the antecedents of moral phenomena or acts of will, there is no such conflict of opposing powers; and to speak as if there were, is at best to use the language of appearance which in its actual meaning is known to be false. And further, it may be truly and properly said, that there is a greater or stronger tendency on the part of every moral being to morally right than to morally wrong action. If it be asked in what sense, I answer not in that in which, as we have seen, the language would be known to be false, but in a very different meaning viz.: to denote the fact, that in the nature and circumstances of a moral being, as these are actually known to us on a priori grounds, and known as moral causes merely, there is more adaptation or fitness to secure right than wrong moral action. While no one can doubt the propriety of using the language in this application, it cannot be supposed to be so used, except as the language of appearance, and surely not to denote a ground of the certainty of right moral action. So true is it in the proper use of language, that there is a greater tendency to right than to wrong moral action on the part of moral beings in the sense now explained, that, judging on a priori ground, there is far more reason for the conclusion that they will act morally right, than that they will act morally wrong; and that wrong moral action on their part, in view of the tendency to right moral action, is cause for universal astonishment as utterly irrational.

 

But it will be further asked, how is this if we judge a posteriori--how is it when we see a whole race of moral beings uniformly acting morally wrong instead of morally right? Can we in view of such a fact, say that there is not a greater tendency in their case to act morally wrong than morally right? I answer; first, that without denying the propriety of saying that there is a greater or stronger tendency to wrong moral action than to its opposite on the part of men, inasmuch as the false language of appearance is often proper, I affirm that the only truth in the case to which such language can respect, is that there is a ground or reason of the certainty of wrong moral action. There can be no evidence from the universal phenomenon of wrong moral action, of a greater tendency to such action in the meaning in which such language may now be supposed to be properly used. There may be and in my view there is, a ground or reason for the certainty of wrong moral action, which fact in the false and harmless language of appearance is mistaken for a stronger tendency to wrong moral action. But there can be no truth in the actual meaning of this language of appearance thus employed. The tendency to right and to wrong moral action in every moral being implies no conflict between opposing powers or influences in which the one overcomes the other as being the superior or greater power or influence. The only power in the case is THE WILL, which is equally adequate to either act. Power or influence as we have shown, cannot be predicated of motive or of any thing which determines the will. Of course no greater tendency which depends on such power or influence can be truly inferred or predicated of it. There is the same possibility, so far as possibility depends on power, to either act instead of the other. In view of this known power and possibility as given by this power, neither the fact of right nor of wrong moral action, nor the uniformity of either, can be the least evidence of a greater tendency to one than to the other, which depends on power or influence. The only sense in which it can be said that there is a greater tendency to right than to Wrong moral action on the part of men, implies nothing which can with truth be called greater power or influence to secure right than wrong moral action, which also gives the certainty of right moral action. Still less can it be supposed that what may be called the less tendency to wrong moral action, should involve any thing in its nature which makes it certain. We are indeed, in view of the fact of wrong moral action on the part of men, obliged to admit some ground or reason of the certainty of such action with power to the contrary. But this is not and cannot be a greater tendency to such action, but is a ground or reason of its certainty, notwithstanding a greater tendency as above explained to right moral action. Such is always the fact when the mind knowingly chooses the inferior good. If it be asked, what gives this certainty of the wrong moral action, we may or may not be able to assign some one antecedent as the cause, ground or reason of this certainty in all cases. It may be the nearness of the inferior good, or it may be the peculiar vividness of the mind's view of it, or it may be any one of many other possible circumstances. Nor is it in the lowest degree incredible, that the ground or reason of this certainty should vary in different cases, and that no common characteristic of such antecedents can be affirmed, except that they give the certainty of wrong moral action. Be these things as they may, still the mind in every moral choice, knows in the most absolute manner in which truth can be known, that its own highest happiness depends on choosing morally right. Otherwise the choice can have no moral character. I only ask, can reasoning from physical tendencies set aside this truth of absolute knowledge, that the greater is the happiness known to depend on an act of choice, the greater the tendency to that act? If not, then instead of a greater tendency to wrong than to right, there is a greater tendency to right than to wrong moral action, under the present system.

 

But it may be said, still there is a cause, ground or reason of the certainty of wrong moral action on the part of all men under the present system. This is readily admitted. But this cause, ground or reason of the mere certainty of wrong moral action giving no necessity for it, but implying power to the contrary, may in respect to divine prevention, be incidental to the best moral system. Or thus, the present system notwithstanding this metaphysical imperfection, may be not only better than none, but the best possible to the Creator. This cause, ground or reason of the certainty of wrong moral action may be said to be a tendency to such action. Though it be less than that to the opposite, still it may be a tendency which gives the certainty of wrong action. Some degree of tendency to wrong action is unavoidable in a moral system; and while if it were greater to wrong than to right, it would be flagrantly inconsistent with a moral system, yet that there should be that which gives the certainty of wrong moral action, is not necessarily inconsistent with the Creator's preference of right to wrong moral action under the present system. He may purpose this cause of the certainty of wrong moral action, not as good in itself or as the means of good, but solely as an evil incidental in the very nature of things to the best possible system. He may prefer the existence of this evil and its consequent in wrong moral action, so far as the latter exists, to the non-existence of the best system and for no other reason. But this is no proof, not the lowest degree of probable evidence, that he prefers wrong to right moral action in a single instance under the present system. On the contrary, according to the present supposition of possible truth, the proof is decisive, that he would prevent this tendency which results in wrong moral action, were it possible to him to do so and yet adopt or not perpetuate the system, that he permits it only as a metaphysical evil inseparable by his power from the best system, and that therefore while be adopts the best system, he prefers in every instance right to wrong moral action under the present system. Nor is this all. Since on the present supposition he prefers the existence of this tendency to wrong moral action solely to the non-existence of the best system, he does not prefer it to a tendency that should give the certainty of right moral action. On the contrary, this tendency to wrong moral action must be a tendency to that which when compared with right moral action, is contrary to his will. Of course his whole will must be opposed to this tendency to wrong moral action, compared with a tendency to right moral action in its stead. The very tendency therefore, alleged as proof that he prefers wrong to right moral action, implies and proves on the present supposition his preference of right to wrong moral action under the present system. And what sort of proof is that of his preference of wrong to right moral action, which for any thing which can be shown to the contrary, may be a decisive proof of the opposite preference.

 

The grand and only objection to our present position, derived from the tendency to moral evil in the world, and its existence and prevalence, is then without the least plausibility.

 

Here then I appeal to the great fact on which our present argument rests, viz.: that God has created men moral beings, thus adapting their nature to right moral action, and thus, from the necessity of their nature as moral beings, causing tendencies to right moral action, which clearly manifest his will or preference that they should, in every instance, act morally right. So far as tendencies can have any influence or bearing on the question of what kind of moral action he prefers, the tendencies to right moral action stand forth in the nature and circumstances of the beings, as the great and only fact to be taken into consideration, when the question is, what is his will in respect to the moral conduct of his moral creatures? This fact is proof, uncounteracted by the least opposing evidence, and therefore unequivocal and decisive, that God prefers right to wrong moral action. Analyze and scrutinize the true nature and tendencies of things as we may, and we must see in what God has done in respect to right and wrong moral action, adaptation, fitness, tendency to one end, and to one end only to right moral action--insomuch that in this contemplation of a moral agent, we wonder that he should ever do wrong. We count all wrong-doing a disorder, and a violence done to the nature and laws of a moral economy. It is eternal necessary truth, that a moral agent is a being so constituted and so circumstanced, that virtue, perfect moral excellence, is the sure and only means of his highest and perfect happiness. All that can be called adaptation, fitness or tendency in the nature and condition of moral beings, is a greater, higher adaptation, fitness or tendency to right moral action than to wrong. The evidence in the case all goes to prove, that the Creator of such beings prefers right to wrong moral action on their part. This will of God stands forth in the nature of man as a moral being in as clear and bright manifestation, as had this been a world of universal obedience to that will. The question of the Creator's preference of right to wrong moral action is not touched at all by the results whether in obedience or disobedience. The system itself so far as any thing appears to the contrary, is not only better than none, but, notwithstanding the evil, is the best which a perfect God could adopt. The question therefore concerning his preference of right to wrong moral action, under this best system, is one which in the very nature of the case, is to be decided in view of its adaptations and tendencies. If the system when thus judged of, is not only better than none, but the best conceivable for aught we know or can Bay to the contrary, then it is proof decisive, viewed in its true nature and tendency, that its Author prefers right to wrong moral action. If under this same system there had been universal obedience, it would have added nothing to the evidence of his preference, for he would have done no more to secure obedience than he has now done. The proof on this supposition, would be furnished, not by the obedience of, the subjects, but solely by the nature of the system; so that if the system does not prove his preference without, it. could not prove it with obedience. So likewise, universal disobedience lessens not this evidence, for he does nothing less to secure obedience than had universal obedience been the result. If then the system with universal disobedience, does not prove his preference, it could not prove it with universal obedience, for the system would be the same on either supposition.

 

Such is undeniably the true and only legitimate mode of reasoning on this subject. The question is not, what subjects do; but what has the moral governor done? It is not what is the conduct of subjects under the system, but what is the system under which they act? Take an example. Let it be once ascertained that a father has done all that wisdom and goodness dictate to secure the obedience of his children, that the System of influence is perfect, or which is the same thing in the argument, that there is no proof that wisdom and goodness required him to do any thing more than he has done for the purpose, or that to have done any thing more or less would not have been for the worse instead of the better; and his preference of obedience to disobedience is alike conspicuous and undeniable, whether his children obey or disobey. Here then I ask, what other than a moral system, and what moral system better than the present, could God in his infinite wisdom and goodness have chosen, supposing him to be infinitely good? Could he have adopted a system of moral government without creating free moral agents to be governed by the laws of such a jurisdictions Could he have created moral beings without giving them power to obey or disobey under that system, be it what it might? And now when they act wrong under such a system of influence, which for aught that can be shown to the contrary, is the best fitted to secure their obedience, is their wrong doing to be alleged as proof that he prefers it to their right doing? In an analogous case of human government parental or civil, would disobedience impart the slightest shade of obscurity to the will of the parent or the legislator? Would not a similar system of adaptations and influences be as decisive of a father's preference of obedience to disobedience as had uniform obedience been the actual result? Why then is it not so in respect to God? Why should we not be as charitable in our judgment of our Maker as of a fellow being? Is there no possible case in which law can be transgressed without proving the insincerity of the lawgiver? If so, then the transgression of law is a solecism and a contradiction, for there can be no law when there is no sincerity in a lawgiver. If then we say, that because God is omnipotent, he can secure obedience in every instance, and therefore if he does not, it must be because he prefers disobedience to obedience in that instance, then God cannot give a law--he cannot sincerely prefer obedience to disobedience in any case in which the latter occurs. There is no alternative but this. Either he can prevent all Bin in the case or he cannot. If he cannot, then he may be sincere in the prohibition of it in his law. But if he can and does not, he cannot be sincere in its prohibition in any case in which sin takes place. Disobedience in the subject is decisive proof of insincerity in the lawgiver, and of course that there is no law. But if there is a possible or conceivable case, in which the transgression of a law from God should exist without proving his insincerity, i.e., consistently with his real preference of obedience to disobedience, what is this possible case, except that which we have proved to be real? Were God the friend and patron of iniquity, would he have so formed and ordered all the adaptations and tendencies to righteousness, that the soul of man should find joy unmingled and perfect only in the practice of it? Has God so formed man, even in his own image, that he never can, and knows that he never can be happy but in the consciousness of moral excellence, that he can secure in the highest measure the gratification of every part of his sentient nature, only as he spurns every sensual excess; that he never can feel himself truly ennobled, but by the high resolve of virtuous doings, that he can never rise to his true grandeur and godlike elevation, only as he gives up himself, his passions and appetites, to the control of perfect moral principle--what other conclusion can be drawn from such premises, than that the Being who formed us, loves the virtue that thus exalts, adorns and blesses his creatures, and hates the vice that degrades, deforms and ruing them? Surely the design of the Creator is conspicuous in this universal and undeniable tendency of things. I decide not here that he loves virtue for its own sake, or whether his preference of virtue to vice is a benevolent or a selfish preference, but only that he has this preference. To deny it, is to do violence to the most incontrovertible of all principles--it is to maintain that a perfect adaptation to an end is no evidence that the end is designed, or that the best kind of evidence that God can furnish, is no evidence at all. The most august fact in the creation of God, the moral constitution of moral beings, is divested of all significance in reasoning, and the author of that constitution of the high character of an intelligent and designing Creator. Surely if the sun is placed in the heavens to illumine and warm the earth, if the rain falls to water it and to cause it to bring forth food for man and beast, if food and drink are formed to nourish and refresh our bodies, then is the mind of man created to be conformed to the law of benevolent action. This is the will--this is the law of God. It comes to us in the very nature and structure of the mind--it is given us in the actual cognitions of the inner man, in the knowledge of ourselves, and therefore in a manner not less distinct nor less impressive, than were it sent in thunders from his throne.

 

In conclusion I remark, that the question we have now discussed is one of the deepest concern. There is an Infinite Being, who has given existence to man, and made him a moral being. It is the will of his Great Creator that he should act either morally right or morally wrong. On the latter supposition, what is this Infinite Being? He is plainly the most appalling object that ever terrified a frenzied imagination. You cannot conceive of another so fitted to overwhelm with terror and dismay; an Infinite Being preferring wrong to right, moral action! the Great God the friend and patron of iniquity! What ground for hope, for confidence, for joy, could remain under his dominion? Who could pray, or praise, or love, or rejoice? Whose hopes would not perish, whose heart would not break, whose spirit would not sink and die in anguish?

 

Yet men, to defend their schemes of faith, talk of a benevolent God, who on the whole prefers vice to virtue--sin to holiness! What proof then that every creature of his power, formed in his image, will not become a fiend, and his moral universe a pandemonium? Dream of any thing else, and enjoy it as you may, but dream not, for consolation's sake, of a benevolent God who is the minister of sin! Of all the absurdities that ever disgraced Deism or Universalism, or any other system of faith, that which combines the character of the perfect God and a perfect Devil in one being is the most monstrous.

 

Shall we then adopt the other supposition? Then there is an Infinite Being, who has given a law to man--whose will it is, that man should always act morally right rather than morally wrong. This Being can make his creature, man, supremely happy or supremely miserable, as he obeys or disobeys his will. What will he do in fact? To impute to him the imbecility of mutable purposes--to suppose the want of all purpose in the exercise and products of his infinite attributes, or an utter indifference to the accomplishment of them, we cannot. If his designs are not benignant, they are at least such in respect to vastness of comprehension, strength of decision, and grandeur of object, as to exempt their author from contempt; they are such as accord with the infinitude of his natural attributes. He may, for aught we now say, be a benevolent, or he may be a malignant Being. But having infinite power and knowledge, he will not so act as to incur the contempt of his intelligent creation. His designs and doings, in their nature and results, will be great, like their author. They will be such, that human reason cannot look on the reality and make light of it. What then is it for man to know that he is absolutely in the power of such a Being, and that he has always crossed his will!--done what he could to defeat the design of his Creator in giving him existence!! And yet who is the man that has not done it? There is no such man. What then are our prospects? Is death the end of all? That cannot be proved. What then is to be the issue of God's great design in creating man a moral being, the most exalted in kind which he can create? Will it be abandoned in indifference or in fickleness? Will the great design of all his works be relinquished as impracticable by an Omniscient and Almighty Creator? Will it prove to be a plan, for entering on which there were no reasons, or for abandoning which new ones will occur? Will this great design of God toward men, which stands forth first, and brightest, and greatest among them all, come to naught? Will death arrest the whole moral economy of God, and bring on it failure and defeat? I do not say here that it will not. But if it is rational in some cases to hope, is it not as rational also to fear? Were your life, your every interest, thus in the hands of a mysterious stranger of your own species, whose will you had always intentionally thwarted, would you not rationally fear to meet him? And when that stranger is your Creator, the Infinite Being who has made you to obey his will, and you have disobeyed it, have you no concern to know the issues of the design of your creation? Is there to be no full and final consummation of this moral economy? Are your wishes, hopes, fancies, dreams, good evidence that the great question between God and his moral creation will go unsettled, and terminate in insignificant and degrading mockery? Or, have you good reason to expect that you shall one day encounter the displeasure of one whom you have so much displeased? Can the will of any being--can the will of God be crossed, even that will on which the end of his creation depends, and he not be displeased? When you think of the violence done to your own moral nature, and the practical defiance of the known will of the Being that made you; when you listen to that voice of remonstrance and of warning from within which you cannot silence, and to those distinct and impressive whisperings of self--condemnation which you cannot mistake, do you not know that there is an account between yourself and your Maker yet unadjusted? Can you feel that all is safe? In spite of yourselves, of all your wishes and your hopes, do you not fear a retributive hour--do you not expect to meet an avenging God?

 

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