Providential and moral government defined. -- Moral government included in providential. -- All events fall under providential government. -- Grounds of the certainty of deferent kinds of action differ in their nature and their design. -- In what sense does God purpose wrong moral action?

 

 

THE government of God is both providential and moral. I shall attempt to describe and show the difference between them so far as they relate to the purposes of God.

 

The providential government of God consists in that system of influence by which he secures the accomplishment of his providential purposes; i.e., those purposes which respect the certainty of the events purposed.

 

According to this definition the providential government of God directly respects all his own acts, as these are the objects of his providential purposes; i.e., he employs his power in performing all those acts which he purposes to perform. It indirectly respects all the acts and agencies of creatures, as these fulfill his purpose that they shall take place. It thus comprises his own direct agency in performing those acts of his own by which he produces effects as their proximate efficient cause, and those acts also by which he produces the grounds of the certainty of the acts and operations of all created beings and things.

 

The moral government of God consists in that influence which is designed and fitted to secure right moral action in moral beings rather than wrong. This influence I, have already described as consisting in the simple influence of authority on moral beings through the medium of law. It respects only one single purpose or will, viz., that right moral action should (not shall) take place rather than wrong. It consists not in any act or acts of God, but simply in that influence which arises from the full expression of his will in the form of law. While it is designed to produce right moral action rather than wrong, and is adequate to produce, and if uncounteracted by its objects would produce the former, still it does not necessarily imply, as we have already shown, an influence which will actually secure right moral action. It is an influence on beings who have power to counteract it, and thus to defeat the direct end which it is designed and fitted to accomplish through their agency. It may indeed, in entire consistency with its nature, actually secure right moral action; and yet there may be a perfect moral government, under which not right but wrong moral action on the part of subjects is certain, even universal.

 

The purpose or will of God which is expressed in his law is not a purpose that its object -- viz., right moral action -- shall take place, but a preference that it should take place rather than wrong; a preference of the manner in which he would that his moral creatures should act. This preference does indeed imply a providential purpose actually to secure the highest amount of obedience on the whole, which he can secure by furnishing the necessary means of this end, or the ground of its certainty. The purpose however which respects the certainty of right action and the means of it, is not the same as the purpose or preference that right action should take place rather than wrong. The latter preference must, in the order of nature, precede the purpose to secure the actual existence of the former.

 

While therefore moral government implies an influence which, considered in relation to the powers of its subjects, is adequate to produce right moral action, and implies a preference of right moral action rather than wrong moral action while it implies also every kind and degree of influence that will secure the highest amount of obedience which the moral governor, if benevolent, can secure -- and while in some cases, or even in all, it may actually secure and be intended to secure right moral action, still it is not essential to its nature that it secure right moral action even in one instance, much less in all instances.

 

To mark clearly this distinction between the providential and moral government of God, it is necessary further to remark, that the influence which I have called, moral government may, without losing its peculiar character, become also a part of his providential government, although that influence which we call providential government cannot become a part of his moral government. The former is true, when the influence called moral government is used with a design or purpose actually to secure right moral action. This influence would be complete and perfect considered as that of moral government, though it were used with no other preference than that the subjects should obey rather than disobey the law, and though all should rebel. But when, as the case may be, the moral governor can secure right moral action, knows he can secure it, and purposes actually to secure it by the influence of moral government, then this influence, without losing its distinctive character, becomes an influence of his providential government, being used not only with the preference that the subjects should obey rather than disobey, but also with a further design or purpose actually to secure their obedience. Thus this influence, considered as used with the simple preference that subjects should obey rather than disobey, is the influence of moral government, and when also used with the further design or purpose actually to secure obedience, it is an influence of providential government. It is obvious however that the influence of providential government, being designed merely to secure the certainty of the event which is its object, can never be used merely with the preference that the event which is its object should take place, and therefore cannot become the influence called moral government.

 

If these remarks be just, then that influence which we call moral government, when it is used actually to secure right moral action, becomes also, without losing its distinctive character, a part of that influence called providential government. Hence if we assume that God's providential purposes extend to all actual events, it will follow that all actual events are brought to pass by his providential government. Here however there is one grand peculiarity in respect to right moral action. When this actually occurs, although the influence by which it is brought to pass is an influence of providential government, and designed to accomplish the purpose that the action shall take place, yet this same influence is also called moral government. It is still the simple influence of authority, and as such is the same influence, whether right moral action be secured by it or not, or whether there be any providential purpose to secure it or not. Nor is this all. It is that peculiar influence by which alone as the proximate influence, obedience to a moral governor can be secured. All other providential events, except such obedience and its results in happiness, may be secured without this influence as their appropriate antecedent. But voluntary submission to the will of a lawgiver can be proximately secured by no other influence than the authority of a lawgiver.

 

According to the preceding view of the subject, it follows that all actual events, considered as events -- even the existence of that peculiar influence called moral government -- fall under the department of providential government, inasmuch as they are all the objects of God's providential purposes, and brought to pass by that influence which we call providential government. This universal fact however, does not exclude or conceal the peculiarity of that influence called moral government, as the great influence to whose existence and efficacy all other influences are subservient, for the sake of its results in character and happiness.

 

That those influences which result in events in the material world fall under the department of providential government, will not be doubted. A question however may naturally arise whether some other influences which, according to the present view of the subject, would belong to providential government, do not more properly fall under moral government. I here refer to the influence of motives, and to any other influences which may be supposed directly to reach the mind and secure obedience; particularly whether the acts of giving a law to moral beings, and furnishing motives to obedience, are not properly a part of moral government? The answer to this question depends on the principle of classification we adopt, or on the views we form of the two departments. If we include under the department of moral government those acts of God, or those events directly consequent on his acts, like the act of giving a law, which have a direct bearing on moral action in creatures, then indeed these acts fall within the department of moral government, To this mode or principle of classification however there lies, if I mistake not, one serious objection, if no more -- viz., it utterly confounds the two departments. For example, the trials of life and the gifts of divine bounty have as direct an influence on moral action as the giving of a law, or the furnishing of motives to obedience in any other mode. But the former, by universal consent, are denominated

 

Providential events. Indeed all that God does in all the varying modes of dispensation, has a bearing, more or less direct, on moral action in creatures, as we shall have occasion hereafter to show. Nor do I believe it possible, on the principle of such a connection of events with moral action, to draw any clear line of demarkation between the two departments of the divine government.

 

The principle now proposed seems to me at least, to be the only one on which any correct classification of events under the two departments can be made. Moral government is an influence on moral beings; an influence to produce simply right moral action in moral beings. It is designed, so far a's there is any purpose formed in the divine mind in regard -- to the moral quality of actions, to produce those which are right and no other. But the acts of God in giving a law, supporting it by sanctions, and providing means of conveying truth to the mind, &c., are not this influence, but are acts from which this influence results. It is this influence only, resulting from these acts, which can affect or move moral beings as subjects of a moral government. The acts themselves can produce no such event as their proper. and proximate effect. The acts therefore of giving a law, sustaining its authority by sanctions, providing means of conveying truth to the mind, are not constituent parts of moral government, but are providential acts which arc necessary to that influence which constitutes moral government.

 

If the preceding remarks be just, then the certainty of all moral action results from the government of God, and the question naturally arises, why is not all moral action to be placed under the same department? God, it may be said, provides alike for the certainty of every right and every wrong moral action, and why is not this provision one and the same, and to be known by the same name? I answer, while it is true that God provides for, i.e., furnishes the grounds of the certainty of every right and every wrong moral action that takes place, these grounds are widely diverse in the two cases. They differ in their nature and in their design.

 

They differ in their nature. The influence which is the ground of the certainty of right moral action, is in its appropriate tendency, fitted to produce right moral action in every being on whom it operates, and has no other tendency in respect to him. In case it fails to produce its appropriate result, i.e., in the case of certain wrong moral action, this failure or this wrong moral action can in no sense be ascribed to this influence. It is always sufficient for its end, viewed in connection with the powers of the subject. Wrong moral action therefore cannot be ascribed to this influence, even on the ground of its imperfect degree, because if it fails of its end, the failure is not owing to its deficiency as means or influence, but to the counteraction of it by the agent who is its subject. When wrong moral action is certain, it is to be traced either to the strength of propensities to natural good in the subject, or to the degree of temptation which assails him -- an influence widely different from that which we have denominated moral government -- an influence so different, that to yield to it implies the direct counteraction of the other. Now things so different are properly distinguished by different names, while to make no distinction between them, is to annihilate right and wrong in the actions of moral beings. While therefore the government of God furnishes the grounds of the certainty of every right and every wrong moral action, the grounds, of this certainty in the two cases are widely different in their nature -- the one we denominate moral government, the other providential government.

 

Again: they differ widely in their design or purpose. We shall hereafter see some of the different respects in which God may be said to purpose different events. This difference has an important application to the present subject. Thus God, in the character of a moral governor, purposes right moral action and not wrong moral action; i.e., he prefers in every instance that moral agents should act right and not wrong, so that wrong moral action compared with right moral action is never an object of the divine purpose or preference, while right moral action is always the object of his preference compared with wrong moral action in every instance in which the latter occurs. Such is the only purpose or preference which God has in relation to moral action. He knows no other. Now we say that the influence which he provides for the accomplishment of this single preference for moral actions as such, deserves a name. We say the purpose itself is distinct from every other purpose of God, and the influence appointed and designed for its fulfillment is in its design also distinct from every other. It is true, as we have already said, that this influence is provided by providential government. But then by this influence, viz., moral government, a design or purpose is to be answered which no act or influence of providential government is designed directly to answer -- viz., a purpose that there should be right moral action rather than wrong. This is a preference that moral agents should, and not that they shall act right. The only design of the providential acts which result in this influence is, that they shall result in it. Here their design terminates; and when these acts have produced the degree of influence that will result in right moral action, the purpose which respects the moral quality of actions is not gratified, but simply the purpose to furnish the means of gratifying it. In a word, the providential governor furnishes, in fulfillment of his purpose, the moral governor with the means of fulfilling his peculiar purpose. Thus the purposes of the providential governor are wholly subservient to the grand purpose of the moral governor, and obviously distinct from it. Of course providential government and moral government differ widely in their design.

 

This difference will appear still more clearly if we inquire in what respect God may be said to purpose wrong moral action. Does he purpose it in a moral respect? does be prefer its existence in any case to right moral action? has he put into operation any system of influence which bespeaks such a preference? If he has established a moral government, the law of which requires right moral action, then he has no such preference, and has done nothing to gratify it. But if God does not prefer wrong moral action to right -- if he has no preference for the former in respect to moral qualities -- in what sense can he have a purpose that wrong moral action should exist? I answer, he can be conceived to have such a purpose only in one respect, namely, that wrong moral action is to him unavoidably incident to the necessary means of the greatest good. It falls into the system aside from his main design, and in opposition to that design. It is therefore itself designed only as an evil, incidental so far as divine prevention is concerned, if the system be adopted. The system itself is not designed to produce it rather than right moral action, but the contrary. But either the system must not exist or sin must exist. The existence of the system with this inseparable evil, God purposes; i.e., he prefers the existence of the system to its non-existence with this inseparable evil. Such a purpose that sin shall be, is perfectly consistent with another purpose, viz., that compared with obedience, sin should not be. God, instead of a purpose that sin should be when compared with obedience, has an unqualified purpose that it should not be. To prevent its existence and to secure obedience, he has in fact done all he could do in the circumstances in which it exists. It results only from that which is the necessary means of the greatest good, as a consequence which God cannot prevent without the sacrifice of these means.

 

Let any one then compare the purpose of God that obedience should exist in preference to sin, with the only purpose which he can be supposed to have in respect to the existence of sin, and he will see that as moral acts, on the one the heart of God is supremely fixed, and that the other he only wills in the form of acquiescing in an unavoidable evil. Let any one compare the influence which is provided to secure, and actually does secure obedience when it exists, with that which is the direct occasion of the existence of sin, and how widely different is all that God designs and does in reference to the existence of one, from what he designs and does in its relation to the existence of the other. While then the certainty of all moral action results from the government of God, yet this government in relation to one class of these actions is so diverse from it in relation to the other, that truth and propriety both require that this diversity should be marked and described. This diversity, for aught I see, is accurately defined by dividing his government into moral and providential, and whether I have succeeded in drawing the line of demarkation between them or not, I am satisfied that the distinction is real and important. I am fully convinced that as the consequence of not making this distinction, or making it but imperfectly, the theology of many has tended directly to conceal that character of God, in which above all others he would be known and recognized by his intelligent creatures, and that instead of a moral governor willing the obedience of his children, with the most unqualified sincerity and most solicitous affection, God has appeared only or chiefly as an omnipotent disposer of all things, whose pleasure can in fact be known only by actual events, and whose decrees render nugatory the purposes and agency of his dependent creatures.