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MORAL AGENCY; 
 
 AND 
 
 MAN AS A MORAL AGENT. 
 
 WILLIAM M'COMBIE, 
 
 AUTHOR OP "HOURS OF THOUGHT. 
 
 PUBLISHED BY R. B. SEELEY AND W. BURNSIDE: 
 
 AND SOLD BY L. AND G. SEELEY, 
 
 FLEET STREET, LONDON. 
 
 MDCCCXLII. 
 
SEARCH FOK TRUTH, BY WHICH XO PERSOS HAS EVER BEEN INJURED." 
 
 MARCUS ANTONINUS. 
 
 THE HOLY BOOK, LIKE THE EIGHT SPHERES, DOES SHINE 
 WITH THOUSAND LIGHTS OF TRUTH DIVINE. 
 SO NUMBERLESS THE STARS, THAT TO THE EYE 
 II MAKES BUT ALL ONE GALAXY. 
 VET REASON MUST ASSIST TOO; FOR IN SEAS 
 SO VAST AND DANGEROUS AS THESE, 
 OUR COURSE BY' STARS ABOVE WE CANNOT KNOW, 
 WITHOUT THE COMPASS TOO BELOW." 
 
 PRINTED BY L AND 6. SEELEY, THA.VIES DIITON. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 The following treatise proceeds on the prin- 
 ciple that there are ascertainable laws and con- 
 ditions of moral being as well as of physical 
 and organic existence. It is this which renders 
 moral agency capable of being treated as a 
 matter of science, — brings it within the range 
 of rational investigation, and warrants our 
 pursuing our inquiries respecting it as we do 
 in regard to the objects of physical science, 
 unchecked by any apprehension lest the results 
 should be found to contravene the statements 
 of holy writ, — confident rather that the princi- 
 ples and views we obtain by the proper exer- 
 cise of our rational powers must ever ultimately 
 be found to harmonize with these. It is well, 
 however, that reason should know its limits, 
 and we are not to seek for the origin of moral 
 obligation in any of what are merely results of 
 its exercise. The constitution of moral agents, 
 and the grounds and conditions of moral action 
 are matters open to the investigation of reason ; 
 but the sense of obligation can result only from 
 Divine authority apprehended or believed to be. 
 
somehow, manifested or revealed. The follow- 
 ing treatise is thus less concerned with the 
 foundation of moral obligation than with the 
 constitution and powers of moral beings; many 
 of its principal topics therefore relate less to 
 things directly taught in Scripture than to 
 what is involved or implied in what it teaches, 
 and what the consistency of its different parts 
 with each other, and with the nature and con- 
 ditions of moral agency and moral govern- 
 ment requires. Other parts of it, however, 
 bear on what the Scriptures directly teach; 
 and in the inquiries and discussions regarding 
 both is involved the fullest exercise of the riffht 
 of private judgment, which great principle of 
 Protestantism, it should be borne in mind, in- 
 volves in it the recognition of the use and exer- 
 cise of individual reason in religious matters, 
 the right of each individual to judge for himself 
 clearly presupposing the possession of a power 
 or faculty which, if rightly exercised, is compe- 
 tent to this ; and this principle is nullified not 
 less when the competence of individual reason 
 is denied, than when its exercise is disallowed. 
 With this great principle the whole strain and 
 bearing of Scripture harmonizes, which, so far 
 from aiming at ' putting out the light of reason,' 
 uniformly recognizes its exercise, and addresses 
 itself to it on all fitting occasions. 
 
PREFACE. V 
 
 Such a well-defined and healthy protestant- 
 ism, the writer conceives the present times 
 emphatically call for. The tendencies of theo- 
 logical and ecclesiastical opinion are making it 
 every day more manifest that all religionists 
 are fast ranging into two classes, — those who 
 take their faith from the Bible, and those who 
 take it from the Church. Having thus stated 
 with all distinctness with which of these he 
 himself holds, the writer may be permitted 
 respectfully to ask his reader, — * With which 
 do you range yourself?' If with the latter, 
 and you have decidedly taken part, the writer 
 cannot hold out to you any hope of satisfaction 
 in the perusal of the following pages ; for what- 
 ever church it be whose teaching you confide 
 in, you will not find its creed there done homage 
 to on account of its being such ; and as it must 
 be a point settled with you beyond the reach 
 of rational questioning, that whatever conclu- 
 sions any one may come to that are not in har- 
 mony with the accredited symbol of your faith, 
 must of necessity be wrong : no better results 
 than annoyance and mental disquietude can 
 well be anticipated from a review of inquiries 
 and reasonings, many of which will be found to 
 belong to what is with you a proscribed order, 
 and which by consequence you have already 
 prejudged and condemned. 
 
VI PREFACE. 
 
 But if you are one of those who come directly 
 to the Bible for your faith, you of course prac- 
 tically know that its meaning is to be ascer- 
 tained through the exercise of the same facul- 
 ties, which are applied to the investigation of 
 the works of nature ; and while claiming the 
 liberty of judging for yourself, and conceding 
 to others an equal freedom, you will be ready 
 to accept with gratitude every discreet and 
 well-intentioned endeavour to aid you in ascer- 
 taining the true principles taught in the word 
 of God, or involved in what it teaches. From 
 such as you who, maintaining and exercising 
 intellectual freedom, have resolved to search 
 after truth for themselves, and who would not 
 * sell' it for the most splendid possessions or 
 honours which the universe has to bestow, the 
 writer anticipates a cordial sympathy in his 
 labours, and apprehends no uncharitable cen- 
 sure, even where they may deem him to have 
 erred. To such, then he would humbly de- 
 dicate the following inquiries, confident that 
 whether they acquiesce in few or many of the 
 results, they will at least honour the motive 
 which prompted him to institute them. 
 
 Cairnballoch, 
 Jan. 12, 1842. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Introduction 
 
 PART 1. 
 
 OP MORAL AGENCY IN GENERAL. 
 
 SECTION I. 
 Nature and Conditions of Moral Agency, lo 
 
 SECTION II. 
 Difficulties ------ 20 
 
 SECTION III. 
 Of the kind of Knowledge which is the 
 GROUND of Moral Agency - - - 44 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PART 11. 
 
 MAN CONSIDERED AS A MORAL AGENT. 
 
 SECTION I. 
 Inquiry respecting the present Condi- 
 tion OF Man as a Moral Agent - - 92 
 
 SECTION II. 
 Of the Original Condition and Powers 
 OF Man considered as a Moral Agent 104 
 
 SECTION III. 
 Inquiry respecting the Uses of Suffering 116 
 
 SECTION IV. 
 Respecting the Scripture View of the 
 Present Condition and Powers of Man 124 
 
 SECTION V. 
 
 Present Condition of Man not incompa- 
 tible WITH his being a Moral Agent 151 
 
 Summary — Conclusion - - - - 172 
 
 Notes and Illustrations . . . 195 
 
hiiC. MOVIBG 
 
 i. THSOL.OGIG:S.I» 
 
 . Vi"*V'' 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 There are two great inquiries embraced in the fol- 
 lowing Treatise, viz. 1st. What is moral agency con- 
 sidered in itself; and, 2ndly. What are the powers 
 and conditions of man in relation to it. Under the 
 first, the author has endeavoured to ascertain what 
 the nature of moral agency is, and what are the 
 indispensable conditions of its being exercised ; in 
 doing so he has been led to inquire what the kind of 
 knowledge is which forms properly the basis of moral 
 agency, and how it is obtained, and has endeavoured 
 to meet the difficulties which arise from the divine 
 Ibreknowledge, and to subvert the position that mind 
 in its actings is subject to the law of causation, or 
 that in choosing and willing, it is not free. In the 
 second part of the treatise, the writer has entered on 
 the inquiry, what the powers, and capabilities, and 
 resources of man are, considered as a moral agent. In 
 what respects and to what extent he has, considered in 
 this light, been affected by the sin of Adam or the fall, 
 and in what respects and to what extent by the work of 
 Christ. In regard to these, the writer has endeavoured 
 to show that whatever evils mankind universally may 
 have become exposed to, or may suffer, on account of 
 
 B 
 
2 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Adam's sin, independently of any agency on their 
 part, are obviated, or will be ultimately repaired — alike 
 independently of their agency — by Christ; that no man 
 is now under any sentence of condemnation to eternal 
 perdition on account of Adam's sin alone, or anterior 
 to personal transgression: that the loss sustained by 
 man by the fall is not strictly a loss of the power to do 
 good, but of the disposition ; consequently, that in 
 man's present condition there is no insuperable barrier 
 to his choosing and pursuing what is right, or to his 
 reaping the proper consequences of so doing, and that 
 it is from these things being so, that his pursuing what 
 is wrong derives its special ill-desert and heinousness. 
 
 The reader will require to have distinctly in view, that 
 in the following treatise the work of Christ is regarded 
 as having a twofold bearing on the condition and destiny 
 of man. The first in relation to the evils, just referred 
 to, brought on all by the sin of Adam, anterior to, and 
 apart from, any choice of theirs ; and which as they 
 come on all independently of any agency on their part, 
 are obviated or will be ultimately repaired by Christ in 
 a manner equally independent of personal agency ; 
 1 Cor. XV. 21,22. Compare, Rom. v. 15, 18: And 
 the second in relation to the evils which men suffer or 
 become exposed to through their own personal trans- 
 gression, and which, as they never come on any but 
 through their own choice, will never be removed from, 
 or repaired to any, but those who embrace and avail 
 themselves of the remedy. In its former bearing, the 
 atonement is not only sufficient, but efficient in regard 
 to the whole race ; in its latter bearing, though equally 
 sufficient for the salvation of all, it can be available to 
 none but those who personally embrace its provisions. 
 It is in the former of these bearings that the work of 
 
INTRODUCTION". 6 
 
 Christ comes within the scope of our inquiry; the lat- 
 ter, if adverted to at all, is only incidentally so, in the 
 course of the following pages. If the reader will keep 
 this distinctly in view, it may prevent him from charg- 
 ing the author with holding a defective theology, 
 because he has not referred to doctrines or principles 
 which it fell not within the plan of his work to include. 
 
 A probable exception to much in the following 
 pages will be, that many of the discussions are far too 
 metaphysical. There is extensively diffused among 
 us an unfortunate distaste for metaphysical inquiries, 
 and a very hurtful prejudice against them. Now it 
 certainly can be no proof that such inquiries must 
 necessarily be unprofitable or injurious, that they have 
 often been conducted so as to be productive only ol 
 mysticism or error. The true way to obviate such 
 evils is not to neglect and despise the philosophy ol 
 mind, but to endeavour to cultivate it in a proper man- 
 ner and a proper spirit ; for we may be assured that 
 if the thinking or questioning portions of the com- 
 munity are not pervaded by the elements of a sound 
 philosophy of mind and moral action, thousands will 
 embrace false and distorted views, which will exercise 
 a fatal influence, both on their mental condition and 
 their conduct. We often hear invectives against me- 
 taphysics, on the ground that they are of no practical 
 value or importance, but we shall come to a very differ- 
 ent conclusion if we take an impartial survey of the 
 history of metaphysical systems and their ]3ractical in- 
 fluence, though this survey should not extfud beyond 
 a very recent period. From what did the prevalent 
 scepticism of the eighteenth century, on the one hand, 
 and the inertness of the true church on the other, du- 
 B 2 
 
4 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 ring the same period, spring, but from a false or per- 
 verted metaphysics ; and what other foundation has 
 the pernicious system of socialism in our own times ? 
 Shall it be assumed that metaphysics are of little or no 
 practical moment, when we take into view the distress, 
 often rising to agony, which the dark and difficult ques- 
 tions involved in them, occasion to almost every ques- 
 tioning and contemplative mind ; and think how many 
 of the more sensitive and desponding order of human 
 spirits have, by misapprehensions regarding the first 
 jsrinciples of the philosophy of accountable rational 
 mind, been driven on the quicksands of pyi-rhonism ; 
 and how many of the harder and more sanguine, on 
 the sterile rocks of dogmatism. 
 
 Indeed the greatest misconceptions and errors in 
 theology and morals, spring from an ill-constructed 
 or false philosophy of mind and responsible action. 
 Romanism, Anglican ' church principles,' Hyper-Cal- 
 vinism, and Socialism, have a fraternity in this ; that 
 they arise out of, and subsist by, misconceptions or 
 imsound positions regarding the capacity and powers 
 of man, the economy under which moral agency finds 
 scope and is developed, and the principles which in 
 the divine government regulate the treatment of moral 
 agents. Now, though the philosophy of mind and 
 moral agency are not capable of the same sort of cer- 
 tainty as the exact sciences, the main principles in- 
 volved in the existence and order of voluntary and 
 responsible relations, must surely be ascertainable ; 
 else we should be left in an uncertainty altogether in- 
 compatible with the very idea of responsibility. While 
 then the nature of the subject forbids, on the one hand, 
 our receiving any system — mystic, or dogmatic — on 
 the ground of a church authority of ostensibly, or 
 
INTRODUCTION. § 
 
 tacitly, assumed inflillibility, it should prevent us from 
 concluding, as many seem to do, on the other,— that 
 any investigation of such recondite matters must in- 
 volve us in the mazes of hopeless uncertainty or inter- 
 minable error. Many evince a reluctance to pursue, 
 or even allow, inquiry on certain topics, because they 
 regard them as mysterious. Such feelings may, and 
 often no doubt do, arise from true humility and reve- 
 rence for what is inscrutable in the divine counsel ; 
 but they may also spring from indolence, combined 
 with a sort of spiritual ])ride, or from apprehensiveness 
 for the safety of favourite dogmas, which, it may be 
 feared, would not stand the ordeal of rational investiga- 
 tion. There is a distinction between what is myste- 
 rious and what is secret, to which it is of no small 
 importance that we attend. A mystery is something 
 open to our view, or revealed to us, but of which we 
 are unable to comprehend the grounds or reasons ; we 
 see or believe that it is, but are unable to pereeive how 
 it exists in the manner that it does, rather than in any 
 other : we are in this predicament, with respect to 
 innumerable things in nature ; but in regard to the 
 " secret things" in the divine economy, our ignorance 
 does not necessarily arise from their being of an in- 
 comprehensible character, — many of them we might 
 be quite able to comprehend, — but from God's hav- 
 ing seen fit quite to conceal them from our view. 
 Things on which God has distinctly put the seal of 
 secrecy, it were presumption to pry into ; but in re- 
 gard to facts or principles revealed, but the gi'ound or 
 nature of which may appear mysterious, the propriety 
 of investigating such, will depend on the competence 
 of our faculties to gi'apple with and solve the questions 
 which may be involved in their investigation. Many 
 
b INTRODUCTION. 
 
 things conventionallv deemed inscrutable might be 
 made to yield, ov might have their difficulties much 
 alleviated, by being subjected to patient and severe 
 investigation by minds of superior powers of com- 
 prehension and analysis. The source of mystery is 
 not any indistinctness in the nature of some truths 
 considered in themselves, but is to be assigned to the 
 inadequacy of the cognizant or conceptive powers in 
 the minds to which such truths appear mysterious. 
 All truth is certain, and all relations must appear dis- 
 tinct and clear, both in their principle and actual sub- 
 sistence, to a being of sufficient reach of view and grasp 
 of faculties. It might prove a serious impediment to 
 the progress of knowledge, were we to abstain from 
 the investigation of every thing deemed mysterious, 
 simply on account of its being so regarded. Had such 
 a principle been deferred to in investigations respect- 
 ing physical nature, the sciences conversant with phy- 
 sical relations could never have advanced so far towards 
 perfection. But on the other hand it must be borne 
 in mind, that man has but a very circumscribed range 
 of view, and that the faculties of his mind are but of 
 limited power ; there is much, therefore, that must re- 
 main inscrutable to him. The range of investigation 
 has on all sides a limit beyond which human thought 
 is baffled and human inquiry vain ; and those who 
 have imagined they could comprehend all mysteries, 
 or that there was nothing really bearing such a cha- 
 racter; that they could jjass on unobstructed and at 
 will even into the depths of the divine nature and 
 counsel, have in the presumptuous attempt, run them- 
 selves against that adamantine wall which bounds the 
 range of knowledge accessible to man ; and were pos- 
 sessed only by the illusions of their reeling senses — 
 
INTRODUCTION. 7 
 
 under the stunned recoil, when they fancied they had 
 penetrated to the glories, and were scanning the primal 
 fonns, in the inner sanctuary ol" ihe universe. 
 
 But in addition to his recognising the utility and 
 importance of metaphysical inc^uiries, the reader must 
 keep in view that the author of the following treatise 
 has proceeded on the principle, that each one is not 
 only entitled, but solemnly bound, to judge for him- 
 self on sufficient examination, respecting the meaning 
 of Scripture, free from all restriction or dictation on 
 the part of any body which may call itself" the church." 
 If on sufficient evidence we have received the Scrip- 
 tiu'es as a divine revelation, by so receiving them we 
 become bound to believe all the truths, and obey all 
 the laws contained in them. But the Scriptures come 
 to us under the conditions which are common to all 
 written language ; they are addressed to us as rational 
 creatures capable of understanding their meaning, — of 
 forming a judgment respecting it, and of using me- 
 thods for ascertaining it when it is not obvious at first 
 view ; and no body of men is entitled to step between 
 us and the Bible, with an interpretation of its contents, 
 aiid say, ' In this sense, and this alone, you must re- 
 ceive them, else you are a heretic, and must be treated 
 as an outcast from the church.' Those who would 
 attempt to assume such ' dominion over our faith,' we 
 can confront with the charter of our spiritual freedom, 
 derived from no lower authority than that of God him- 
 self, who has given it with the solemn injunction that 
 we maintain it inviolate. " Search the Scriptures." 
 " Prove all things ;" " hold fast that which is good." 
 •• Stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made 
 us free." And if every one must at last answer for 
 himself, surely it is right that every one should be free 
 
8 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 to judge and choose for himself, respecting that on 
 which his eternal destiny is declared hy God to de- 
 pend. God, in offering the high boon of salvation to 
 a sinful world, has made the truth essential to it, clear, 
 simple, and of easy comprehension by all : a teachable 
 disposition is the only thing necessary to its recep- 
 tion. But the case is very different with regard to the 
 true value and bearings of Christianity, considered as 
 an important part of the great scheme of the Divine 
 administration ; these seem only in the course of being 
 slowly evolved by extended observation, patient study, 
 and laborious research, with a progress analogous to 
 the practical evolution of that great economy through 
 the course of time. Moreover, as our views become 
 more just, distinct, and enlarged, respecting the 
 economy of nature, and the constitution, powers, and 
 susceptibilities of man, the more correct and well-de- 
 fined will our notions become, both of the relations of 
 Christianity to him, and of its harmony with that 
 economy of nature under which he exists. For such 
 reasons as these we rest not uninquiringly in the 
 views of those who have preceded us, however dis- 
 tinguished they may have been for character or attain- 
 ments. We are perfectly willing to allow that it was 
 quite possible and even likely for the Christians of the 
 third and fourth centuiies, to attain to more comprehen- 
 sive views of scriptural truth, and of the various bearings 
 of the redeeming economy, than those of the first (whe- 
 ther such was in fact the case it is not necessary for us 
 at present to inquire) ; but this involves the very rea- 
 son why we judge it \\Tong to rest either indolently or 
 superstitiously in what they attained to, as we conceive 
 that they had no means of surpassing their predecessors, 
 except as we have coiresponding or greater facilities for 
 
INTRODUCTION. 9 
 
 surpassing them. The true and consistent Protestant, 
 wlio makes the Christian scheme and its various rela- 
 tions, special objects of inquinng thought, studies the 
 fathers and doctors of the Church, that he may obtain 
 all the assistance they can furnish in fonning just and 
 enlarged conceptions of truth ; tliat he may, if possible, 
 turn their labours to some valuable account for the ad- 
 vancenent of the highest orders of knowledge, feeling 
 that if he aimed not at this he would be utterly un- 
 worthy to have succeeded to such an intellectual in- 
 heritance. But the adherent of " church principles " 
 studies them only that he may resign himself to their 
 authority, and adopt their faith in blind unquestioning 
 acquiescence ; with a mystic sentiment of awe he loves, 
 or rather adores, the Church, because her stained win- 
 dows and sombrous aisles, screen him from the painful 
 excess of light which is breaking forth in the open 
 world around. 
 
 Many readers desiderate definitions of the principal 
 terms and phrases in treatises of this kind ; and pro- 
 pounders and expositors of metaphysical systems, have 
 been charged with occasioning much needless contro- 
 versy, and producing a great appearance of difference, 
 where little or none really existed, by not accurately 
 defining the principal terms and phrases by which 
 they expressed their doctrines, or by not sufficiently 
 keeping in view the sense in which such tenns and 
 phrases may have been used by those whose principles 
 they have set themselves to controvert. We mean 
 not to deny that for such a complaint there has been 
 some gi'ound, but all that could be done in the way of 
 definition would go but a short way in narrowing the 
 debateable land of mental science and metaphysical 
 
10 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 theology : though stript as far as possible of all logo- 
 machy, the great points of controversy would still re- 
 main. When men, having a competent acquaintance 
 with the language in which they write, use contradic- 
 tory words and phrases in expressing their notions of 
 the same subject, it is certainly more likely that there 
 is some opposition or real discrepancy in the notions 
 themselves, than that they have merely misunderstood 
 each other's meaning. When words and phrases are 
 in danger of producing ambiguity from their bearing 
 various senses, it is well to indicate in which of these 
 they are used. But the using of words in senses new 
 or alien from what they have been formed for, and 
 trusting to mere definition for fixing them down to 
 such a meaning, is always a hazardous and seldom 
 a successful experiment. Forms of expression are 
 by no means such pliable things as many seem to 
 imagine ; tliey cannot, at the will or mere caprice 
 of every one who handles them, be bent and twisted 
 about from the meaning which they are adapted, 
 and, if I may so express myself, have been moulded 
 to convey ; they uniformly resent such violence, and 
 speedily, in the mind, at least of the reader, if not 
 in the intention of the writer, come round to the 
 proper sense they are fitted to bear ; or if not allowed 
 to do that, refuse to convey any intelligible meaning 
 at all, and there is far more danger of occasioning 
 confusion and misconception by arbitrary definitions of 
 tenns and phrases, than by allowing them to convey 
 their natural and appropriate meaning, that being har- 
 monized with, and distinctly brought out by a simple 
 and luminous context. 
 
 As an expression of two distinct and widely differ- 
 ent exercises of mind, language divides itself into two 
 
INTROBUCTIOX. 1 1 
 
 great compartments ; the one adapted to convey im- 
 mediate, lively, or powerful impression, the other calm 
 philosophical investigation. The immediate and un- 
 investigated aspects of things often impress us very 
 deeply-, and we choose woi'ds and forms of expression 
 which we deem best adapted to embody what we per- 
 ceive and feel. Language in this use of it is a record 
 not so much of things as they are in themselves, as 
 of the impressions we receive from them, our purpose 
 in using it is to communicate our impressions as dis- 
 tinctly and vividly as possible to the minds of others. 
 Thus in poetical descriptions, that of which we de- 
 lightedly or exulting] y recognise the truthfulness and 
 beauty, is quite a diflerent thing from any successful 
 disclosure of the nature of the things described con- 
 sidered by themselves, or under their physical rela- 
 tions, it is the revealing of that relation (strange and 
 imdefineable !) which they bear to our experience and 
 the workings of our minds. The felicity of such de- 
 scription or portraiture is recognised not according as 
 it most distinctly brings to view the abstract nature or 
 relations of things, but according as it most vividly 
 brings home to our consciousness those — if I may be 
 allowed so to call them — spirit-relations. The pro- 
 cesses of mind which are involved in inquiries into the 
 nature of things, and into those relations which lie 
 without the sphere of consciousness and living experi- 
 ence, are of a different order, and a different vehicle is 
 required for communicating to others both them and 
 their results. In the former case, a writer or speaker 
 aims only at giving a vivid description of things as 
 they appear to him, or as they affect him ; in the 
 latter case it is his aim to show what the things 
 really are, and how it is that they come to be what 
 
12 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 they are. The mtroduction hito strictly philoso- 
 phical inquiry or speculation of the language and 
 modes of speaking, which we appropriate to poetical, 
 or popular and non-philosophical composition, has 
 proved a source of much confusion and error, while 
 attempts to guard against these by means of defini- 
 tions generally avail little ; and in fact in the nature 
 of things cannot avail much, seeing the very cast and 
 moulding of such language and modes of expression 
 are incompatible with the use to which they are ap- 
 plied : their appropriateness and force in their own 
 proper sphere, arising from their being figurative, or 
 in some degree intensified and exaggerated; whereas in 
 a strictly philosophical treatise we cannot hope to ap- 
 proach precision, unless we strip our language as far 
 as possible of all that is figurative, and avoid all con- 
 scious exaggeration. 
 
 To give some illustration of these remarks. When 
 we say of a miser, he cannot part with his money, we 
 do so because we always perceive in him the greatest 
 reluctance to part with any which he can possibly re- 
 tain. According to the principle above stated we use 
 this mode of speaking in order to give a vivid impres- 
 sion of the strength of his passion for gold, and when 
 confined to popular discourse, and introduced so as 
 not to imply inevitableness, such a mode of speaking 
 may be used not only without impropriety, but with 
 special beauty and force. In like manner, when in 
 common speaking, we say of a confirmed drunkard, 
 that he cannot keep from drink ; or when it is said in 
 Scripture, " That he that is in the flesh cannot please 
 God," and " He that is born of God cannot sin," it is 
 never meant that in either of these cases there is any 
 real impossibility, all that is intended is emphatically 
 
INTRODUCTION. 13 
 
 to express a strong inclination or disinclination. But 
 the case is completely changed when such and similar 
 phrases are used in such a way as to imply necessity 
 or impossibility ; or when, taken in all the fulness and 
 strictest literality of their meaning, they are made the 
 basis of metaphysical principles or theological doc- 
 trines; as, when it is maintained, for instance, that be- 
 cause the states and operations of mind are uniformly 
 connected with the influences which operate on it, 
 therefore there is in these the force of inevitable causa- 
 tion : or, because it is declared in Scripture, " That 
 he that is in the flesh cannot please God," it is held 
 that there is a real impossibility in his doing so. 
 There are many popular modes of speaking in regard 
 to material things, which are used as freely as they were 
 before the modern discoveries of physical science 
 showed that they were applicable only to the appear- 
 ance of things, and not to their real state or order ; 
 yet they never confuse or mislead the minds of philo- 
 sophical inquirers. We speak of the sun rising and 
 the sun going down ; but no one acquainted with the 
 relations of the bodies composing the solar system, is 
 ever in danger of being led, by the use of such ex- 
 pressions, into the notion that the sun daily performs 
 the circuit of the heavens. We speak of the old 
 moon and the new moon, but we never think from 
 using these phrases, that every month the moon's sub- 
 stance is gradually wasted and renewed. 
 
 In the course of the following pages the writer has 
 had occasion, in expressing his own views, to contro- 
 vert principles promulged by various distinguished 
 men, among whom he may name Edwards, Cousin, and 
 Abercombie. In doing so he has expressed himself 
 
14 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 freely, and in terms corresponding with his convictions, 
 where these were strong and decided. But he is 
 not one of those who would altogether condemn a 
 man, however eminent he may he, because they con- 
 ceive he has committed some mistakes, or fallen into 
 some errors; or who will not allow that he may, notwith- 
 standing, have done essential service to the cause of 
 truth. Indeed the present writer would he reluctant 
 to think that humble independent enquiry should 
 ever ultimately fail of such a result, and his apprehen- 
 sions regarding the following attempt are not a little 
 alleviated by the hope that though it should be found 
 of but little service in clearing away obstacles and 
 throwing light on obscurities, it may at least sometimes 
 indicate the way by which truth is to be found, and 
 that the very mistakes and errors into which he may 
 have fallen may stimulate others to a more successful 
 search. 
 
 Freedom of thought is the highest intellectual dis- 
 tinction of our being (and that not the less that it 
 has been so often disallowed and foregone), as freedom 
 of choice is the indispensable condition of our moral 
 agenc}^ Our true elevation as rational and accounta- 
 ble intelligences, can result only from the proper ex- 
 ercise of both. Nothing short of a free and unbound- 
 ed range of inquiry, resti'ained and controlled by no 
 authority, save that of God, can furnish a sphere wide 
 enough for the full developement of our intellectual 
 being; while the perfection of our moral character can- 
 not be attained in anything less than a readiness to do 
 or suffer whatever God may call us to, regardless of 
 personal sacrifice. 
 
PART I. 
 
 OF MORAL AGENCY IN GENERAL. 
 
 SECTION I. 
 
 THE NATURE AND DISTINCTIVE CHARACTER OF 
 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 A MORAL agent is an intelligent being who has the 
 power of choosing, and scope to act according to his 
 choice ; one to whom the Supreme Governor has 
 given a cognizable law, with its proper sanction, by 
 which to regulate his volitions and actions, and who is 
 placed in circumstances which present no physical 
 obstruction, either to obedience or disobedience. Mo- 
 ral action, therefore, is action which springs from choice, 
 and is not necessitated either by mental propension or 
 external circumstances : intelligent, free, and account- 
 able, it is distinguished on the one hand from instinc- 
 tive action, which is the result of an undeviating and 
 unfailing but blind propension, and on the other from 
 Divine action, which though certain as instinct, is yet 
 in the fullest sense intelligent and free. Instinctive 
 action is certain, because it results Irom unfailing and 
 determinate impulse proper to the action it prompts 
 to, and free from the risk of incertitude from doubt. 
 
16 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 as it is beneath the range of intelligence. Divine ac- 
 tion is certain too, as it is disturbed by no doubt and 
 no vacillation or weakening of impulse; but it is so be- 
 cause it springs from an intelligence in which all doubt 
 is swallowed up, is sustained by a power above resistance, 
 and is exerted with a freedom beyond control. But 
 moral action has neither the certitude of action from 
 instinct, nor of Divine action ; for both sovereign pro- 
 pension, and omniscience, or an indubitable universal 
 knowledge, would be alike incompatible with moral 
 agency. A being capable of moral agency is one who 
 possesses the means of judging rightly, and power to 
 act accordingly ; but whether he will do so or not, de- 
 pends on the voluntary exercise of his faculties : so 
 that by neglecting rightly to exercise these he may 
 judge and act wrong. Had all truth been presented 
 to the cognizance of our senses, or made intuitively 
 certain, or been brought before us in the form of de- 
 monstration, there could have been no such thing as 
 faith, and consequently no moral agency ; such agency 
 involving reliance on testimony, and resulting from the 
 influence of motives drawn from objects neither per- 
 ceptible by the senses, nor capable of demonstrative 
 proof.* Moral agency always involves the operation 
 of different or opposing motives on the mind ; for such 
 agency ceases where there is only one motive present- 
 ed, or where motives operate irresistibly. But the 
 capability of being influenced by motives involves the 
 susceptibility of emotion : a moral agent, therefore, in 
 addition to the caj^acity of distinguishing right from 
 wrong, and freedom to act according to his choice, 
 must be susceptible of emotion to impel him to choose. 
 
 * The grounds of these positions the reader will find stated in 
 detail under Section 3 of Part I. 
 
MORAL AGENCY. 17 
 
 Whether there exist in any sphere of creation hare 
 intelHgences, capahle of receiving truth only with the 
 insensitive hardness of mathematical demonstration, 
 we know not, but the existence of such is prima facia; 
 improbable ; for supposing such to exist, they could 
 not be moral agents, for they would want all the sus- 
 ceptibilities which render intelligent natures capable 
 of advancement, or even of action. Though endued 
 with the power of comprehending and mastering all 
 trutii, yet destitute of all the powers of feeling, they 
 would have no stimulus to its discovery, and its acqui- 
 sition would give them no pleasure. The powers of 
 taste spring from a sense of beauty and congruity, 
 whose impressions excite keen and delicate feeling, and 
 it is indispensible to the sense of moral obligation, 
 not only that moral sanctions be comprehended, but 
 that they be felt ; but such intelligences being insus- 
 ceptible of all feeling, could not be amenable to law, 
 for to beings incapable alike of enjoyment and of 
 suffering, its fulfilment could bring no good, and its 
 infraction no evil ; and being unamenable to law, and 
 insusceptible of the refinements of taste, they would 
 be incapable of acquiring any character. 
 
 But a moral agent must not only be susceptible of 
 emotion, he must be susceptible of the excitement of 
 appetites, or desires for objects which are denied him, 
 for if he were susceptible of emotive excitement only 
 towards right objects, his agency would be more akin 
 to the instinctive than the moral. But on the other 
 hand, it is not less essential to moral action that the 
 mind should have the power of controlling its emo- 
 tions ; this power is what is usually termed the Will, 
 which determines according to the dictates of the un- 
 derstanding, and in moral action is impelled by tJie 
 c 
 
18 MORAl AGENCY. 
 
 sense of moral obligation or conscience, which can'ies 
 with it the most powerful of all impressions. The 
 power and legitimate influence of conscience, how- 
 ever, are greatly dependant on the right exercise of 
 the reflecting and judging faculties, and the proper 
 control of the various propensions. If truth is not 
 unremittingly sought, if the propensions are not regu- 
 lated and restrained, in the one case conscience cannot 
 be enlightened, in the other it will ultimately have to 
 succumb to the tyranny of passion. 
 
 A diflSculty will, no doubt, have presented itself to 
 the thinking reader, in regard to some of the principles 
 just laid down — that they are incompatible with the 
 existence of moral character in God. In reference to 
 this, it must be observed that the moral character of 
 God is not subject to the conditions of dependant moral 
 agency. God is not accountable, he is not placed 
 under any law given and sanctioned by a superior na- 
 ture, for he is himself supreme ; and he cannot be 
 placed in a state of trial, regulated by faith in the testi- 
 mony of a superior, and exercised regarding objects 
 future, and but relatively certain,* for he has no su- 
 perior, and there is nothing future or uncertain in his 
 view. These conditions of dependent moral agency 
 are intended and adapted for the developement and 
 maturing of moral character ; but the moral character 
 of God is original, and not capable of any other de- 
 velopement than its disclosure to his creatures, accord- 
 ing to their conduct and circumstances. The trial of 
 his character can only bring out what may formerly 
 
 * By relatively certain is meant, not certain by itself, or abso- 
 lutely, but only in connection with something else ; as salvation 
 is certain, not to all, but only to those who believe, and endure to 
 the end. 
 
MORAL AGENCY. 19 
 
 have been hidden from them, there is nothing to form. 
 But in created moral agents, the moral character is to 
 develope and mature ; and it could not be otherwise, 
 unless they were created in a perfection, beyond which 
 there was no room for advancement, which is utterly 
 incompatible with the idea of dependant moral agency. 
 God then is not a moral agent in any such sense as 
 his dependent intelligences are, as he is not subject to 
 the conditions of such agency as theirs. While in 
 all cases their agency has a bearing upwards to him, 
 the bearing of his is ever downwards to them ; while 
 the law which regulates moral action in creatures ema- 
 nates from him, that which regulates the action of the 
 Divine Mind, — which coiTesponds to moral in crea- 
 tures, — springs up spontaneously there. 
 
 2 
 
SECTION II. 
 
 DIFFICULTIES. 
 
 The first difficulty, in regard to moral agency, arises 
 from the alleged fact, that God's certain fore-knowledge 
 of events renders them necessary, and as this fore- 
 knowledge extends to all events, it include the actions 
 and volitions of moral agents, rendering these neces- 
 sary as well as other events. ' It is evident,' says 
 President Edwards, ' that if there he a full, certain, 
 and infallible fore-knowledge of the future existence 
 of the volitions of moral agents, then there is a certain 
 infallible and indissoluble connexion between those 
 events and that fore-knowledge ; and that therefore 
 those events are necessary events, being infallibly and 
 indissolubly connected with that, whose existence al- 
 ready is, and so is now necessary, and cannot but 
 have been.'* Again, ' it is perfectly demonstrable, 
 that if there be an infallible knowledge of future voli- 
 tions, the event is necessary, or, in other words, that it 
 is impossible but the event should come to pass.'f 
 Now if there are to be events at all, if moral agents 
 
 * Works of Jonathan Edwards, 2 vols. London : 1834. Vol. 
 i. p. 36. t Ibid. 
 
DIFFICULTIES. 21 
 
 are to think and act, in otlier wortls, if there are to 
 be moral agents, God must know their volitions and 
 actions, what they are to be, else he would not be Om- 
 niscient; if he did not know all these during all duration 
 his knowledge would be imperfect, and he would be 
 unfit to be the moral Governor of the universe, for if 
 any of the volitions or actions of rational agents — to 
 occur in however remote an era — were hidden from 
 him, some of these might take him by surprise, and he 
 might be disconcerted, and his plans might be disar- 
 ranged by them. A full and certain knowledge or 
 foreknowledge (the former is the proper term in re- 
 lation to God, the latter an accommodation to our im- 
 perfect conceptions), a full and certain fore-knowledge 
 of all events is necessary alike to the perfection of the 
 Divine nature, and to the discharge of the functions 
 of a moral Governor. But this full and certain 
 knowledge interferes not at all with the freedom of 
 moral agency, and it neither causes nor proves any 
 necessity in the volitions and actions of moral agents. 
 God's knowing certainly that they will resolve on this, 
 does not preclude the possibility of their resolving on 
 that instead ; his knowing certainly that they will do 
 this, does not prevent them from doing that, any more 
 than your seeing a man walking to the alehouse on 
 Sunday prevents him from going to church. As little 
 can anything be distant by futurity in time from Je- 
 hovah, as anything can be distant from him by re- 
 moteness in space. It is not less certain, nor more 
 difficult to conceive of, that God should comprehend, 
 at once all events throughout all eras, than that he 
 should be present at once with every existence through- 
 out all regions of the universe. Progression is the 
 law of created natures, comprehensive continuousness, 
 
22 DIFFICULTIES. 
 
 of the Divine. God, therefore, does not need in any 
 case, in order to obtain certainty of knowledge, to 
 trace out link by link, as we do, a chain of consecu- 
 tive causation, and, because one of his dependant 
 minds must form this volition, conclude that that 
 other must necessarily follow, and that other still 
 again from it : he sees the whole at once. Knowing 
 all things immediately, not mediately, in order to be 
 certain of any (future) event, he does not need to know 
 that it will be an infallible result of some other event 
 which he has determined, or of some action which he 
 is to perform ; to suppose any such process necessary 
 to the certitude of his knowledge, were indeed to limit 
 and dim the glory of his Omniscience — to reduce his 
 knowledge, if not to the measure, at least to the man- 
 ner of our own. 
 
 President Edwards brings forward the following ar- 
 gument as proof, in his view, that ' no future event 
 can be certainly fore-known, whose existence is con- 
 tingent, and without all necessity. It is impossible 
 for a thing to be certainly known to any intellect, 
 without evidence. To suppose otherwise, implies a 
 contradiction; because, for a thing to be certainly 
 known to any understanding, is for it to be evident to 
 that understanding : and for a thing to be evident 
 to any understanding, is the same thing as for that 
 understanding to see evidence of it ; but no under- 
 standing, created or uncreated, can see evidence where 
 there is none ; for that is the same thing, as to see 
 that to be which is not. And therefore, if there be 
 any truth which is absolutely without evidence, that 
 truth is absolutely unknowable, insomuch that it im- 
 plies a contradiction to suppose that it is known. 
 
 ' But if there be any future event, whose existence 
 
DIFFICULTIES. 23 
 
 is contingent, without all necessity, the future exist- 
 ence of the event is absolutely without evidence. If 
 there be any evidence of it, it must be one of these 
 two sorts, either self-evidence or proof; an evident 
 thing must be evident, either in itself, or evident in 
 something else ; that is, evident by connexion with 
 something else. But a future thing, whose existence 
 is without all necessity, can have neither of those sorts 
 of evidence. It cannot be self-evident, for if it be, 
 it may now be known by what is now to be seen in the 
 thing itself, its present existence, or the necessity of 
 its nature ; but both these are contrary to the suppo- 
 sition. It is supposed both that the thing has no 
 present existence to be seen, and also that it is not of 
 such a nature as to be necessarily existent for the fu- 
 ture ; so that its future existence is not self-evident. 
 And, secondly, neither is there any proof, or evidence 
 in anything else, or evidence of connexion with some- 
 thing else that is evident, for this is also contrary to 
 the supposition. It is supposed that there is now 
 nothing existing with which the future existence of the 
 contingent event is connected ; for such a connexion 
 destroys its contingence, and supposes necessity. 
 Thus it is demonstrated, that there is in the nature of 
 things absolutely no evidence at all of the future ex- 
 istence of that event, which is contingent, without all 
 necessity (if any such event there be), neither self- 
 evidence nor proof. And therefore the thing in reality, 
 is not evident, and so cannot be seen to be evident, or 
 which is the same thing, cannot be known.' * 
 
 •Viewed under the light of the preceding observa- 
 tions, this demonstration will be found anything but 
 valid. This ' future thing, whose existence is without 
 * Works of Jonathan Edwards, vol. i. p. 36, 
 
24 DIFFICULTIES. 
 
 all necessity,' not only may, but certainly will, be 
 seen by a being who sees all duration — and all exist- 
 ences and events throughout it — at once. 
 
 All events are certain to a being all-knowing ; to 
 affirm this, is saying no more than that one event can- 
 not be the same and another at the same time : for 
 supposing all events now occurring in the world quite 
 different from what they are, that would not in the 
 least have diminished the certainty of such a being's 
 knowledge of them ; for such a being must ever have 
 known what they were to be, let that be supposed what 
 it will. The identity of events, then, and not their 
 necessity, is all that is requisite in order to their cer- 
 tainty in the view of an omniscient being. No two 
 events or actions can be the same in time, place, cir- 
 cumstances, and agency. Every act must differ from 
 every other act, either in the time of its performance, 
 the circumstances in which it is performed, or the 
 agent that performs it : there is therefore no act but 
 what differs, in some respect, from every other act, or 
 in other words, has something which individualizes it, 
 and this individuality is all that is necessary to make 
 it certain in the view of an omniscient being. Nothing 
 indeed could render any act, or event, uncertain to 
 such a being, except the impossible supposition, that 
 it might be the same, and yet a different one, at the 
 same time. Events, then, are certain in the view of 
 God, inasmuch as each has an individuality which 
 prevents it from being confounded with any other, and 
 inasmuch as it is impossible for any event to be the 
 same and another at the same time : but an event is 
 necessary, not because it cannot be at once the same 
 and another, but because any other, in the given cir- 
 cumstances, is impossible. This is in effect repeatedly 
 
DIFFICtTLTIES. 25 
 
 affirmed by Edwards, as — * To suppose the future vo- 
 litions of moral agents, not to be necessary events ; 
 or, which is the same thing, events which it is not im- 
 possible, but that they may not come to pass ; and 
 yet to suppose that God certainly fore-knows them, 
 and knows all things, is to suppose God's knowledge 
 to be inconsistent with itself.' And again — ' There 
 is as much impossibility but that the things which are 
 infallibly fore-known, should be ; or which is the same 
 thing, as great a necessity of their future existence, as 
 if the event were already written down, and was known 
 and read by all mankind, through all preceding ages, 
 and there was the most indissoluble and perfect con- 
 nexion possible between the writing and the thing 
 wTitten.' In the paragraph immediately following this 
 last quotation, he affii-ms that this necessity is not at 
 all inconsistent with any liberty which man or any 
 other creature enjoys. But what sort of liberty it 
 can be which is consistent with a necessity, so stern 
 as to render it absolutely impossible for any single 
 volition or action to have been different from what it 
 is — how it can be absolutely impossible for me not 
 to write this page, and yet be free to write it or not, 
 as I choose — if this is not a contradiction in terms, I 
 know of nothing which can be. Man's freeness to 
 choose, is one of the original, spontaneous, and inde- 
 structible convictions of the human mind, and unless 
 our mental constitution be a lie — unless we adopt the 
 revolting principle of Lord Kaimes, that the human 
 mind is really bound by a fatal necessity, and yet so 
 constituted as to fancy itself free, and feel as if it were 
 so — we are shut up to one of these conclusions, — 
 either, two propositions that contradict each other may 
 be both true, or the doctrine of necessity must be false. 
 
26 DIFFICULTIES. 
 
 This "we might deem suiBcient to set the doctrine 
 in question at rest, yet such is the tenacity of life in 
 this metaphysical monster, that though thrice slain, it 
 will start u}d before us anew ; and after all, we may 
 expect to hear the question, how can a thing be seen 
 which has no existence, and in regard to which there 
 is no necessity that it should exist ? If it is seen or 
 fore-seen, must it not then of necessity exist ? Take 
 anything now existing ; is the present seeing of the 
 existence of such a thing any proof that it was neces- 
 sary that it should exist ; because it is seen to exist 
 now, does that prove that it was from eternity im- 
 possible but that it should exist ? If its being seen 
 now existing is not a proof of this necessity, nei- 
 ther is the prescience of its existence a proof of the 
 necessity of it, for in the ])re-view of it no more is 
 seen, than is seen when it actually exists, only rela- 
 tively, and in the apprehension of progressive minds, 
 it is seen before ; all the difference is in the power 
 of the mind which can thus see it. In conformity 
 with what we have already remarked, fore-knowledge, 
 which arises from inference, or fore-ordaining, must 
 depend for its certainty on the inferences being ne- 
 cessary, or the decrees absolute ; but fore-knowledge, 
 which arises from immediate sight, depends on nothing 
 but the power of thus seeing, neither involving nor 
 requiring any necessity in the events or actions thus 
 seen. 
 
 Moral agency has been involved in another difBculty, 
 by viewing the acts of the mind as subject to the law 
 of cause and effect, as is material nature. It has been 
 affirmed, that ' nothing can ever come to pass without 
 a cause, or a reason, why it exists in this manner 
 
DIFFICULTIES. 27 
 
 rather than another.' And if this be so, ' that it will 
 demonstrably follow, that the acts of the will are 
 never contingent, or without necessity, in the sense 
 spoken of, inasmuch as those things which have a 
 cause, or reason, of their existence, must be con- 
 nected with their cause.' * And that ' it is as repugnant 
 to reason, to suppose that an act of the will should 
 come into existence without a cause, as to suppose 
 the human soul, or an angel, or the globe of earth, or 
 the whole universe, should come into existence with- 
 out a cause.' f 
 
 The law of cause and effect in material nature is 
 that like agents operating on like subjects, always pro- 
 duce like effects, and, that, within the range of great 
 variety of locality and circumstances ; thus humidity 
 and warmth cause seeds to germinate, though these 
 vary very much in degree, and this is true of seeds of 
 all sorts, however much they may differ. 
 
 Now supposing us to admit that the operation of 
 external influences on mind were analogous to that of 
 causes in nature, there are no like subjects for these 
 influences to o])erate on in the world of mind. Dif- 
 ference in thought and sensation constitutes difference 
 in mind, and sensations are excited and thoughts 
 prompted to a great extent by external objects and 
 circumstances ; and these cannot be exactly alike to 
 any two active living beings. Suppose two such beings 
 created at the same instant, endowed with exactly the 
 same powers, constituted to think at the same rate, 
 and place side by side in some solitary region. They 
 could not move, except in a direct line, without chang- 
 ing their relative positions, and seeing objects mider a 
 different aspect : were they to look at each other, one 
 * Edward's Works, vol. i. p. 24. f Ibid. p. 17. 
 
28 DIFFICULTIES. 
 
 would not see the same side of his companion that the 
 other would : were they to look on the ground or on 
 objects very near, the one would not see them under 
 the same angle the other would, — their aspects would 
 not be exactly the same, — their ideas of them could 
 not be therefore exactly similar : were they to com- 
 municate with each other, each must be enunciating 
 the same thought to the other at the same moment, 
 else they could not be the same in mind. Such beings 
 could not enjoy any thing of the nature of social in- 
 tercourse, for the enjoyment of such intercourse de- 
 pends on the communication of thoughts varying from 
 our own ; the incessant communication of the same 
 thought as was in our own minds could bring us no 
 benefit, and would soon become intolerably irksome 
 to us. But no thought could be commimicated to the 
 one, differing from that at the instant in the mind of 
 the other, for the moment such were the case, they 
 would cease to be like ; and once unlike, they could 
 never become entirely like again. And if beings such 
 as these could not continue like, far less any two 
 human beings ; for there never were, nor could be, 
 two of the race of man, born at the time, and who 
 always saw the same objects, heard the same sounds, 
 and touched and tasted the same things. Supposing 
 two human minds at first constituted alike in an active 
 state, they could not continue so an hour. Then, there 
 do not operate the same influences on any two minds ; 
 which are some of those things Edwards regards as 
 analogous to causes in the natural world. But the 
 same mind — the subject on which these operate — does 
 not continue a like subject ; new sensations are expe- 
 rienced, new thoughts arise, new opinions are formed, 
 and new determinations ; the mind is not the same in 
 
DIFFICULTIES. 29 
 
 regard to these at any two periods. Thus admitting 
 external influences for a moment to operate on the 
 mind in a manner analogous to causes in nature, it 
 does not continue a like subject under them for an hour. 
 It will no doubt be said that material bodies change 
 under the operation of material agents, (and certainly 
 they do, else there could be no causes or effects either) 
 — they change, but it is in a definite mode, and lend- 
 ing towards a certain result. 
 
 But we are indeed very far from admitting, that the 
 action of motives on the mind is analogous to the action 
 of causes in material nature. Natural causes operate 
 according to certain laws, varying so as to ensure the 
 production of a vast variety of determinate results, and 
 they have assigned limits beyond which they become 
 quite inoperative : without this their ojieration could 
 not have that uniformity which evinces the existence 
 of law. In regard to all propagative organized beings, 
 the operation of causes is modified and limited by the 
 nature of the subjects on which they act ; each of these 
 is uniformly produced " after his kind," No variety 
 of situation or influence ever transforms one species 
 into another : a new species can be produced only by 
 a new creation. But the causes which contribute to 
 the production and growth of organised beings, have 
 not only these, which may be called lateral limits, but 
 also limits of duration ; there is among them an esta- 
 blished order of transition and succession, according 
 to which one agent gradually gives place to another, 
 till the proper result is attained, — the plant or animal 
 brought to maturity, when the germ or rudiment of a 
 a new body is produced, destined to the same process 
 of growth, propagation, and decay. On all organised 
 substances^ causes or agents operate according to the 
 
30 DIFFICULTIES. 
 
 law of their nature, unaffected by any voluntary acti- 
 vity or power inhering in them. But voluntary acti- 
 vity is an essential characteristic of rational mind, 
 involving a large measure of power to modify and con- 
 trol at its pleasure the influences which operate on it. 
 The operation of motives or influences on mind differs 
 in this essential particular from the operation of causes 
 in nature, that mind has an elective power ; so that 
 how it will act, is a matter for itself to choose, whatever 
 the influences which may operate on it. The action 
 of physical causes on material subjects, is in each case, 
 restricted by the nature of these, to an uniform specific 
 result. But it is quite otherwise with rational mind ; 
 though there be presented to it sufl^cient motives, it 
 has always scope to act on them or against them as it 
 pleases. This is fully proved, we think, by the fact, 
 that motives which under all right exercises of reason, 
 must be regarded as sufficient to stimulate to action, 
 are in innumerable instances resisted; and the concur- 
 rent fact, that men often on subsequent reflection per- 
 ceive the sufficiency of such motives, and deeply blame 
 themselves for not acting on them, while they perceive 
 the insufficiency or decei)tive character of those which 
 they approved, and equally blame themselves for yield- 
 ing to them : all which conspire to prove that, unless 
 the constitution of rational mind be a practical lie, it is 
 not a subject of causation at all analogous to material 
 organizations. 
 
 A material body has no power over the influences to 
 which it is subjected : a seed must lie where it is de- 
 posited, whether amid moisture or aridity, in a rich or 
 ban-en soil. It is otherwise quite with a voluntary 
 agent ; he can change his situation ; he can often choose 
 what objects he will look at, or attend to, what he will 
 
DIFFICULTIES. 31 
 
 reflect on, and what aspects of them he will contemplate. 
 He has a control over the influences of external nature 
 on him ; he is not the creature of circumstances ; to a 
 great extent he has the ])ower of moulding and con- 
 trolling these at his pleasure ; as a result of this con- 
 trol over his sensations, reflections, inquiries, and 
 musings, he possesses a control over his moral state or 
 character, as we hope to be able to show in detail 
 below. Man, we thus see, is not the subject of neces- 
 sity, nor the creature of circumstances, in regard to the 
 objects which as motives influence his choice and his 
 determinations ; for he possesses a large amount of 
 power in admitting their influence, in modifying it at 
 his pleasure, or in withdrawing himself from it, and 
 shutting it out altogether. 
 
 Since then there is nothing proving necessity in the 
 means by which the mind obtains knowledge, reflects, 
 inquires, and judges in order to its choosing and de- 
 termining, let us now inquire whether there is any 
 thing proving necessity in the mode by which it is 
 constituted to perfonn these acts. The will is not 
 properly the faculty or power of choosing : choosing 
 is that process by which among various things that 
 present themselves as eligible to be done, the mind 
 sets itself to examine and weigh the reasons for each ; 
 and finding on seeing, what, on all considerations, it 
 seems best to do or do, first, it prefers or chooses that, 
 and in every well-disciplined mind, the act of will- 
 ing immediately follows which is just the resolution 
 to do it, — that which sets the person to action, or 
 in a state of preparedness for action when the proper 
 time anives. Much difficulty and confusion has arisen 
 from thinking and speaking of the will, as if it were, 
 somehow, a sort of distinct and active being or person- 
 
32 DIFFICULTIES. 
 
 ality ; when it is only a power which mind possesses 
 of performing a certain class of acts. No act of the 
 will ever terminates on itself : every determination 
 must have an object extrinsic to the mere act of will- 
 ing ; whenever we determine it is to do something. 
 The will determining itself is an absurdity. Man is 
 an agent, and the determinations of the will have re- 
 spect always to action ; as the elements by which it 
 determines are without itself, so the objects respecting 
 which it determines are always something other than 
 itself. 
 
 Those who contend for what they call the self-deter- 
 mining power of the will, and the necessity of the 
 mind being in a state of indifference in order to free- 
 dom, seem to consider it necessary to have a power of 
 willing action in all cases, uninfluenced by any thing 
 previously experienced or done ; which is quite incom- 
 patible with the unity of progressive being, and which 
 though it were possible, would preclude the develop- 
 ment or even existence of character, which is the re- 
 sult of a concatenated series of feelings, thoughts, 
 determinations, and actions : for were there a being 
 who should choose and act uninfluenced by any pre- 
 vious feelings, choice, or actions, such a being would 
 it is obvious be incapable of acquiring any bias or set- 
 tled i)iclination either towards good or evil ; for such a 
 bias,* so far as it is not original, — and that it could not 
 be in the case we are supposing,— is just the result of 
 the accumulated and connected influence of previous 
 modes of thought and of action. 
 
 Equally irrelevant and evincive of equal indistinct- 
 
 * The consistency of inclination towards good or evil with 
 moral agency and a state of trial, will be discussed in a siibsequent 
 chapter. 
 
DIFFICULTIES. 33 
 
 ness and confusion of conception in those who enter- 
 tain it, is, that view of the operations of the will, oppo- 
 site to the one to which we have just adverted, which 
 regards it as determined in every case hy motives. 
 This is making that subordinate which is supreme, — 
 the ruler the ruled. The mind is influenced by mo- 
 tives in choosing, and the will detennines according 
 to choice. The only exception to this is, Avhen there 
 is such a balancing of motives that the mind is unable 
 to decide which of two things it is best to do, and he- 
 sitates awhile, and the proper time for doing either is 
 in danger of passing away ; in every well-regulated 
 mind a contempt of indecision or the urgency of act- 
 ing in some way will become a prevailing motive, and 
 it will fix on either rather than on none. Unless 
 there be much moral obliquity or induration, such a 
 state of mind can only occur in regard to comparatively 
 unimportant matters; and the better the mind is regu- 
 lated, and the more of energy there is in the charac- 
 ter, the more seldom will it occur even in regard to 
 such. 
 
 We said that in every well-disciplined mind, the 
 act of willing, or the resolution to do, succeeds that of 
 choosing or approval ; this fact, so far from disproving 
 the power of the will, establishes it : for what is it 
 which, in an ill-ordered mind, is allowed to preclude 
 the resolves and efTorts of action from succeeding to 
 the discovery of preferableness or of duty ? Is it not 
 indolence, or passion, or evil habit ? And is it not 
 a proof of power that the will can cany choice into 
 effect, in spite of these ? that it can impel the indivi- 
 dual to action with a force sufficient to overcome them ? 
 
 ' According.' says Edwards, ' to the hypothesis of 
 the acts of the will coming to pass without a cause, it 
 
 D 
 
34 DIFFICULTIES. 
 
 is the cause in fact, that millions of millions of events 
 are continually coming into existence contingently 
 without any cause or reason why they do so, every day 
 and hour throughout all ages : so it is in a constant 
 succession in every moral agent. This contingency ; 
 this efficient nothing; this effectual no-cause, is always 
 ready at hand to produce this sort of effects, so long 
 as the agent exists, and as often as he has occasion.'* 
 One cannot contemjilate without astonishment, this 
 attempt, clumsy as it is, to turn into ridicule the effi- 
 cient power of the human mind, considered as a cause. 
 Is the idea of ascribing causative or productive power 
 to the mind indeed to be sneered at, when we have seen 
 that it has a control even over its sensations, — when it 
 can direct as it pleases its inquiries and reflections, — 
 when it can regulate and control its emotions and pas- 
 sions, — when, if it rightly exercise these powers, it will 
 be qualified to make an independent choice, to choose 
 for itself, and resolutely to act agreeably to such choice ! 
 Created mind within a limited sphere is like its great 
 Author, itself an originating power, cognizant of the 
 qualities and relations of matter, and capable, to no 
 contemptible extent, of moulding and directing it at its 
 will. The works of human art, proving man to be pos- 
 sessed of voluntary intelligence and active power, 
 form the basis of the great argument, that the marks 
 of design and power in nature prove it to be the work 
 of an intelligent and all-powerful agent ; but where is 
 the legitimacy or force of this argument, if all causa- 
 tive or originating energy is denied to created mind, f 
 If human skill be no cause in the mechanism of a 
 watch, how shall it be proved that Divine skill is any 
 
 * Edwards, Vol. i. p. 16. f See Note A. 
 
DIFFICULTIES. 35 
 
 in the mechanism of a world ? It will be said, this 
 skill is not a result of the human will. I answer, it is 
 greatly so, inasmuch as it is the result of the volun- 
 tary, resolute, and protracted application of the hu- 
 man faculties. 
 
 Besides all this, if the volitions of created moral 
 agents are necessary, so must those of the Divine Mind 
 be ; for, it is said, as God is necessarily holy, wise, just, 
 and beneficent, he cannot but choose and do what is 
 wisest and best. This view of the Divine character 
 may be just, if the expressions are used merely in a 
 free and popular sense, but cannot if they are taken 
 in a strict and philosophical one. We never think 
 that an action deserving of any praise which a man 
 could not help doing; nor yet one which he does from 
 a prevalent propension. It is essential to the idea of an 
 action deserving praise, not only that he who performs 
 it was under no necessity of doing so, not only that he 
 could have refrained from doing it, but that he could 
 have done so without any discredit, that his not doing 
 it would not have detracted from his character as a 
 man of worth, or made him less respected than his 
 fellows. But the highest praise and admiration are 
 awarded to actions done for the good of others ; the 
 doing of which, subjects one to severe effort and en- 
 durance, and demands much sacrifice of personal gra- 
 tification. So in regard to God, were all his volitions 
 and doings necessary, or such as that they could not 
 have been otherwise, we are unable to see how his wis- 
 dom would be entitled to our admiration, or his good- 
 ness to our gratitude. 
 
 A cramped and scholastic theology may exhibit God 
 as shut up by the necessity of his nature to the doing 
 of what is best, and precluded by the same necessity 
 D 2 
 
36 DIFFICULTIES. 
 
 from doing any thing wrong or evil ; but the Divine 
 character is far too high and expanded to be compre- 
 hended within such limits. It is the high and intel- 
 ligent sense of right and wrong in the Divine Mind 
 which sustains its love of the one and its hatred of the 
 other. It is perilous to represent the Divine conduct 
 as regulated by any thing else than an analogue of that 
 principle by which moral action is regulated in man, 
 and which may be regarded as the fundamental prin- 
 ciple of all moral action and order — the moral sense. 
 This principle, while it forbids the least infringement 
 of the rule of right — forbids that less than justice should 
 be done by God to any of his creatures, obstructs not 
 the doing of more, but aflbrds ample scope and range 
 for the exercise of goodness. While it requires what- 
 ever promises or pledges God may have given to his 
 creatures to be in every case fulfilled, it obstructs not 
 the range of beneficence " exceeding abundantly be- 
 yond" them. It thus affords range without a limit, 
 save the confines of evil, for all the benevolent affections 
 of the Divine Mind to find objects and have play. 
 Here then is a boundless sphere for the freest choice, 
 and ample space for the display of all the lovelier fea- 
 tures of the Divine character, — room for all the prompt- 
 ings of benevolent emotion to be obeyed, even to the 
 sublimest heights of sacrificial endurance and effort. 
 And this room for choice neither tends to, nor implies 
 liability to change on the part of God, because choice 
 is not in him as in us, the result of a series of conse- 
 cutive acts of mind, but the objects of choice, the 
 motives to it, the acts resulting from it, and the con- 
 sequences of these, are all before his mind at once. 
 
 Nearly, if not quite as fatal, to moral agency as the 
 
DIFFICULTIES. 37 
 
 iiecessitaiian system, is that which restricts freedom 
 to the mere act of willing ; denying it wholly to the 
 acts of intelligence and judgment. ' It is not,' says 
 Cousin, ' in the power of man to judge that one mo- 
 tive is preferable to another ; we are not masters of 
 our preferences.'* But our preferences are very much 
 as are our inclinations, and our inclinations are very 
 much according to our habits ; and habit, as the name 
 implies, is the result of a series of voluntary indulg- 
 ences. Cousin adds, ' We prefer one motive to ano- 
 ther according to our intellectual nature, which has its 
 necessary laws, without having the consciousness of 
 being able to prefer or to judge differently, and even 
 with the consciousness of being unable not to prefer 
 and to judge as we actually do.'f The fallacy of these 
 statements will distinctly appear if we revert for a mo- 
 ment to some of those principles of mental action 
 stated above. The nature of our sensations is alto- 
 gether independent of our will ; yet we have seen that 
 they are greatly under our power, first, by the com- 
 mand we have over many of the objects which produce 
 them, and over ourselves in relation to many more. 
 We know, for instance, that thorns pricking our flesh 
 cause pain ; but in general we can avoid coming in 
 contact with them. I know that certain objects excite 
 in me improper desires ; but in general I can with- 
 draw myself from such objects, or shut my eyes against 
 them. Then we have a measure of power over the 
 continuance and intensity of our sensations and feel- 
 ings ; we can cherish them, we can so reflect as to 
 deepen them ; or we can, on the other hand, in most 
 cases modify them, and in many, suppress or extin- 
 
 * Exposition of Eclecticism, translated by George Ripley. Note, 
 p. 127. t Ibid. 
 
38 DIFFICULTIES. 
 
 guisli them altogether. And if we have thus no small 
 measure of power over our sensations and emotions ; 
 we have much more over our reflections and inquiries. 
 None are so situated hut that they can frequently 
 choose the objects of these. The acquisition of know- 
 ledge, to a lai'ge extent, is in the power of all. There 
 are many objects to which we can give our attention, 
 or from which we can withhold it, and on our attend- 
 ing to objects depends our acquiring just conceptions 
 of them ; the impressions they make on the senses 
 give us but their superficial aspects, as it were, intended 
 to excite us to inquire into their nature and relations ; 
 according then as we inquire or not, shall we obtain 
 knowledge ; and according as "we possess knowledge, 
 or want it, shall we judge and conclude, — shall we 
 prefer one motive to another ;— a matter thus clearly 
 very much within our power. 
 
 Let this be illustrated by an example. A man has 
 got a bruise or contusion in his limb : there is an ex- 
 perienced surgeon in the neighbourhood ; but a quack 
 has also recently made his appearance in it, who pro- 
 fesses to cure all diseases and heal all wounds, and as 
 if by a sort of magical simplicity of treatment; the man 
 is aware that his pretensions are scouted by all the 
 intelligent people around, he has himself enjoyed 
 means and opportunities of behig intelligent, but he 
 has neglected them ; he does not seek information ; 
 he is credulous, — ignorance is always so, — he prefers 
 the quack. The consequence of this is, he loses his 
 limb, and escapes with his life only by its amputation. 
 Had this man no power to have judged differently ? 
 Was it owing to the necessary laws of his intellectual 
 nature, or to the neglect of its powers, that he prefer- 
 red the quack, and lost his limb ? He had not the 
 
DIFFICULTIES. 39 
 
 power of preferring otherwise at the inoment, says 
 Cousin : — * Without doubt, different intelligences, or 
 intelligence in different moments of its exei'cise, will 
 often pass very different judgments on the same thing. 
 It will even often be deceived ; it will judge that what 
 is true is false, that what is good is bad, that what is 
 beautiful is ugly, and the reverse ; but at the moment 
 at which it judges that a proposition is true or false, 
 that an action is good or bad, that a form is beautiful 
 or uglv, — at that moment it is not in the power of 
 intelligence to pass a different judgment from that 
 which it does pass ; it obeys the laws of its nature 
 which it did not make itself; it yields to motives 
 which determine it without any concurrence of the 
 will. In a word, the phenomena of intelligence to 
 comprehend, to judge, to know, to think, whatever 
 name we give it, is marked by the same characteristic 
 of necessity as the phenomena of sensibility.'* Nota- 
 ble philosophy indeed ! to say that we have no free- 
 dom in our judgment of truth and right, because, at 
 the moment the mind forms a certain judgment it 
 could not form a different or contradictory one; judg- 
 ing is the result of deliberation, and deliberation cannot 
 in any case be a momentary act. The act of the mo- 
 ment of judging then — the judgment formed — is the 
 result of, and will be according to, the previous deli- 
 beration ; the conclusion will not only be according 
 to the evidence, but the evidence obtained will be 
 ample or scanty, — will preponderate on this side or on 
 that, very much according as attention is directed and 
 fixed, and inquiry made, which are the mind's volun- 
 tary acts. What indeed would the power amount to, 
 
 * Exposition of Eclecticism, Note, p. 122. 
 
40 EIFFICITITIES. 
 
 of being able at the moment we form a certain judg- 
 ment, to fomi a contradictory one ? what would this 
 be but a power to conclude contrary to the evidence, 
 or the preponderating evidence, — a power of receiving 
 falsehood as truth, or an inability to distinguish be- 
 tween them. 
 
 The very same process of reasoning as this, adopted 
 to establish the necessity of the acts of intelligence, 
 would establish the necessity of the acts of the will. 
 When we resolve to do a certain thing, we have always 
 some reason for doing it, rather than doing any other 
 thing, or rather than doing nothing. At the moment 
 when we resolve to do this thing, we could not resolve 
 to do another thing, frustrating the reason or end for 
 which we were resolving to do this ; unless we could 
 at the same moment act for a reason, or rationally, and 
 contrary to that reason, or irrationally. At the mo- 
 ment the mind is forming a certain resolution, it can- 
 not form a different one, — even allowing it to possess 
 the power of resolving contrary to the motive inducing 
 that certain resolution. Be it that it resolves to act 
 contrary to what is seen to be a proper motive, merely 
 for the purpose of showing it can do so, it cannot re- 
 solve to act contrary to this motive at the moment it is 
 resolving to act on this motive ; for supposing it re- 
 solving to act on the motive, in order to resolve to act 
 contrary to it, it must think of doing so, and approve 
 of doing so, and then the moment of former resolving 
 is gone. 
 
 And yet the existence of such a power has been 
 asserted with the most peremptory decision by Cousin, 
 and he has confidently affirmed that our freedom 
 inheres in it alone. ' At the very moment,' says he, 
 'when it' (the will) 'exercises itself by a special act 
 
DIFFICULTIES. 41 
 
 of any kind, we have the consciousness that it could 
 exercise itself by a special act of a quite contrary 
 kind, without any obstacle.' Here then in all its 
 perfection is the characteristic of liberty.* Such is 
 the philosophy which is held up before the schools 
 of Europe and America, as embodying the selected 
 and digested truth of all previous systems ! f 
 
 Every act of mind is connected with some previous 
 act or acts ; this does not make the act necessary, but 
 is essential to its rationality : for were every mental 
 act free in the sense apparently attached to freedom 
 by a certain class of philosophers, free in the sense of 
 being independent of all previous acts, mind would 
 act for no reason, and to no end. That this connec- 
 tion, however, does not involve necessity, is what we 
 trust we have already abundantly shown. 
 
 These reasonings, if conclusive, against the dogma, 
 that the acts of intelligence are necessary, will be 
 equally so against the dogma, that belief is iiTesponsi- 
 ble. They must stand or fall together. If we have 
 no control over the judgments or conclusions of our 
 intellect, then we have none over the results of these 
 opinions — we hold the belief we entertain, and for that 
 over which we have no control, we cannot be account- 
 able. But, on the contrary, if it has been joroved 
 that we have great power over the processes of atten- 
 tion, inquiry, reflection, and if the nature of the con- 
 clusions we arrive at, whether they be correct or incor- 
 rect, true or false, depends very much on these ; then 
 have we great control over the knowledge we acquire, 
 and by consequence over the opinions we form, and 
 the belief we entertain, and for that over which we 
 have a control, we are responsible. 
 ■* Exposition of Eclecticism, Note, p. 128. f See Note, B. 
 
42 DIFFICULTIES. 
 
 There occurs yet another difEculty. The character 
 of moral action is also greatly dependent on emotion 
 or feeling, (the way in which we will act towards any 
 being will be greatly influenced by the way in which 
 we feel towards him) and are not these constitutional 
 and so physical ? and if so, how can the action to 
 which they incite or impel, be moral action according 
 to the definition you have given of it ? How can 
 action be free which originates in constitutional or 
 physical propensions or impulses ? The fact that 
 there are constitutional impulses to action which 
 comes within the sphere of moral law, would not 
 make that action necessary, or prevent it from being 
 free, unless such impulses were uncontrolable ; but so 
 far are they from being so, that it will be found that 
 we have a control over them similar to that which we 
 have ascertained ourselves to be possessed of over our 
 thoughts and volitions. It is not feeling properly 
 that is constitutional or physical, but the capacity of 
 feeling. The constitutional susceptibility of different 
 kinds of emotion requires objects to excite it : the 
 susceptibility may be dormant or unknown, if the 
 the proper object be not brought into view. Feeling 
 is thus excited by the perception or knowledge of ob- 
 jects, and corresponding to the extent we have found 
 man possessed of a control over these, is the measure 
 of his control over those emotions or impulses which 
 influence moral action. The whole intercourse of 
 life is carried on on the conviction, that attention and 
 thought have a high influence on feeling. On this 
 principle the forlorn pauper tells his tale of misfor- 
 tune, or of suffering ; the compassionate listens, and 
 inquires, while the miser and the misanthrope shut 
 their ears, and hasten away. On this principle are 
 
DIFFICULTIES. 43 
 
 founded the persuasives and remonstrances of friend- 
 ship, as well as the appeals of the pleader, the preacher, 
 and the poet. Moral law requires rational agents 
 to cultivate certain feelings, the rectitude of such, 
 a requirement evidently involves these three con- 
 ditions, namely, a physical susceptibility of such 
 feelings, the existence of objects suitable for ex- 
 citing them, and the knowableness of these objects : 
 the absence of either of these conditions would consti- 
 tute a physical impediment to the generation of the 
 feelings required. The fact of rational agents being 
 responsible for their feelings or passions, involves yet 
 another condition, namely, knowledge of what feelings 
 the law requires. With this knowledge the mind can 
 set itself to inquire about the object of the feeling de- 
 manded, and if it properly consider and weigh the 
 obligation, it will make all the inquiry possible, con- 
 templating it under every aspect, and if the object 
 is properly knowable, and suited to excite the feeling 
 required, and if the mind is susceptible of it, the pro- 
 duction of such feelinsr will be the result. 
 
SECTION III. 
 
 OF THE KIND OF KNOWLEDGE WHICH IS THE 
 GROUND OF MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 Knowledge is the mental perception or apprehension 
 of existing objects, of their relations and qualities, 
 and of the thoughts and actings of intelligent beings. 
 Truth is the ground of correct knowledge, or that 
 which, in knowing, the mind perceives or apprehends, 
 whether it be derived immediately from objects them- 
 selves, or from other minds, through the medium of 
 articulate sounds or conventional signs. All know- 
 ledge results from diversity ; knowledge of objects in- 
 volves a distinction between them, and things can be 
 distinguished only by their differences. Without di- 
 versity there could be no relations. Without diversity 
 there could indeed be but one existence, for absolute 
 sameness cannot be conceived of but as identity. 
 Every being possessing consciousness, and the con- 
 scious exercise of the bodily senses, has a certain 
 amount of involuntary knowledge, or such as it cannot 
 but possess, e. g. — the knowledge of its own existence, 
 of thought, of the external world and the obvious 
 
KIND OF KNOWLEDGE. 4o 
 
 aspect of the^ objects on it. Beyond or beneath this 
 there is a large amount, first, of necessary truth ; but 
 whether we become cognizant of it depends on the 
 voluntary exercise of our own powers, — we cannot 
 obtain the knowledge of such truth unless we examine 
 and infer; of this sort are all the properties and re- 
 lations of mathematical lines and figures. Then there 
 is a vast amount of truth involved in the physical con- 
 stitution and relations of universal being, ascertain- 
 able by observation and experiment. This sort of 
 truth is certain as contradistinguished from necessary, 
 inasmuch as it is uniform, or, certain things are always 
 found existing after the same manner, without any 
 reason assignable that they must be so, e. g. — be- 
 tween different species of plants and animals the spe- 
 cific differences are invariably maintained ; this is a 
 certain fact, yet there are no data warranting us to pro- 
 nounce that it must necessarily be so. There is an- 
 other order of knowledge, embracing whatever may be 
 ascertained or infeixed with preponderating probability 
 respecting mind, and the actings of voluntary agents, 
 beyond that which is physical or which belongs to 
 their constitution. This sort of knowledge, the phi- 
 losophy of voluntary and moral action, can never 
 attain the same sort of certitude as the philosophy of 
 physical nature, owing to the universal diversity of 
 mind, arising from this, that while natural agents act 
 or change in an established order, or according to fixed 
 laws, choice and volition enter as elements into the 
 actings of intelligent beings. The relations of phy- 
 sical facts are fixed and determinate, therefore every 
 fact of this kind can at once be assigned to its proper 
 place and rank when these relations are known ; but 
 the relations of moral facts, or the voluntary actings of 
 
46 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 mind, are ever varying ; and as every act of mind is 
 related to, and liable to be influenced by, every pre- 
 vious act of mind, and yet no certainty how it shall be 
 influenced by it, or whether at all, — and as all the previous 
 actings in any two minds never are the same, no volun- 
 tary fact can occur in any two minds in exactly the 
 same relations. From this cause too, and from the 
 nature of language, chiefly and primarily adapted to 
 represent material objects and operations, arises the 
 difliculty of accurately expressing mental facts. Thus 
 is the science of mind, in all its voluntary actings, 
 involved in difficulties altogether unknown to the phy- 
 sical sciences. We know nothing of the essence either 
 of mind or matter ; we know both only by their qua- 
 lities or powers ; we are conscious of thought, of feel- 
 ing, and of will, but not of the substance that thinks, 
 and feels, and wills. Whatever in mind is physical, 
 or belongs to its constitution, may be strictly ascer- 
 tained. We know that it has the power of thinking, 
 of feeling, of examining, of comparing, of remember- 
 ing, of judging, and of willing ; but when we come to 
 inquire into the laws which regulate the performance 
 of these acts, the voluntary principle immediately 
 meets us, under the controul of which, each of these 
 operations, more or less, is ; and a strict inquiry will 
 lead us to the conclusion that, while intelligent mind 
 is, in its actings, open to a thousand influences, it is 
 constituted so as to be in these subject to no law 
 but the moral, or that which regulates an intelligent 
 choice. True it is that intelligent agents are actuated 
 by propensions or dispositions, bat these are physical 
 just so far as they are not and cannot be brought 
 imder the controul of the voluntary principle or will. 
 The less that voluntary power is exercised, the more 
 
KIND OF KNOWLEDGE. 47 
 
 do mental actings become physical or subject to exte- 
 rior influences. Thus it is that the actings or opera- 
 tions of mind are limited on both hands ; those intelli- 
 gent agents who exercise self-control do so according 
 to moral law; they regulate their minds and conduct by 
 it. Those who do not exercise self-control become 
 in their actings subject to physical influences, so that 
 their acts are directed by the influences brought to 
 bear upon them. Thus, may we remark, in passing, 
 do we see, how entirely wicked men — those who do 
 not govern their o^\^l propensions and passions — are 
 under the Divine controul ; as God has entirely at his 
 command the influences to which they are subjected. 
 Thus it is only the good, those who control their 
 propensions and regulate themselves by moral law, 
 who are truly free. 
 
 In connection with the preceding observations we 
 may remark, though it belongs not strictly to our pre- 
 sent subject, that all possible knowledge ranges it- 
 self under three great divisions : Mathematics, or tlie 
 science of necessary relations ; Physics, or the science 
 of established relations; and Ethics, or the science * 
 of voluntary relations. The first embraces whatever 
 may be established by demonstration ; the second 
 whatever may be ascertained by observation and ex- 
 periment ; and the third, whatever influences, regu- 
 lates, and results from voluntary agency, of which 
 moral law embodies the rule, poetry, the motive in- 
 fluences, and histor}^ the actings. We have seen above 
 that there is so much knowledge that cannot but be pos- 
 sessed by every conscious intelligent being; but the dis- 
 tinction is carefully to be noted between this involuntary 
 
 * I use tlie word science here, the reader will perceive, in the 
 ■widest sense of knowledare. 
 
48 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 knowledge and necessary truth. So much of knowledge 
 is not only acquired without any voluntary effort, but 
 owing to our constitution and circumstances we acquire 
 it inevitably, but it does not follow at all that the truth 
 thus known is necessary truth; that such knowledge is 
 inevitable does not result from the nature of the truth 
 known, but from the nature and circumstances of the 
 agent knowing it. The nature of the knowledge does 
 not at all detennine the nature of the truth known ; 
 for while there is much that is necessarily known 
 which is not necessary truth, there is much necessary 
 truth of which not only is the knowledge not inevitable, 
 but never possessed by myriads of intelligent beings. 
 In whatever degree any knowledge may fall short of 
 complete certainty in finite minds, to whatever de- 
 gree it may be open to doubt^ there cannot be such a 
 thing as truth in itself uncertain, this would be a con- 
 tradiction in terms. To a being of limited powers 
 and attainments, it may be doubtful whether this or 
 that statement or opinion be a truth, as he may not 
 have the means of fully ascertaining its correctness, 
 but there cannot be such a thing as a truth doubtful 
 in itself. The certainty of truth (we cannot express 
 our meaning fully without this seeming pleonasm), re- 
 sults from all existences, events, and relations, being 
 distinguishable each from every other. Were such a 
 thing possible as for two beings to exist which could 
 not in any way be distinguished the one from the 
 other, this would make some truth respecting them 
 uncertain, for if they could not possibly be known in 
 any way the one from the other, it could not be 
 certain which was which, it would not be certain 
 that the one was not the other, and it would of 
 necessity be a truth that the one could not be the 
 
KIND OF KNOWLEDGE. 49 
 
 Other, for this it could be not unless they were but one. 
 If there were nothing in the time, place, or circum- 
 stances of their existence by which they could be dis- 
 tinguished, it could not be known that they were two, 
 and yet the supposition is based on their duality. 
 Were such a case possible, it would involve an uncer- 
 tainty of truth ; not merely that it would be uncertain 
 to a mind of limited capacity, but inasmuch as it would 
 be absolutely unknowable. That no such case, how- 
 ever, can occur among intelligent beings, has been 
 already sho^vn, and that it cannot occur in any case is 
 evident, inasmuch as things cannot but differ in some 
 respect unless they be the same, unless it were possi- 
 ble for a thing to be the same, and yet not the same 
 at one time. Every existence, event, and relation, 
 then, in the universe, being distinguishable from 
 every other, not onl}'' is all truth certain, but knowable 
 with certainty to a being of sufficient range of observa- 
 tion and perceptive power. Yet neither does its quality, 
 of being knowable with certainty, nor its being actu- 
 ally so, known by such a being, constitute it necessary ; 
 for were it so, that would make all existence necessary, 
 and all events and relations necessary, which is far 
 indeed from being accordant with fact. No existence 
 is necessary, but such as could not but have been ; and 
 no relation or property is necessary, but such as could 
 not possibly have been otherwise. Moreover, whatever 
 has a necessary existence must have an eternal exist- 
 ence : eternity is involved in its necessity ; otherwise 
 it would not be true that it could not but have been, 
 for if it were not eternal, a period might be assigned, 
 when it not only was possible for it not to have existed, 
 but when it actually did not exist. Necessity of rela- 
 tions or properties does not involve necessity of exist- 
 
50 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 ence in the subjects of these relations.jThat it was ever 
 a necessary truth that the three angles of a triangle must 
 be equal to two right angles, did not make the actual ex- 
 istence of a single such figure necessary, only that if 
 any did exist it could not but exist so. Necessary exist- 
 ence is uncaused existence ; that which has any ground 
 or cause of existence anterior to itself is not necessary. 
 Necessary relations are uncaused as relations, they are 
 not as such the result of any causative agency, but are 
 necessarily involved in the existence of the objects of 
 which they are relations. But it does not follow from 
 necessary relations being imcaused, that the objects 
 are uncaused of which they are the relations ; that pane 
 of glass was certainly made, though as a parallelogram, 
 its corresponding sides are necessarily parallel and 
 equal. Yet had all relations and properties in the 
 universe been necessary, it could not have been proved, 
 but that it might have had a necessary and conse- 
 quently uncaused existence. But relations and 
 properties not necessary must be caused. Things 
 commencing, continuing, and terminating their exist- 
 ence in a uniform manner, or after a regular order, 
 cannot be necessary, but must owe their existence with 
 its mode and duration to some exterior and ade- 
 quate cause, e. g. to revert to an illustration formerly 
 employed : A certain kind of seed is deposited in the 
 ground, and it springs up and becomes a tree : it was 
 owing to no necessary property of seeds that this par- 
 ticular one became a tree, else all seeds would produce 
 trees, for a necessary property is an invariable property. 
 But it may be alleged that it necessarily became a 
 tree from the nature of the seed. But how came the 
 seed to be of such a nature ? This could not result 
 from any necessary property of matter, else there could 
 
POIA'ERS OF MIND. 51 
 
 not ]iossibly be any other kind of seed. But if the 
 existence of an arboreal seed canncit be the result of 
 any necessary property of matter, it must be owing to 
 some power superior to matter, and capable of mould- 
 ing and controlling it, for that which can give fonn 
 and capabilities to anything, above what it possesses by 
 its mere nature, must be superior to that thing. More- 
 over, if every different kind of seed uniformly produces 
 a dillerent kind of plant, and each plant the same sortof 
 seed as that from which it was produced itself, and that 
 seed thesame sort of plant again in invariable succession, 
 this involves a designing power, or one which controls and 
 fashions matter according to fixed and diversified mo- 
 dels, and in order to determinate and diversified ends. 
 
 It may here be proper to glance for a moment at 
 the powers of mind adapted to judge of and receive 
 these different orders of truth. The distinction so ear- 
 nestly asserted by Mr. Coleridge between reason and 
 understanding is, I conceive, valid and proper-; but he 
 appears to me widely to have gone astray in his at- 
 tempt to discriminate between them, by assigning the 
 distinct characteristics and functions of each.* With 
 these two, in a right estimate of an intelligent, volun- 
 tary, and responsible agent, is to be classed another, 
 namely, the moral sense, — and then the three may be 
 thus distinguished : — understanding, which has long 
 since been properly described, as the faculty ; judging 
 according to sense, from the forms, qualities, and dis- 
 positions of matter, deduces necessary relations and 
 established laws: reason is the faculty, judging ac- 
 cording to evidence, distinguishing between true and 
 false in matters of fact, judging between all the differ- 
 ent degrees of probability in matters of opinion : the 
 * Note C. 
 E 2 
 
52 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 moral sense is the faculty, judging of right and wrong 
 in matters of conduct, accompanied by a peculiar and 
 appropriate order of feeling, indicating and giving sanc- 
 tion to its decisions. Associated with, and auxiliary to 
 these, are three other powers, memory, imagination, 
 and the will : memory to bring forwaid previously as- 
 certained facts and inferences as the ground of induc- 
 tion and reasoning ; imagination to supply possible 
 combinations and relations among which to compare, 
 judge, and discriminate ; and the will to carry out into 
 action the decisions of the moral sense. According to 
 this view, then, of the powers of rational and ac- 
 countable mind, the functions of understanding are 
 demonstration, or the deduction of necessary inferences 
 from self-evident truths, those known intuitively, 
 perceived by the senses ; or previously ascertained 
 facts, and generalization, or the tracing and develop- 
 ing of the same principle as operating in the production 
 of widely different phenomena. Reason is conversant 
 with whatever has a relation to voluntary action, and 
 is not capable of being established by strict induction 
 or by demonstration. Understanding is conversant 
 with necessary and established or physical relations ; 
 reason with whatever is involved in, or results from, 
 voluntary and moral relations. When a man cannot 
 comprehend any axiom, or calculation, or mechanical 
 principle which we clearly understand, and deem of 
 easy comprehension, we call him dull and stupid ; but 
 when a man refuses to be swayed by, or to yield to 
 persuasives, which approve themselves to our judgment 
 as fully sufficient, and are known to harmonize with 
 the general j udgmeut of mankind : when he refuses to 
 be swayed by the greatly preponderating reasons which 
 have been clearly laid before him, we call him unrea- 
 
POWERS OF MIND. 53 
 
 sellable ; but we never call a man unreasonable for not 
 understanding an axiom, or a proposition, or any 
 principle of physical science. But when a man admits 
 the dictates and conclusions of sound reason, when he 
 acknowledges that his actions should be according to 
 them ; when he acknowledges that such a course is 
 right, yet neglects to pursue it ; when he admits that 
 such another is wrong, yet indulges in it, — we call not 
 such an one stupid, we call not him unreasonable, we 
 call him bad or immoral ; in such a man it is not the 
 understanding that is weak or dull, not the power of 
 judging, or reason, but the sense of moral obligation. 
 The object then to which the moral sense has relation, 
 is moral law, or the sanctioned rule which distinguishes 
 right from wrong ; it differs from reason in this, that 
 reason has its relation to rational (probable) truth, or 
 what is to be believed ; the moral sense has its relation 
 to duty or what is to be done. The one is guided to 
 its conclusions by evidence, the other is ruled in its 
 decisions by authority, vindicated at the promulgation 
 of law by external proofs and symbols, and sustained 
 in every breast in which conscience is not perverted 
 by false teaching, and not stifled or indurated by sin, 
 by the coincident sanctions of moral feeling. So far 
 then as conduct is dependent on belief, so far is the 
 moral sense dependent for the rectitude of its decisions 
 on the right exercise of the rational powers. But if 
 there be any such thing as an immediate or intuitive 
 sense or perception of duty, independent of knowledge 
 from exterior sources, unconnected with any present 
 or previous exercise of reason, so far as there were any 
 such, if any such there be, so far would the moral 
 sense in its actings be independent on reason. But 
 this, at any rate, cannot be the case where knowledge 
 
54 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 of law is derived from any external source, for when- 
 ever law is thus known, the decisions of conscience will 
 depend in some degree on the exercise of reason. For 
 though reason has nothing to do in any case to judge 
 whether a law is such as should be obeyed ; when once 
 it is known to be a law, it is the province of reason to 
 judge in regard to everything put forth as such, whe- 
 ther it be really a law ; that is, whether there'is sufficient 
 evidence of its emanating from one whose right it is to 
 promulge it. Whatever conclusions we may anive 
 at respecting the power of conscience to decide inde- 
 pendently of reason, a question we shall revert to below, 
 this far may be affirmed without question, that the pe- 
 culiar order of feeling which the moral sense embodies, 
 and with which it is armed, serves to authenticate inti- 
 mations of nioial law received from exterior sources, 
 and to sanction acting on them, when without it they 
 would be involved in the most painful incertitude. 
 
 Man, as a being constituted and designed for moral 
 action, is to a high degree susceptible of the impression, 
 that he lives and acts under invisible governing or re- 
 tributive power — an impression which all the objects 
 and events around him conspire to produce ; and has 
 a perception of the moral character of actions, or of a 
 right and a wrong, springing out of this sense of re- 
 sponsibility, combined with the consciousness of free- 
 dom to act according to choice. 
 
 Right and wrong are not, and cannot be absolute, but 
 are relative, arising out of the relations of intelligent 
 and accountable creatures, presupposing these in order 
 to their possibility. And as they are not absolute, so 
 neither are they necessary, like the relations of mathe- 
 matical lines and figures ; it is not said of moral rela- 
 tions as of mathematical, that they must be so, but that 
 
CONSCIENCE. 55 
 
 they ought to be so, implying that the conduct proper 
 to these relations is not of the kind which springs from 
 a necessity of nature in the beings related, but has for 
 its regulation a law or standard, congruous to their 
 nature, but addressed to their voluntary recognition, 
 and requiring a voluntary conformity. Thus moral 
 law, though in its great and immutable features always 
 in harmony with reason, is never susceptible of de- 
 monstration. Though, apart from the knowledge of 
 such law, reason may, in regard to many things com- 
 ing within its scope, conclude that thus and thus it 
 should be ; it is not entitled in any case to say that from 
 the nature of things thus and thus it must be. 
 
 While thus, reason, when rightly exercised, may to 
 a certain extent ascertain, and the heart, when under 
 proper culture and discipline, indicate — what is due to- 
 our fellow men, — while it may be an immediate sugges- 
 tion of the heart on just reflection, that " what we would 
 that others should do to us we should do even so to 
 thein," and thus man may " do" so far " by nature the 
 things contained in the law ;" it is only when we act 
 under a sense of accountableness to invisible ])ower, 
 that conscience awakes to utter either its accusing 
 or excusing voice. Without a sense of responsibility, 
 questions of right and wrong degenerate into mere 
 questions of expediency, or of jDrofit and loss. Thus 
 the sense of responsibility being thus involved in every 
 exercise of conscience, that and that only can be felt 
 as a matter of moral obligation, respecting which the 
 divine will is believed to have been indicated or express- 
 ed, enjoining or forbidding it ; nothing comes within 
 the range of conscience, but what is somehow perceived 
 to be, or deemed a subject of, divine law. Truth and 
 falsehood are matters of direct consciousness, and jus- 
 
56 MOKAL AGENCY. 
 
 tice is an immediate dictate of reflective feeling ; but 
 speaking the truth and rendering to all their dues are 
 •felt to be matters of conscience only when we feel ac- 
 countable for how we act in these respects to Invisible 
 authority. 
 
 But how come we to the knowledge of this law, a 
 belief or sense of which is thus involved in every ex- 
 ercise of conscience ? Has conscience not only the 
 power of perceiving actions as right and as wrong, but 
 an immediate perception of what is right and what is 
 wTong, ' independent of any acquired knowledge, and 
 without reference to any other standard of duty.' The 
 reader conversant with mental and moral science is 
 aware that this is one of the most difficult questions 
 connected with the philosophy of the human mind ; 
 and in entering on an inquiry, in order if possible to 
 make some advance towards its solution, it shall be our 
 special endeavour to guai'd against any appearance of 
 dogmatising, as, than that nothing could be more un- 
 becoming in a matter involv-ed in so much obscurity. 
 We may observe in the outset that the question is by 
 no means settled by the fact, — though it might appear 
 at first sight to be so, — that no voluntary action can be 
 performed without having been first in thought. For 
 though no such action can be performed without an 
 exercise of reason, or a recurrence to a previous exer- 
 cise of it in a like case, in order to the ascertaining 
 Avhether the action is practicable, or eligible, or urgent, 
 yet the decisions of conscience are anterior to action 
 in all things of a moral nature, and indeed its voice is 
 the first that should be heard in the soul when any 
 thing coming under that class is proposed to be done. 
 An action may present itself as desirable, and pre- 
 viously known to be practicable^ respecting which the 
 
CONSCIENCK. 5V 
 
 instantaneous decision of conscience may be that it is 
 wrong, and must not be done. Now the question is 
 whether the human mind was constituted with the 
 power of feeling certain acts to be right and others 
 wrong, immediately, without reverting to any standard, 
 or only with the capacity of doing so with the greatest 
 promptitude, on the gi-ound of law somehow known. 
 Had the mind been endowed with the power of imme- 
 diate and independent moral judgment, it appears to 
 us that there could have been no connection between 
 the exercise of the rational principle and the moral 
 sense, no subserviency of the rational to the efficiency 
 of the moral principle, or the advancement of the 
 moral being, which is entirely incongi'iious to the con- 
 stitution of the world, as well as contrary to the imi- 
 versal sense of mankind, and utterly inconsistent with 
 the express declarations of Scripture. Besides, were 
 moral judgment in any case entirely independent of 
 knowledge, would not this make it in such a case in- 
 stinctive ; and the actions it might originate of the 
 nature of instinctive actions ? If the instantaneous 
 effect of the perception of certain objects were — let us 
 call it — a moral sensation, passing immediately into 
 an impulse stimulating to action, or restraining from it, 
 without any intervention of thought or choice, any re- 
 ference to previous knowledge, this would make the 
 action physical, as certainly resulting from constitu- 
 tional powers, instead of moral and resulting from choice. 
 But that there is no such acting of conscience, is evi- 
 dent from the vast disparity in the moral views and 
 conduct of men, compared with the unvarying certitude 
 of instinct. There is another way however in which 
 moral judgments might be immediate or independent 
 of any exercise of reason ; if the knowledge of what is 
 
58 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 right and wrong were intuitive, or such as is self-evi- 
 dent — incapable of proof and independent of it. Now 
 it is to be observed, that though the capacity of distin- 
 guishing right from wi'ong, or of apprehending moral 
 distinctions, is an original power of the human mind : 
 it no more follows that the notions of actions as thus 
 distinguished, are innate in the mind by means of this 
 power, than it does from the capacity of seeing pos- 
 sessed by the eye — that the images of external objects 
 are innate there. 
 
 The universal conviction that there is a right and a 
 wrong, shows that men are constituted with the power 
 of perceiving things under a moral as])ect. But, as 
 in the case of natural seeing, their being rightly per- 
 ceived and distinguislied will depend on tbe soundness 
 of the percipient power, on the objects being within 
 its range, and attention being given to them. The 
 eye, when in a diseased state, may give very distorted 
 views of objects to the mind, and could not convey 
 any knowledge to it if placed in vacuity, and though 
 abundance of objects be before it, will convey very 
 little, unless some measure of attention be given to 
 them. Agreeably to this, we find that those who act 
 with moral correctness, are considerate and circum- 
 spect ; -while those who live immoral lives are thought- 
 less, inconsiderate, or have their consciences seared. 
 Analogous to the other senses, the moral sense pos- 
 sesses not a revealing, but a percipient or disceniing 
 power. What reason might perceive as only desirable 
 or expedient, or might regard as doubtful, it recog- 
 nises as moral, or subject to divine law : and man 
 being constituted to submit to spiritual authority when 
 perceived, the instantaneous result of the perception 
 of anything as a subject of moral law, is (in every 
 
CONSCIENCE. 59 
 
 ri"-htlv-orclerecl mind) a feeling of obligation. Let 
 anything be perceived as law, and immediately it is 
 echoed and sanctioned by the voice within. There is 
 no questioning why or how the law is such, because 
 the mind has an original constitution adapted to har- 
 monise with it. Let the subject of law be thought, 
 or feeling, or conduct, it matters not, only if it be 
 something capable of being performed — something 
 which the agent has it in his power to do. 
 
 Whether conscience be a judge of right and wrong 
 ' independent of any acquired knowledge, and with- 
 out reference to any other standard of duty,' may be 
 brought to such a test as this : — Is there any instance 
 to be found of the moral sense, at once directing or 
 impelling a person to correct any article of belief held 
 by the sect to which he belongs, or any course of con- 
 duct sanctioned or enjoined by the moral code which 
 his sect regards as of divine authority, without in any 
 way reflecting on or inquiring about such principle or 
 conduct ? If any well-authenticated instances could 
 be produced, of conscience alone thus spontaneously 
 proclaiming and enforcing what is right, independently 
 of whatever may be held, or taught and practised by 
 others as of divine authority, then we should admit, 
 that in the case of some at least, conscience is a judge 
 of right and wrong, ' independent of any acquired 
 knowledge, and without reference to any other stand- 
 ard of duty, and yet, unless it did so universally, or 
 with only a few explicable exceptions, it would not be 
 entitled to be regarded as a fact in the constitution of 
 human nature. But is such at all the case ? On the 
 contrary, do not we see men on all hands clinging to 
 error, and persisting in wrong-doing, even when truth 
 and duty are clearly set before them, and their momen- 
 
60 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 tous sanctions solemnly and earnestly pressed on their 
 consideration. In view of these facts, what can we think 
 of conscience as an independent monitor of right, and 
 standard of duty ? That such a faculty may seem 
 necessary to some men's idea of a perfect humanity is 
 certainly no proof, especially in the present state of 
 human nature, that it exists in fact. When persons 
 become dissatisfied with the religious system under 
 which they have been brought up, does not their dis- 
 satisfaction sjiring fi'om doubt ? and does not doubt 
 imply reflection or inquiry ? But were there an in- 
 tuitive perception of right and wrong, which one, in- 
 dependent of acquired knowledge, and of all reference 
 to a standard of duty, must be, it would preclude all 
 doubt, for we neither doubt what we clearly see, nor 
 what we distinctly feel : doubt arises when the cer- 
 tainty of anything depends on something else respect- 
 ing which we are uncertain, and which, if capable of 
 being known at all, requires inquiry, or an exercise of 
 thought and reasoning, in order to ascertain it. An 
 intuitive and authoritative revelation by, or in, the moral 
 sense, would, as far as it extended, exclude religious 
 doubt, for if it did not, it would neither be immediate 
 nor authoritative ; yet we find that in all cases in which 
 a change in one's religious belief occurs, it originates 
 in doubt, is wrought out by inquiry, and completed 
 in conviction. Thus it is in the various spheres 
 of missionary labour, — those who are dissatisfied 
 with the religion of their country, and have thought 
 of embracing Christianity, are designated ' inquirers/ 
 and in harmony with this is the language of Scripture, 
 Prov. ii. 2, 9 — J3. " If thou incline thine ear unto wis- 
 dom, and apply thine heart to understanding ; then 
 shall thou understand righteousness, and judgment. 
 
CONSCIENCE. 61 
 
 and equity ; yea, every good path. When wisdom 
 entereth into thine heart, and knowledge is pleasant 
 unto thy soul, discretion shall preserve thee, under- 
 standing shall keep thee; to deliver thee from the 
 way of the evil man, from the man that speaketh fro- 
 ward things ; who leave the paths of uprightness, to 
 walk in the ways of darkness." * 
 
 But conscience, it is said, is the voice of God in 
 the soul, announcing and sanctioning his law. But 
 without some fixed standard hy which to test the 
 genuineness of these internal revelations, how are we 
 to know what are such ? Are they distinguishable from 
 the operations of our own minds ? If they are, in what 
 way .'' By any manifestation to the senses ? — That agrees 
 not with the hypothesis we are considering. By the pe- 
 culiar nature of the attendant feeling ? If that is the 
 attestation of the voice of Deity, how comes it that this 
 special feeling has sanctioned actions directly con- 
 trary in different individuals ? If from a principle of 
 conscience, much good has been done ; from the same 
 principle have been committed the greatest crimes ; 
 men have killed the excellent of the earth because in 
 this they thought they were doing " God service." 
 The perception that actions are right or wrong is not 
 obtained from this peculiar feeling, excited previous to 
 any perception, but the feeling results from the percep- 
 tion, or is produced by it. A certain action is perceived 
 as wrong; can itbe perceived as such without something 
 being known as right, to which it is opposed, or 
 without some standard or rule on which it infringes ? 
 Feelings anterior to, or independent of, knowledge or 
 perception, must be purely physical, and if our moral 
 
 * Note D. 
 
62 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 judgments were tlie result of such feeling this would 
 again land us in the conclusion that our moral judg- 
 ments are physical, a plain contradiction in terms. 
 Thus, were our moral perceptions intuitive, or the 
 certain result of a peculiar feeling, there would be no 
 room for choice, no exercise of the moral principle in 
 forming them, and no trial of disposition. We are 
 then, on every hand, held hack from the conclusion 
 that moral judgments are the result of intuitive know- 
 ledge, or peculiar feeling, independent of any exercise 
 of reason, or the knowledge of any public or tradi- 
 tionary standard. But then, on the other hand, it is 
 equally evident that these judgments involve some- 
 thing more than a mere modification of the exercise 
 of reason, namely, a moral sense having its relation, 
 not to the reasonableness of moral law, but to its au- 
 thority, perceiving, recognising, and submitting to it 
 as emanating from Spiritual Power. Connected with 
 this power or faculty thus specially adapted to the per- 
 ception of moral distinctions, is the susceptibility of a 
 peculiar order of feeling, prompting to act according 
 to such perception, and restraining from acting con- 
 trary to it, and deriving much of its intensity from 
 a belief that for the manner in which we act, we are 
 accountable to Omnipotent governing power, and that 
 our moral conduct involves the most momentous and 
 permanent personal consequences. Thus the moral 
 sense, from the veiy nature of the objects to which it 
 has relation, stands altogether unique in its keenness 
 and profundity among the susceptibilities of the mind, 
 constituted specially for recognising invisible govern- 
 ing power, and involving a sense of such power in all 
 its exercises. Conscience, when otherwise it might 
 seem dormant, evinces its life in those undefined but 
 
CONSCIENCE. 63 
 
 docp-scatecl fears which are not referable to any visi- 
 ble or mundane object. It thus in the original 
 constitution of man, appears to have been a power 
 specially adapted to the vicegerency with which it was 
 intrusted, — alert in recognising its master's voice from 
 afar. The limitations and obstructions of its efficient 
 authority in the present state of human nature will 
 be considered by and by. There is a peculiarity 
 belonging to the susceptibility connected with the 
 moral sense which should be carefully noted : the 
 feeling is not at all so keen nor strong in the im- 
 pulse it gives to right action, as is that by which it 
 guards against what is seen to be wrong ; if there is 
 a jn'opension in our nature, as it at present subsists, 
 toward evil, there is also a powerful restraint upon it. 
 
 We have already observed that moral law generally 
 approves itself to rational judgment, or, that on reflec- 
 tion we may perceive reasons, in the nature and con- 
 quences of actions, why that which the law prescribes 
 should be done, and that which it prohibits, avoided ; 
 but, as we have already hinted, ourmoralperceptionsand 
 judgments are by no means dependent on any such 
 appearances. Let the moral sense perceive that any 
 thing is a command given by the rightful law, and 
 although reason should discern nothing as to why such 
 a command should be given, its recognition and en- 
 forcement by conscience, if that is in a sound state, 
 will be immediate and instantaneous ; and thus there 
 comes to our view an additional evidence that consci- 
 ence is not merely a modification of the reasoning 
 faculty, or an exercise of reason, deriving its speciality 
 from the nature of the objects it bearsupon, — for reason 
 invariably arrives at its conclusions by the perception 
 of evidence why a thing should be so. The moral 
 
Q«t MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 sense is not independent of the exercise of reason, but 
 it has distinct functions ; all the powers of the human 
 mind are connected so as that one subserves the effi- 
 ciency of the other, but that is certainly no reason 
 why we should confound them. 
 
 Furthermore, the very perversions of conscience 
 serve to attest its original and indestructible character 
 as an element of the constitution of man. Whatever 
 confusion or misplacement of right and wrong may 
 have prevailed among mankind, moral distinctions 
 have them recognised universally. Of mankind there 
 has never existed tribe or tongue, that has not acknow- 
 ledged that there is a right and a wrong ; for there 
 never was any community, the members of which did 
 not attach blame to each other for certain parts of their 
 conduct ; and blame, as we have elsewhere shewn, pro- 
 ceeds invariably from the sense of wrong. The greater 
 the perversions of conscience, the more is its indivi- 
 duality and indestructible nature evinced. In such 
 cases it is more reason than conscience that is at fault ; 
 the mind does not examine the evidence for that reli- 
 gious system of which such perversions are principles. 
 For these contrarieties in the voice of conscience to the 
 true standard of right, universally arise from a received 
 religious system. Never has wrong been done from a 
 principle of conscience but it has been done as an act 
 of worship, or of obedience to some superior power. 
 Conscience even in these melancholy cases is ever true 
 to its function of being the internal enforcer of moral 
 authority. We must not overlook the fact, that even 
 in these cases there is some knowledge of what is re- 
 garded as moral law. Conscience, where the agent is 
 sane, never rests merely on individual conviction, but 
 is in all cases sustained, by at least some traditionary 
 
CONSCIENCE. bo 
 
 or sectarian, if not public and documentary belief that 
 the deities it worships, exist, and that the homage or 
 service it renders, is acceptable to them. 
 
 If then, there is any validity in these reasonings, 
 they conduct us to the conclusion, that all moral ac- 
 tion is connected with knowledge, inasmuch as it is 
 regulated by moral law, which by its very nature can 
 have no power but so far as it is known, which governs 
 by sanctions, that are neither demonstrable, nor ad- 
 dressed to the senses, but to reason ; and in respect to 
 which, reason has to judge as to the evidence of its 
 emanating from the rightful authority. Moral action 
 then is grounded on the knowledge of law, and this 
 law, though it addresses itself directly to the conscience, 
 yet appeals to reason in the evidence it brings of its 
 origin or source. 
 
 Strictly and directly then, those states of mind and 
 those actions, only, are moral, which are the subjects of 
 moral law : other actions are matters of judgment, or 
 prudence, the doing of which is characterized as wise 
 or unwise, rash or considerate, prudent or imprudent. 
 Indirectly, however, all action and even thought has 
 a moral bearing, inasmuch as all action and even 
 thought is calculated to advance or hinder our own 
 good or the good of others. The concatenated se- 
 quences of our individual being, and the influence of 
 individual action on society, make it so, that there is 
 no exercise of thought and no external act, but what, 
 for aught we can tell, may have an important influence 
 on our own well-being, or on that of others. Conse- 
 quently, as our duty to all, as well as to ourselves, is 
 love, and as love prompts to good offices, all action 
 and even thought has a moral bearing. But then in 
 regard to whatever is not the subject of explicit moral 
 
 F 
 
66 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 precept, it is a question for reason to examine whether 
 it should be clone or not, and its morality is according 
 to its reasonableness, it is matter of duty only in as far 
 as it approves itself to reason as likely to do good, or 
 be useful on the whole ; whereas the morality of what 
 is matter of direct precept is no further dependent on 
 any exercise of reason, than as it is satisfied that the 
 precept is a moral law. There is no moral principle 
 called into exercise in the reception of mathematical 
 truth if we direct our minds to its investigation ; but 
 indirectly moral principles may have a bearing on our 
 decision, whether we shall enter on such investigations ; 
 as it may be a question whether we can do so consist- 
 ently with the right discharge of imperative duties. 
 So in regard to physical inquiries, the discovery of 
 physical relations and laws does not directly call into 
 exercise any moral principle — the moral state of our 
 minds does not influence our conclusions regarding 
 them ; yet indirectly such discoveries have a moral 
 bearing like the former, inasmuch as not only does all 
 useful knowledge tend to expand and invigorate the 
 mind, but all new disclosures of the system of nature 
 tend to increase and ennoble our conceptions of the 
 perfections of God. Physical relations and laws be- 
 long to the understanding, and power or capacity to 
 trace them does not depend on the right moral state 
 of the mind ; but the moral inferences deducible from 
 these, belong to the province of reason ; and whether 
 they are rightly deduced, and in many cases whe- 
 ther they are deduced at all, will depend much on 
 the moral habits, and the state of moral feeling. 
 
 Moral law, then, by its very nature has always ad- 
 mitted of choice in regard to its reception as such. 
 It has never come to the mass of mankind in a wav 
 
KIND OF KNOWLEDGE. 67 
 
 that irresistibly evinced its origin — as by unambiguous 
 intuition, by demonstration, or by indubitable repre- 
 sentations to the senses. Law promulged from hea- 
 ven has addressed the evidence of its divinity to the 
 reason of mankind ; the only exception to this is in 
 the case of those to whom it was primarily and origin- 
 ally revealed, and that is hardly an exception, as but a 
 small portion of revelation was originally communicated 
 to the same individuals ; the evidence for the rest was 
 the same to them as to others. And then the sanctions 
 of this law are, to all, future and unseen, influencing 
 by addressing themselves to reason, and not to the 
 senses by visible representation, nor to the understand- 
 ing by demonstration, yet sustained in a highly pre- 
 ponderating probability by the nature of moral feeling. 
 
 Thus do we see, that so far as moral action is based 
 on knowledge, or connected with it, it is neither the 
 knowledge we have by consciousness, nor that which 
 we inevitably receive through the medium of the 
 senses, nor that which results from demonstration, or 
 strict induction, but is of that kind which is cognizable 
 by reason, which rests on evidence, which in no case 
 excludes the possibility of doubt, and consequently in 
 no case precludes the exercise of choice in I'egard to 
 its reception : in a word it is such as is fully compatible 
 with moral agency — that is, witli free action, regulated 
 and directed by choice, which necessary, or intui- 
 tive, or demonstrative knowledge, could not have been. 
 
 For had all knowledge been inevitable, or such as 
 required no voluntary effort to obtain it, there could 
 have been no scope for anything of the nature of 
 moral agency, no choice in regard to its acquisition. 
 Anything of personal improvement by voluntary ex- 
 ertion would have been impossible. A being consti- 
 r 2 
 
68 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 tuted to receive knowledge only in this way, must 
 have received its full complement at once, or it must 
 have been impelled to whatever place it was to receive 
 more, or to whatever acts might be required for this 
 purpose, without anything of the nature of will of its 
 own : anything of voluntary exertion in pursuit of 
 knowledge being incompatible with an involuntary 
 imposition or instilment of it. No doubt we can con- 
 ceive of intelligent beings physically impelled from 
 land to land, and from world to world, somewhat like 
 the planets in their orbs, gathering up, or perhaps we 
 might more properly say, imbibing knowledge in their 
 course ; but whatever might be their recipient capacity 
 for truth, they could be but a sort of conscious ma- 
 chines at best, being by their constitution incapable of 
 any social connexion above what might be secured by 
 instinct, and incapable of any sentiment other than 
 physical, or what is the result of exterior influences. 
 
 Then again, had the knowledge of all truth been 
 by intuition or demonstration, there could have been 
 no scope for anything moral or any choice in its re- 
 ception, for the knowledge obtained in either of these 
 ways, if obtained at all, is obtained with absolute cer- 
 tainty, and a truth that presents itself with absolute 
 certainty; oris demonstrated, leaves no room for choice 
 whether we will receive it or not; a demonstrated 
 truth when the demonstration is comprehended pre- 
 cludes all doubt. Further, admitting of no medium 
 between entire ignorance and absolute certainty, it 
 would scarcely have comported with moral agency in 
 action, for there could have been little trial of moral 
 principle or disposition, had right and wrong with 
 their eternal consequences, been in every case so cer- 
 tain, or seen so fully, that it was impossible to start 
 
TESTIMONY. 69 
 
 a doubt respecting the one, or conceive the shadow of 
 an excuse for the other. 
 
 Further still, however, it requires to be noted, that 
 the knowledge meant to bear immediately on moral 
 action, which God has been pleased to impart to man, 
 has ever borne the form of a testimony ; it has never 
 been certified by demonstration, nor * imposed ' by any 
 faculty, power, or principle in our own minds. Now 
 our minds are constituted to receive what comes to lis 
 in the form of testimony ; whatever another relates to 
 us as truth, we have a disposition to believe as it thus 
 comes to us, and it occasions a painful revulsion of 
 feeling, when it so clearly controverts our fonner know- 
 ledge as to make it obvious it must be false. How- 
 ever, when we know nothing against what another tes- 
 tifies to us, it is in our nature to receive it as true. 
 The fulness of our assent or conviction is connected 
 with our knowledge of the character of the relater ; if 
 we know him to have a character for veracity — that he 
 has a reverence for truth, and an abhorrence of false- 
 hood — it gives us confidence in what he says, we rely 
 on his character for truthfulnesss though all other evi- 
 dence of what he relates may be wanting : in other 
 words, we have faith in him. Such is the mode in 
 which God has communicated to us moral knowledge, 
 sometimes indeed he gives reasons for his commands, 
 and condescends to place before us the proof of what 
 he says ; but oftener he simply declares his will, ac- 
 companied by the sanction which he has placed to 
 enforce obedience, making our belief to rest imme- 
 diately on his word, always however accompanying it 
 with sufficient evidence that it is his word. Thus it 
 was in the instance of the first command given to man, 
 " Of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil thou 
 
70 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 shalt not eat, for in the day thou eatest thereof thou 
 shalt surely die." Thus the command is at once a 
 rule of life and a test of his creature's feeling towards 
 himself. A result of the tendency in our minds to 
 receive what comes to us in the form of testimony, is, 
 that a contrary statement to one we have already be- 
 lieved, tends to shake this belief, and then it is for 
 reason to judge which is most likely to be true. Apart 
 from each of such contradictory statements being tes- 
 tified to us, is there any evidence of one being true 
 rather than the other ; or if there is no such evidence, 
 is there from what we know of the character of the re- 
 laters, more reliance to be placed on the one than on 
 the other ? Thus may we perceive what should be 
 the functions of reason when what is known to be a 
 divine testimony is controverted. Is it the character 
 of God or that of the controverter that gives most sanc- 
 tion to his statements ? 
 
 That the true foundation of religion is a declara- 
 tion or testimony of the divine will and purpose, ap- 
 proves itself to the universal sense of mankind. 
 Every fonn of religion which has obtained votaries in 
 the world, has professed to be a revelation from heaven 
 —a declaration of the will of the gods. No enthusi- 
 ast ever thought of promulging a new faith without 
 claiming for it such an origin. Schemes of spiritual 
 philosophy and of morals, may be reared from ano- 
 ther basis, but other foundation for a religion among 
 beings who have forfeited the Divine favour, than the 
 will of him who is the object of worship and submis- 
 sive obedience, somehow made known, is utterly in- 
 conceivable. The will of any moral agent, — much 
 more that of the Supreme and Almighty Governor, — 
 is something which from its very nature cannot be 
 
TESTIMONY. 71 
 
 discovered with any certainty, unless it be somehow 
 declared ; it belongs neither to the department of ne- 
 cessary truth, nor of physical or established truth, but 
 of voluntary truth, or such as may be communicated 
 or withheld at pleasure. Such is every thing belong- 
 ing to the will and purposes of a voluntary agent, until 
 declared by him or evinced in action. The existence, 
 and to a certain extent the character of God, are mani- 
 fested in his works ; but His will in regard to what he 
 requires from us, is discoverable from these only to a 
 very limited extent. Can we, from our own consti- 
 tution, or the objects around us, discover what worship 
 will be proper to our situation, or acceptable to Him .'' 
 Is there any unambiguous evincement and vindication 
 of moral law in the present world, in the consequences 
 attending moral action ? Are one set of actions uni- 
 formly attended with good consequences, or rewarded, 
 and another as uniformly attended with evil conse- 
 (juences, or punished ? Or, is not each of these so 
 far from being unifonnly the case as to justify the de- 
 claration of the preacher, that good or evil is not 
 known by anything that is done under the sun ? 
 Do not the existing constitution of nature, and the 
 administration of providence, present many facts very 
 difficult to reconcile with the government of a being, 
 at once of strict justice, and boundless benevolence ? 
 Without any other clue to the character of God or 
 the destiny of man, than what is found in the consti- 
 tution of nature and the course of events, we see in 
 what painful perplexity a thoughtful mind is involved 
 in the exclamation of the ancient sage* — ' I have 
 
 * Aristotle. I cite from memory, and am sensible the first part 
 of the quotation is verbally inaccurate. 
 
72 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 lived in clouLt, and die in uncertainty. O thou cause 
 of causes, have mercy on me ! ' The need for such 
 a ground for religious faith and divine worship has 
 been made most manifest, by the incertitude and per- 
 versions to which these have been incident in every 
 country in which the revelation vouchsafed of heaven 
 has not been specially preserved. Even the obvious 
 (as we should think) obligation of the duties arising 
 out of the most intimate relations, has not preserved 
 them from systematic violation, nor prevented the op- 
 posite crimes from being extensively practised, conni- 
 ved at, legalized, and even regarded as sacred observ- 
 ances and perpetrated from a principle of conscience : 
 as witness, the exposure of infants in China, the legali- 
 zation of theft in Sparta, and Thuggee, and the burn- 
 ing of widows in Hindustan. 
 
 The Scriptures represent the voice of nature under 
 the character of a testimony to the Divine wisdom and 
 glory: " The heavens declare the glory of God, and 
 the firmament sheweth his handy-work ; day unto day 
 uttereth speech, and night unto night sheweth know- 
 ledge. There is no speech nor language where their 
 voice is not heard." Yet this testimony as well as that 
 of revelation may be rejected; it does not compel men 
 to receive it ; on the contrary to read it aright requires 
 an observant eye and a teachable heart. 
 
 " The works of the Lord are great, sought out of 
 all them that have pleasure therein," " Then shall ye 
 know if ye follow on to know the Lord." There is no 
 direct manifestation of the Divine character and glory 
 to sense ; and the teachings and warnings which na- 
 ture gives may certainly be missed, and they will be 
 so by those who give up their minds to the slumber of 
 uninquiring indolence, or surrender them to the chaos 
 
REASON. 73 
 
 of dissipation and undisciplined reverie. But the 
 same class of persons will equally fail of apprehending 
 in their true spirit and fulness, the larger and more 
 explicit revelations of the Divine character and will, 
 given us in Scripture. The knowledge meant by God 
 to bear immediately on moral action, in whatever ve- 
 hicle it may be borne, is only brought before us, or 
 presented to our acceptance, never forced or ' imposed ' 
 upon us. The most astounding and awful scenes and 
 phenomena are made to conspire to impress us with 
 the unspeakable importance of seeking, embracing, 
 and acting on it ; nevertheless, still, we are free to em- 
 brace or neglect it, under the solemn warning that we 
 neglect it at our peril. 
 
 If these reasonings are of force in regard to the the- 
 ories and assumptions on which they have been spe- 
 cially brought to bear, they will also be found to sub- 
 vert that recent system which makes man merely the 
 passive recipient of spiritual truth, which is' imposed '* 
 on him by an impersonal, independoit, and sort of 
 divine principle, to which is appropriated the name of 
 ' reason ;' and perhaps the special application to this 
 hypothesis of the principles and reasonings brought 
 forward above, might be left to the candid and inqui- 
 ring reader ; but the influence it is gaining in not a 
 few quarters, and the importance begun to be claimed 
 for it, demand that it should receive a more direct con- 
 sideration. This system has elsewhere been considered 
 under the aspect of its restricting freedom to the mere 
 
 * ' Independently of our will, reason intervenes, and certain 
 conditions being accomplished, gives us, or rather imposes on us, 
 those truths.' — Cousin. 
 
74 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 act of willing ; here I shall confine myself to what it 
 teaches respecting the nature of reason, and the ne- 
 cessary and absolute character of supersensual truth. 
 And, first, let us hear his* account of reason: 'Rea- 
 son,' says he, ' is literally a revelation, a necessary and 
 universal revelation, which is wanting to no man, and 
 which enlightens every man on his coming into the 
 world : illuminat omnem homenem venientem in hunc 
 munchim. Reason is the necessary mediator between 
 God and man, the Xoyoi; of Pythagoras and Plato, the 
 Word made flesh, which serves as the interpreter of 
 God and the teacher of man, divine and human at the 
 same time. It is not indeed the absolute God in his 
 majestic individuality, but his manifestation in spirit 
 and in truth ; it is not the Being of beings, but it is 
 the revealed God of the human race. As God is never 
 wanting to the human race, and never abandons it, so 
 the human race believes in God with an irresistible 
 and unalterable faith; and this unity of faith is its own 
 highest unity. 'f I must restrain the feelings naturally 
 excited in a mind accustomed to sober and rational 
 statement, by the strange aud outrageous absurdities 
 of this short paragraph. Nor shall I venture any 
 remark on the taste displayed in the attempt to appro- 
 priate the inspired description of the incarnation of the 
 Divine Logos, as the vehicle of this grotesque mysti- 
 cism. Let us hear another statement : ' Every man 
 believes in his own existence, — every man therefore 
 believes in the existence of the world and of God ; 
 every man thinks, — every man therefore thinks God, 
 if we may so express it ; every human proposition re- 
 flecting the consciousness, reflects the idea of unity 
 
 "* Cousin. + Exposition of Eclecticism, pp. 79, 80. 
 
REASON, 75 
 
 and of being, that is essential to consciousness ; every 
 human projiosition therefore contains God ; every man 
 who speaks, speaks of God, and every word is an act 
 of faith and a hymn.'* How easy on this principle is 
 religious worship, and how worthless ! Just as good, 
 regarded in this light, because quite as conscious and 
 voluntary, is the chirp of the chicken, or even the mid- 
 night song of the mountain rill. Our author proceeds ; 
 — ' Atheism is a barren formula, a negation without 
 reality, an abstraction of the mind, which cannot assert 
 itself without self-destruction ; for every assertion, even 
 though negative, is a judgment which contains the idea 
 of being, and, consequently, God in his fulness.' I as- 
 sert, that I write with a pen; — this is not merely a nega- 
 tive, but a positive assertion ; in making this assertion 
 I have the idea of a pen, and in that simple idea alone 
 I have the idea of being, ' for every assertion contains 
 the idea of being.' But what idea of God can be in- 
 volved in the simple and single idea of a pen. I grant 
 I may arrive at the notion of God, by tracing its his- 
 tory, inquiring into its origin, and studying its rela- 
 tions and adaptations, but these involve many and 
 various ideas ; and besides, my obtaining these ideas 
 depends on my own will : I may make the inquiries, 
 I may give the attention, I may exercise the thought 
 necessary in order to obtain these, or not, as I please ; 
 if I do not, the idea of a pen vnll not suggest, far less 
 involve the idea of God. Again, ' Reason is impersonal. 
 Whence then comes this wonderful guest ? What is 
 the principle of this reason which enlightens us with- 
 out belonging to us ? This principle is no other than 
 God.'f 
 
 * Exposition of Eclecticism, p. 78. •)• Ibid. p. 92, Note. 
 
76 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 A direct result of this deification of universal reason, 
 and one indeed distinctly recognised by this philoso- 
 pher, is the divine origin of all the forms of religion 
 and idolatry now extant or which have ever existed 
 on earth. 'Reason is thus clothed in its own eyes with 
 divine authority on account of the principle on which 
 it rests. Now this state of reason which listens to and 
 regards itself as the echo of God on earth, with the 
 peculiar and extraordinary characteristics which then 
 distinguish it, is what we call enthusiasm. The word 
 is a sufficient explanation of the thing. Enthusiasm 
 is the breath of God within us ; it is immediate intui- 
 tion opposed to induction and demonstration ; it is 
 primitive spontaneity opposed to the ulterior develop- 
 ment of reflection ; it is the perception of the loftiest 
 truths by reason, when it is most independent of the 
 
 senses and of our personality It is enthusiasm 
 
 which gives birth to religions ; for every religion sup- 
 poses two things, namely — that the truths it proclaims 
 are absolute truths, and that it proclaims them in the 
 name of God himself, by whom they are revealed,'* 
 Islamism and Hinduism, Buddhism and Soofeeism 
 are all religions as well as Christianity ; consequently 
 they have had their birth alike from this Divine en- 
 thusiasm ; consequently they are all sustained by the 
 same authority, embody the same absolute truths, re- 
 vealed by the same God : yet in one he declares that 
 " the Lord our God is one Lord ; and there is none 
 other but he." This surely is an absolute truth, and 
 corresponding to it there is given in the same religion 
 a command equally unqualified : '< Thou shalt worship 
 the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve j'' 
 
 * Exposition of Eclecticism, pp. 92, 93, Notes. 
 
REASON. 77 
 
 while another ' great religion ' presents to its adherents 
 the enormous number of 330 millions of deities de- 
 manding worship. In the one he has declared that he 
 will not give his glory to another, nor his praise to 
 graven images ; while in the other, these very things 
 are done which he declares from his own mouth he 
 will not do. Nor is this all : Christianity pronounces 
 all the religions of the Gentiles false, and charges those 
 who hold them with having " changed the truth of God 
 into a lie ;" and its founder enjoined his disciples to 
 " go into all the world and preach it to every creature," 
 declaring that " he that believed should be saved, and 
 he that believed not should be damned." How were 
 they to do to whom it was thus proclaimed with such 
 awful sanctions, who had already embraced a religion 
 sustained by equal authority, equally divine ? What 
 were to be their thoughts between the two ? Is there 
 another religion besides that of Christ based on the 
 conviction, that men are sinners, which proclaims any 
 other expiation as adequate to the removal of guilt 
 than the sacrifice of Christ upon the cross, or admits 
 of any other mediator between God and men but him ? 
 If Christianity is trae, such a religion must be false. 
 For the Christian Scriptures declare that " there is 
 one Mediator between God and man, the man Christ 
 Jesus," and that " there is none other name under 
 heaven given among men whereby we must be saved, 
 but the name of Jesus." Such a religion, as every 
 one at all acquainted with it knows, is Hinduism : 
 among other things which it holds forth as sufficient 
 for the expiation of guilt and purification from sin, are 
 — laceration and torture of the flesh, and bathing in 
 the ' sacred waters ;' yet, on the principle of Cousin, 
 both are equally divine. Was ever a system pro- 
 
78 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 pounded involving more palpable contradictions ? In- 
 deed its author himself seems to have felt considerable 
 uneasiness in contemplating it as open to this charge : 
 and when he looked abroad on the spectacle, grotesque 
 and strange, of antagonist and repugnant systems of 
 faith which have gained possession of the human soul, 
 it was impossible for him to suppress some audible 
 misgivings. ' If these convictions of faith be com- 
 bined in every act of consciousness, and if conscious- 
 ness be one in the whole human race,' he asks, and 
 well he may, ' whence arises the prodigious diversity 
 which seems to exist between man and man ? in what 
 does that diversity consist ? In truth, when we ap- 
 pear to perceive at first view so many differences 
 [mark how cautious and fearful of a fatal admission] 
 between one individual and another, one country and 
 another, one epoch of humanity and another, we feel 
 a profound emotion of melancholy ; and are tempted 
 to regard an intellectual development so capricious, 
 and even the whole of humanity, as a phenomenon 
 without consistency, without grandeur, and without in- 
 terest.' Something akin to this indeed, one would 
 think, would be the spontaneous voice of correct and 
 enlightened religious feeling. Not so, however, our 
 author ; he deems this but a superficial and deceptions 
 view of the matter. ' But it is demonstrated by a more 
 attentive observation of facts, that no man is a stranger 
 to either of the three great ideas that constitute con- 
 sciousness.' We were not aware that any particular 
 ideas constituted consciousness ; we thought that was 
 an element of all ideas in rational mind : but let us 
 hear what these ideas are, — ' personality or the liberty 
 of man, impersonality or the necessity of nature, and 
 the providence of God.' If the liberty of man be an 
 
REASON. 79 
 
 element of consciousness, sure enough many a philo- 
 sopher has been as unconscious as a lobster ; for many 
 a one has utterly denied it : and quite as unfortunate 
 have been many more as to the necessity of nature, — 
 myriads in their unconscious ignorance regarding it as 
 originated by the spontaneous energy, sustained by the 
 free will, and directed and regulated by the intelligent 
 providence of God ; but what room there can be for 
 this ' providence ' under 'a necessary system of nature,' 
 is far more than we able to divine. But to return to our 
 author : ' E very man,' says he,' comprehends these three 
 ideas immediately, because he found them at first, and 
 constantly finds them again within himself.' Again, in 
 another place : ' The very idea of being implies, in its 
 lowest degree, an idea (moi'e or less clear, yet real) 
 of 6em^ itself, that is of God. To think, is to know 
 that we think ; it is to confide in our thought, that is 
 to confide in the principle of thought, that is to believe 
 iu the existence of that principle. As this does not 
 imply that we believe ourselves' [as if the belief of our 
 existence required something for its gi'ound surer than 
 consciousness, and consciousness was not to be trusted 
 merely in itself] ' or that we believe the world ;' [as if 
 we were not to trust our senses for the existence of 
 what we perceive by them, — if this is not the old scep- 
 ticism in both its great phases, — if Cousin has slain it, 
 surely this is its ghost ! ] ' and yet implies,' he con- 
 tinues, ' that we believe ; it is evident, that whether we 
 know it or do not know it, it implies, that we believe 
 in the absolute principle of thought ;' [but what can 
 be the nature of a belief that we know not of, or are 
 not conscious of ? and how can such a belief be a 
 constituent of consciousness ; ] ' so that all thought 
 implies a spontaneous faith in God, and natural athe- 
 
80 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 ism is impossible.' Admitting that this were true, 
 what would be the value of an unconscious theism ? it 
 could have no influence on rational or moral action. 
 Both these proceed from choice, consequently imply 
 conscious knowledge of the objects among which 
 choice is exercised, and of the gi-ounds or motives 
 which induce it. This unconscious faith has peculiar 
 channs for Cousin ; the reason is obvious, — the great 
 majority of mankind have no desire for a better. But he 
 assigns a different one, sti'ange enough, and like many 
 others of his, not very intelligible. The unreasoning 
 masses, these unconscious believers * alone have true 
 existence,' that is, if the language has any meaning, 
 they alone are the possessors of humanity in its ori- 
 ginal purity and integrity. * If ignorance is bliss 'tis 
 folly to be wise.' ' Leave out the exceptions which 
 appear from time to time in certain critical periods of 
 history, and you will perceive that the masses, which 
 alone have true existence, always live in the same 
 faith, of which the forms only vary.' ' A lie is but 
 the truth in masquerade,' says Lord Byron. What 
 the unprincipled poet exclaimed in the spirit of pro- 
 fane banter and sceptical scorn. Cousin virtually 
 (would I not be justified in saying explicitly) affirms, 
 with a solemn air, in a treatise professing to embody 
 the only true philosophy of human nature. 
 
 ' But the masses do not possess the secret of their 
 convictions ;' they and the sceptical philosophers it 
 appears then are in the same situation ; * when the 
 scholar has denied the existence of God, hear the man, 
 ask him, [he is equally unconscious if the masses re- 
 present him in his true condition] ' take him at una- 
 wares, and you will see that his words imply the idea 
 of a God ; and that faith in God, is without his know- 
 
REASON. 81 
 
 ledge, at the bottom of his heart.' Thus, then, the 
 atheist and the masses are, on these principles, in tlie 
 same condition, and practically the results attest that 
 this is but too near the truth. Nor has true philosophy 
 far to search in order to account for this. For suppos- 
 ing the thing possible, — a belief which is unknown to 
 its possessor, is one which he must be unable to distin- 
 guish from any thing else. Things are distinguished 
 by their differences, but a thing which is unknown to 
 us cannot be discerned as differing from any other 
 thing ; for before it could be so, it must be discerned 
 what it is in itself. A belief, then, unknown to its pos- 
 sessor cannot be any standard of truth ; it cannot be 
 any guard against error; it cannot be any guide to us, 
 as to what we are to receive or what we are to reject ; 
 for being unknown we cannot perceive what other arti- 
 cles of belief are com])atible, or what are incompatible 
 with it. So in the history of mankind we see inter- 
 minable variations and fallings-off from the true belief. 
 One sceptic has denied the existence of the world, 
 another has disallowed Providence, another the exist- 
 ence of God himself; the masses have robbed him of his 
 unity, his purity, his glory, and his worship, and have 
 agreed in nothing further than the recognition and 
 dread of some sort of invisible power, which they have 
 conceived of as manifested under every form of absur- 
 dity, and subsisting in connexion with every j^hase of 
 wickedness. Here the reader will observe we have to 
 do with these melancholy facts as facts, — an inquiry 
 into their causes belongs to another part of this treatise. 
 We must now briefly advert to some other truths 
 which Cousin affirms reason alone can reveal, and to 
 the characteristics which in his view distinguish them 
 from all other truth. ' Let it be remembered that the 
 
 G 
 
82 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 truths which reason intuitively discovers, are not arbi- 
 trary, but necessary, that tliey are not relative but ab- 
 solute.'* ' It is to reason that we owe the knowledge 
 of universal and necessary truths, of principles which 
 we all obey, and which we cannot but obey.'f What 
 then are these necessary and universal truths ? We 
 have a complete list of them, he says, in the categories 
 of Aristotle; but he conceives these may be reduced 
 in number, and ultimately arrives at the conclusion 
 that ' the laws of thought may be reduced to two, 
 namely — the law of causality, and that of substance.' 
 Elsewhere, however, he classes other notions with 
 them as possessing the same characteristics, and as 
 derived solely from the same source. Thus, * among 
 the notions which reason furnishes, there are some, 
 the characteristics of which are irreconcileable with 
 those of the sensible phenomena : for example — the 
 notions of cause, of substance, of time, of space, of 
 unity, and the like. Let sensation be tortured as much 
 as you please, you will never draw from it the cha- 
 racteristics of universality and necessity, by which 
 these notions and many others are incontestibly dis- 
 tinguished. 'j Let us examine the claims of some of 
 these notions to the character of universality and ne- 
 cessity ; and first as to the notion of causation. Do 
 we regard it as a necessary condition of every thing 
 that exists that it must have a cause : this would be 
 necessary to the universality of the notion, for ' if it 
 be universal and necessary, to limit it would be to de- 
 stroy it.' Is it then imlimited P If so, though we 
 should anive at the knowledge of some thing or of 
 some being which is the cause of all other being, this 
 
 * Exposition of Eclecticism, p. fl2, Notes. t Ibid. p. 60. 
 
 X Ibid. p. m. 
 
REASON. 83 
 
 necessary and universal principle of causality de- 
 mands a cause for it; and supposing that found, a 
 cause for that again, inevitably issuing in the atheistic 
 absurdity of an eternal chain of causation. But if we 
 are to avoid this absurdity we must limit the principle 
 of causality, and acknowledge an order of existence ex- 
 empt from the law of causation : accordingly when we 
 set ourselves to inquire how wide the range is of the 
 principle of causality, we find that it is not every 
 thing that exists which must have a cause, but what- 
 ever begins to exist. It is only where we perceive 
 marks of an origin or of change that we ascribe exist- 
 ence to a cause. Where we find an existence that is 
 unbeginning and unchanged, there we recognise ne- 
 cessary or uncaused existence. The notion of causa- 
 lity, then, is not universal, for there is an order of ex- 
 istence in which it is not at all involved ; and it is not 
 absolute, for it depends on the notion of limited and 
 variable existence. Moreover, it is not intuitive, for 
 its limits are not to be correctly ascertained but by a 
 process of abstract thought. 
 
 Then as to the notion of substance being an intui- 
 tive and necessary revelation of reason, — if it is so, the 
 writer of these pages is certainly an in'ational animal, 
 for though he has expended no little thought on the 
 matter, he has to confess that as yet he has failed to 
 obtain any distinct notion of what in the philosophy 
 of Cousin is even meant by substance. Vulgar no- 
 tions of substance are derived directly from the sense 
 of touch and of seeing, and most men will allow that 
 they feel some difficulty in conceiving of a thing as 
 substance which is both impalpable and invisible. As 
 to the notion of substance being' incontestibly distin- 
 guished by universality and necessity,' I would ask 
 a 2 
 
84 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 whether many a one has not had a distinct notion of 
 substance who never dreamt of any existing beyond 
 the boundary of his native hills ; and if it is replied 
 that this is not a notion of what is properly substance 
 at all, — the reply itself is fatal to the theory, for the 
 persons in question have had no other ; and if many 
 of the human race have had no other, how can this 
 notion of substance contended for, be an intuitive 
 principle of universal reason. 
 
 Further, that the notion of time is an absolute and 
 necessary one, I deny ; time has but a ' relative/ exist- 
 ence, it exists in relation to succession, — absolute eter- 
 nity knows no succession : like absolute infinity it is 
 not divisible into parts. The notion of time then, so 
 far from being absolute and necessary, implies the 
 previous notion of successive and limited existence. 
 Thus, not only is time measured by succession, but 
 without the consciousness of succession we could have 
 no such notion as tbat expressed by time or duration. 
 
 And as to unity, surely no superhuman power is ne- 
 cessary to give one a notion of that, seeing it may be 
 most distinctly obtained without sending one's thoughts 
 beyond one's own self; for what more impressive notion 
 of unity shall we obtain anywhere than what is fur- 
 nished by the wonderful mechanism of our own bodies, 
 all harmonizing, and all subserving, without let or jar, 
 the purposes of an animating and directive mind.* 
 
 Among all these categories, that of space perhaps 
 has the greatest appearance of claim to an absolute 
 character ; yet does not the notion of space depend on 
 the notion of body or substance ? Is it not the notion 
 of that in which body subsists, or that which intervenes 
 
 * See Note E. 
 
DIVINE FREEDOM. 85 
 
 between bodies ? If any one doubts this, let him en- 
 deavour to form a notion of space without body or 
 matter. Let him send forth his thoughts beyond the 
 farthest star and the remotest planet of creation, be- 
 yond the utmost range of the power of gi'avitation, be- 
 yond where the last ray of light expires, and tell us 
 what notion of space he can form there, and whether 
 it any way resembles what he has been used to enter- 
 tain amid life and light and tangible forms. With 
 these simple remarks then we shall leave the reader to 
 judge, whether the notions in question ' are incon- 
 testibly distinguished by the characteristics of univer- 
 sality and necessity.' That some of them directly, and 
 all of them ultimately, conduct us to something higher 
 than the sensible phenomena, we are ready, not only 
 to acknowledge, but to maintain : but what has that to 
 do either with their necessity or their universality ? 
 
 There is another principle propounded by Cousin 
 which demands a brief notice, inasmuch as were it 
 established it would preclude the possibility of any 
 thing of a moral nature in the Divine character, 
 — namely, his notion of creation. ' God^ if he is a 
 cause, can create ; and if he is an absolute cause, he 
 cannot but create ; and in creating the universe, he 
 does not dmw it forth from nothingness, but fi'om him- 
 self. An absolute creative force, which cannot but 
 
 pass into act, being eminently his characteristic, it 
 follows, not that creation is possible, but that it is ne- 
 cessary. It follows that God is creating without ces- 
 sation and infinitely, and that creation is inexhausti- 
 ble, and sustains itself constantly.'* If creation is 
 
 * Exposition of Eclecticism, p. 131, Notes. 
 
86 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 necessary, — if God cannot but create, — if incessantly 
 and infinitely he is producing from himself by neces- 
 sity of nature, what is he but an infinitude of physical 
 causation ? He is not an independent being acting 
 by choice and will ; the universe is as necessary to 
 him as he is to it. Accordingly we find our author 
 declaiiDg that * A God without a world is no less false 
 than a world without a God ; a cause without effects 
 which manifest it ; or an indefinite series of effects 
 without a primary cause,' in these extremes, he says, 
 there ' are equal error and equal danger.' A cause 
 that cannot be without effects, is not a voluntary cause, 
 for in a voluntary agent acting voluntarily, causation 
 originates in the will, — effects are or are not according 
 as it wills them to be or not. If God cannot but 
 ci'eate incessantly and infinitely, his will has nothing 
 to do with creation, for all exercise of will or choice is 
 precluded in what a being must of necessity do, and 
 as effectually will the exercise of intelligence be pre- 
 cluded too ; for what relation can intelligence have to 
 action, unless it be in supplying the grounds of choice ; 
 but the perception of grounds of choice, where choice 
 is precluded, would be but a mockery. But it may 
 be meant, that though God cannot but create, he is 
 free to choose what or how much ; but if God was free 
 to choose what he would create, he must in regard to 
 every particular thing or being, have been free to 
 choose whether he would create it or not. For in the 
 very admission, that he was free to choose, whether 
 what he was to create was to be of this kind or of that, 
 it is involved not only that the thing existed not, but 
 that its existence was not necessary ; for if its exist- 
 ence were necessary, its nature and qualities must be 
 determinate : for to say the existence of a thing is ne- 
 
DIVINE FREEDOM. 87 
 
 cessary, and yet that in that necessity is not involved 
 any determinate nature or qualities of the thing re- 
 specting which this necessity is predicated, is an ab- 
 surdity ; for what is it which individualizes a thing, or 
 distinguishes it from other things, if it is not its nature 
 and qualities. But a thing which has no particular 
 nature or qualities is nothing; for so far from necessity 
 being predicable of such existence, apart from indivi- 
 dualizing characteristics, nothing can even be ima- 
 gined. But physical or necessary causation is not 
 creation : creation is the production of what before 
 was not by voluntary power, acting not by necessity, 
 but according to choice or will. If the universe were 
 necessary, it were an absurdity to call it creation. In 
 that case, it must either exist eternally and independ- 
 ently, or it must be a portion of God ; or rather — 
 which indeed seems to be the notion of Cousin — the 
 development of the Divine substance. ' God is,' ac- 
 cording to his idea, * at once substance and cause, — 
 always substance, and always cause, .... one and 
 many, eternity and time, space and number, .... in- 
 finite and finite together, .... at the same time God, 
 nature, and humanity.'* ' The creations of God are 
 from himself; therefore he creates with all the charac- 
 teristics which we have recognised in himself, and 
 which pass necessarily into his creations.'f If God 
 is nature and humanity, what follows but that each of 
 these is so much of God. If he creates with all the 
 characteristics which belong to himself, passing neces- 
 sarily into his creations, what are these other than por- 
 tions of himself ? rather, we should say, is it not a most 
 grievous solecism to speak in this case of creations. 
 
 * Exposition of Eclecticism, p, 77. + Ibid. p. 13], Notes. 
 
88 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 This system recognises nothing like Divine will ; it 
 merges that in the necessity of the Divine nature. 
 Now we readily acknowledge that the Divine will is 
 not to be represented as distinct from the Divine na- 
 ture, but for a very different reason ; it is because we 
 regard the Divine nature as just the aggregate of all 
 the spontaneous emotions and acts of the Divine mind, 
 — spontaneous, because that mind is the original and 
 only absolute, anterior to, or beneath which there is 
 no necessity in regard to any thing creatable, — and 
 certain, or unchangeable, because that mind is all- 
 knowing and supreme. According to this view, then, 
 instead of its being true that ' God cannot but create,' 
 or that all his creations are by necessity of nature, we 
 shall come to the conclusion that every act of creation 
 is the result of free intelligent purpose, and unnecessi- 
 tated will. It may be said, that to make creation or 
 any part of it contingent, or such as might not have 
 been, is incompatible with the unchangeableness of 
 God ; for if, for instance, you suppose this world not 
 to have been created, God could not have had the in- 
 numerable thoughts and purposes which have been in 
 his mind respecting its creation, sustentation, and go- 
 vernment, without having changed, on the supposition 
 of its not being made ; for if he had purposed to create 
 it, and it not yet have been created, it is clear he must 
 have changed. And if he had never had the intention 
 of purpose to create it, and consequently none of the 
 thoughts involved in that purpose, he would not have 
 been exactly of the same mind as he is, seeing it has 
 been created. But, in answer to this, let it be ob- 
 served, that the not having this pmiiose and the 
 thoughts involved in it, would not make God change- 
 able : this would not be the case unless God had 
 
DIVINE FREEDOM. 89 
 
 formed such a purpose and afterwards altered it. For 
 as God's having created the world, is seen by all to 
 have been perfectly compatible with his unchangeable- 
 ness, seeing there is no intimation nor proof of his 
 having ever had any other purpose but to create it ; so 
 though he had not created this world, would his un- 
 changeableness have appeared less indubitable to the 
 rational inhabitants of other worlds, if there had been 
 no indication of God's ever having had any intention 
 of creating it ? Unless we hold that creation is abso- 
 lutely infinite, which I conceive would be a contradic- 
 tion, as no possible aggregation of finite things, how- 
 ever vast their number, can make up an infinite ; un- 
 less then we assume what is contradictory, we must 
 admit that there are possible worlds which God has 
 not created ; consequently there are many possible 
 purposes to create which God has not seen meet to 
 form, and had our world not been created it would 
 have been among these possible, but not actually ex- 
 isting worlds, and its non-existence would as little 
 have shown any liability to change in God as their's. 
 It is possible, however, that it may be farther objected 
 Though this may be compatible with the unchange- 
 ness of God, how can it consist with the infinity of 
 his nature ? If there are possible purposes which God 
 has not purposed, is it not evident that the Divine 
 mind cannot be infinite, seeing we can conceive of 
 something which is not in it ? But what has an infi- 
 nity of nature to do with infinity of purpose ? every 
 thing created is a finite thing, and the purpose to create 
 must coiTespond with the object to be created : a pur- 
 pose is a certain definite act or state of mind which we 
 can readily conceive of as eternal, but which has no 
 conceivable relation to infinity ; consequently, if the 
 
90 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 principle above referred to be correct, that no number 
 of finite tilings, however great, can constitute infinity, 
 it is obvious that infinity is not predicable of purposes 
 — it is irrelevant to their nature. Moreover, if the 
 absence of some possible purposes were not compatible 
 with whatever constitutes the true infinity of the Di- 
 vine nature, this infinity would be incompatible with 
 the freedom of the Divine will ; for if this infinity re- 
 quired the Divine mind to entertain all possible pur- 
 poses, and consequently, unless it were to change, to 
 execute them, there would be no room for choice : 
 for there is no choice if one must do all that is pos- 
 sible, — choice is exercised in selecting from among 
 possible things what is best ; and we should be landed 
 again in the necessity of creation, and the annihila- 
 tion of the Divine will. But further, God could 
 not have all possible purposes, without all the voli- 
 tions of all beings being his, consequently, not with- 
 out his being the real doer of whatever they do ; 
 consequently, not without being not only the au- 
 thor, but the actual doer of whatever is called sin, 
 which, however, in that case, could be no such thing ; 
 therefore, not without making moral law the most 
 intolerable mockery, and whatever is called retribu- 
 tion, — a malignant absurdity confounding all con- 
 ception ; — if there is any willing to hold such prin- 
 ciples concerning the infinity of the Divine nature, 
 with all these inevitable consequences, I leave it to 
 the reader to say whether he is not worse than an 
 atheist. 
 
 This error seems to originate in confounding un- 
 changeableness with necessit}'. What is the differ- 
 ence ? Unchangeableness merely implies that it 
 never was otherwise ; necessity, that it never could 
 
DIVINE FREEDOM. 91 
 
 be Otherwise. Unchaiigeableness is perfectly com- 
 patible with freedom of choice, provided the purpose 
 resulting from such choice continue unaltered ; but 
 necessity by its very nature precludes choice altoge- 
 ther", for choice can be no element of an action which 
 is necessary, and a pur])ose which is necessary is no 
 purpose but a physical state.* 
 
 * See Note F. 
 
PART 11. 
 
 MAN CONSIDERED AS A MORAL AGENT. 
 
 SECTION I. 
 
 INQUIRY RESPECTING THE MORAL CONSTITUTION 
 AND STATE OF MAN. 
 
 Consistently with the conditions above stated, moral 
 agency admits of a wide variety of constitution and 
 circumstances in those who are capable of it. They 
 may be unembodied spirits, or invested with various 
 orders of corporeity. They may differ vastly in the 
 strength and range of their intellectual and active 
 powers. They may be instigated by propensions and 
 emotions, greatly varying both in nature and charac- 
 ter. Each individual may owe his existence to a dis- 
 tinct act of creation, as is the case with those beings 
 revealed to us in Scripture under the name of angels : 
 or a whole race may derive it, through the medium of 
 predecessors, from an original stock, as is the case with 
 man. They may be created with the powers neces- 
 sary to moral agency in a state fit for immediate exer- 
 cise, as was the case with the first human pair ; or 
 these may be progressively developed from a mere 
 rudiment, evincing scarcely any thing more than the 
 
CONSTITUTION AND STATE OF MAN. 93 
 
 characteristics of animal existence, as in all the other 
 members of the human family. 
 
 Human nature may be conceived of as subsisting 
 in three moral states. First, in a state of trial, the 
 heart drawn by outward and emotive incitements to- 
 wai'ds evil, but with the moral sense so prompt and 
 keen as to supply sufficient motive to resist and repel 
 them. Indifference towards the objects of moral con- 
 duct is not necessary to moral agency ; for that could 
 not subsist but in a mental habitude entirely devoid of 
 emotion. Pleasure or giatification of whatever kind 
 necessarily involves complacency towards the object 
 producing it, and pain displacency ; and there are no 
 emotions or propensions which do not involve one or 
 other of these, A mind indifferent to the objects of 
 moral action, must be an emotionless mind, and such 
 a mind we have already proved would be incapable of 
 moral agency. Secondly, human nature may subsist 
 in a state in which the heart being inclined toward 
 evil, evil is frequently chosen and pursued, yet with 
 the power of choosing and pursuing good, — evinced 
 by the feeling of regret, which can only be experienced 
 when we are conscious of doing wrong when we might 
 have avoided it, — by mutual blame, — and by evils in- 
 dulged in at one time, being refrained from at another. 
 Thirdly, by long fidelity and the practice of virtue 
 under trial, we can conceive of a habitude of mind 
 being acquired, in which good will be chosen and pur- 
 sued with something like the ease and certitude of 
 instinct. 
 
 In which of these states human nature at present 
 subsists, it is not difficult to determine ; the most pal- 
 pable and melancholy facts show its moral disorder. 
 Men feel regret for many things which they do, which 
 
94 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 shows that they are conscious of doing wrong indivi- 
 dually. Men blame one another, which shows either 
 that they do wrong or jud(je wrong : either that moral 
 law is violated, or the moral sense perverted ; either 
 of which is incompatible with an underanged state of 
 moral being. Let us only be aware that men quan'el 
 with each other, and this single fact alone is sufficient 
 to prove that human nature is in a state of moral dis- 
 order ; for were it in a right moral state, men would 
 form the same judgments and pursue the same conduct 
 in regard to all the great points of moral law ; and 
 if in regard to any minor and obscurer matters they 
 might ever differ in opinion, humility, candour, and 
 love would prevent them from quarrelling. 
 
 The question now arises, how is it that human na- 
 ture is in such a state ? Was such its original con- 
 dition, or has it suffered any derangement ? Many 
 things forbid our concluding that human nature is 
 now in its original condition. It is not consonant to 
 our notions of the moral character of God to think that 
 man is morally in the state to which he was assigned, 
 and for which his powers were adapted by his Maker. 
 Then the state of anarchy in which the recognised 
 powers of the same moral being subsist, equally forbid 
 such a conclusion. It is the dictate of universal i"ea- 
 son, that all the powers and propensions of our nature, 
 should be regulated by that sense of right and wrong 
 with which God has endowed us, in every case in 
 which a right and wrong are cognizable by this sense; 
 but how far this is from being the case, the diversity 
 which subsists between the moral conduct of any com- 
 munity, and the moral judgments of its more thought- 
 ful and virtuous members, sufficiently evinces; and not 
 less the disparity between the dictates of that sense 
 
CONSTITUTION AND STATE OF MAN. 95 
 
 even in die minds of the vicious, in inoments of reflec- 
 tion, and the gi'oss excesses in which they indulge. 
 If then we may not conclude that man's moral being 
 came at first in this state from the hands of his Maker, 
 various deeply interesting questions arise in our minds 
 — When, and how did a derangement take place ? 
 How came it to prevail universally ? Man being a 
 creature under a generative constitution, is this de- 
 rangement in any respect a transmitted thing ? and if 
 it is, in what respect, and to what extent ? If this de- 
 rangement is original or constitutional, is it under the 
 power of personal agency so as that it can thereby be 
 either increased, or diminished and repaired ? These 
 are questions, some solution of which is indispensable 
 to any distinct conceptions of the moral constitution 
 and moral state of man. Man, as distinguished from 
 beings, each of which owes his existence to a distinct 
 independent act of creation, has a generative constitu- 
 tion, — a constitution by which each individual subse- 
 quent to those of the original creation, takes its origin 
 from parents, — an origin wholly rudimentary, and 
 under which each order, and within each order every 
 species is limited and defined by characteristics which 
 pennanently distinguish it from every other. This 
 appears to be the order of all propagated organic 
 being, be it vegetable, animal, or rational. Respect- 
 ing the substance of mind, we are entirely ignorant ; 
 but in human nature we have strong gi'ounds for 
 thinking that mind has a rudimentary origin, analo- 
 gous to that of body ; for be that substance what it 
 may, we are certain that greatness or high develop- 
 ment of mind, consists in reach of knowledge, power of 
 action and endurance, and self-control ; none of which 
 can be acquired without long and strenuous exercise 
 
96 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 and effort. Whatever be their substratum, intellectual 
 and moral being in man present themselves to our 
 view in a mere rudiment at first. Viewing then this 
 being in its rudiment, or as soon as it is capable of 
 moral action, gives it indication of any tendency to- 
 wards good or towards evil ? Does it manifest what 
 I may call a taste for moral law, and a spirit of inquiry 
 respecting it, with a jjrevalent will to act in conformity 
 to it ; or is it characterized by a tendency to act on 
 im2)ulse and propension regardless of such law ? Or, 
 if indiiferent to it, previously to its being brought be- 
 fore it, does it when such is the case, show a prompti- 
 tude in acting agi-eeably to its dictates ? Does it show 
 a regard for the author of its being by inquiry re- 
 specting his character, with a readiness to entertain 
 high notions respecting him, and desire and efibrt to 
 act agreeably to his will, so far as it is or can be known; 
 or does it manifest unconcern respecting him, con- 
 joined with a tendency to entertain inadequate and 
 debasing notions of his nature and character, and to 
 yield to other beings the homage and obedience due 
 to him alone ? Impartial observation and general 
 history bring out an answer to these inquiries conso- 
 nant to the declaration of an ancient and revered book ; 
 that men do " not like to retain God in their know- 
 ledge," and even according to what knowledge they 
 may have of him, are not careful to " glorify him as 
 God." But man is an imitative being, especially when 
 young ; and much of the evil tendency appearing in 
 the early stage of his life, may be accounted for from 
 the evil example, and defective or erroneous training 
 of his guardians and seniors. Doubtless, this is true ; 
 but wijl this alone account for the tendency in ques- 
 tion ? There is a ready test for any such theory. 
 
CONSTITUTION AND STATE OF MAN. 97 
 
 Where children are partly under good and partly un- 
 der evil influences, which are they most apt in general 
 to yield to? It is possible enough to adopt a standard 
 of moral action so low, as will greath' abate our esti- 
 mate of the aberration of human feeling and conduct 
 from the rule of right. But on the principle — surely 
 a just one — of supreme regard being had to him who 
 is supreme — him who is the Author of our being, and 
 the Benefactor from whose hand we receive all that 
 we enjoy, this estimate cannot be other than appalling. 
 Such a principle recognised will not permit us to hesi- 
 tate about the right answer to the question, whether 
 there is a greater aptitude in the young to yield to 
 good influences or to evil. We mean not by any 
 means that there is in all men a proneness to commit 
 every form of sin, so soon as occasion and op];ortunity 
 present themselves ; such a view of the moral state of 
 human nature would be utterly inconsistent with ob- 
 vious fact. But that there is a permanent derange- 
 ment in human nature, which, if we rightly apprehend 
 it, is this, — a predominance of the sensual over the 
 spiritual ; the latter, in constant risk of being smo- 
 thered as it were by the former, an evil, the primary 
 and most melancholy manifestation of which is ne- 
 glect and forgelfulness of God, with the concomitant 
 tendency to act on motives of sense and immediate cir- 
 cumstances, instead of on those of a remote and super- 
 sensual kind. This much obviously is predicable of 
 man universally. Tendencies to particular sins, whe- 
 ther personal or against society, may arise from special 
 influences, or be derived from immediate progenitors, 
 but this unquestionably pervades the whole race. 
 
 This specific derangement of our nature has mani- 
 fested itself strikingly and most mournfully, in the 
 
 H 
 
98 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 perpetual proneness of mankind to sensualize the ob- 
 jects of moral and spiritual regard. Thus we find 
 that the adoration of sensible objects soon became so 
 universal that one people could scarcely be preserved 
 from it by special divine provisions ; and we may see 
 in the image-worship of the Romish Church, and in 
 the character of the Mohammedan Paradise, striking 
 illustrations of the same universal tendency. 
 
 But what is the amount or force of this tendency ? 
 It cannot be such as to necessitate sin, for sin neces- 
 sitated would cease to be sin ; no being could be 
 charged with guilt in doing what he could not of ne- 
 cessity but do. This tendency, inasmuch as it inheres 
 in our nature, is physical, as contradistinguished from 
 moral, strictly so called ; yet it is controlable by the 
 will, stimulated by moral motives, for were it not so, 
 it would not be only a tendency, it would be a law ; 
 and so far as it is thus controlable, and so soon as it 
 becomes so, it comes to be of a moral nature. The 
 range of moral law is no wider than the possession of 
 a self-regulating or self-controling power : nothing is 
 morally good but what results from the exercise of 
 this power ; nothing immoral or evil but what results 
 froui its abuse or neglect ; consequently, not only are 
 beings who want this power incapable of guilt, but 
 also in beings who are capable of it, guilt is not pre- 
 dicable of any state of feeling which may subsist, or of 
 any action that may be performed, previously to its 
 development, or during seasons when it may be sus- 
 pended. No one regards insane persons as responsi- 
 ble ; nor can the sonmambulist be called to account 
 for his actions, nor he who talks in his sleep, for his 
 words, or the thoughts and feelings they express. As 
 little, we conceive, can infants be charged with sin for 
 
CONSTITUTION AND STATE OF MAN. 99 
 
 any dispositions or feelings they may liave, which may 
 be conceived at variance with moral law, so long as 
 they are incajmble of knowing it, and are without the 
 power of self-control, which is a sine qua non in all 
 who are the subjects of it. But while the tendency we 
 are speaking of, cannot be charged as guilt in the un- 
 conscious stages and states of our being, it is involved 
 in the principles just stated, that it immediately be- 
 comes so, when allowed to prevail, after we become 
 possessed of the know^ledge of the law to which it is 
 inimical, and acquire the power of self-control by 
 which it is to be regulated. 
 
 Of the substance, or substantial essence, of mind we 
 know nothing at all, but from the very nature of moral 
 agency we can clearly perceive that it cannot have any 
 inherent moral impurity independent of, and apart 
 from, thought, feeling, and volition ; for there are no 
 other conceivable modes of mental action. And if not 
 mental action only, but conscious voluntary action, is 
 involved in the very idea of moral agenc}', whatever 
 belongs to the mind anterior to, or independent of, 
 thought, feeling, and volition — is as clearly physical 
 as the bones and sinews of our bodily frame ; and for 
 any such state of mind, if there were any such that 
 might be so named, we should be as little accountable 
 as for the length of our limbs or the complexion of our 
 skin. In the present state of human nature, the mind 
 can act only in and by the body which it animates ; 
 and being so embodied and limited, is from the very 
 dawning of its faculties in a state of constant contact 
 and converse with the material world, and being fur- 
 nished with all the susceptibilities requisite for, and 
 proper to, an intimate connection with, dependence on, 
 and control over, the objects around it, it must ever be 
 
 H 2 
 
100 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 open to direct impressions from these. Tlie world of 
 sense is thus that which first presents itself to man, 
 and with which he is first capable of being acquainted; 
 and were he always incapable of knowing anything 
 else, or were his situation such as to shut him up to 
 impressions of sense, and the thoughts which they 
 occasion, he cei'tainly could not be blamed for not 
 thinking of anything besides, or for not acting on other 
 motives, when placed in a condition in which none 
 other could operate. Nor could he in such a case 
 contract any moral stain by invariably acting according 
 to such impressions and stimulants, for he would only 
 be acting in a manner consonant to his capabilities 
 and condition, seeing he had no scope for choosing, 
 whether he would yield to these, or act on motives of a 
 higher order. The essence of a state of moral pollu- 
 tion is a disposition to choose, and an indulging with 
 delight in, what is known to be wroug ; but it could 
 not be moral pollution unless these indulgences or 
 pleasures were witliin the range of choice, and per- 
 ceived to be under the regulation of moral law ; for 
 the mind and conscience cannot be defiled but by in- 
 dulging in, or choosing, what is believed or known to 
 be wrong. But this incapacity of moral perception 
 and choice is characteristic only of the first stage of 
 our being, to which alone, consequently, these remarks 
 are applicable : man, as soon as the powers of rational 
 and voluntary action are developed, is, as we hope to 
 be able to show in a subsequent section, furnished 
 with the means of acquiring spiritual knowledge, and 
 subsists under an economy teeming with events which 
 strongly prompt to moral reflection and action; and he 
 is guilty because he prefers yielding to the appetites 
 and the impressions of sense, to attending to, and act- 
 
CONSTITUTION AND STATE OF MAN. 101 
 
 ing on, moral and spiritual monitions : and the de- 
 rangement of his natm-e is manifested in this, that 
 while he is facile in yielding to external impressions 
 and the cravings of appetite, he shews an inaptness 
 and aversion to admit and retain spiritual impressions, 
 and withstands the influence of motives drawn Irom 
 super-sensual and eternal verities. 
 
 But this propension of which we are speaking can 
 have no practical operation, or can induce no action of 
 a moral nature previous to a knowledge of right, or o( 
 the distinction between right and wrong. There can 
 be nothing moral or innnoral where there is no power 
 of choice, and in order to the power of choice there 
 must be the perception of distinction, and in order to 
 the power of moral choice the perception of moral dis- 
 tinctions — of the distinction between right and wrong. 
 But the knowledge that a tiling is right, obligatory, or 
 such as we ought to do, involves in it a sense of power, 
 or the perception that it is something that we can do. 
 The sense of obligation and the perception of impossi- 
 bility are intuitively contradictory ; it is impossible 
 they can subsist together. But not only is there 
 always a general sense of right and wrong developed 
 previous to the guilty operativeness of any propension 
 to evil ; in every individual case there must be the 
 power of knowing the law which restrains and regu- 
 lates any propension, before there can be guilt in not 
 restraining or regulating it ; for a law utterly hid and 
 unknowable is for all practical purposes (and the only 
 purpose of moral law is practical) the same as none: 
 and where there is no conscious violation of law, and 
 vvhere ignorance is owing to the voluntary neglect of 
 no duty, there can be no guilt. So clear is it then 
 that man has power to regulate and restrain the ten- 
 
102 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 dency or proj)ension which is in his nature to evil, 
 that without this power any tendency in his nature 
 could not be a tendency to moral evil, and never could 
 induce that, seeing voluntary power is involved in the 
 very idea of anything being moral. 
 
 In addition to the evils of constitutional propension, 
 the mode and the relative position in which man's ra- 
 tional and moral powers are developed, involve in the 
 present state of human nature peculiar disadvantages 
 and difficulties. Human beings apart from the propen- 
 sions they may derive from, or through, their parents, 
 depend so much on them in early life for their notions 
 of right and wrong, — for the depth of their impressions 
 regarding moral evil, — for the habits they form, and as 
 to whether the power of self-government be cultivated, 
 or appetite and passion allowed to obtain sway, — each 
 individual and each generation is connected so with 
 that which preceded it, influenced in its character so 
 much, not only by derived tendency, but by example 
 and direct moulding influence, that when once human 
 nature is radically deranged, difficulties almost insur- 
 mountable present themselves in the way of its resto- 
 ration. 
 
 But when or how did the moral disposition of man 
 suflfer this derangement ? Here philosophy utterly 
 fails us, and we anxiously ask, Is there any document 
 existing which can throw light on questions so import- 
 ant; or have any traditions reached us of a more happy 
 constitution and condition having ever been enjoyed ? 
 From whatever source derived, traditions have been 
 current among all nations of a ' golden age ' of inno- 
 cence and felicity, as the pristine condition of man. 
 But we have yet a surer guide, in a book which is 
 proved beyond reasonable doubt, to be not only au- 
 
CONSTITUTION AND STATE OF MAN. Wli 
 
 ihentic, but divine ; we have the account of the origin 
 of the human race, of the state in which man was cre- 
 ated, of the moral trial to which he was subjected, of 
 how he transgressed the law under which he was placed, 
 and that the result was that melancholy condition of 
 human nature which we have been contemplating. 
 
SECTION II. 
 
 OF THE ORIGINAL CONDITION AND POWERS OF 
 MAN CONSIDERED AS A MORAL AGENT. 
 
 Having pursued as far as reason could conduct us, 
 our investigation respecting the derangement of the 
 powers of moral action in man, apparent in his present 
 character and condition, we are now to inquire what is 
 taught us in Scripture on this momentous question. 
 But in order to obtain the more distinct an issue, it 
 will be well in the first place to ascertain whether it 
 throws any light on our original moral constitution ; 
 for as every quality necessarily implies the possibility 
 of an opposite, if that constitution promised anything 
 pre-eminently happy as the result of acting in con- 
 formity to moral law, it will abate the difficulty of 
 accounting for the peculiar evils which have been in- 
 volved in its violation. 
 
 The sacred historian informs us that when God 
 created man he " created him in his own image," which 
 I take to mean, that in addition to the animal constitu- 
 tion which he received in common with all other sen- 
 
ORIGIXAL CONDITION AND POWERS OF MAN. 105 
 
 tient beings, he was endowed with the power of 
 comprehending truth, and made susceptible of mental 
 enjoyment; but especially in that he was constituted 
 with the power of acting from choice, regulated by an 
 intelligent sense of right and wrong. A being insus- 
 ceptible of all emotion and devoid of all propension, 
 we have found would be incapable of moral agency. 
 But man was intended for a moral agent, and conse- 
 quently received a soul susceptible of all the emotions 
 proper to his situation and his duties : moreover, this 
 soul being made the animating principle of a compli- 
 cated corporeal organization, and constituted to derive 
 nourishment and enjoyment from external objects, 
 appetites and passions became necessary to it, corres- 
 ponding to its wants and susceptibilities. This animal 
 nature being sustained in life and vigour by chemical 
 agencies and processes far too various and subtile for 
 immediate comprehension, man was relieved of all the 
 care of directing and guarding so complicated and de- 
 licate a mechanism, except attending to the intimations 
 of a [few determinate impulses. In order that these 
 impulses might not fail of their object, it was necessary 
 that their appropriate actions should be attended with 
 enjoyment : such appears to be the law of all organized 
 sentient being. But man's nature having a higher end 
 than mere animal existence and enjoyment, the grati- 
 fication of these appetites was not to be his sole nor 
 chief object, they were therefore placed under the con- 
 trol of reason and the moral sense ; the moral powers 
 of human nature were to be developed, and the moral 
 nerves, 'if I may so speak, strung, by keeping these in 
 subjection. That some such exercise was necessary 
 for these momentous purposes is evident from the very 
 nature of moral agency ; for where there is nothing to 
 
106 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 regulate nor resist, there is uo room for choice, and 
 consequently there can be no moral action. 
 
 All moral action implies law or rule ; all law a pro- 
 mulgating and sanctioning authority. Man as a moral 
 agent was placed immediateh^ under the authority of 
 God, but this authority could not be shown but by 
 some command ; without something enjoined or for- 
 bidden, there would have been no test of man's regard 
 for such a being or his authority either. Accordingly, 
 the sacred historian relates, that God having created 
 man, male and female, in his own image, and placed 
 them in Eden, a garden furnished with all things ne- 
 cessary to their subsistence and comfort, and promising 
 a constant supply of these, provided they bestowed on 
 it the necessary care and labour ; gave them permis- 
 sion to use whatever their tastes approved as food, 
 with the exception of the fruit of one tree, in regard 
 to which he delivered this law, " Of the tree of the 
 knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it ; 
 for in the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." 
 Such a lav? being made the test of regard to God, and 
 submission to his authority, has furnished a copious 
 source of gibes and derision to unbelievers — a circum- 
 stance which as much as any other connected with the 
 opposition of sceptics to revelation, shows that such 
 opposition is any thing but the result of a calm and 
 profound exercise of reason. For not only may such 
 a moral test be vindicated from the charge of every- 
 thing mean and ridiculous, but it may, we are confi- 
 dent, be shown to be eminently appropriate ; regard 
 being had to the constitution and circumstances of the 
 primitive pair. Various considerations lead us to think 
 that an object indifferent and even insignificant apart, 
 from any Divine command respecting it, formed the 
 
ORIGINAL CONDITION AND POWERS OF MAN. 107 
 
 most proper test of obedience for a being so consti- 
 tuted and circumstanced as Adam. The conduct in 
 regard to such an object, would be regulated by regard 
 to God alone ; — being an inanimate object, this conduct 
 would not be influenced by any of the sympathies 
 called forth by living natures ; had the inhibition re- 
 spected anything unbecoming or cruel towards other 
 sentient creatures, a rightly constituted mind, which 
 we are certain Adam's then was, would naturally have 
 revolted from any such act. Moreover such a test 
 was calculated to call into exercise the principle of 
 faith, as well as keep alive a constant sense of the sove- 
 reign though inscrutable wisdom and authority of 
 God. ' Why threaten death if I eat of the fruit of 
 this tree ? God is all-wise, myself " fearfully and 
 wonderfully made ;" and this wondrous world in which 
 I am placed clearly shows this. God has created me 
 and constantly sustains me, therefore he has a clear 
 right to give any injunction which it is in my power to 
 observe.' And this test was not merely a check on 
 what in Scripture language are appropriately called 
 " the desires of the flesh," but also on " the desires of 
 the mind ;" for the designation given to the inhibited 
 tree intimated some mysterious knowledge-giving 
 property connected with the use of its fruit ; and the 
 human mind would understand all mysteries. But 
 man was thus taught that there are cases in which he 
 must hold his curiosity in abeyance, and that he must 
 submit to obtain knowledge in such modes and mea- 
 sures, as God may see meet to allow and sanction. 
 But why assign any test beyond that moral code which 
 regulates the conduct of all men through all ages and 
 all times ? A little reflection will show that much of 
 this code was inapplicable to man in the situation he 
 
108 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 then occupied. Was it any of the commands of the 
 table which regulates his conduct towards his fellows, 
 which should have been made the moral test ? He 
 then had no fellows ; the only relation he sustained 
 was one in which the impulses of his nature anticipated 
 all law. Should it have been any part of the table, 
 which inhibits whatever is derogatory to the reverence 
 and worship due to God ? The details of this table, 
 Adam was removed far from any temptation to vio- 
 late ; but the law to which we are adverting, embodied 
 the spirit of the whole, and that apart too from every- 
 thing extraneous. It brought the soul directly into 
 contact with Divine authority ; and while no reason 
 was assigned for such a particular object being made 
 the test of man's regard for this authority, its reason- 
 ableness must have been apparent of whatever sort the 
 object might have been, when the law respecting it, 
 emanated from God, and was such as man had power 
 to obey. 
 
 As a moral agent, Adam did not stand apart by 
 himself, an isolated and independent actor; he was the 
 generative root, and to a certain extent the representa- 
 tive of all his descendants. But as the connection of 
 Adam with his posterity, and the measure in which 
 their character and condition depended on his conduct, 
 will come before us as special subjects of inquiry, 
 when we come to treat of the present state of man as 
 a moral agent, we shall for the present waive a parti- 
 cular examination of these points ; and this we may 
 do with the more propriety and advantage, as all tbe 
 passages in Scripture which bear on tliem do so in 
 relation to man as fallen. 
 
 Whatever disadvantages and difficulties in regard to 
 moral action have been occasioned to his posterity by 
 
ORIGINAL CONDITION AND POWERS 01' MAN. 109 
 
 the fall of Adam, corresponding advantages and facilities 
 would have been enjoyed by them had he stood. Tlie 
 greater the evil may be which has resulted from his 
 fall, the greater would have been the corresponding 
 good which would have followed his fidelity. If 
 Adam's sinning has entailed on all his posterity a pro- 
 pension towards evil, a like proj)ension towards good 
 would have been the result of his obedience. If man 
 now conies into existence with the seeds of death in 
 his constitution, that constitution would then (may we 
 not conclude ?) have embodied the principle of an 
 immortal life. And if he was fui'nished with all the 
 powers necessary to qualify him for yielding obedience, 
 and had strength sufficient to have resisted the tempta- 
 tions with which he was assailed, do not these adapta- 
 tions of the constitution of human nature, and of the 
 economy under which man was placed, not only vin- 
 dicate but gloriously illustrate the benignity and good- 
 ness of God in his original treatment of man ? 
 
 But the Divine goodness and benignity are farther 
 manifested, in the admirable adaptation of the constitu- 
 tiou of human nature to promote the kindly affections. 
 We cannot conceive that beings sustaining no other 
 relation to each other, but corporeal or mental resem- 
 blance, could ever feel such a mutual interest and 
 tender regard, as creatures, one portion of whom derive 
 their existence from the other. The various relations 
 ai'ising out of this element of humanity, contribute to 
 evolve and cultivate a highly interesting order of feel- 
 ing, which, so far as we can perceive, must have been 
 wanting under any other economy. Now the very 
 perfection of the intelligent universe seems to consist 
 in a union of love. Solitary intelligences cognizant 
 only of their Creator may be conceived of; but there 
 
I 10 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 seems no reason to conclude that they anywhere exist 
 The highest created being would be overwhelmed and 
 rendered powerless if he stood alone in the conscious 
 presence of the Eternal. Advancement, mental and 
 moral, is the result of the interaction of like minds. 
 Asolitary being, wanting the stimulus which relation to, 
 and contact with, such supply, would, so far as we can 
 perceive, be but ill adapted either for mental or moral 
 advancement. But the original constitution of human 
 nature was not only adapted to individual advance- 
 ment, but by mutual stimulation, and the interest 
 excited by intimate relationship, admirably adapted for 
 facilitating the advancement of the whole race. 
 
 And yet further may the constitution of human na- 
 ture be vindicated as being one pre-eminently favour- 
 able. If the disposition of mankind in regard to 
 moral volition and action was made greatly to depend 
 on the conduct of Adam, he was placed in circum- 
 stances more favourable for obedience than any of his 
 posterity could have been placed in. The relations 
 and consequently the duties of the first pair were few 
 and simple, compared with those of the members of 
 numerous families, and of complicated communities. 
 Adam had it thus in his power to have passed through 
 his incipient probation, in a sphere secluded from the 
 more subtle order of mental temptation. He had no 
 superiors whom he might be tempted to envy, or to 
 disobey; and there were none over whom his own 
 superiority might excite pride, consequently the risk 
 of erring in his case was comparatively limited. True 
 it is he wanted experience, but then he enjoyed im- 
 mediate divine teaching. The narration in Gen. iii. 
 8 — 12, shows that Adam and Eve were not strangers 
 to Divine manifestations. And though the communi- 
 
ORIGINAL CONDITION AND POWERS OF MAN. Ill 
 
 cations of men in their intercourse with each other 
 may often be frivolous, we may be assured that the 
 communications of God to his creatures will never be 
 of this character, — " his ways are not as ours." Then 
 by this constitution had Adam stood, all his descend- 
 ants would have been placed in perhaps the most 
 favourable position in which moral agents can be 
 placed consistently with the exercise of such agency, 
 as his fall reduced them to, perhaps, the worst. Start- 
 ing on his career of moral agency with a powerful 
 propension or disposition towards good, this propen- 
 sion would have been cherished by parents and guar- 
 dians, in whom it had acquired the force and stability 
 of habit. Each generation would have watched over 
 and trained the succeeding, which would have been 
 confirmed in goodness ere it passed from under its 
 predecessor's care. What is now productive, and per- 
 petuatory of evil, the connection and influence of 
 parents with their children, would, in that case, have 
 been productive only of good. But why, it may be 
 asked, so constitute man that such evils were possible ? 
 Why not make the origin of existence in each indivi- 
 dual independent of every other ? Angels were so 
 created, yet that did not jDrevent many of them from 
 sinning, nor from leading each other to sin. Why 
 then did God permit the existence of sin at all ; God 
 could have prevented sin had he pleased ? This ques- 
 tion just resolves itself into that other, why did God 
 create moral agents ? for the existence of such neces- 
 sarily implies the possibility of sin, else they could 
 not be free to act as they choose. Why did God cre- 
 ate any creature endowed with reason, capable of know- 
 ing him, and of yielding him a conscious obedience ? 
 why did he constitute any species of living agency 
 
112 MORAL AGENCr. 
 
 higher than instinctive ? If by Adam's obedience 
 all his posterity would have entei'ed on existence in 
 a state highly favourable to their continuance in moral 
 good, this was what he received powers competent to 
 ensure. If his sin has entailed on them a disposition 
 highly unfavourable to such good, this is not God's 
 fault, but Adam's. The assertion is daily reiterated, 
 that God could have prevented moral evil had he 
 pleased ; but those who affirm this, do not seem to 
 inquire whether he could have done so in consistency 
 with moral agency. Moral action can be influenced 
 only by presenting motives; whenever force is applied, 
 action ceases to be moral. Man was supplied with 
 knowledge commensurate to his responsibility. He 
 was told his duty ; he was warned of the consequences 
 should he sin. The strongest motives were presented 
 to induce him to obey : life and good should he obey ; 
 death and evil should he disobey. It is not less ne- 
 cessary to moral agency that occasions should be pre- 
 sented for the exercise of the power of choice, than 
 that the power itself should be possessed, — such an oc- 
 casion was the tree of knowledge, — indeed without this 
 the power would be entirely useless. Were only one 
 course of action possible, or were the possibility of any 
 other hid from the view of the agent, or were he pre- 
 vented from pursuing any other by an abiding im- 
 pression so powerful as to preclude all other impres- 
 sions, as occurs in some cases of insanity, — action in 
 any of these cases could not be moral. Man as a 
 moral agent had an occasion presented to him for ex- 
 ercising the power of choice, and he was allowed to 
 act " according to the freedom of his will," or accord- 
 ing to choice; but he was not " left" without divine 
 teaching, nor was he placed in a situation permitting 
 
ORIGINAL CONDITIuK AND POWERS OF MAN. 113 
 
 him to forget his dependence on God. The test of 
 obedience, we have ah'eady seen, was one adapted to 
 keep alive sentiments of faith and holy awe. Divine 
 operations conducive to his comfort were constantly 
 going on before his eyes : " The Lord God planted a 
 garden eastward in Eden, and there he put the man 
 whom he had formed. And out of the ground the 
 Lord God formed every beast of the field, and every 
 fowl of the air, and brought them to Adam, to see what 
 he would call them : and whatsoever Adam called 
 every living creature, that was the name thereof." He- 
 brew names are all expressive, and no mean powers of 
 mind must he have been endowed with, who could be 
 qualified to give such names to " every beast of the 
 field and every fowl of the air." " And the Lord God 
 caused a deep sleep to fall on Adam, and he slept : 
 and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh 
 instead thereof. And the rib which the Lord God had 
 taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her 
 unto the man. And Adam said. This is now bone of 
 my bones and flesh of my flesh : she shall be called 
 Woman ; because she was taken out of man." In 
 every question as to what God could do in regai'd to 
 living agents, is not only involved whether the Divine 
 power be competent to produce the efiect asserted to 
 be possible, but whether the thing can be done con- 
 sistently with the nature and constitution of the agent. 
 In the present case the proper question is not whether 
 God had power, or was able to have prevented man 
 from sinning, — it may not be doubted but God had 
 such power, — but, whether he could have done so con- 
 sistently with man's continuing a moral agent ? See- 
 ing man was fully informed of his duty, and the most 
 awful sanctions placed before him as motives to its 
 I 
 
114 MORAL AGENCY- 
 
 performance, and dissuasives from sin, whether more 
 could have been done for the prevention of moral evil 
 without at the same time preventing moral good — 
 making man an animated mechanism impelled by in- 
 stinct like the brutes, instead of being directed by 
 reason. 
 
 The constitution of human nature renders impos- 
 sible a strictly independent individual responsibility; 
 indeed absolute independence of action is not compa- 
 tible with the existence of any social economy what- 
 ever : wherever rational natures have intercourse toge- 
 ther, they will to some extent influence each other. 
 But strict independence is not necessary to our idea 
 of personal moral agency, only that the agent have 
 power to act according to the suggestion or influence 
 of his fellows, or against it, as he judges right. Such 
 influence may just be a form of trial, — trial of some 
 sort being, as we have seen already, necessary to the 
 exercise of moral agency. By the constitution of hu- 
 man nature, the measure of relative responsibility is 
 much gi'eater than in beings who owe their existence 
 to independent acts of creation. Adam was respon- 
 sible for his posterity to the extent to which his con- 
 duct was to detennine the moral tendency of their 
 minds, and to that also to which his good or evil ex- 
 ample might be the initiative of a series of correspond- 
 ing example, going down through the entire period of 
 the existence of the race. 
 
 Quite in harmony with the moral powers and con- 
 stitution of man was that of his organic nature, and of 
 the external world. His body was sound and health- 
 ful, without any predisposition to disease and decay ; 
 yet it was possible enough for him to have injured it, 
 — there were trees, for example, in Eden, against 
 
ORIGINAL CONDITION AND POWERS OF MAN. 115 
 
 which, by carelessness or rashness, he might have run 
 himself and produced fracture or contusion. The 
 ground was stocked with the proper plants ; its native 
 produce was not thorns or thistles, yet man was placed 
 " in Eden to dress it and to keep it," — even Eden, 
 then, by neglect, was liable to go into disorder. Like 
 the moral disposition of man, it was originally in a 
 right state, but required care and labour to prevent it 
 from going wrong. 
 
 1 2 
 
SECTION III. 
 
 INQUIRY RESPECTING THE USES OF SUFFERING. 
 
 We should now have proceeded to the inquhy re- 
 specting the Scriptural account of the present moral 
 state and position of man ; but a question presents 
 itself at the entrance, of which it seems highly desira- 
 ble to seek some solution, in order to clear our way 
 for such an inquiry, which will no doubt prove per- 
 plexed enough, though freed as far as possible from 
 all collateral difficulties. 
 
 Wherever we look around us in the world, there is 
 one thing which presents itself to us on every hand — 
 which meets us at all times, in every rank of life, and 
 in every situation — and that is, suffering. However 
 we may settle the question as to its causes, or its ends, 
 or though it should baffle all our efforts to account 
 for it, still it will not be the less true that the history 
 of our world, like the roll of the prophet, is filled with 
 " lamentation, and mourning, and woe." 
 
 Three uses of suffering may be conceived of, — the 
 physical, the moral, and the punitive, — its physical 
 use is to extend and heighten the susceptibility of en- 
 
THE USES OF SUFFERING. 117 
 
 joyment : as without labour we could not know what 
 rest is, so comfort and ease derive a j^eculiar delight- 
 fuhiess from the recollection of privation and pain ; 
 and the sense of difficulties sunnounted, and of oppo- 
 sition overcome, is the very essence of triumph. We 
 affirm not that there could be no enjoyment without 
 relation to suffering; but such enjoyment would be 
 wanting in the highest elements. Whether this be 
 the main purpose which it serves in the case of the 
 lower animals, or whether it has any connection with 
 a moral being, incipient, or afterwards to be developed, 
 are questions which we are not competent to solve. 
 The sufferings of the lower animals have been very 
 generally regarded as occasioned chiefly or solely by 
 the sin of man ; but such a conclusion seems discre- 
 dited by the recent disclosures of geological research. 
 These astonishing disclosures open up to us an en- 
 tirely new view of the constitution of the universe, and 
 in casting about for a solution of the (as it seems to 
 our notions) awful and anomalous fact of the univer- 
 sal prevalence of suffering and death, the idea presents 
 itself that trial and pain may be indispensable to the 
 development of mind, as we have every reason to be- 
 lieve they are in every system of moral agency. It 
 has been generally assumed, but unphilosophically, we 
 think, and certainly without any authority from Scrip- 
 ture, — that the original state of man must have been 
 one of unmingled enjoyment; and preachers and poets 
 have strained their imaginations, and exhausted nature 
 for images to picture its felicity. Now if the prin- 
 ciples we have been endeavouring to establish be cor- 
 rect, a being gliding on the stream of undisturbed 
 enjoyment — nothing desirable denied him , and nothing 
 to regulate or restrain, — could not be a moral being. 
 
1 18 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 As to the moral use of suffering, then, we conceive 
 that something of that nature is inseparable from a 
 state of moral probation. We have repeated!}'' had 
 occasion to observe, that trial is essential to moral 
 agency. But what is tiial ? Can there be any trial 
 but what involves something desirable which we have 
 to refrain from ? or something difBcult to perform, or 
 something painful to submit to ? There is nothing 
 morally great — nothing even deserving praise in a 
 moral view, but what involves difficulty ; nothing but 
 what interferes with the ease which would have been 
 enjoyed at the time in not doing it, if it is an exer- 
 tion, or the anticipated pleasure if it is an act of self- 
 denial. Where is the thing which deserves the name 
 of trial, in which the mind does not suffer ? Let it 
 be but a privation, if it is of what is ardently desired, 
 the suffering may be great ; and if it is not desired, 
 nor the want of it felt, it cannot be called a privation : 
 let it be what interferes with our ease or comfort in 
 any way, it must be repugnant to the mind, as inter- 
 fering with that happiness which the mind always 
 would enjoy. Indeed every moral trial involves a 
 choice, contrary to what we would make at the time, 
 were ease or happiness alone regarded. T may appeal 
 to the reader whether moral trial in the form of self- 
 denial, or privation of what the mind earnestly desires, 
 may not be as distressing as a high degree of bodily 
 pain. If it might not be so, how could it be possible 
 for incorporeal beings to suffer intensely ; for even re- 
 morse derives much of its bitterness, from the want of 
 an opportunity of retracing the fatal step which has 
 wakened up its horrors. These considerations may 
 serve not only to abate the painful and desponding 
 feeling, with which we are apt to contemplate the pre- 
 
THE USES OE SUEEERING. 119 
 
 valence of suffering among a race of beings in such a 
 moral state as ours, but also forbid our expecting to 
 find any class of moral agents in a state of probation, 
 entirely free from it. Under these considerations like- 
 wise we are led to inquire in what cases suffering is 
 really an evil. It cannot be so where it is contri- 
 buting to the developement of higher powers of action 
 and endurance, or generating a capacity for higher 
 enjoyment, than would have otherwise been possessed. 
 Instead of regarding sufferings, when productive of 
 such results, as evils, we are taught both by Christ and 
 his inspired messengers to regard them as pre-eminent 
 privileges and blessings : " Blessed are ye when men 
 shall hate you, and shall separate you from their com- 
 pany, and shall reproach you, and cast out your name 
 as evil, for the Son of Man's sake. Rejoice ye in that 
 day, and leap for joy ; for behold your reward is great 
 in heaven." "We glory in tribulation, knowing that 
 tribulation worketh patience, and patience experience, 
 and experience hope." " To you it is given on the 
 behalf of Christ, not only to believe on him, but also 
 to suffer for his sake." 
 
 On these principles we are not entitled to pronounce 
 that the most anomalous of all the modes of suffering 
 which come under our view — that of the lower animals 
 — is to them an evil, seeing we know not how far it 
 may contribute to enhance their enjoyment; and are 
 ignorant whether they may not have a future destina- 
 tion, in regard to which it may be subserving the most 
 important purposes. 
 
 The punitive is the most obvious of all the uses of 
 suffering; but though easily distinguishable from what 
 is strictly probatory, corrective, or stimulative, there 
 is no reason to conclude, that under the Divine ad- 
 
120 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 ministration, there is any infliction of punishment 
 simply for its own sake. Suffering the most strictly 
 punitive, is, we may believe, in every case, intended to 
 have a moral influence ; and this it may have, first 
 on those who are the subjects of the law of which it is 
 announced as the penalty, in preventing or deterring 
 them from violating that law ; and secondly, when in- 
 flicted on the violators of it, acting as a warning to all 
 who behold this. 
 
 Suffering strictly punitive is brought on or inflicted 
 as the punishment of violation of law ; but that the 
 sufferings of mankind in the present state are in a 
 great degree, at least, not punitive, is evident from ob- 
 vious facts : human beings suffer before they are con- 
 scious, and consequently before they are capable of 
 knowing right from wrong : they suffer likewise from 
 the faults of others, in which they had no share ; and 
 in the course of providence, when suffering arises from 
 causes not traceable to human agency at all, the inno- 
 cent are often as great or greater sufferers than the 
 guilty. Such seemingly anomalous treatment is ge- 
 nerally accounted for by reference to a future equita- 
 ble and compensatory retribution ; but any difficulty 
 which it at first sight presents may be solved as scrip- 
 turally, and quite as well, by regarding it as intended 
 to subserve moral elevation, and increase the capacity 
 of future enjoyment. To those who have embraced 
 the offer, and are using the instruments of moral reno- 
 vation, suffering, as we have already seen, is repre- 
 sented in scripture as a high boon and privilege. And 
 certain we are, that without severe trial or painful en- 
 durance, there never could have been anything morally 
 great. By obvious necessity moral greatness implies 
 great effort, or perilous trial, or great suffering; and 
 
THE USES OF SUFFERING. 121 
 
 with profound reverence we may be allowed to say, 
 that the moral greatness of the Divine character even, 
 could never have been displayed, had God never been 
 assailed by any opposition, had the conduct of his 
 rational creatures not brought him into circumstances, 
 peculiarly trying to the moral qualities of his nature. 
 
 Keeping all these considerations in view, we can 
 hardly conclude with a noble living author :* ' That, 
 generally speaking, the preservation and happiness of 
 sensitive creatures appears to be the great object of 
 creative exertion and conservative providence.' Ra- 
 ther is it, it should seem, that infinitely higher one, 
 the production and development of susceptible mind, 
 and especially of a rational and moral universe, re- 
 flecting its Author's own glorious image, and destined 
 to make unlimited advances — though never capable of 
 approaching — towards his boundless j)erfection, and 
 consequently towards his sublime felicity. The high- 
 est enjoyments of sense are of a low order essentially : 
 their zest is of brief duration, or if attempted to be 
 prolonged, invariably results in pain ; but the enjoy- 
 ment arising from successful struggles, from difficul- 
 ties surmounted, from opposition overcome, and from 
 suffering patiently endured, is essentially noble, con- 
 sonant to the nature of mind, never becomes effete by 
 repetition, and is circumscribed by no constitutional 
 limits as to its duration. 
 
 Death, as it is the termination of corporeal suffer- 
 ing, is also its consummation. Is it to be regarded as 
 an instrument of moral discipline, or solely as puni- 
 tive ? Death considered as the permanent dissolution 
 of human nature, with no hope of recovery or a resur- 
 
 * Lord Brou'rliiini. — Orisin of Evil. 
 
122 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 rection, — which was doubtless the import of the ori- 
 ginal threatening, — must be regarded as purely pu- 
 nitive. Being the irremediable dissolution of the 
 constituent elements which form the distinctive being, 
 man ; and sufficient of itself, where there was no spe- 
 cial provision made to prevent it, to terminate the 
 happy existence or enjoyment of the soul, death simply 
 or without relation to a resurrection and a remedial 
 economy, could not be regarded in the light of an in- 
 strument of moral discipline at all. How could it be 
 such to a creature of whose distinctive being it was to 
 be the inevitable end ? to whom without the revelation 
 of a provision of mercy it must have been the termi- 
 nation of all hopeful prospect. Speak of moral disci- 
 pline to a being who had no good to hope for, even in 
 the faintest degree, beyond this brief life ? It is only 
 when viewed in connection with a glorious resurrection, 
 and as the translation of the soul from a deteriorated 
 and perishing body, and a life exposed to innumerable 
 serious ills, into a state and sphere, where happiness 
 is secured to it by special Divine provisions, that 
 death can be contemplated as other than the most 
 dreadful of evils. When a future and endless life is 
 brought to light, whose state as to happiness or misery 
 is to accord with the deeds done in the present, then 
 indeed, it becomes a powerful instrument of moral dis- 
 cipline, inasmuch as it is an event to which we are 
 inevitably hastening, that will bring the soul into 
 immediate contact with God, and introduce it into a 
 state of endless felicity or woe. 
 
 But death has been represented as coming on man 
 not as a punitive divine infliction, but according to a 
 law of nature, by which all organized existence returns 
 after a time to its constituent elements. But as we 
 
THE USES 01' SUFFERING. 123 
 
 have already found, that it is owing to nothing in the 
 nature of matter that there is organized existence at 
 all, the return of organized forms to their constituent 
 elements must be regarded as the result of a Divine 
 arrangement, consequently as resulting from the Divine 
 will : therefore though all organized bodies which come 
 under our observation are subject to such a law, we 
 ai'e not then entitled to infer that all such must be so. 
 There can be no question but the power which can 
 sustain organized bodies in vigour forty or fifty years, 
 could do so for ever, or at any rate could transmute 
 them into a state adapted to immortal life without 
 subjecting them to death, as has already been the case 
 with two of mankind, and as we are assured will be 
 the case with all that are alive at the last day.* 
 
 Because dissolution is the law or order of existence, 
 where there is only a material organization, or where 
 an animal nature is predominant, is no proof that it 
 must be so where the animal nature is subordinate to 
 a ruling, intelligent, accountable mind ; rather may it 
 not be a question whether the subjection of humanity 
 to this law is not a consequence of the revolt of the 
 animal nature, or " flesh," from its subordination, 
 
 * Note G. 
 
SECTION IV. 
 
 RESPECTING THE SCRIPTURAL VIEW OP THE 
 PRESENT CONDITION OF MAN AS A MORAL 
 BEING. 
 
 The p'eat question which introduces the inquiry in- 
 dicated by the title of this chapter, is, What wei'e the 
 consequences of the original sin of Adam, or of what 
 is generally designated the Fall : for on the view 
 which we adopt as an answer to this question will de- 
 pend the complexion of our estimate of the whole 
 existing moral economy. 
 
 In endeavouring to find the proper answer to this 
 question, then, it seems important to distinguish be- 
 tween the judicial consequences of Adam's sin, or 
 those brought on by punitive infliction ; and those 
 which, for want of a better term we may call natural, 
 or such as inevitably took place by the constitution of 
 man as a rational and moral being. And first, as to 
 the latter. It seems involved in the very constitution 
 of rational mind, that sin, or acting contrary to Divine 
 command, must put an end to happy communion with 
 God. When we do what even an earthly superior 
 
SCRIPTURAL VIEW. 125 
 
 enjoins, or desires us to do, we expect that it will 
 attract his favourable regard. Cheerful obedience is 
 the ground of mutual complacency, and the recipro- 
 cation of esteem and love. But when we do what has 
 been forbidden by one who has authority over us, 
 especially if a penalty has been annexed to the law, 
 we are afraid to meet our superior, and under the in- 
 fluence of shame and suspicion and fear, we shun his 
 presence. Then, under the consciousness of guilt 
 expecting his frown, and anticipating the infliction of 
 punishment, while at the same time our self-partiality 
 hides very much our desert of it : actuated by these 
 feelings, we soon begin to hate him. Moreover, as 
 every conscious and susceptible being, instinctively 
 dreads sufiering, and endeavours to avoid it ; without 
 some valid assurance of forgiveness, there would never 
 be any approaches on the part of the culprit towards 
 him whose law he had violated, and whom owing to this 
 he could contemplate only as an avenger ; conceiving 
 himself pursued to be punished, if he could elude his 
 pursuer he would not think of suing for a reconcilia- 
 tion. So it is with man in regard to his Maker ; for 
 we find that the scriptural account of the result of the 
 sin of our first parents, is, that shame and fear caused 
 them to endeavour to hide themselves from the pre- 
 sence of God : " And the Lord God called unto Adam, 
 and said unto him. Where art thou ? And he said, I 
 heard thy voice in the garden, and I was afraid, be- 
 cause I was naked, and hid myself." 
 
 Unless measures were taken on the part of God, to 
 remove this displacency towards him on the part of 
 the transgressor, it could not but continue and increase. 
 Until his mind can entertain the hope of pardon, "ini- 
 quity " must still " separate " the sinner from his sove- 
 
126 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 reign. That separation from God, then, in which spi- 
 ritual death is commonly regarded as consisting, took 
 place immediately on the sin of man, hy the very con- 
 stitution of his mind, and needed no punitive infliction 
 to bring it on. We have already reviewed the reasons 
 which are found in the history of human thought and 
 action for concluding that this displacency is inherited 
 by all the race ; and that such is the case, the testi- 
 mony of scripture is full and explicit : " Except a 
 man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. 
 , . . . That which is born of the flesh is flesh." " They 
 that are in the flesh cannot please God." That in 
 the nature of the case there cannot be any approach 
 first on the part of man towards God, is clearly stated 
 to us by our Lord : " No man can come unto me ex- 
 cept the Father who sent me draw him." So his apostle 
 in applying the language of the Psalmist, declares, 
 " There is none that seeketh after God." And Christ 
 in addressing an auditory of his countrymen, traces 
 this estrangement to a repugnancy of mind, or want of 
 will : " Ye will not come unto me that ye might have 
 life." In regard, moreover, to moral action generally, 
 the scripture declares of men, that, " There is none 
 righteous, no not one. They are all gone out of the 
 way, they are together become unprofitable ; there is 
 none that doth good, no not one." Such general de- 
 clarations respecting the character of man, have been 
 very commonly regarded as apj)licable to him during 
 the entire term of his animal existence, or natural life. 
 In doing so, however, we think the important distinc- 
 tion between man when capable of moral action, in 
 other words, when he can distinguish between good 
 and evil, and man before he is capable of doing so, lias 
 been overlooked. The Bible is addressed to men as 
 
SCRIPTURAL VIEW. 127 
 
 rational and moral agents ; it is therefore uniformly 
 practical in its bearings. Indeed it is involved in the 
 very idea of such a collection of principles of belief, 
 precepts, exhortations, examples, warnings, that those 
 to whom it is addressed be capable of understanding 
 it, and of acting as it prescribes. Being thus entirely 
 a practical book, and regardhig and bearing on man 
 as a moral agent, it seems right that we should under- 
 stand its general declaration, respecting the moral state 
 and character of man, as applying to him in those 
 stages of life, and states of mind, in which he is capable 
 of moral action ; and it does not seem accordant with 
 just views of the intention of revelation to regard these 
 declarations, as on account of their universality neces- 
 sarily including infants, when in the nature of things 
 the Bible cannot possibly be addressed to them. The 
 universality of the declarations can certainly never 
 necessitate the inclusion of more than all who are ca- 
 pable of the sentiments and actions the}' attribute. In 
 regard to every one of the "all "who are declared to 
 have " become unprofitable," it is implied in the de- 
 claration, that they had it in their power to be profit- 
 able ; the declaration," there is none that understand- 
 eth," implies that those to whom it is applicable are 
 capable of acquiring the knowledge they are affirmed 
 to want, which infants evidently are not. Still less 
 are they capable of some of the evils affirmed of men 
 universally in an unregenerate state; they certainly 
 do not " deceive with their tongues" who cannot speak, 
 nor can " their feet be swift to shed blood" who cannot 
 walk. But that such declarations cannot be applicable 
 to infants, is not established by inference alone, how- 
 ever certain, but is abundantly manifest from other 
 passages of scripture that expressly refer to them. 
 
128 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 The inspired writers define sin to be the transgression 
 of law, and distinctly tell us that " where there is no 
 law there is no transgression." Now, moral law can 
 be no law to those who are incapable of knowing it ; 
 to such it can have no relation ; in order to be obeyed, 
 law must first be known. But infants are declared in- 
 capable of knowing either good or evil ; and being so, 
 they certainly cannot be capable of knowing the law 
 which distinguishes them : " Your little ones which 
 had no knowledge between good and evil." Dent. i. 39. 
 " Before the child shall know to refuse the evil and 
 choose the good." Isa. vii. 15. And infants, supposing 
 it possible for them to be guilty of sin, could never be 
 convicted of guilt, seeing they are incapable of know- 
 ing law, " for by the law is the knowledge of sin." 
 Moreover, " whatsoever the law saith, it saith to them 
 who are under the law, that every mouth may be stop- 
 ped, and all the world become guilty before God." 
 But infants are not^ under it ; it can be no rule of 
 action to them, for it has no relation to their state ; it 
 implies power in those to whom it is addressed, which 
 they possess not and cannot possess ; consequently 
 they are not included in " all the world '" thus shewn 
 to be " guilty."* Furthermore our Lord while on 
 earth, once and again, treated infants and little chil- 
 dren, and spoke of them in a way inconsistent with 
 the supposition of guilt, or strict moral pravity : 
 " Jesus called a little child unto him, and set him in 
 the midst of them, and said. Verily, I say unto j'ou, 
 except ye be converted, and become as little children, 
 
 * Infants are designed innocents in scripture. Compare Jer. ii. 
 34, and xv. 4, with Psalm cvi. 37, 38, Ley. xviii. 21, and 2 Chron. 
 xxviii. 3. 
 
SCRIPTURAL VIEW. 129 
 
 ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven." " Take 
 heed that ye despise not one of these little ones ; for I 
 say unto you that in heaven their angels do always 
 hehold the face of my Father which is in heaven." 
 " And they brought unto him also infants that he 
 should touch them : but when his disciples saw it, 
 they rebuked them. But Jesus called them unto him, 
 and said, Suffer little children to come unto me, and 
 forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom of heaven." 
 Moreover, our Lord in answer to a question put to 
 him by the pharisees — " Are we blind," said, " If ye 
 were blind, ye should not have sin ;" now in this 
 sense infants are blind, wanting spiritual perception ; 
 on this principle therefore they cannot have sin. 
 
 The reader who adheres to the current (Calvinistic) 
 theology, if he has had patience to proceed so far, may 
 not unlikely be tempted to dash aside the book by this 
 time, and denounce the writer as a pestilent heretic, 
 teaching worse than Pelagian error — denying original 
 sin, and even the natural depravity of man ; such we 
 would request to suspend his judgment till our case be 
 fully heard. Such a reader will no doubt himself 
 admit, that there are at least many kinds of evil or sin 
 which do not manifest themselves in the heart and life 
 of man from the first, many which in fact he is inca- 
 pable of committing ; yet he regards this as no proof 
 that man's nature is not depraved, and whv should he 
 insist that tve must regard man as naturally pure and 
 upright, because we do not admit that moral pravity 
 can be strictly attributable to him previously to his 
 being a moral agent. In relation to man in the early 
 stages of his being in this world, as well as in regard 
 to the present mortal organization of the saints as pre- 
 ceding an immortal and etherial body, it is true, that, 
 
 £ 
 
130 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 " that is not first which is spiritual, but that which is 
 natural," or animal ; and while man manifests only 
 the characteristics of animal life, while all that distin- 
 guishes rational being is dormant, or undeveloped, — 
 while self-consciousness, or a sense of individual inde- 
 pendent agency is wanting, it is certainly little less 
 than absurd to attribute to him qualities, or features of 
 character, which involve the existence of rational and 
 moral powers. We have already come to the conclu- 
 sion that a tendency to evil is shewn in the constitu- 
 tion of man. But many of the physical powers and 
 susceptibilities which are proper to his nature or the 
 constitution of his being, are not developed at first ; 
 rather, we should say, none are in other than a rudi- 
 mentary state ; they are not perfected till manhood ; 
 and some of his most important and interesting sus- 
 ceptibilities are not awakened till he touches its verge. 
 Man then is not to be regarded as free from all ori- 
 ginal tendency to evil because it cannot manifest itself 
 from the commencement of his being ; it seems to us 
 quite sufficient to prove that he has such a tendency, 
 if it manifests itself in connection with his various 
 powers and susceptibilities so soon as time or circum- 
 stances call them forth. If, as we have already ob- 
 served in a previous chapter, so soon as man was ca- 
 pable of acquiring a knowledge of God, he showed a 
 readiness to receive such knowledge, and a disposition 
 to seek it ; if so soon as he could comprehend in any 
 measure his character and claims, an habitual holy 
 awe and revei'ence possessed his mind in regard to 
 him, and if ready submission and cheerful obedience 
 were the characteristic tenor of his life, should we not 
 certainly say that he had a natural disposition towards 
 a^od ? Now if the sad reverse of all this is in fact 
 
SCRIPTURAL VIEW. 131 
 
 the case, does it not compel us to conclude that he 
 has a natural disposition towards evil ? 
 
 The testiujony of scripture then conducts us to the 
 same conclusions which we formerly arrived at, hy an 
 examination of the history and constitution of human 
 nature. We affinn not — neither, we conceive, warrant 
 us to affirm — that infants are holy ; but that neither 
 holiness nor sin are strictly predicable of them, that 
 whatever tendency is in them to evil must be physical 
 so long as they are unconscious of a distinction between 
 good and evil, and that moral qualities are strictly 
 predicable of them, only when they become capable of 
 knowing law, and consequently of obedience or dis- 
 obedience. So much at present for the effects result- 
 ing from the original sin of Adam, by the constitution 
 of man : we are now to inquire what were its judicial 
 consequences. 
 
 The apostle Paul informs us, that " By one offence 
 sentence came upon all men to condemnation." Now 
 the question is, condemnation to what ? or, what was 
 the extent of the condemnation which Adam accord- 
 ing to the original threatening came under by sin- 
 ning ? and do all his posterity come into the world 
 under the same condemnation ? 
 
 " In the day thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely 
 die," was the original threatening ; and we conceive 
 that it announced at once the judicial penalty of dis- 
 obedience, and the efiects which would certainly result 
 from it according to the constitution of human nature. 
 According to the idiom of the Hebrew language, the 
 threatening runs, " dying thou shalt die," which leaves 
 it doubtful whether, though the sentence had been 
 allowed to take its full effect, it would have involved 
 the immediate dissolution of human nature or not : at 
 K 2 
 
132 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 any rate it did not involve annihilation ; for among all 
 the variety of meanings which death^bears in scriptm-e, 
 it never imports that. We have already seen that the 
 breaking up of fellowship in spirit with God, and the 
 cessation of improving and happy intercourse with 
 him, in other words, spiritual death, was the imme- 
 diate certain consequence of disobedience; and that 
 without special measures on the part of God for effect- 
 ing a reconciliation, this separation must continue and 
 increase. These two elements then, the separation of 
 the soul from the body, threatened as a punitive inflic- 
 tion, and the separation between the soul and God, 
 were sufficient, if the soul was to be immortal, to make 
 its immortal existence one of misery, — their conti- 
 nuance, which nothing but a special intervention of 
 Divine mercy and power could prevent, would consti- 
 tute in its strictest sense eternal death, whether the 
 justice of God should require any positive subjection 
 of the soul to punitive suffering or not, which we con- 
 ceive the threatening itself neither warrants us to 
 affirm nor deny. At all events we may conclude that 
 God's hatred of sin would continue to be manifested 
 by precluding access to any sources of enjoyment. 
 Can we form any conception of the state of a spirit 
 thus denuded ; retaining its consciousness and proper 
 susceptibilities, yet divested of its vehicle of inter- 
 course with the world of sense ; cut ofl' from all 
 happy communion with the Father of spirits ; con- 
 scious of his presence only to be conscious of his 
 awful frown. Who shall conceive of the utter dark- 
 ness of the dwelling place of such a spirit, — a dark- 
 ness with not a ray of hope, even, to relieve it. And 
 this, be it remembered, is the mildest view of the 
 punishment of primal disobedience which scripture 
 
SCRIPTURAL VIEW. 133 
 
 permits us to entertain ; for from its general tenor, 
 the probability of a positive infliction of punishment 
 might be maintained with much force of argument ; 
 and as our first parents had yielded themselves servants 
 to Satan, that they should share in his doom, such 
 being explicitly declared to be the fate of all who 
 serve him now. 
 
 Do all mankind, then, come into the world con- 
 demned to such a destiny ; and with such a perversion 
 of their moral powers, that they are unable to act in 
 any other way than so as fearfully to enhance their 
 doom ? Are the whole race, then, the heirs of perdi- 
 tion, by a sentence pronounced, and a nature deter- 
 mined, long ere they were born ; with the exception of 
 a select number whom God of his mere sovereign 
 pleasure hath chosen and given to Christ, to be re- 
 deemed from sin and wrath ? 
 
 Against a view of the condition of our race, so 
 gloomy and appalling, we might argue, that the pre- 
 sent constitution of the world is not congruous with 
 the supposition of such a moral position of its princi- 
 pal inhabitant. We might reason that a system of 
 nature affording to all indiscriminately, so many 
 grounds and encouragements for hope, and a life em- 
 bodying so many marked elements of a probationary 
 state, seem anything but accordant with what we 
 should suppose would be the condition of the fore- 
 doomed victims of eternal wrath. Were such the view 
 we must take of the state of the vast majority of man- 
 kind, we might be tempted to ask whether all the 
 favourable elements of the present life were other than 
 the most bitter and cruel tantalizing ? we might ad- 
 duce against it its repugnance to the indestructible 
 sense of justice, and consequently to all proper notions 
 
134 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 of the Divine character. Its improbability might be 
 further argued from what we might imagine to be a 
 system of external nature, congruous with such a con- 
 dition. — we might conjure up before the imagination 
 of the reader, — and challenge his reason whether the 
 picture were not in hannony with such a scheme, — a 
 race lashed on to perdition by perpetual storms, over 
 a blighted and burning soil, beneath a sky scowling 
 with leaden gloom, relieved only by lurid lightnings, 
 and opening never to disclose the radiance of sun or 
 star ; every movement painful, every sensation a pang, 
 and the only intercourse an interchange of spleen, ma- 
 levolence, or execration, — with far a-head in view, the 
 ascending smoke of the bottomless pit, and the wail- 
 ings of the damned blending with the sullen roar of 
 the lake of fire ! Such considerations as these and 
 others might be adduced as bearing against the notion, 
 that a condemnation to eternal perdition rests on all 
 men on account of the sin of Adam ; but on a ques- 
 tion so momentous it is proper to come at once to the 
 standard of truth, " What saith the Scripture?" It 
 indeed informs us that " by one offence sentence came 
 upon all men to condemnation ;" but does it say that 
 this condemnation rests on them ? No ; but that 
 " by one righteousness, sentence has come on all men 
 to justification of life." The same infallible authority 
 informs us, that " God sent not his Son into the world 
 to condemn the world," which obviously implies that 
 whatever condemnation the world was under, there 
 was yet another and further condemnation deserved, 
 else there would have been no room for speaking of it 
 as an end for which Christ might have been sent " to 
 condemn it." " God sent not his Son to condemn 
 the world, but that the world through him might be 
 
SCUIPTURAL VIEW. 135 
 
 saved" — implying that the world was in a salvable 
 state, — a fact inconsistent with the notion of the ma- 
 jority of its inhabitants lying under eternal wrath. 
 What was it then which moved God to send his Son 
 into tlie world ? it was his unspeakable love : to whom ? 
 — to the elect ? Not so, testifies the Son himself; he 
 declares it to have been love to the world : " God so 
 loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son, 
 that whosoever believeth on him should not perish, 
 but have everlasting life." Thus it was not love 
 merely to a select and chosen number that prompted 
 God to devise and execute the scheme of redemption ; 
 but a love of such unlimited comprehensiveness, as by 
 the substitutionary sacrifice of Christ, to afford ground 
 of justification, and consequently of salvation to all, 
 whosoever they might be, who should believe on him ; 
 a ground so ample as to justify the invitation, " who- 
 soever will, let him take of the water of life freely," 
 and fully to vindicate the Divine sincerity in the de- 
 claration that " God is not willing that any should 
 perish, but that all should come to repentance." If 
 it be really true that God is not willing that any should 
 perish, and that " he will have all men to be saved," 
 how could he have from eternity condemned the bulk 
 of mankind to perdition, not for anything they have 
 personally done (anterior even to personal trial) solely 
 for his own glory. Were there anything in scripture 
 necessitating a belief like this, how could we suppress 
 the most painful suspicions respecting the sincerity of 
 God in the unrestricted and universal offer of salva- 
 tion. The declaration of St. Paul in writing to the 
 Ephesians, that they had been by nature the children 
 of wrath, even as others, is frequently adduced as 
 proof that mankind are born under condemnation ; 
 
13G MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 but if the observations above be correct, a thing's 
 being natural to man, or belonging to his nature, is 
 no proof that it is predicable of liim from his birth. 
 It is natural for the wheat-plant, or it is in its na- 
 ture, to produce ripe grain ; but he certainly were a 
 strange reasoner who, from this should infer, that this 
 ripe grain must be in the green leaves which it puts 
 forth in spring. But apart from these considerations, 
 — and though such a sense were not incompatible 
 with numerous other declarations of scripture, to 
 several of which we have just referred, — the ob- 
 vious sense of the context alone from which the 
 declaration springs, — " were by nature the children of 
 wrath," — would hardly permit us to infer that they were 
 born such, but evidently bears that they were so, inas- 
 much as they had been grievous personal sinners : 
 " You," saith the apostle, " were dead in trespasses 
 and sins ; wherein in time past ye walked according 
 to the course of this world, according to the prince of 
 the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in 
 the children of disobedience ; among whom also we all 
 had our conversation in times past, in the lusts of our 
 flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the 
 mind ;" how could persons thus devoted in heart and 
 soul to iniquity but be characterized as children of 
 wrath, even by their very nature, seeing " the wrath 
 of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness 
 and unrighteousness of men ? " 
 
 The other passage so often adduced as proof of the 
 opinion we are controverting, viz., Rom. v. 12 — 19, 
 embodies the fullest refutation of it, inasmuch as 
 whatever be the condemnation which is there declared 
 to have come on all by Adam, a justification or deli- 
 verance commensurate in extent, and in some respects 
 
SCRIPTURAL VIEW. 137 
 
 vastly greater, coiDes, we are explicitly informed, on 
 all by Christ. From all the consequences of the sin of 
 Adam which come on men involuntarily, — from all 
 share in his sin or the evils it has entailed, in all cases 
 in which we do not continue to make it our own by 
 personal and impenitent transgression, — this passage 
 teaches us that Christ brings, if not an immediate, an 
 ultimate deliverance. Whether the original threaten- 
 ing in its full extent involved any permanent con- 
 demnation of the whole race for Adam's sin or not, 
 the Scriptures are explicit, that it now involves no 
 such consequence. Invariably are we infonned that 
 the final award of retribution will be assigned to every 
 one " according to his works." " They that have done 
 good shall come forth to the resurrection of life, and 
 they that have done evil to the resurrection of damna- 
 tion." " The soul that sinneth, it shall die. The son 
 shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall 
 the father bear the iniquity of the son ; the righteous- 
 ness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wick- 
 edness of the wicked shall be upon him." The de- 
 claration of the Saviour respecting the final separation 
 of mankind is, that " these," referring to those he had 
 described as despisers of him and his people, " these 
 shall go away into everlasting punishment, but the 
 righteous into life eternal." 
 
 If then, a justification to life comes on all men by 
 the one righteousness of Christ, commensurate with 
 the condemnation, whatever it was, which came on all 
 by Adam, it becomes of less moment whether we as- 
 certain precisely what was the extent of that condem- 
 nation or not ; nevertheless it is desirable that we 
 should if possible do so, on many accounts ; for on 
 pur doing this will depend our competence to un- 
 
ySS MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 derstand aright some very important declarations of 
 scripture, and it will be foimd indispensable to just 
 notions of the value and bearings of the redemptive 
 economy. As none who arrives at the period of con- 
 scious rational agency is saved, unless by a voluntary 
 act of mind he embrace the salvation offered, or in an 
 important sense, make the righteousness of Christ his 
 own ; is it not reasonable to infer (inasmuch as the 
 reparation by Christ is to be commensurate with the 
 damage done by Adam) that even though there had 
 been no redemption prepared for mankind, none would 
 have been positively sentenced to everlasting misery 
 who did not make Adam's sin his own by voluntary 
 transgression. But a remedy having been provided, 
 this is not our present inquiry, but, what is the con- 
 demnation Avhich has actually come on all men by 
 Adam's sin ? In search for a distinct answer to this 
 question, let us turn first to the narrative in Genesis. 
 When the Lord God had traced the original trans- 
 gression to its source, he is represented as pronouncing 
 sentence severally on the serpent, the woman, and the 
 man. Passing over the serpent, and all the difficulties 
 connected with the part of the narrative which relates 
 to him, as not being our immediate concernment; we 
 find the sentence pronounced on our first parents to 
 run thus : " Unto the woman he said, I will greatly 
 multiply thy sorrow and thy conception ; in sorrow 
 thou shalt bring forth children ; and thy desire shall 
 be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee. And 
 mito Adam he said, Because thou hast hearkened to 
 the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree of 
 which I commanded thee, saying. Thou shalt not eat: 
 cursed is the ground for thy sake ; in sorrow shalt 
 thou eat of it all the days of thy life. Thorns also 
 
SCRIPTURAL VIEW. 139 
 
 and thistles shall it hring forth unto thee ; and thou 
 shalt eat the herb of the field ; in the sweat of thy 
 face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the 
 ground ; for out of it wast thou taken ; for dust thou 
 art, and unto dust shalt thou return." Here then 
 temporal death is the last and greatest of the evils 
 which man was adjudged to suffer as the inevitable 
 punishment of the original transgression. Did this, 
 and the other evils to which our first parents were 
 thus condemned, come on them alone ? The universal 
 history of their progeny embodies the unequivocal 
 answer to such a question. But do greater evils than 
 these come on Adam's posterity as a punishment for 
 his sin ? No greater evils are here declared inevitable 
 to Adam himself. And shall there be a commutation 
 of the punishment involved in the original threatening 
 permitted in the case of him the actual transgressor, 
 and yet that sentence allowed to take its most rigorous 
 effect on multitudes of his posterity who could not 
 possibly have any blame in the matter ? That his 
 descendants are not explicitly mentioned in this con- 
 demnatory sentence, can be no valid objection, for as 
 little are they mentioned in the original threatening ; 
 and they have certainly been subjected to the specified 
 evils not less than he was himself. We may here re- 
 mark that this treating of Adam, even after his fall, 
 as still as in a measure the representative of his pos- 
 terity ; and this condemning of them only by impli- 
 cation, in the sentence passed on him, seems to mili- 
 tate against the scheme of those, who, adhering to the 
 most rigid views of the federal and representative cha- 
 racter of Adam up to the moment of his fall, imme- 
 diately reduce him to as bare an individuality in re- 
 gard to moral influence as any of his descendants. In 
 
140 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 the sacred narrative, however, we find God still treat- 
 ing him as in some respect the representative as well 
 as the generative root of all his race ; but not however 
 so, as that any futm-e act of his was to involve any ju- 
 dicial consequences in regard to them. According to 
 the views of high Calvinists, Adam's posterity were in 
 the Divine eye considered one with him in his first 
 sin. Now if such were the case, how could they in 
 justice have been regarded in any other light in its 
 remission ? Can we conceive of God as removing the 
 condemnation from Adam the actual sinner, and 
 allowing his posterity to remain under it, none of 
 whom existed when it was committed ? And if Adam 
 was not delivered from the condemnation of his first 
 sin, was it possible for him to be saved ? And if God 
 left Adam in a condition in which it was impossible 
 for him to be saved, how can we vindicate the procla- 
 mation of mercy, or the sincerity of the declaration 
 that God is not willing that any should perish, but will 
 have all men to be saved ? It may be said that his deli- 
 verance from condemnation depended on his becoming 
 penitent, and that so does that of any of his posterity. 
 But can there possibly be any such identity or even 
 similarity of the feeling, as to warrant its being called 
 by the same name, in his mind who reflects on having 
 consciously and voluntarily committed an act of dis- 
 obedience; and in their's in reference to the same act; 
 who had no existence when it was committed, and 
 consequently who had it not in their power either to 
 concur or dissent. If we are to admit such indefinite- 
 ness, not to say perversion in the use of language, all 
 hope of any approach even to certainty in mental or 
 theological inquiries is at an end. 
 
 Further : if we regard the condemnation coming on 
 
SCRIPTDKAL VIEW. 141 
 
 all, by the first sin of man, as involving a greater evil 
 than temporal death ; the contrast drawn by the apostle 
 between Christ and Adam in 1 Cor. xv. 21, 22, as to 
 the influence each had in regard to all mankind, will 
 be involved in insuperable difficulty : " Since by man 
 came death, by man came also the resurrection of the 
 dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall 
 all be made alive." If we regard the death which all 
 die in Adam, as meaning simply the separation of the 
 soul from the body, and connected temporal evils, the 
 reparation effected by Christ is commensurate with 
 the extent of the injury, and the sense distinct and 
 unincumbered. But if we hold that the death which 
 comes on all by Adam, involves an evil greater than, 
 and beyond the separation of soul and body, will it not 
 follow that the making of all alive by Christ must in- 
 volve a good of a corresponding character, beyond their 
 reunion. In a word, how can we affirm that the death 
 coming by the one, involves eternal misery, and deny 
 that the life coming by the other, involves eternal 
 happiness ? But besides, is it not inconsistent with 
 the scope of the apostles' discourse to regard eternal 
 consequences of a spiritual nature as meant in either 
 case, seeing he is treating simply of the resurrection 
 of the dead ? These observations are equally applica- 
 ble to Rom. V. 18, for if we regard the condemnation 
 which came on all by the " one offence," as involving 
 eternal misery, we ore there taught that a justification 
 of commensurate extent, and consequently including 
 eternal happiness, has come on all by the " one righ- 
 teousness ;" an assumption not only incompatible with 
 numerous express declarations of scripture, but incon- 
 gruous to its entire strain and bearing from beginning 
 to end. 
 
142 AIORAL AGENCY. 
 
 After what has been said above, it may hardly be 
 needful to remark, that regarding the condemnation 
 which has come on all men by the sin of Adam as not 
 involving any greater evil than temporal death, is not 
 inconsistent with the fact of a moral depravation 
 coming on all by his sinning ; this taking place, not 
 in consequence of any punitive sentence, but by being 
 involved in the constitution of human nature. 
 
 If then temporal death is the greatest evil, which 
 will be ultimately repaired to men by Christ, inde- 
 pendent of any concurrence on their part, are we not 
 shut up to the conclusion that it was the greatest evil 
 included in the condemnation coming on all by Adam, 
 as that condemnation came on them independent of 
 any act or concurrence of their's ; otherwise how 
 should we account for the declaration of the apostle, 
 that the substitution of Christ has done much more 
 than repaired the evils to which men have been sub- 
 jected on account of Adam's sin: •' If through the 
 offence of one," says he, " the many be dead, much 
 more the grace of God, and the gift by grace, which 
 is by one man Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto the 
 many." Moreover, if the death which reigned by one, 
 was both spiritual and eternal as well as temporal, what 
 is there much more than the reparation of this in the 
 life by one Jesus Christ, in which they who receive 
 abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness, 
 shall reign with him ? The evils of the mind which 
 the sin of Adam has had an influence in producing, 
 are of another order. They are not produced without 
 any voluntary act or concuri'ence of our own, and so 
 neither without this are they removed. Whatever 
 disposition to such evils the mind has by nature, is of 
 course involuntary; but the disposition to an evil, and 
 
SCRIPTURAL VIETV. 143 
 
 the commission of an evil, are different things. A 
 state of feeling or disposition of mind is guilt, only 
 when it is hidulged after it is known, or might be 
 known to be wrong. Such appears to be the view given 
 of this matter by the apostle James : " Every man is 
 tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and 
 enticed ;" that is, when he indulges and yields to 
 im])roper desires, whether inherent or kindled by ex- 
 ternal excitements; " for," he continues, " when lust 
 hath conceived it bringeth forth sin, and sin when it is 
 finished bringeth forth death." Here is a distinction 
 made between lust and sin ; lust, or desire for objects 
 disallowed, arising in the mind, is not characterized as 
 sin ; bat when it is allowed, or indulged in the mind 
 so as to produce voluntary action, " lust " thus con- 
 ceiving " bringeth forth sin." Every moral act then, 
 or every moral stale of a responsible mind, is a volun- 
 tary act or a voluntary state ; or, in other words, is one 
 in relation to which the mind had a choice, had it in 
 its power to have made it different. All the moral 
 evils to which our nature has acquired a tendency by 
 the fall of Adam, are yet voluntary evils ; in regard to 
 every one such of which we have been guilty, it was 
 or might have been in our power to have avoided it. 
 It is an essential element of the sense of guilt, that we 
 should feel that it was in our power to have done 
 otherwise ; without the consciousness of this the charge 
 of blame-worthiness could never be brought home to 
 the conscience. 
 
 To this view of the matter, it may be objected, that 
 the apostle expressly asserts, that " By the disobe- 
 dience of one, the many were made sinners ;" which 
 must either mean that they all sinned in him, or ine- 
 vitably become smners in consequence of the nature 
 
144 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 they derive from him. In regard to this I would re- 
 quest the reader's serious attention to the following 
 observations of Moses Stuart : ' Those who are fami- 
 liar with the idiom of the original scriptures ' observes 
 this eminent biblical critic, ' must know, that causation 
 of every degree and kind was usually expressed by the 
 Hebrews in one and the same way. We are accus- 
 tomed when we wish for nice distinctions, to speak of 
 cedent or principal cause, and of secondary or in- 
 strumental or occasional cause, &c. But it is not so 
 generally in the Scriptures : " God moves David to 
 go and number Israel, and Satan moves David to go 
 and number Israel." The very same verb is ajiplied 
 to both agents in this case ; so " the Lord hardened 
 Pharaoh's heart, and Pharaoh hardened his own heart." 
 See Exod. vii. 13; ix. 12; x. 1, 20, 27; xi. 10; 
 xiv. 8. Rom. ix. 18. Deut. ii. 30. Isa. Ixiii. 17. 
 John xii. 40. So evil is ascribed to God, both moral 
 and natural : 2 Sam. xii. 1 1 ; xvi. 10. 1 Kings xxii. 
 22. Josh. xi. 20. Psalm cv. 25. 1 Kings xi. 23 ; 
 xxiv. 1. In like manner God is said to give men a 
 new heart, and they are commanded to " make to 
 themselves a new heart ;" the Spirit of God is said to 
 convince, and convert, and regenerate the sinner : and 
 the same thing is often ascribed, for the most part in 
 the like words, to the Gospel and to the power of 
 Divine truth. Now he who has not carefully noted 
 and weighed these obvious and highly important facts, 
 is in great danger of making out in some way a very 
 partial system of theology, and of contradicting, in his 
 exegesis of one part of the Bible, what the sacred 
 writers have affirmed in another. 
 
 To apply this to the case before us : were consti- 
 tuted sinners, means, that Adam was, in some sense 
 
SCRIPTURAL VIEW. 145 
 
 or other, the cause or occasion of his posterity becom- 
 ing sinners. Bat whether this was througli a degrada- 
 tion of their nature, physically propagated down from 
 father to son ; or whether it was (as Chrysostom, 
 CEcumeniiis, Pelagius, Erasmus, and others have 
 maintained, although with high improbability) only 
 by virtue of the exaaij^le which he set, or whether it 
 was in some other way, is not determined by the lan- 
 guage of the text. Such expressions as we have seen 
 above, do not determine of themselves either the de- 
 gree or the kind of causality. 
 
 * That men should be constituted, or made sinners 
 by the disobedience of Adam, (most naturally means, I 
 had almost said,) must necessarily mean, that in some 
 way his olfence so affected them that they become ac- 
 tual sinners in propria persona. Now, is anything 
 more common than this mode of expression : 'A man of 
 vicious character,' we say, ' corrupts his whole family. 
 A profligate of winning exterior corrupts the whole 
 neighbourhood of youth around him. One sceptic 
 makes many doubters in revelation. The example of 
 a bad man in many respects has a tendency to render 
 others vicious. Sinners entice others to join with 
 them. Voltaire made half of literary Europe scepti- 
 cal.' Now in these and a thousand other like expres- 
 sions, we do mean to assert an active influence, a real 
 causality in some proper sense, of the evil done or 
 spoken. Yet we never once think, for example, of 
 Voltaire's scepticism being imputed to half of literary 
 Europe ; nor do we once imagine, that any of tlie 
 classes above-named as being corrupted, are corrupted 
 without any voluntary agency of their own. The sin 
 of corrupt feelings and aflections is entirely their oivn : 
 
 L 
 
146 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 it matters not what the causes [influences] were that 
 operated on them, so long as they were after all left 
 to their own choice whether they would yield to the 
 excitement, or resist it.'* 
 
 If to these highly important and pertinent observa- 
 tions I might add a remark on this part of the subject, 
 it would be to the effect that the style of the inspired 
 writers is free and popular as contradistinguished^from 
 scientific. Their usual manner is at the farthest pos- 
 sible remove from the guarded statements and timorous 
 circumlocutions of those who are chiefly concerned to 
 save the rigidly defined points of a dogmatic or philo- 
 sophical system. The end of scriptural statements is 
 to stimulate to right action, to generate right emotions, 
 and not (or at most but in a very secondary measure) to 
 satisfy the cravings of metaphysical speculation. These 
 facts always kept in view, the style and manner of the 
 sacred writers, instead of seeming to need any apology, 
 will appear specially marked by wisdom and appro- 
 priateness. Moreover if the Scriptures as composi- 
 tions were to be governed by the laws and limitations 
 of human thought and language, and if they had not 
 been so, they could neither have been written by men 
 nor have been intelligible to them — they, like other 
 compositions, can only bring up one train of thought, 
 or one course of narration by itself at a time. The 
 human mind is not competent to pursue, nor human 
 language to convey, several trains of thought along- 
 side of each other. The relation of each of these to 
 others, and their mutual bearings must be ascertained 
 by collation, compaiison, and inference. Besides, in 
 every earnest hortatory discourse, the writer or speaker 
 
 * Commentary on Romans. Excursus vi. pp. 583 — 585. 
 
SCRIPTURAL VIEW. 147 
 
 Strives to give the utmost force to the subject of his 
 present appeal, without studying to adjust his expres- 
 sions to strict philosophical rules. A consideration 
 then of the laws and limitations of all human com- 
 positions, and of the characteristics of that order of 
 writing under which the Scriptures chiefly rank, will 
 show us the necessity of guarding against — what has 
 been too common — founding systems on the extreme 
 sense of single texts, ov classes of texts, without ad- 
 verting to the limitations which are imposed by other 
 texts, or by the obvious order of nature, and the 
 ascertained laws of matter and mind. Were we to 
 look in the Scriptures for a system of theology rigidly 
 defined and scientifically arranged, we should certainly 
 look in vain. The system of truth embodied in them 
 is to be evolved from narrative, and apologue, and hor- 
 tatory appeal ; and especially by the balancing of 
 apparently antagonist statements, so as to ascertain 
 their harmonising points and mutual limitations. Thus 
 may we see that the true theology of the Bible is any- 
 thing but open to precipitate or indolent minds. This 
 however is not the place for enlarging on the general 
 canons of scriptural interpretation. 
 
 From this lengthened examination of scripture pas- 
 sages, the general conclusion to which we come, re- 
 specting the public character of Adam, is this, — that 
 he was constituted the probationary representative of 
 his posterity to this extent, that had he stood, they 
 would all, on the ground of his obedience, have entered 
 on existence with a title to immortal life, without being 
 subjected to any such special test as he was, and con- 
 sequently would not have been in danger of forfeiting 
 that title, but by violation of the immutable require- 
 L 2 
 
148 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 ments of the moral law. Moreover as the root of a 
 genei'ative order of being, it would have followed from 
 his fidelity, that all his posterity would have commenced 
 their course as moral agents with a disposition prompt- 
 ing to good, and probably the law of God would have 
 been as universally obeyed as it is now violated. 
 Obedience would, however, in every case, have been a 
 voluntary act, or an act of choice, as disobedience is 
 now, and the violation of the law as possible in that 
 condition of human nature as its fulfilment is in the 
 present. But now, inasmuch as Adam has sinned, his 
 descendants are brought before us as so far identified 
 with him in the Divine eye, that they are condemned 
 to suffer many ills, and death ultimately on his account, 
 and in consequence of his fall, commence their term 
 of ])robationary agency, with a disposition tending to 
 a disregard and violation of the Divine law. 
 
 And these, on the other hand, are the conclusions 
 at which we arrive, regarding the influence of the work 
 of Christ as the sacrificial substitute of mankind. The 
 work of Christ has a double bearing on mankind, in 
 respect that they are subject to misfortune, and charge- 
 able witli guilt. In so far as all mankind suffer by 
 the sin of Adam, independently of any blame on their 
 part, they are purely the objects of pity. But had 
 they been sufferers only by personal and wilful crime, 
 we can scarcely conceive that they could have been 
 so ; for pity has always a relation to misfortune, — to 
 an evil or evils which come on a person without his 
 being to blame, or he being greatly not to blame for 
 them. The figure adopted by the prophet Ezekiel to 
 represent the original state of Jerusalem or the Israel- 
 itish nation, — an infant cast out in the helplessness and 
 impurities of its birth, — may be regarded as an apt 
 
SCRIPTURAL VIEW. 149 
 
 emblem of all mankind, as sufTerers in conseqnence of 
 the sin of Adam, and as objects, as such, of the Divine 
 compassion.* An exclusion of the whole race from 
 God was occasioned by the sin of Adam, inasmuch as 
 all became sinners in consequence of his sin, and being 
 sinners could not but be the objects of the Divine 
 aversion, and subjects of punishment so long as their 
 guilt was unatoned for. The exclusion of mankind 
 from God, thus occasioned by Adam's sin, has been 
 annulled by Christ ; so that for mankind as sinners 
 there is now an open and unobstructed way of access 
 to God. Christ has so far finished transgression and 
 made an end of sin, that none are now excluded from 
 acceptance with God and eternal life but such as wil- 
 fully and obstinately reject the offers and terms of 
 pardon and reconciliation. Anterior to any act or 
 thought on their part, access to God by Christ is open 
 and free to the whole human race ; and not only so, 
 but the strongest inducements and persuasives are 
 made use of to induce men to return to God, — per- 
 suasives and inducements addressed not to a select 
 and favoured class, but to all, — " Wisdom crieth with- 
 out, she uttereth her voice in the streets, she crieth in 
 the chief place of concourse," — and to whom ? " To 
 you, O men, I call, and my voice is to the sons of men.'' 
 The invitation of Divine mercy runs, " Ho ! every 
 one that thirsteth ! " so that " whosoever will may 
 take of the water of life freely." Then all the evils 
 which come on mankind by the sin of Adam, Christ 
 neutralizes, transmutes, or repairs. The ills of the 
 present life, included in the curse, are under the eco- 
 nomy of mercy converted into powerful instruments of 
 
 * Ezek. xvi. 3 — 6. 
 
150 MORAL AGEKCT. 
 
 moral discipline, and in regard of the redemption of 
 the body, Christ is the Saviour of all men, delivering 
 all " from the power of the grave." 
 
 But as the higher condemnation comes not on any 
 of the descendants of Adam, hut such as by voluntary 
 choice or action make his disobedience their own : so 
 neither does the higher justification — that which de- 
 livers from eternal wrath — come on any but such as 
 by the mental act of faith receive as theirs the righ- 
 teousness of Christ — he is the Saviour " specially of 
 them " only " that believe." And herein appears the 
 superabounding of the grace of Christ over the curse 
 or condemnation by Adam, inasmuch as he will not 
 only ultimately deliver from whatever condemnation 
 comes on all by him, but justifies from " many" per- 
 sonal " offences," all who receive the abundance of 
 grace and of the gift of righteousness, which he is 
 ready to communicate, and even pressing on the ac- 
 ceptance of all.* 
 
 * Note H. 
 
SECTION V. 
 
 PRESB^NT CONDITION OF MAN NOT INCOMPATI- 
 BLE WITH HIS BEING A MORAL AGENT. 
 
 It lias been a very prevalent impression that a greater 
 discrepancy exists between the original and the pre- 
 sent condition of man, than will be fomid on a just 
 estimate of both to be actually the case, and that, as 
 much by regarding his primeval condition as freer 
 from difficulty and danger than it could have been, as 
 by viewing his present state as more than it actually 
 is, one of disastrousness and ilnbecility. It seems to 
 have been very generally tacitly assumed, that as the 
 universe was created and is sustained by a Being essen- 
 tially good and benevolent, these attributes could not 
 permit the occurrence of suffering or of wrong-doing 
 without the risk of discrediting their fulness or inte- 
 grity. Accordingly the question, ' Whence, or how 
 comes evil ? ' has from immemorial time been regarded 
 as the grand enigma of the universe. That the oc- 
 currence of suffering under the government of a bene- 
 volent being is by no means so mysterious an anomaly 
 as at first sight it appears, is what we have already 
 
152 MORAL AGKNCY. 
 
 found, and reflection as to what is indispensable to 
 moral agency will convince us, that neither is the oc- 
 currence of moral evil under a moral Governor such 
 an inexplicable enigma as it is usually deemed. 
 
 The definition we proposed of moral action was, that 
 it is action which results from choice, and is regulated 
 by law given and sanctioned by a superior nature. 
 The law which regulates such action then, in distin- 
 guishing or discriminating between good and evil, 
 must bring both before the mind ; it makes evil as 
 well as good the subject of thought, so that the won- 
 der often expressed how the thought of evil could ever 
 enter a pure mind, is seen to be entirely groundless. 
 Law brings before the mind evil or wrong as possible, 
 and consequently prompts to the contemplating of it 
 as so. This in the nature of things must be the case, 
 if the mind think of that which is the subject of law 
 at all : in doing this it must view what the law forbids 
 as a possible course, or as something which might be 
 done. But this is not sin unless it view such action 
 or course of action with complacency ; it becomes sin 
 only when the mind allowedly desires or chooses to 
 do it : — 
 
 ' Evil into the mind of God or man 
 
 May come and go, so unapproved, and leave 
 
 No spot or blame behind.' 
 
 This eflfect of law prompting the mind to think of 
 what it forbids, is distinctly recognised by the apostle 
 Paul : " I had not known lust, except the law had 
 said thou shalt not covet : but sin, taking occasion by 
 the commandment, wrought in me all manner of con- 
 cupiscence." 
 
 But though the law may thus bring a pure mind to 
 contemplate evil as possible, how can such a mind 
 
PRESENT CONDITION OF MAN. 153 
 
 ever come to look on it with complacency P Attention 
 to another element of moral agency will at least abate 
 this difficulty. If moral action be such only as re- 
 sults from choice, it must be possible for evil as well 
 as good to be chosen, else there could be no choice or 
 preference in doing the one rather than the other. But 
 a thing which may be chosen must be capable of being 
 viewed or rejiresented in such an aspect as to appear 
 desirable. That which could not be viewed as in any 
 respect desirable, it will at once be seen, could never 
 be chosen. It is certainly no small recommendation 
 of this philosophy of the matter, that it accords exactly 
 with the inspired account of the Avay in which the first 
 sin of man was committed : " When the woman saw 
 that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant 
 to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, 
 she took of the fruit thereof and did eat." If evil 
 were in every possible aspect in which it could be 
 contemplated abhorrent to the mind, or such as could 
 never be chosen, there could be no such thing as a 
 state of probation or moral trial ; and a being to whom 
 good and evil were not choosable, wherein would it 
 differ from a being acting from instinct or by con- 
 straint ? Once admit then — and the denial of this 
 would be a virtual denial of the possibility of moral 
 agency — once admit that evil, or that which law inhi- 
 bits, is capable of being viewed as desirable, and attend 
 to the fact that its inhibition simply in itself has a ten- 
 dency to incite the mind to desire it ; and there will 
 not appear any incomprehensible mystery in its coming 
 to be actually desired and even chosen. The possibi- 
 lity of perceiving how moral evil originates, should do 
 anything rather than abate our impression of its bane- 
 ful character. That a thing may be contemplated as 
 
154 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 in some respect desirable, does not at all abate the 
 guilt of desiring and choosing it when this is distinctly 
 known to be wrong, — known to be forbidden and ab- 
 horred by God our Creator and Sustainer, and hourly 
 Benefactor. That anything should be chosen contrary 
 to his declared will implies a most awful and culpable 
 oblivion or disregard of all his incomparable claims. 
 Such knowledge ought to scorch up as instantaneously 
 as the fire of heaven, the first rising of disallowed 
 desire. 
 
 The unfallen condition of humanity then was not 
 one in which all thought of evil was as remote from 
 the mind as the antipodes, and as hateful to it as Tar- 
 tarus ; had such been the case man could not have 
 been a moral agent, and would have been entirely in- 
 capable of moi'al character ; but quite otherwise was 
 the case, he was so constituted as to be open to impres- 
 sions inciting to sin, and being placed in contiguity to 
 a forbidden but attractive object, it was ever and anon 
 brought before his mind as an object of thought and 
 desire. Man's original constitution and situation, then, 
 were such as to demand a struggle with such thoughts 
 and feelings, and such as afforded scope for self-denial, 
 unwearied effort, moral courage, and dependence on 
 divine power in suppressing and subduing them ; such 
 in fact as made him capable and afforded him the 
 opportunity of acquiring the habits, and reaching the 
 dignity and elevation of a great moral character. 
 
 So tar of the original condition of human nature 
 in regard to moral agency : its present state we have 
 formerly inquired into at length, both as it is repre- 
 sented in scripture and as it appears in the history of 
 human thought and action. In brief, we have found 
 man wofully insensible to the claims of God, — selfish, 
 
PRESENT CONDITION OF MAN. 155 
 
 forgetful of what is due to his fellovv-inen, and apt to 
 do them wrong. To tlie first most especially of these 
 evils we have found him to have a strong natural ten- 
 dency, but this, we have remarked, is to be carefully 
 distinguished from sin, — for a tendency, as the word 
 imports, is something which it is jiossible to withstand ; 
 so, on the other hand, a disrelish for duty, however 
 strong, nowise precludes the possibility of performing 
 it, if there be the physical power requisite to this. 
 And have we not the physical capacity of loving, and 
 of loving G od ? And are we not placed amid the ele- 
 ments which make such a capacity available ? Have 
 we not the means of knowing his existence, his attri- 
 butes, his character ? And are we not capable of 
 being awed by what is stupendous, of admiring what 
 is wonderful, and of loving what is good ? and thus 
 capable of obeying the Divine injunctions — to " fear 
 the Lord and love him ? " We can love only what is 
 loveable ; but certainly it will not be denied that God 
 is so, nor affirmed that human nature is incapable of 
 loving him, else he could not be loved by any of man- 
 kind. But naturally we are inapt and averse to think 
 of God ? And why is it so ; have we not power to 
 think of him ? May not his character and works be 
 made distinct and intelligible subjects of thought ? 
 Can we not inquire concerning him, and will not in- 
 quiry and thought find inexhaustible sources of admi- 
 ration, giatitude, and love ? Are not his works above 
 us, around us, and — us ourselves ? Is not all that we 
 behold and are — of him P and do not they bear upon 
 them the distinct impresses of his power, his wisdom, 
 and his goodness ? And what hinders us any day or 
 hour from being elevated, awed, affected by these ? 
 If we are not, can we assign any other cause than want 
 
156 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 of thought ? Ave not wonders inexhaustible, goodness 
 infinite, love immeasurable, open every hour to atten- 
 tion and thought ? But it will be objected that the 
 Scriptiu'es represent mankind as spiritually blind, and 
 incapable of perceiving the glory and loveliness of the 
 Divine character. I answer, unhesitatingly, that they 
 do not represent men as by nature wholly so, or uni- 
 versally; on the contrary, they distinctly inform us 
 that, " tliat which may be known of God is manifest 
 in them, for God hath shewed it unto them." That 
 is, not to any select or favoured class of men, but to 
 mankind generally: " For the invisible things of him 
 from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being 
 understood by the things that are made, even his eter- 
 nal power and Godhead ; so that they are without ex- 
 cuse : because that when they knew God they glorified 
 him not as God, neither were thankful, but became 
 vain in their imaginations ;" thus is indicated the vo- 
 luntary process by which they became blind — " and 
 their foolish heart was darkened. Professing them- 
 selves to be wise they became fools, and changed the 
 glory of the incorruptible God into an image made 
 like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four-footed 
 beasts, and creeping things." Again : " The heavens 
 declare the glory of God ; and the firmament sheweth 
 his handy-work. Day unto day uttereth speech, and 
 night unto night sheweth knowledge. There is no 
 speech nor language where their voice is not heard. 
 Their line is gone out through all the earth, and their 
 words to the end of the world." The numerous scrip- 
 ture passages which speak of men as wholly spiritually 
 blind, represent them as becoming so (as in that just 
 cited from Romans) by voluntary personal sin, or ex- 
 hibit such blindness as a judicial infliction (while it 
 
PRESENT CONDITION OF MAN. 157 
 
 comes on according to the laws of rational mind when 
 moral influences are not improved but withstood) on 
 account of obstinate intractableness, and contimied 
 impenitence. We know the character of God's ancient 
 l)eople — how propense to idolatry — how incorrigible 
 under divine correction and warnings. The message 
 which the prophet received from God to them : "Go,and 
 tell this people, Hear ye indeed, but understand not; 
 and see ye indeed, but perceive not. Make the heart 
 of this people fit, and make their ears heavy, and shut 
 their eyes ; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with 
 their ears, and understand with their heart, and con- 
 vert and be healed," is given thus when cited by our 
 Lord : " In them (his countrymen) is fulfilled the 
 prophecy of Esaias, which saith, By hearing ye shall 
 hear, and shall not understand ; and seeing ye shall 
 see, and shall not j)erceive : for this people's heart is 
 waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and 
 their eyes have they closed ; lest at any time they 
 should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, 
 and understand with their heart, and should be con- 
 verted and I should heal them." What the prophet was 
 commanded by God to do to his countrymen in his 
 days, Christ declares they had done to themselves in 
 his. But how was the prophet to do this ? He was to 
 declare to them plainly their sins, and announce the 
 judgments with which they would be visited if they 
 persisted in their evil and impenitent course; and such 
 was the temper of their minds that its effect on them 
 would only be to deaden and to indurate. That their 
 blindness was not owing to the want of power to see, 
 is evident from the way in which similar language is 
 applied to them by God in declaring their character to 
 another prophet : " Son of man, thou dwellest in the 
 
158 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 midst of a rebellious house, which have eyes to see, 
 and see not ; they have ears to hear, and hear not ; 
 for they are a rebellious house." It belongs to the 
 constitution of man as a moral agent, that moral mo- 
 tives or suasives operating on the mind, originally 
 produce feeling prompting to act upon them ; but 
 when such suasives are disregarded or resisted again 
 and again, the feeling or impulse they produce be- 
 comes weaker and weaker, till eventually it dies away 
 altogether; and these suasives, instead of setting in mo- 
 tion the springs of moral action, only tend more and 
 more to deaden them. Motives and persuasives, when 
 yielded to and acted on, tend to produce right moral 
 habits, and to generate and consolidate moral charac- 
 ter ; but when disregarded or resisted (and surely this 
 is the fault of man) and God still continues to ply 
 men with them, the effect they produce is in the 
 popular style of the Scriptures ascribed to God, inas- 
 much as he is the author or disposer of the influences 
 which o])erate on them, and he is said to blind them 
 or to harden their hearts ; but at other times these 
 effects are ascribed to themselves, as it is owing to 
 their conduct they are such as they are; had they acted 
 as they ought to have done, these effects might have 
 been quite different, and on this account it is they are 
 chargeable with guilt in regard to them. " Why do 
 ye not understand my speech ? " said our Lord to his 
 auditors, " Even because ye cannot hear my word." 
 Not that they had any physical incapacity of hear- 
 ing,* but because they would not give an unbiassed 
 ear to his teaching, but came with minds full of preju- 
 
 * ' Ye cannot hear.' The verb anoveiv, denotes frequently in 
 scripture, and even in profane authors, not barely " to hear," but 
 " to hear patiently." ' — Campbell. 
 
PRESENT CONDITION OF MAN. 159 
 
 dice against him. Blindness in the sense of being 
 unable to see, would, we are taught by the same au- 
 thority, be incompatible with responsibility. Were 
 men thus spiritually blind, they could not be charged 
 with guilt. " Some of the pharisees said unto him. 
 Are we blind also ? Jesus said unto them. If ye were 
 blind, ye should have no sin." 
 
 Then as to our neighbour : the love demanded of 
 us for him is not a love of complacency, for since it is 
 required in regard to men universally, it could not be 
 of this kind unless men were universally good, for it is 
 only goodness that we are commanded or even pennit- 
 ted to look on with complacency ; but it is a love of 
 benevolence, and none surely will deny that we are 
 susceptible of such a feeling. And are we not placed 
 amid elements and influences by which we may ex- 
 cite it ? Do we not know that our brother whom it 
 is our duty to love, possesses the same nature with 
 ourselves — is the creature of the same God — is placed 
 in the same perilous position — encompassed with 
 similar infirmities — exposed to similar woes — that he 
 acts under the same tremendous responsibility — hopes 
 and trembles in anticipation of an equal immortality ; 
 and is not he an object of the tenderest concern and 
 the deepest regard P There is scarcely an individual 
 in whose bosom such feelings are not called forth 
 towards some of his fellow-men in some situation of 
 interest or distress ; and might he not by reflection 
 and incjuiry find occasions adapted much oftener to 
 call it forth ? With just and far-reaching views of 
 the situation and destiny of man, can any human 
 being ever be viewed as not an appropriate object of 
 such feelings ? But if men have the power of feeling 
 and acting right, why do they so lamentably fail of 
 
160 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 doing so ? why is the performance so disproportioned 
 to the power ? In the present state of human nature 
 it is readily allowed that obedience is difficult, in many 
 cases so to a very high degree ; and we have previously 
 seen how the difficulty of obedience arising out of the 
 existing state of human nature, is vastly increased by 
 voluntary thoughtless waywardness and perversity. 
 But in the confession of its difficulty is implied its 
 possibility ; and that which it is possible for us to do 
 it cannot properly be said that we have no power to 
 do. Then, in the ordinary affiiirs of life, it is allowed 
 on all hands, that men often do wrong when it was in 
 their power to have acted right, and that too when 
 acting right would have been vastly to their advantage. 
 If a high degree of difficulty were not quite compa- 
 tible with possibility, or if difficulty extinguished re- 
 sponsibility, anything great or noble in the way of 
 moral character would be impossible. Man is respon- 
 sible for whatever is so dependent on a voluntary state 
 of mind, that without this voluntary state it could not 
 have taken place. If we liad such a control over a 
 certain state of mind that it was in our jiower to have 
 made it different; and if an event was so dependent on 
 that state of mind that it could not have been, had 
 that state been different, is it not clear that for such 
 an event we are responsible ? Responsibility is com- 
 mensurate with power ; over whatever we have ])ower, 
 however small in regard to that, we are responsible to 
 the extent of our power. And that men are possessed 
 of moral power, is one of the indestructible convictions 
 of the human soul, and can never be disproved so long 
 as the language remains in which these indestructible 
 convictions are embodied. Personal and mutual blame 
 which we have formerly adduced as conclusive proofs 
 
PRESENT CONDITION OF MAN. 161 
 
 that men do wrong, are no less conclusive proofs that 
 they can do right. If men not only blame themselves 
 and others for committing many evils, but for neglect- 
 ing to perform many duties or things which they should 
 have done, it certainly is implied that they had power 
 to have performed the things which they blame them- 
 selves for not doing ; for men do not blame others or 
 themselves for not doing what they have no power to 
 do ; indeed they never could do so without an annihi- 
 lation of all moral perception. It is, to say the least of 
 it, a very questionable mode of magnifying the grace 
 of God, to represent man as in his natural state so 
 utterly imbecile, that he is totally unable to do any 
 thing good, unless impelled to it by a special influence 
 from heaven. Certainly it is little calculated to bring 
 glory to God, to represent him as so treating men as if 
 they were free and responsible, while they can neither 
 do good nor choose it ; and as inflicting the most tre- 
 mendous eternal punishment on them for sinning, 
 when on the theory in question it was utterly impossi- 
 ble for them to cease from doing so. 
 
 It is quite possible to contemplate too exclusively 
 the disadvantages and evils of our present state, and 
 to overlook the benefits presented to all, and the sana- 
 tory influences brought to bear upon all. It is true 
 that evils of a very serious character have come on all 
 involuntarily, and especially a disposition inclining to 
 omit what is right and do what is wrong; but we 
 should consider that means of a corrective nature, spe- 
 cially adapted to our character and situation, are 
 brought to bear on us in the present constitution of 
 nature and of human society; yet in full harmony with 
 the conditions of moral agency, they are such that 
 they must depend for their efficacy on our voluntary 
 
162 MORAL AGENCT. 
 
 use and improvement of them. If there is in man a 
 strong predominance of the sensual over the moral and 
 spiritual, — if it is with difficulty he is raised to anything 
 above physical action, or such as is prompted by pre- 
 sent circumstances and immediate gratification ; it 
 ought to be carefully noted that the present constitu- 
 tion of nature, and the current arranaements of Pro- 
 vidence, have a special adaptation (such as could not 
 have been congruous to a state of moral rectitude and 
 purity) to rouse men, and even hedge them up, to en- 
 tertain and act on moral views and motives, or such as 
 belong to remote and super-sensual results. The hus- 
 bandman prepares the ground for a crop, but he has 
 to wait many days for the fruit of his skill and labour. 
 Under the expectation of a future good he must deny 
 himself present ease and gratification, while the com- 
 parative remoteness, and to a degree uncertainty of 
 the reward, call into exercise patience, and hope, and 
 faith. vSimilar is the case in regard to the acquisition 
 of useful knowledge, or the attainment of eminence in 
 any business or profession, which in no case can be 
 reached w'ithout much self-denial, in regard to what 
 would be immediately grateful to the mind, and sub- 
 jection to much that is irksome and distasteful. Every 
 occasion indeed which presents to us a remote good, to 
 be obtained by foregoing present gratification, furnishes 
 an opportunity of acquiring moral power. Further- 
 more ; change, suffering, disease, death, tear from us 
 our gratifications, or sever us from them, and furnish a 
 constant succession of incitements and warnings, tend- 
 ing to make us contemplate things under moral aspects, 
 and to act on moral motives. Even the changes of 
 the seasons and the vicissitudes of the weather, disturb 
 our disposition to rest ia present ease, and to seek only 
 
PRESENT CONDITION OF MAN. 163 
 
 present enjoyment. He who subjects himself to no 
 unpleasant toil or inconvenience to make provision for 
 the future, will soon be a poor man. " The sluggard 
 .who will not plough by reason of the cold, shall beg- 
 in harvest and have nothing." In a word, the succes- 
 sion of nature and the arrangements of Providence, 
 combine in forming one harmonious and unceasing 
 process of moral discipline, admirably adapted to the 
 existing state of human nature, and auxiliary to the 
 scheme of saving mercy, if not rather to be regarded 
 as important parts of its machinery. 
 
 Even the defects and evil tendencies of our nature 
 supply peculiar elements and occasions of moral im- 
 provement and elevation. It is a mistake to think 
 that we must be free from all propension or tendency 
 to evil in order to be able to act aright. Propension 
 towards what is wrong is not incompatible with acting 
 rightly if it can be overcome ; on the contrary, when 
 this is practicable it places within our power the ac- 
 quiring of higher moral qualities than could have been 
 otherwise acquired. The sense of dangers to be 
 guarded against, and difficulties to be overcome, fur- 
 nishes powerful motives to constant vigilance and 
 strenuous exertion. Propensions towards evil furnish 
 perpetual occasions for self-denial, and for sacrificing 
 present and sensual gratifications to remote and spi- 
 ritual considerations. An innate propensity may be 
 no worse to withstand or overcome, than a temptation 
 from without : it may he regarded as, equally with that, 
 — a mode of trial, and an element of moral discipline. 
 Without something to overcome or subdue, there could 
 be no room for moral courage ; as without something 
 to suffer, there could be none for fortitude ; and without 
 the sense of imperfection and deficiency no stimulus 
 M 2 
 
]64 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 to improvement ; in order even to the possibility of 
 which indeed, these are implied. Even errors, rightly 
 viewed, become warning posts of danger, and supply 
 elements of the wisdom and experience by which their 
 recurrence may be avoided. 
 
 But if you claim so much moral power for man, and 
 find so many elements of moral improvement and ele- 
 vation in his constitution and condition, do you not 
 bring dishonour on, and as it were render useless, the 
 astonishing provisions of the grace of God ? What- 
 ever of moral power may be claimed for man, and 
 whatever elements of moral advancement may be re- 
 garded as belonging to his condition — the greater these 
 are shown to be — will not his guilt be fonnd the greater 
 if he neglects to use the one, and fails to improve the 
 other ; and as the slightest glance over the world is 
 sufficient to convince us how lamentably he does so, is 
 not the grace exhibited as the more illustrious, which 
 has made provision for pardoning such guilt ? And 
 instead of making the atonement ajipear the less neces- 
 sary, does not sin thus voluntary and aggravated make 
 it unspeakably the more so ; inasmuch as the more 
 aggravated sin is, the more imperatively must divine 
 justice demand satisfaction. And if it be asked how, 
 with the power of avoiding it, men come to be charge- 
 able universally with such aggravated guilt, let it be 
 considered that without such power they could not be 
 chargeable with guilt at all; disobedience of the Divine 
 commands could not be charged as sinful in those who 
 could not do otherwise than disobey them ; power to 
 obey does not necessarily involve immediate willing- 
 ness to do so, that the agent may be required to ge- 
 nerate, it is sufficient that the reasons are open to 
 attention and inquiry which should make him willing. 
 
PRESENT CONDITION OF MAN. 16o 
 
 And, as has been well observed, if Adam sinned though 
 possessing adequate knowledge, and holy inclinations, 
 and when placed in ikvouvable circumstances, it is no 
 wonder if his posterity sin, when inclined to evil, and 
 placed within the sphere of an example, exhibiting far 
 more of evil than of good. If he sinned, who we are 
 certain had fall power to have refrained from doing so ; 
 surely the sinning of all his descendants cannot be re- 
 garded as any proof that they are altogether destitute 
 of such power. 
 
 Had man by the fall been reduced as a moral agent 
 to a state of utter imbecility, and had he been exposed 
 to hopeless misery solely in consequence of this im- 
 becility, his deliverance would have been something 
 we might have confidently expected from the Divine 
 compassion, but would have afforded no illustration of 
 sovereign mercy, and no room indeed for its exercise ; 
 for mercy has respect not to misery owing to misfor- 
 tune merely, but to misery combined with and result- 
 ing from guilt. Had the condition of man been what 
 we are supposing, it would have been repugnant to all 
 our notions of the divine character, to think that God 
 would have allowed him to perish in it. We could 
 not conceive of His doing so, and yet being the good 
 and compassionate Being which we know he is. But 
 the case is quite diflferent when man becomes guilty and 
 miserable by his own choice ; that choice being made 
 in disregard of the Divine goodness, and in voluntary 
 breach of the divine law. It was not, then, because 
 man by his fall had lost all moral power, and was 
 threatened with misery in consequence of this imbe- 
 cility, that God interposed to rescue him from ruin; — 
 that would have aflforded but a faint exhibition of the 
 glory of the Divine character, compared with what is 
 
166 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 given in the actual state of the case ; but God in infi- 
 nite love and mercy resolved on man's deliverance, 
 and in his wisdom devised a scheme for accomplishing 
 this, notwithstanding that the whole race was by volun- 
 tary choice indulging in a course of sinning against 
 him, or in other words, doing evil when it was in their 
 power to do good. That such was the case, is through- 
 out the whole Scriptures affirmed or implied ; on 
 one occasion we are told that " all flesh had corrupted 
 his way ;" on another, that " God looked down from 
 heaven on the children of men, to see if there were 
 any that did understand, and seek after God ; but they 
 were all gone aside, and were together become filthy." 
 Men " when they knew God," we are informed, " glo- 
 rified him not as God ; did not like to retain him in 
 their knowledge, but changed the glory of the incor- 
 ruptible God into an image made like to corrujitible 
 man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping 
 things." But when the punishment, thus so amply 
 deserved, was to be averted from the head of the trans- 
 gressor ; when God had determined to extend mercy 
 to man, the question was irrelevant, whether man might 
 not have acted otherwise than he had done ; he must 
 then be viewed, not as he might have been, but as he 
 was ; and agreeably to this we find that the main difl'i- 
 eulty on the solution of which the Scriptures bear, 
 and for the practical removal of which indeed the re- 
 demptive scheme was devised and executed, was not 
 how, with the powers man possessed and the means at 
 his command, man came to sin so grievously, but how 
 was he to be delivered, and sin destroyed ? These 
 considerations will, we hope, in the view of the candid 
 reader, fully obviate the objection, that the principles 
 we have been advocating, are calculated to bring dis- 
 
PRESENT CONDITION 01" MAN. 167 
 
 honour on, and exhibit as in gi'eat measure unneces- 
 saiy, the provisions of sovereign grace. 
 
 Responsibility, we have ah'eady remarked, is co- 
 extensive with power; and riglitly understood, this is a 
 truth which we conceive Hes at the very foundation 
 of moral science. But what is the power with which 
 responsibility is commensurate ? Is it, in regard to 
 every act, only what may be possessed when it is per- 
 formed, or what might have been possessed ? De- 
 cidedly, we hold, the latter. Men, we conceive, are 
 responsible in regard to every action, not only to the 
 extent of the power they may possess when it is per- 
 formed, but to the extent of all they might have pos- 
 sessed, by improving all the advantages previously 
 within their reach, and choosing and acting right in 
 all cases where they may have had a choice : so that 
 men are not free from blame in re<jard to things which 
 it may be beyond their present power to do or avoid, 
 if but for previous misconduct they might have had the 
 requisite power. Were we to hold responsibility to be 
 commensurate only with present power, we should be 
 landed in the conclusion that the greatest and most 
 hardened wickedness had really in it the least of guilt ; 
 for it is certain that the more men indulge in evil, their 
 power to do good is proportionately diminished.* 
 
 Our Lord's parable of the talents beautifully illus- 
 trates the nature of human responsibility. There, 
 while we are taught that men are held responsible, we 
 are also shown that they are furnished with what is 
 requisite to constitute them so, — elements of moral 
 powder. These are represented by the talents com- 
 mitted to each, which depend for their original amount 
 
 * Note I. 
 
168 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 on the wise donation of heaven ; but for their improve- 
 ment, and the measure of it, on the will and exertions 
 of the recipients : "The kingdom of heaven is as a 
 man travelling into a far country, who called his 
 servants, and delivered unto them his goods. Unto 
 one he gave five talents, to another two, and to another 
 one ; to every man according to his several ability , . . 
 He that had received the five talents went and traded 
 with the same and made them other five talents ; like- 
 wise he that had received two, he also gained other 
 two. But he that had received one, went and digged 
 in the earth and hid his Lord's money." Then each 
 was held responsible not merely to the extent of what 
 he had received, but of what he might have made it. 
 While he that had doubled the five talents, and he that 
 had doubled the two, received their lord's high appro- 
 bation and the apportioned reward ; he that had hidden 
 the one in the earth was condemned, not for squander- 
 ing that which he had received, but for not increasing 
 it : " Thou wicked and slothful servant, thou oughtest 
 to have put my money to the exchangers, and then at 
 my coming I should have received mine own with its 
 produce."* Then, the result of failing to improve, 
 was the ultimate loss of what was originally bestowed ; 
 moral power can be retained only by being used and 
 turned to account : " Take therefore the talent from 
 him, and give it unto him who hath ten talents. For 
 unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall 
 have abundance ; but from him that hath not shall be 
 taken away even that which he hath." 
 
 But did not God declare to his ancient people that 
 " if a soul sin, and commit any of these things which 
 
 * " With its produce" — not usury, for that is unlawful interest. 
 —Adam Clarke. 
 
PRESENT CONDITION 01' MAN. 169 
 
 are forbidden to be done by tlie commandments of the 
 Lord ; though he wist it not, yet is he guilty and shall 
 bear his iniquity " ? And has not our Lord declared 
 that the servant who knew not his Lord's will, and did 
 connnit things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten, albeit 
 it be " with few stripes " ? In regard to the children 
 of Israel, against what was the sin, committed through 
 ignorance, of which they were to be held guilty ? 
 It was " against the commandments of the Lord." 
 Had they, or had they not, the means of knowing 
 these ? The means of knowing them undoubtedly 
 they had. God publicly promulgated his laws from 
 time to time by his servant Moses : — " The Lord 
 spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of 
 Israel ; — command the children of Israel." Thus in- 
 variably ran the Divine message, and it was not ne- 
 glected by the faithful servant of the Lord : " Moses 
 spake unto the children of Israel according unto all 
 that the Lord had given him commandment unto 
 them : Moses called all Israel, and said unto them. 
 Hear, O Israel, the statutes and judgments which I 
 speak in your ears this day, that ye may learn them, 
 and keep, and do them." " And these words, which 
 I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart : 
 and thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, 
 and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, 
 and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou 
 liest down, and when thou risest up. And thou shalt 
 bind them for a sign upon thine hand, and they shall 
 be as frontlets between thine eyes. And thou shalt 
 write them upon the posts of thine house, and on thy 
 gates." Was not ignorance in such circumstances 
 highly culpable ? And was it not obviously just to 
 hold him guilty who sinned through it ? The parable 
 
170 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 of our Lord bears an obvious allusion to the Jewish 
 law which prescribes and limits punishment by the 
 infliction of stripes. It seems most in harmony with 
 its spirit to regard it as intended to represent by the 
 servant who " knew his Lord's will and did it not," 
 those who disregarded a direct revelation from heaven ; 
 and him who knew not his lord's will, and yet did 
 commit things worthy of stripes, as representing those 
 who sinned without enjoying such revelation. The 
 responsibility was to be proportioned to the privi- 
 lege : " To whom much was given, of him should 
 much be required." If the former deserved to be 
 beaten with many stripes, because he disregarded a 
 distinct statement of his lord's will, the latter could 
 not have deserved to have been beaten at all, if it 
 had been utterly beyond his power to have known 
 anything of this will ; for " where there is no law 
 there is no transgression." But the Scriptures assure 
 us that none of the race of man are left in such a con- 
 dition ; the servant in question might have learnt his 
 lord's will from his fellow-servant that knew it, and 
 even among those who had no direct revelation from 
 heaven, " God left not himself without witness, in 
 that he did good, and gave rain from heaven and 
 fruitful seasons, filling their hearts with food and 
 gladness." "The Gentiles who have not the (writ- 
 ten) law, are a law unto themselves ; who show the 
 works of the law written on their hearts," by the 
 witness of their consciences in their accusing or ex- 
 cusing dictates. 
 
 If then, man by his fall has not lost the power of 
 moral choice, nor of self-control, but suffered a de- 
 rangement of disposition ; that being now inclined to 
 evil ; and if this disposedness to evil^ however strong, 
 
PRESENT CONDITION OF MAN. 171 
 
 is not originally in any case such as might not be 
 overcome ; and if in order to the counteraction of his 
 strong indisposition to moral action and the exercise 
 of the power of self-control, he is placed amid a 
 constitution of things, and under an economy, sup- 
 plying many and powerful stimulants to these, it can- 
 not be affirmed that the present state of man is incom- 
 patible with his being a moral agent. 
 
SUMMARY-CONCLUSION. 
 
 We shall now endeavour briefly to indicate tbe main 
 points evolved in this somewhat elaborate inquiry re- 
 specting moral agency, and the powers and condition 
 of man in relation to it. We have found that moral 
 action is action which results from choice, — choice 
 regulated by law given and sanctioned, or believed to 
 be so given, by superior invisible power ; freedom to 
 choose, and to act according to choice, being essential 
 to such agency. We have found that free choice and 
 free action are not precluded, nor in any way inter- 
 fered with, by the Divine foreknowledge, nor by any 
 thing in the nature of the will, nor by the influence of 
 motives and of feelings. We have found that the 
 knowledge on which moral action is specially based, is 
 not that obtained through the medium of the senses, 
 nor by intuition, nor demonstration, but is chiefly pre- 
 sented to us in the form of testimony, and therefore 
 such as may be received or refused — not forcing itself 
 on the accejDtance of any, but affording room for choice, 
 and proving a criterion of disposition : That this law. 
 
SUMMARY. 173 
 
 thus brought before us, is recognized and authenticated 
 by conscience within us, which never sanctions any 
 thing but what is believed to be of Divine authority, 
 and is therefore in all its operations connected with a 
 lielief, more or less strong, in invisible power. 
 
 In reference to the present character and condition 
 of man as a moral agent, we have found it evinced that 
 all men are sinners ; by their mutual charges of guilt, 
 and by the remorse experienced at one time for what 
 may have been done at another. We have seen that 
 there is an inherent derangement in man's disposition, 
 from the strong tendency that appears in him from 
 the first dawn of discriminative power, to prefer the 
 sensible and immediate to the spiritual and remote ; 
 while as a moral resj^onsible being he is bound to do 
 the very reverse. While tracing this derangement to 
 the fall of Adam, and finding, according to 'the con- 
 stitution of human nature its universality inevitable, 
 we have, notwithstanding, found that constitution ca- 
 ])able of the fullest vindication, and of being shown to 
 evince the highest benignity. We have found that 
 the loss sustained by the fall is not a loss strictly of 
 power, but of will or disposition, and that all the ele- 
 ments essential to forming right resolves are within us 
 and around us : that disposition is a thing greatly 
 under our control, inasmuch as the state of feeling in 
 any mind depends much on the views it entertains, — 
 and these are greatly according as it inquires and ex- 
 amines, — and inquiry and examination are voluntary 
 acts ; consequently indisposition to fulfil the law neither 
 involves want of power, strictly, nor nullifies the obli- 
 gation to do so. We have found that whatever evils all 
 men became exposed to by the sin of Adam without 
 anv voluntary agency of their own, are obviated, or 
 
174 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 to be ultimately repaired to all by Christ, alike inde- 
 pendently of their agency ; and that provision has 
 been made, adequate to free all from whatever evils 
 they may bring themselves under, or become exposed 
 to, by their own personal transgression, — provision re- 
 quiring nothing further to render it available, but that 
 it should be voluntarily embraced and duly improved ; 
 — that to such, the evils and sufferings of life are con- 
 verted into elements of moral discipline, and are con- 
 tributing to enhance the capacity for, and extend the 
 range of, future enjoyment, and death itself is deprived 
 of its sting. Having derived from scripture such 
 views of the substitutionary work and sacrifice of 
 Christ, we found in accordance with them, that there- 
 by the whole human family have been placed under a 
 dispensation of mercy, affording as full an amnesty 
 for transgression, and making as ample provisions of 
 grace, as can at all consist with a condition of moral 
 trial and discipline ; consequently that there is no 
 portion of mankind lying under any sentence of con- 
 demnation heavier than that of temporal death : that 
 none will be allowed to suffer any gi-eater calamity, 
 but such as bring themselves under it by voluntary 
 obstinate transgression. In order to show that man's 
 present condition is consistent witli his being a moral 
 agent, we have contrasted it with his original state, and 
 have found that neither could the one have been so 
 wholly happy, nor can the other be so utterly disas- 
 trous (viewed apart from what he may voluntarily 
 make it) as is generally imagined ; as the evils and the 
 tendencies to evil in his present moral state are mpt 
 by powerful counteractives, not only in the special 
 economy of gi'ace, but in the whole machinery of 
 Providence, and the existing constitution of nature. 
 
SUMMARY. 175 
 
 Reader, are you living in gaiety and spiritual un- 
 concernedness ? are you pursuing pleasure without 
 thinking or inquiring about duty P And do you flat- 
 ter yourself that all is right because you are i'ree from 
 all flagrant vice, and thus better than many you see 
 around you ? Do you think then that you were 
 brought into existence and constituted as you are, 
 merely to enjoy yourself and pursue your own gratifi- 
 cation, and that you could be charged with nothing 
 blameworthy, if you kept yourself free from every 
 thing popularly deemed immoral or disgraceful ? 
 And have you really never awakened to a sense of 
 what constitutes the great distinction of your being ? 
 have you never reflected on, and felt in all its practi- 
 cal importance, the truth, that while like the ground 
 you tread on, the plants it supports, and the animals 
 that range on it, you are what you are involuntarily 
 as to physical constitution, you yet take rank essen- 
 tially with an incomparably higher order of being, in- 
 asmuch as your state in regard to dignity or meanness, 
 happiness or misery, will be for ever according as you 
 choose. Have you never reflected that, as a moral 
 agent, you are under the most solemn obligations 
 to make a choice, between what may be for your im- 
 mediate gratification, and what the divine law requires ? 
 Have you never endeavoured to ascertain whether there 
 be any discrepancy between what you delightedly 
 pursue and its requirements ? Have you never re- 
 flected, that, as it enjoins a supreme regard to s])i- 
 ritual objects, and the bliss of an undisclosed futurity, 
 while you are inclined habituall}" to neglect these, and 
 to pursue inmiediate gratification, there likely is, there 
 cannot but be, such a discrepancy ? Does not the law 
 require you to love the Lord your God with your 
 
176 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 whole soul, and strength ? and do you ever think even 
 of the claims he has to your love ? Do you ever 
 gratefully and with delight remember that you derive 
 your existence from Him, and that you are daily sus- 
 tained and protected by his providence, and owe to 
 him all the means and sources of enjoyment ? Or is 
 it true that you scarcely ever direct your mind to such 
 considerations, that you habitually allow yourself to 
 forget him, " in whom you live and move and have 
 your being," permitting your mind to be engrossed with 
 the merest trifles, and the most evanescent pleasures ; 
 while you have never made his claims an element of 
 your consideration — have hardly ever adverted to them 
 at all. What would you think of yourself if you had 
 so treated an earthly benefactor, from whom you had 
 not received even the thousandth part of the favours ? 
 you would be utterly ashamed to be found destitute of 
 all sense of obligation in the one case ; what do you 
 think of being found destitute of all sense of infinitely 
 higher obligation in the other ? Do you not see your- 
 self wanting in the affections most emphatically pro- 
 per to your condition and capabilities ? do you not 
 perceive that you have never opened your heart to the 
 highest and most ennobling range of feeling, — that in 
 fact you have been failing of the highest purjjose of 
 your being, — have been degrading yourself to the level 
 of the irrational animals ; that though constituted a 
 moral agent, you have not been exercising the powers 
 of such an agent; but have been utterly neglecting the 
 duties arising out of your relation to your Creator and 
 moral Governor, as well as failing to exercise that self- 
 denial and self-control which moral agency involves in 
 its very essence ? Do you perceive that hitherto you 
 have acted unworthv of your nature, and resolve from 
 
CONCLUSION. 177 
 
 henceforth to commence a new course, — to inquire 
 what God claims of } ou, to act agreeably to the re- 
 quirements of his law, and not merely on the stimulus 
 of your fleshly nature ? In this you do well. It cer- 
 tainly is what you ought to do. But if it is what you 
 ought to do now, it is more ; it is what you ought 
 always to have done. And if you have neglected to do 
 what you ought always to have done, — what it was in 
 your power to have done, — and what you were under 
 the most solemn obligations at all times to do, have 
 you not incurred guilt, and guilt long accumulating ? 
 And how is this guilt to be cancelled ? If the law 
 ever demands obedience to the full amount of your 
 strength, you can never produce any supererogatory 
 merit to set against your former deficiencies, though 
 that were available. Unrelaxing in its demands, the 
 law is strong only to condemn ; its declaration is — 
 " Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things 
 which are written in the book of the law to do them." 
 What course then remains for you but to cast yourself 
 on the Divine mercy, and accept of that pardon which 
 is offered you through the substitutionary sacrifice of 
 God's own Son, or perish. Will you choose to perish 
 when salvation is within your reach, when there is 
 nothing on the part of God, nothing in his whole cre- 
 ation, save what may be within your own heart, hin- 
 dering you from being saved ? Will you choose im- 
 mediate gratification, as it were but for an hour, though 
 conscious that it involves the loss of eternal joy, and 
 the certainty of eternal woe ? If you are not prepared 
 for an issue so fatally disastrous, escape for your life 
 now ; there is increasing danger in every hour's delay. 
 " Now is the accepted time, now is the day of salva- 
 tion." " Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and thou 
 
178 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 shalt be saved." But perhaps you are one of those 
 whose perverted notions of the Divine administration 
 furnish them with an excuse for neglecting their duty : 
 ' I cannot believe of myself, and God is Sovereign in 
 the bestowment of spiritual blessings.' You cannot 
 believe of yourself ; but when were you ever left to 
 yourself? You could not believe if God had given 
 no testimony ; but has he not given one of the most 
 explicit character ? and is not this in your hands ? 
 Are you perusing it with that solemn and earnest 
 attention which a message from God to you demands ? 
 You could not confide in him if he had given you no 
 means of ascertaining whether his character is worthy 
 of confidence ; — has he left you entirely without such 
 means ? Nay, he never so left any of our race, (Acts 
 xiv. 17.) how much less you. Are you then using 
 the multiplied means at your command for ascertain- 
 ing whether his character be worthy of confidence — 
 that confidence which is involved in believing ? If 
 you are not, is it any wonder that you cannot believe ? 
 Or need the fact be regarded as anywise mysterious, 
 when there is so obvious a cause, in your own criminal 
 neglect of all the means with which God has furnished 
 you, of becoming acquainted with his character P 
 
 But you say, God is sovereign in the bestowment of 
 spiritual blessings. What do you mean by this — that 
 man having rendered himself wholly unworthy of such 
 blessings, the purpose to bestow them springs from 
 God's free love and good pleasure alone ? This is a 
 glorious truth, but by itself not relevant to your pur- 
 pose at all. But in addition to this, by pleading that 
 God is sovereign in the bestowment of spiritual bless- 
 ings, do you mean, that, in every case he bestows them 
 on whom he pleases, and when he pleases, irrespective 
 
CONCLUSION. 179 
 
 of anything in the state of mind, or in the conduct of 
 the recipients ? If such were indeed the true state of 
 the case, nothing could become you so much as to sit 
 still and wait, or rather, to pursue your own pleasure, 
 and give yourself no concern about the matter ; and 
 no doctrine could be more convenient for one who 
 wished to be freed iVom a painful sense of neglected 
 duty, and consequent deep responsibility ; for under 
 this view of the economy of salvation, no obligation 
 could be felt on the neglect of which conscience could 
 found a charge. But is this view a just one? Does 
 the Divine testimony warrant our entertaining it ? 
 Founded on a one-sided interpretation of a few isolated 
 texts, does it not nullify the innumerable earnest and 
 most moving appeals which God makes to sinners — 
 to the unconverted, to " turn," to " turn from their 
 wicked ways and live;" to "repent," and to "believe"? 
 In promising spiritual blessings, God invariably de- 
 mands a state of mind and conduct appropriate to their 
 reception. If the proper state of mind is cultivated, 
 and the prescribed conduct pursued, the ajjpropriate 
 spiritual blessings are promised without exception or 
 reserve : the knowledge of God, if we follow on to 
 know him ; victory over Satan, if we resist him ; over 
 sin, if we mortify the deeds of the body ; over the 
 world, if we live by faith; salvation, if we believe; the 
 Holy Spirit, if we ask him ; final triumph, if we endure 
 to the end. Is this teaching salvation by the works 
 of the law, whereof we may boast and glory ? Nay, 
 verily. All these blessings are brought before us by 
 the grace of God, and in the exercise of that grace, — 
 infinite wisdom adapting its provisions to the exigen- 
 cies of our moral being and condition, — are connected 
 in their bestowment with the state of mind, and the 
 N 2 
 
180 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 conduct appropriate to their reception. You may 
 safely calculate on whatever benefits are connected 
 with duly by Divine promise, if in a spirit of humble 
 dependence, you attend to the requisite duties ; but if 
 you sit still and presume on any exercise of midis- 
 closed sovereignty, you incur the most awful risk of 
 irremediable ruin. Let it be true that God in an ex- 
 traordinary manner calls one here and another there, 
 from the crowds of the unthinking, the deluded, or the 
 vicious, and makes them witnesses for him, and agents 
 in carrying on his work, in the midst of an alienated 
 world. But the rareness of such cases makes it fear- 
 fully improbable, in regard to any individual, that he 
 shall be thus arrested and saved ; and of all conceiv- 
 able cases, yours is surely the most hopeless (if I 
 should not rather say entirely so) who are knowingly 
 neglecting that way in which salvation is revealed as 
 sui'e. Instead of indulging such perilous presump- 
 tion, ought you not rather to bethink yourself of your 
 awful guilt, accumulating every hour, while " you 
 thus neglect so gi'eat salvation." The mode in which 
 he may exercise his sovereignty, God necessarily 
 keeps secret ; for to reveal how he would act in such 
 cases, would obviously nullify sovereignty, as it would 
 limit him to the specified mode. It is not for us to 
 limit God, in regard to the modes in which he may 
 apprehend those " on whom he will have mercy," 
 amid the multitudes who despise or neglect his grace ; 
 but the revealed mode in which deliverance is to be 
 obtained, and our duty in regard to it, is clear : " God 
 so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son, 
 that WHOSOEVER BELiEVETH in hiiB should not perish, 
 but have everlasting life :" " Justified freely by his 
 grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus; 
 
CONCLUSION. 181 
 
 wlioui God hatli set forth to be a propitiation, tlirough 
 faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the 
 remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance 
 
 of God; that he might be just and the justifier of 
 
 him who believeth in Jesus." And as he " gave him- 
 self a ransom for all," and God " will have all men to 
 be saved," the reason why any perish is equally clear : 
 " He that believeth not is condemned already, because 
 he hath not believed in the name of the only-begotten 
 Son of God. And this is the condemnation, that light 
 is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather 
 than light, because their deeds were evil." 
 
 But possibly you may yet object, — * Hath not God 
 declared, that he " will have mercy on whom he will 
 have mercy, and that whom he will he hardeneth ;" 
 and can I believe or be saved if he withhold from me 
 his grace ? ' But on whom will God have mercy ? 
 will he not on every one who comes to him pleading 
 — "God be merciful to nie a sinner ?" Has he not 
 said, " Come unto me whomsoever will ; and him 
 that Cometh unto me, I will in no wise cast out" ? 
 Did he not give his Son to be a " propitiation for the 
 sins of the whole world ?" And did not that Son, 
 thus given by the Father, give " himself a ransom for 
 all?" And has not God offered salvation to all? 
 Has he not declared in the strongest terms, and mani- 
 fested in the most affecting manner, the earnestness of 
 his desire, that all should accept of it ? And in what 
 light would it exhibit his character to us if he did so, 
 while he knew, that in the case of thousands, accept- 
 ance was no way within their power, — while he had 
 detennined to withhold from them that, without which 
 they never possibly could accept of it ? Will you 
 question the sincerity of God in these offers and ap- 
 
182 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 peals ? Abhorred be the thought I " Let God be true, 
 and every man a liar." Who are they whom God 
 hardeneth, — whom " he giveth over to a reprobate 
 mind " ? Are they not those who " do not like to 
 retain him in their knowledge ;" those whom he has 
 " endured with much long-suifering," fitted and in- 
 tended to " lead them to repentance;" but who in- 
 stead of being so led thereby, have despised " the 
 riches of his goodness and forbearance," and in the 
 indulgence of the hardness and impenitence of their 
 hearts have become " fitted to destruction," having 
 treasured up to themselves " wrath against the day of 
 wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of 
 God ? " And wherefore was it that Israel, which fol- 
 lowed after the law of righteousness, attained not to it? 
 " Because they sought it not by faith." Those strong 
 declarations respecting the Divine Sovereignty which 
 the apostle introduces in the 9th chapter of Romans, 
 have an evident bearing and reference (as shewn by 
 the contextual argument) towards the reverse of that 
 for which they are very often now cited. Instead of 
 being there exhibited as the reason of the limitation of 
 grace, God's sovereignty is adduced as the ground and 
 reason for its unrestricted and expansive freeness. 
 His argument is, that the being of the " seed of Abra- 
 ham " nowise of itself involved the certainty of spi- 
 ritual blessings or of eternal salvation; — that God was 
 not withheld by any stipulations of his covenant with 
 the Jewish people, either from quickening or from 
 hardening whom he would, — that their privileges nei- 
 ther involved the limitation of his grace to them, nor 
 precluded him from visiting their sins with appropriate 
 punishment ; " he hath called not of the Jews only, 
 but also of the Gentiles ;" " he hath mercy on whom 
 
CONCLUSION. 183 
 
 he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth."* 
 But so far from any restriction of the fulness of the 
 invitation and promise, " Come unto me, whomsoever 
 he will, and him that cometh unto me I will in nowise 
 cast out," being involved in the declaration, " he hath 
 mercy on whom he will have mercy," it really expresses 
 the superabundance of his grace beyond all that is im- 
 plied in even these : " I was found of them that sought 
 me not ; I was made manifest to them that asked not 
 after me." The notion that God arbitrarily withholds 
 his grace from any is both unscriptural and of most 
 hurtful tendency ; we ought to settle it in our minds 
 as a fundamental principle, that God never withholds 
 his grace but in cases where its bestowment would be 
 unsuitable, or incompatible with the principles of his 
 moral government. God offers, yea presses on the 
 acceptance of sinners, the blessings of pardon and re- 
 conciliation, and holds out to them the means of spi- 
 ritual renovation ; and they heed not, or contemn his 
 offers. If such remain unsaved, where is the propriety 
 of saying that it is owing to God's withholding his 
 grace ? He has declared to them their danger in the 
 most impressive and awful language ! he has depict- 
 ed that misery to which they are hastening, in every 
 variety of the most appalling colours ! in his pro- 
 vidence they ever and anon have warnings of his dis- 
 pleasure ; yet still blended with intimations of mercy 
 and the attractions of a winning love ; yet day after 
 day, season after season, and year after year, they 
 pursue their own way heedless of all these, and of 
 every claim of his to their regard, though these were 
 presenting themselves at every turning, and every 
 
 * Note K. 
 
184 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 Step of their way. Still, notwithstanding all their 
 provocations, God waits to be gracious, stretches out 
 his hand though no man regards, strives by his Spirit 
 to reclaim them, expostulating with them, " Turn ye, 
 turn ye, why will ye die ? As I live, saith the Lord 
 God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked ; 
 but that the wicked turn from his way and live." How 
 can it be said that God withholds from such his grace, 
 when, in disregard or contempt of all entreaty they ob- 
 stinately refuse to repair to the channels in which it 
 flows ? Is there no grace displayed in the substitu- 
 tion of Christ for all mankind, — in his enduring for us 
 the curse and despising the shame, — no grace in the 
 written revelation of mercy, — none in the institution 
 of the ministry of reconciliation, — none in the univer- 
 sal offer of pardon, and of the Spirit, to them that ask 
 him ? ' Surely,' every right-hearted man will reply, 
 ' they are all of grace.' Then there is no restriction 
 or withholding in regard to these, — the grace that is 
 in them " hath appeared unto all men."* If the 
 gi'ace already communicated be improved for the end 
 for which it was given, more will not be withheld. If 
 the sinner is impelled by the warnings of danger to 
 seek for the way of escape, that way is opened up ; 
 and if he essays to betake himself to it and walk there- 
 in, but feeling his own weakness and the prevailing 
 power of corruption, implores heavenly strength, that 
 strength will be communicated ; and if duly improved 
 and depended on, he will go on his way rejoicing, 
 filled with all joy and peace in believing. But where 
 would be the propriety or wisdom of pardoning the 
 sins of those who do not see that they have any sins 
 
 * Note L. 
 
CONCLUSION. 185 
 
 to pardon, or who do not desire to be delivered from 
 their sins, or who consider them so venial that pardon 
 is of little importance ? Or, how could they be glad- 
 dened with the manifestation of that love which God 
 bears to his chosen, who remain insensible and un- 
 moved under all the displays of his compassion for 
 sinners ; or what other than misery would a sense of 
 the divine indwelling Presence be to him who does 
 not " like even to retain God in his knowledge." If 
 it must be said, that, in not communicating blessings 
 like these to such persons, God withholds from them 
 his grace, he needs not be represented as doing so in 
 the exercise of any inscrutable sovereignty. Neither 
 is it much in harmony either with the general strain of 
 scripture, or the Divine commands to the Church, to 
 represent it as a remarkable display of the Divine 
 Sovereignty that God has given the Gospel to some 
 nations and withheld it from others. God has with- 
 held the Gospel from none : Christ commanded his 
 disciples to " go into all the world and preach the 
 Gospel to every creature." The instrumentality which 
 God in his infinite wisdom has seen meet to employ 
 in the communication of the " glad tidings " of salva- 
 tion " to all people," is the church, and if she neglect 
 her duty, if her tongue is silent, there is no other to 
 take up and proclaim abroad the " joyful sound."* 
 
 But it is possible for some reader so far to pervert 
 the principles we have been endeavouring to establish, 
 as to say, ' Yes, I see I have power to do everj'thing 
 required of me ; my proper business is not to be always 
 imploring Divine help, but to employ and improve to 
 the utmost the powers 1 possess.' I grant it, that if 
 
 * Note M. 
 
186 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 you had fulfilled the law in all points from your youth 
 up, it were needless, and would certainly be irrelevant, 
 for you to pray for mercy. But even if this had been 
 the case, (which I am nowise expecting you are pre- 
 23ared to maintain ) because you were not in a condition 
 requiring this particular blessing, would it follow from 
 hence that there was no necessity for your cherishing 
 an habitual sense of dependence on God, and filial de- 
 sire for his direction and support. It is only when 
 such a sense of dependence is cherished, that the law 
 can be fulfilled ; devoid of this the heart must be in a 
 state at variance with the entire spirit of the law, and 
 quite incongruous to the situation of any dependent 
 creature. Every element and condition of a state of 
 moral trial is adapted to cherish such a feeling : 
 temptation leads the tempted to seek Almighty sup- 
 port and defence ; danger prompts to seek the shield 
 of an unfailing protection ; the future issue in an ulti- 
 mate deliverance and reward, calls into exercise faith 
 and hope. Indeed, a being in a state of moral proba- 
 tion, who is striving to fulfil the law, devoid of a sense 
 of humble dependence on Divine wisdom and strength, 
 is already fallen ; his heart is already tainted with the 
 essence of all sin. There could not be a being, even 
 in a state of unfallen probation, for whom it would not 
 be proper and becoming to pray, " Deliver me from 
 evil :" " Send forth thy light and thy truth ; let them 
 lead me and guide me." An unconfessed impression 
 seems prevalent, that strenuous efforts in working out 
 our own salvation, or in fulfilling the requirements of 
 the Divine law, are incompatible with dependence on 
 God. But no impression could well be more un- 
 founded or pernicious. So far from this being the 
 case, exertion is the only condition of a moral agent 
 
CONCLUSION. 187 
 
 in whicli dependence can be pro{3erly exercised. To 
 remain inactive and expect that God will do all for us, 
 is not to depend but to presume. Exertion and de- 
 pendence should be correspondent and reciprocal : our 
 exertions can never be too great, if our dependence be 
 commensurate with them ; nor our dependence too 
 great, if our exertions be in proportion. 
 
 The state of feeling, then, which you have expressed 
 would be quite unsuitable even for an unfallen moral 
 agent. But is this your character ? I do not suppose 
 you will maintain that it is. If you habituate yourself 
 at all to serious reflection and self-questioning, you 
 must be conscious that you have often forgotten how 
 much you owe to God, and have lamentably failed 
 in yielding the gratitude due to him for all his benefits, 
 and that you have been guilty of m;iny sins besides. 
 The " wages of sin" then, you know, "is death;" 
 and if you obtain not the pardon of your sin, this is a 
 retribution which no effort of yours can avert. But 
 can you expect to obtain pardon, or are you indeed in 
 a state of mind in which it would be of any practical 
 value to you, if you do not desire it ? And, though it 
 be not in a strict sense impossible for you to yield all 
 that is demanded of you, yet as you are conscious of 
 having lamentably failed hitherto in this respect, what 
 ground of assurance have you that you shall exercise 
 unremitting vigilance, and maintain unyielding firm- 
 ness for the future ? But it is impossible if you look 
 solely to yourself, if you trust only in your own heart; 
 — that is a state of mind in which the law never yet was 
 fulfilled, and never can be ; for it is itself, as we have 
 just observed, a state utterly at variance with the spirit 
 of the law. You are fulfilling the law only when you 
 are contending against sin and pursuing duty, depend- 
 
188 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 ing on Divine support ; for while it is declared that 
 " he that trusteth in his own heart is a fool," we are 
 commanded to " trust in the Lord for ever, for in the 
 Lord Jehovah is everlasting strength." And whatever 
 might be the economy under which beings in a state 
 of unfallen probation would subsist and act, you are 
 placed under one, by the institutes of which you are 
 instructed, that all its special benefits are to be asked 
 in order to be obtained or enjoyed. The cultivation 
 of an abiding sense of dependence on the Divine 
 mercy and goodness, of an habitual spirit of prayer- 
 fulness, is indeed an essential part of your duty, enter- 
 ing into the very essence of that holiness which you 
 are sedulously to cultivate and fervently to aspire after. 
 Besides, is not success in everything we undertake, 
 intimately connected with the blessing of God ? Is 
 it not by his favour that you prosper, and are you not 
 commanded to acknowledge him in all your ways "^ 
 And are there not a thousand points at which the 
 Divine agency daily touches your course ? and may 
 it not in innumerable instances, though imperceptibly, 
 do so for your good in answer to prayer ? 
 
 And, after all, the universalist may step forward and 
 sa}' : ' I am glad to perceive you have advanced more 
 than half way toward us ; proceed on your hopeful 
 course ; you cannot find firm footing till you come 
 over altogether to the ground we have taken.' If there 
 be any disposed thus to address us, we would say to 
 such. Do not triumph ere you be sure you have cause ; 
 we have not advanced towards your principles at all. 
 Those we have been endeavouring to establish, if pro- 
 perly viewed, will a])pear much rather a recession from 
 yours. On the ground of the substitution of Christ 
 you hold out to all indiscriminately the prospect of 
 
CONCLUSION. 189 
 
 final blessedness ; while the views of the influence of 
 his work brought forward in this treatise, derive a 
 main portion of their importance, from the principle 
 held in connexion with them ; that on our voluntary 
 choice and consequent conduct here, is suspended our 
 eternal destiny. We hold, and have endeavoured to 
 show, that an indissoluble connection between conduct 
 and destiny, is an essential element of any system of 
 moral being, and something without which moral 
 government were impossible. We believe that God 
 has placed before our race, " life and good, death and 
 evil," and plied us with motives to make us choose 
 life, while everlasting happiness or woe must be our 
 portion according as we choose ; while your principles 
 invest the choice and the perpetration of evil with 
 comparative impunity. In showing that salvation is 
 brought within the reach of all — that all obstructions 
 to it, in regard to the whole race, are removed, except 
 such as they themselves voluntarily raise — and that 
 innumerable appliances are constantly at work for 
 beating down even these, we manifest the justness of 
 their condemnation, who obstinately refuse to accept 
 of the proffered deliverance ; while in maintaining 
 that God makes no requirement of any man but what 
 he has given power to fulfil, or furnished with the 
 means of acquiring such power, we vindicate the jus- 
 tice of God in punishing those who fail to yield to the 
 amount of his requirements, and at the same time con- 
 temn the grace which offers pardon for delinquencies. 
 While we vindicate the glory of Christianity, as em- 
 bodying a free provision for cancelling every form and 
 measure of human guilt, we rejoice unspeakably in 
 perceiving that this may be done in consistency with 
 a system of moral agency, and a process of moral dis- 
 
190 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 cipline, seeing the provisions of Divine mercy cannot 
 be available for removing the guilt of any one unless 
 embraced by his own choice. 
 
 Reader, you have now been led, with however im- 
 perfect and erring a guidance, through some of the 
 labyrinths of a difficult field of inquiry; yet you will 
 remember that your attention has been called to what 
 is no foreign, and should be to you no uninteresting 
 theme; seeing your own powers, capacity, and respon- 
 sibilities are the objects it embraces. With respect 
 to a subject of such imjiortance and interest, see to it 
 that no error you may apprehend in the present essay, 
 prejudice you against the inquiries with which it is 
 occupied. Pursue these for yourself; then will you 
 bring good even out of the mistakes and failures of the 
 present writer, making them beacons of warning, and 
 stimulants to farther scrutiny. 
 
 And now, as this essay is come to its close, and as 
 the only opportunity which the writer may ever have 
 of influencing you the reader, may be that afforded 
 him through the medium of these pages, suffer him 
 to ask affectionately, and with all the earnestness 
 which such a solemn question warrants, whether you 
 feel yourself a sinner, and are valuing and resting on 
 the mercy of God, as manifested and made available for 
 us, by the substitution of his Son. If you are, has 
 your sense of obligation and responsibility as a moral 
 agent (sinful, yet the recipient of immeasurable grace) 
 been at all cleared or deepened by the perusal of this 
 treatise ? Has it led you to feel any more keenly, 
 how evil a thing and bitter sin is, committed by a 
 being of such powers and privileges, against a God of 
 such benignity and grace ? Has it tended in any 
 
CONCLUSION. 191 
 
 measure to enhance your estimate of the intensity of 
 that love which could ])rompt the Godhead to devise 
 and consummate such an atonement for sin, — an 
 atonement not only sufficient to cancel the guilt of 
 the original transgression, but of all other sins, — open- 
 ing a fountain of grace for the whole human family, 
 limited by nothing but the failure of penitent hearts 
 to receive it. If such have been at all the case, the 
 writer will rejoice. If such have been at all the case, 
 you will not rest satisfied with a mere deliverance from 
 condemnation, — with merely planting your feet within 
 the confines of the region of safety ; you will press on 
 to a gi'ateful service and obedience. " The love of 
 Christ" constraining you to live, not to yourself, " but 
 to him who died for you, and rose again." You will 
 not be content with the presumed possession of an 
 inoperative faith ; but knowing that faith without works 
 is dead, you will not only " work out your own salva- 
 tion with fear and trembling," in dependence on God 
 working in you, but strive to gain others to him, la- 
 bouring in your huml)le sphere to hasten that period, 
 when he shall receive the homage of a renovated 
 world. Still in all humility having respect to the joy 
 set before you, pressing on to victory, contending for 
 the prize, your mind tempered with a salutary fear 
 lest at last you should fail or come short; knowing that 
 it is only to Him that overcometh, the crown of life is 
 given ; and that though the reward is all of grace, it is 
 a reward for service rendered, and in proportion to it, 
 and that where there is Jio service there can be no 
 reward. 
 
 But is the case otherwise with you ? Do you live 
 imheedful of the claims God has on you, not grateful 
 for the benefits of which you are the recipient, insen- 
 
192 MORAL AGENCY. 
 
 sible to your situation as a moral being ; unconcerned 
 at being in the most imminent risk of losing all that 
 gives to existence its value, and futurity its hope ; un- 
 alarmed at the guilt you are contracting, and at what, 
 if you continue as you are, must be your final doom ? 
 Have you perused the present treatise merely as bring- 
 ing before you matters of curious speculation, and 
 vifithout feeling that it contains anything in which you 
 have a personal interest ? The state of your mind, then, 
 is one calculated to excite the deepest commiseration. 
 You are hastening on to the final audit utterly unpre- 
 pared, or prepared only for condemnation, and the so- 
 ciety of the lost. And what excuse can be pleaded for 
 you ? You have suffered by the fall, it is true ; by it 
 you endure some evils, and became exposed to the 
 most tremendous. But more than you lost in Adam 
 it is within your power to regain by Christ ; and you 
 can fail to do so only by refusing what is pressed on 
 your acceptance. No sentence of hopeless reproba- 
 tion impends over you ; for no such sentence impends 
 over any, unless they bring themselves under it by 
 continued rebellion, and obstinate rejection of heavenly 
 gi'ace. That dissolution of your being to which you 
 became liable by the sin of Adam shall not be perma- 
 nent ; your body will be " ransomed from the power 
 of the grave;" and will you by your own voluntary 
 impenitence and transgi'ession make yourself liable to 
 the " second death," from which there can be no de- 
 liverance ? You breathe as it were an atmosphere of 
 mercy. You are surrounded with the appliances of a 
 dispensation of infinite grace. God's own word, — his 
 message of reconciliation, — is in your hands daily ; his 
 ministers are beseeching you in Christ's stead to be 
 reconciled to him, the Spirit is striving with you, the 
 
CONCLUSION. 193 
 
 events of Providence and the very elements of nature 
 combine alternately to warn and to win. What shall 
 be said of you ; what hope can remain for you, if you 
 withstand all these— despise all these ? Having re- 
 mained unmoved and obdurate under all the appliances 
 of Divine compassion, — having exhausted the enduring 
 even of Divine forbearance, what can remain for you 
 but " a certain fearful looking-for of judgment and 
 fiery indignation." 
 
 Put not off concern then to the time when concern 
 will be inevitable, for then though the most profound 
 will certainly be felt, it will be of no avail. Think how 
 intensely repugnant to the state of feeling in the 
 Divine mind regarding you, is, what you may deem 
 mere innocent thoughtlessness respecting these things. 
 God is manifesting the deepest compassion for you, 
 and a concern for your impending fate, which no 
 words nor signs can adequately express, and heedless 
 of all the moving expressions and displays of these, 
 you are pursuing your own wayward course, — thus 
 putting contempt on His most profound sympathies, 
 who is the Author and Sustainer of your being. His 
 voice is now lifted up in solemn remonstrance, in 
 earnest entreaty, and gracious proffer ; — " Turn you 
 at my reproof; behold 1 vvill pour out my Spirit 
 upon you, I will make known my words unto 
 you." But you are forewarned that a time is coming 
 when he will treat those who disregard his voice in a 
 very different manner, — " Because I have called and 
 ye have refused ; I have stretched out my hand, and 
 no man regarded. Ye have set at nought all my 
 counsel, and would none of my reproof. I also will 
 laugh at your calamity ; I will mock when your fear 
 
 
 
194 CONCLUSION. 
 
 cometh. . . . For that they hated knowledge, and 
 did not choose the fear of the Lord : therefore shall 
 they eat of the fruit of their own way, and be filled 
 with their own devices." 
 
NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 2 
 
" If you are not a thinking man, to what purpose are you a man 
 at all ?" — Coleridge. 
 
 " In the whole conduct of the understanding, there is nothing of 
 more moment than to know when, and where, and how far to give 
 assent, and possibly there is nothing harder."— Locke. 
 
NOTE A. p. 34, 
 
 THE ARGUMENT FROM DESIGN. 
 
 The reaction in favour of a spiritual philosophy, 
 from a fonner prevalent materialism, is now setting in 
 so strongly, that some, even Christian theists, are 
 showing a disposition to discredit, or abandon as 
 insufficient, the argument for the being and attributes 
 of God, drawn from the design and skill displayed in 
 the works of nature. This, to say the least of it, is 
 certainly a very needless and unwise concession to 
 atheism. In a page subsequent to that from which 
 this note is referred to, I have endeavoured to place 
 this argument on its proper basis, by distinguishing 
 between necessary and established relations and laws, 
 and showing that it is in the latter, and not in the 
 former, that the marks of intelligence are to be found. 
 Atheistical writers confound these, and the Christian 
 theists in question seem to fall into a similar error. 
 Necessity is independent of design, will, or power, 
 but arrangement and adaptation obviously involve all 
 these. Let as much as may in the existing system of 
 the planetary and sideral heavens be shown to be neces- 
 sarily involved in the laws of gravitation and motion, 
 yet while organic nature remains, exhibiting myriads 
 of wondrous forms produced from a few simple ele- 
 
198 VOTES. 
 
 ments, showing endless variety, yet tlie most beautiful 
 systematic arrangements, the proof of the existence of 
 an intelligent Creator, is certainly full and invul- 
 nerable. 
 
 NOTE B. p. 41. 
 
 The quotation inserted and discussed in the text, 
 is from ' Cousin's Analysis of the Will,' a piece of 
 philosophical investigation, which, though marred by 
 the error there adverted to, as well as by that involved 
 in affinning the necessity of the acts of intelligence, 
 displays in the main much analytic skill, and is 
 characterized by an intelligibleness and distinctness 
 which contrast favourably with the hopeless mysticism 
 of some of the author's other speculations. 
 
 For those who have not seen the article, I transcribe 
 the concluding portion of it which may afTord a pretty 
 accurate idea of the general strain of the whole. 
 
 ' The whole action which we undertook to analyze, 
 is resolved into three elements perfectly distinct. 1, 
 The intellectual element, which is composed of the 
 motive for and against, of deliberation, of preference, 
 of choice. 2. The voluntary element, which consists 
 entirely in an internal act, namely, the resolution to 
 do. 3. The physical element, or external action. 
 
 ' If these three elements exhaust action, that is to 
 say, the phenomenon in which we have recognized the 
 characteristic of liberty in opposition to the pheno- 
 mena of intelligence and of sensation ; it is now the 
 question to determine precisely, in which of these 
 
NOTES. 199 
 
 three elements we are to find liberty, that is to say, 
 the power to do, with the consciousness of being able 
 not to do. Is this power to do, with the consciousness 
 of the power not to do, to be found in the first ele- 
 ment, the intellectual element of free action ? No : 
 for it is not in the power of man to judge that one 
 motive is preferable to another; we are not masters of 
 our preferences ; we prefer one motive to another on 
 this side, or that, according to our intellectual nature, 
 which has its necessary laws, without having the con- 
 sciousness of being able to prefer or to judge diffe- 
 rently, and even with the consciousness of being una- 
 ble not to prefer and to judge as we actually do. It 
 is not then in this element that we are to seek for 
 liberty, neither is it in the third element, in the phy- 
 sical act, for this act supposes the external world, an 
 organization which corresponds to it ; and in this 
 organization a muscular system, sound and appro- 
 priate, without which the physical act is impossible. 
 When we accomplish this, we are conscious of acting, 
 but on condition of a theatre which is not at our dis- 
 posal, and of instruments which are imperfectly at our 
 disposal, which we can neither restore, if they leave 
 us, — and they may leave us at any moment, — nor set in 
 order if they become deranged, and deceive us, and 
 which often do deceive us, and obey their own pecu- 
 liar laws, over which we have no power, and with 
 w'hich we are scarcely acquainted : whence it follows, 
 that we do not act here with the consciousness of 
 being able to do the opposite of that which we do. It 
 is not then in this third element, any more than in 
 the first, that we are to look for liberty ; it can only 
 be in the second, and there in fact we find it. 
 
 ' Neglect the first, and the third element, the judg- 
 
200 NOTES. 
 
 ment and the physical act, and let the second ele- 
 ment, the will, subsist alone ; analysis discovers two 
 terms still in this single element, namely, a special 
 act of will, and the power of will within us to which 
 we refer this act. This act is an effect in relation to 
 the power of will, which is the cause of it ; and this 
 cause, in order to produce its effect, needs no other 
 theatre and no other instrument than itself. It pro- 
 duces it directly, without any medium or condition ; 
 it continues and completes it, or suspends and modi- 
 ties it, or alters it entirely, or destroys it entirely ; and 
 at the very moment when it exercises itself by a spe- 
 cial act of any kind, we have the consciousness that it 
 could exercise itself by a special act of a quite con- 
 trary kind, without any obstacle, without exhausting 
 itself by such action, so that after having changed its 
 acts a hundred times, the faculty remains absolutely 
 the same, inexhaustible and identical with itself, in 
 the perpetual variety of its applications, always being 
 able to do what it does not do, and not to do what it 
 does. Here then in all its perfection, is the charac- 
 teristic of liberty. ' * 
 
 On these views, in addition to what has been said 
 elsewhere, I may just add here, that the resolution to 
 do an action, or the act of willing, results from the 
 perception that it is proper or desirable to be done, or 
 from the feeling of obligation, that it ought to be done, 
 or from both combined ; but neither the sense of fit- 
 ness, nor the feeling of obligation can arise without a 
 
 * I have inserted these paragraphs here, that the reader may 
 have an opportunitj' of seeing in their connexion various state- 
 ments and opinions embodied in them, which are introduced into, 
 and commented on in the text, and thus have the better oppor- 
 tunity of judging of the justness of the strictures there offered. 
 
NOTES. 201 
 
 perception of the reasons for doing the action which 
 this sense and feeling have respect to ; and a compre- 
 hensive view of these reasons again can only be ob- 
 tained by the voluntary application of the mind in 
 attention and inquiry. In a rational and moral agent 
 who regulates his conduct by reason and conscience, 
 the nature or kind of his resolves or the acts of his 
 will, are anything but arbitrary or independent of the 
 acts of intelligence and the feeling of obligation ; and 
 we could not have the consciousness that the will at the 
 very moment when it exercises itself by a special act of 
 any kind, could without any obstacle, exercise itself by a 
 special act of " a quite contrary kind," for there are the 
 powerful obstacles of the sense of fitness, and the feeling 
 of obligation. Thus at the moment of forming a resolu- 
 tion in accordance with these, the forming of a con- 
 trary one must be both irrational and immoral, not 
 merel}^ this, but the conscmis resolving iiTationally 
 and immorally, and the liberty to resolve and act 
 thus, is but the liberty to resolve and act as a mad- 
 man and a fiend ; if in this and this alone, consists 
 the liberty of man, from such a liberty we may 
 devoutly pray, " Good Lord deliver us ! " 
 
 NOTE C. p. 51. 
 
 In saying in the text that Coleridge has gone 
 astray in his attempts to discriminate between under- 
 standing and reason, I might have expressed what I 
 meant more accm'ately, by saying that I conceived he 
 had failed chiefly in his attempt to assign the nature 
 and functions of the latter. Hannonizina: in the main 
 
202 NOTES. 
 
 with Cousin and writers of that school, Coleridge re- 
 gards reason as the faculty in man which apprehends 
 or rather imbodies super-sensual truth, " reason is the 
 power of universal and necessary convictions, the 
 source and substance of truths above sense, and having 
 their evidence in themselves." For the reason thus 
 regarded, a far higher sphere and functions are 
 claimed, than are assigned by Butler and his school to 
 " the principle of reflection or conscience," a rule and 
 monitor of right in matters of conduct. Coleridge 
 following Kant, assigns to reason a two-fold form, the 
 speculative and the practical. " We consider one 
 and the same gift now as the ground of formal princi- 
 ples, and now as the origin of ideas. Contemplated 
 distinctively in reference to formal (or abstract) truth, 
 it is the speculative reason ; but in reference to actual 
 (or moral) truth, as the fountain of ideas, and the 
 light of conscience, we name it the practical reason ;" 
 even this last, as will be clearly seen, comprehends 
 much more than the * reflection or conscience ' of 
 Butler. Now, had not those who regard humai. 
 nature as possessed of such a power, better call it at 
 once the spiritual sense, or spiritual intuition ; or by 
 some other better name if they can devise it, and 
 avoid much obscurity and confusion (of which there 
 are abundance connected with the subject at the least) 
 occasioned by designating it by a term long, by gene- 
 ral consent, appropriated to a power altogether diffe- 
 rent. If they regard it as a mental faculty, let them 
 give it a name corresponding to what they deem its 
 nature ; and if they consider it a supernatural or 
 superhuman principle, let them call it by the * divine 
 light ' of the Quakers, or any other unambiguous de- 
 signation they please. 
 
NOTES. 203 
 
 I subjoin in the form Coleridge has given it, his 
 description of Understanding and Reason, each by its 
 characteristic qualities ; and let the reader try what he 
 can make out of it. 
 
 UNDERSTANDING. 
 
 1 . Understanding is dis- 
 cJMTsive. 
 
 2. The understanding in 
 all its judgments refers to 
 some other faculty as its 
 ultimate authority. 
 
 REASON. 
 
 1. Reason is fixed. 
 
 3. Understanding is the 
 faculty of reflection. 
 
 2. The reason in all its 
 decisions appeals to itself 
 as the ground and sub- 
 stance ohheir truth. (Heb. 
 vi. 13.) 
 
 3. Reason of contem- 
 plation. Reason indeed 
 is much nearer to sense 
 than to understanding : 
 for reason (says our great 
 Hooker) is a direct aspect 
 of truth, an inward be- 
 holding, having a similar 
 relation to the intelligible 
 or spiritual, as sense has 
 to the material or pheno- 
 menal. 
 
 The result is, that neither falls under the definition 
 of the other. They differ in kind. 
 
 Aids to Reflection, p. 163. 
 
204 NOTES. 
 
 NOTE D. p. 61. 
 
 I have not made any special reference to Bishop But- 
 ler in the text, but the view of conscience cited and com- 
 mented on in the part referred from, is essentially his ; 
 and a reperusal of his Three Sermons on Human Na- 
 ture, has suggested a few remarks on the functions and 
 capabilities claimed by him for conscience. These 
 remarks are submitted with considerable diffidence, 
 and with the most profound respect and admiration 
 for the high and varied merits of this distinguished 
 ethical philosopher. 
 
 The fundamental error of the system of Butler and 
 those who follow him, seems to be the placing of what 
 he calls the constitution of human nature, or what he 
 holds to be the governing principle there ' reflection 
 or conscience,' in the place of the rule of right or 
 moral law ; whereas conscience is only the power in 
 the mind, constituted and adapted to recognize this 
 law, and maintain its authority. 
 
 " From all these things put together," says he in 
 his Third Sermon, " nothing can be more evident 
 than that exclusive of revelation, man cannot be con- 
 sidered as a creature left by his Maker to act at ran- 
 dom, and live at large up to the extent of his natural 
 power, as passion, humour, wilfulness happen to carry 
 him, which is the condition brute creatures are in, but 
 that from his make, constitution, or nature, he is, in 
 the strictest and most proper sense, a laiv to himself. 
 He has the rule of right within : what is wanting, is 
 only that he honestly attend to it.' * ' Allowing that 
 
 ■" Butler's Fifteen Sermons, p. 25. Tegg's Edition, 1836. 
 
NOTES. 205 
 
 mankind hath the rule of right within himself, yet it 
 may be asked, ' What obligations are we under to at- 
 tend and follow it ? ' I answer, it has been proved, 
 that man by his nature is a law to himself, without the 
 particular distinct consideration of the positive sanc- 
 tions of that law ; the rewards and punishments which 
 we feel, and those which from the light of reason vve 
 have ground to believe are annexed to it. The question 
 then carries its own answer along with it. Your obli- 
 gation to obey this law, is its being the law of your 
 nature.' Here there seems something like a confounding 
 of the law or principle of conscience, with organic law, 
 as if not merely the power of making moral distinctions, 
 but the knowledge of the moral character of actions were 
 an essential element of our being. Not only the ex- 
 istence of this power, but its right exercise, and the 
 maintenance of its authority, are spoken of as essen- 
 tial to the constitution of human nature. " Every 
 man in his physical nature, is one individual single 
 agent. He has likewise properties and principles, 
 each of which may be considered separately, and with- 
 out regard to the respects they have to each other. 
 Neither of these are the nature we are taking a view 
 of. But it is the inward frame of man, considered as 
 a system or constitution ; whose several parts are 
 united, not by a physical principle of individuation, 
 but by the respect they have to each other ; the chief 
 of which is the subjection which the appetites, pas- 
 sions, and particular affections have to the supreme 
 principle of reflection or conscience. The system, or 
 constitution, is formed by, and consists in these respects 
 and this subjection.' '" But is the constitution of 
 
 * Note to Sermon 3. pp. 25, 26. The italics in the last sentence 
 are the present writer's. 
 
206 NOTES. 
 
 human nature dissolved ? does it cease to be human 
 nature when this order is violated ? If its constitution 
 were ' formed by, and consisted in these respects, and 
 this subjection,' then of necessity this constitution 
 would be at an end, when the appetites or passions 
 rebelled against conscience, and the different parts of 
 man's inner frame ceased to bear the proper relation 
 to each other. Were this indeed the case, however, 
 we fear there would be little of human nature now to 
 be found in the world. Here, as in the other instances 
 cited, has the philosopher been misled by a confusion 
 of the law of conscience with an organic principle. 
 The law of conscience is not properly the law of our 
 nature but of our life. The infringement of this law 
 is not the breaking up of man's constitution, but the 
 violation of his character. A man does not cease to 
 be a man, when he acts in opposition to conscience ; 
 but to be a good man. 
 
 The system of Butler, moreover, exhibits but a 
 loose notion of what conscience really is : he speaks 
 of it generally as the principle of reflection or con- 
 science. But reflection has a much wider range than 
 conscience, even in regard to conduct. A person may 
 have been guilty of a violation of a moral precept, 
 and when he thinks of what he has done, he experi- 
 ences a feeling of deep remorse, and severely blames 
 himself for his conduct ; at another time he may have 
 violated some of the conventional proprieties of social 
 life, and when he thinks of it, he experiences a keen 
 sense of shame and self-reproach : the feelings in both 
 cases are the result of reflection, but we could not say 
 that the self-reproach in the latter case was the voice 
 of conscience, as we would say it was in the former. 
 That which an individual experiences in the one case. 
 
NOTES. 207 
 
 is as much a sense of shame, as it is a sense of guilt 
 in the other ; yet would the shame have ever been 
 felt, had he not learned that to be a branch of social 
 etiquette which he had violated ? 
 
 NOTE E. p. 84. 
 
 I am not to be supposed unaware, however incapa- 
 ble I may be of understanding him, that Cousin in- 
 tends some higher and more recondite unity and 
 substance — those which he regards as characterizing 
 and being involved in * the absolute,' — what I mean to 
 show in the text is, that such notions are unknown 
 to the general reason of mankind. Indeed such unity 
 and substance must, considei-ed by themselves, be 
 utterly unknown to man, unless the finite were capa- 
 ble of comprehending the infinite, and in fact could 
 never be considered as coming within the range of his 
 conceptions, but on a system of pantheism which 
 makes humanity to belong to the infinite and absolute 
 itself, by identifying or confounding reason with God ; 
 — a system which denying freedom to the Deity in 
 the production of the works of creation, and yet as- 
 serting it on behalf of the human will, gives to the 
 emanation what is wanting in the source, and thus 
 destroys itself. 
 
 Here is our philosopher's exposition of his notions 
 of substance and unity ; but the reader who shall ex- 
 tract from it any tangible meaning, will be much 
 more fortunate than the present wTiter : — 
 
 * Among the laws of thought given by psychology, 
 
208 NOTES. 
 
 the two fundamental laws which contain all the others, 
 the law of causality and the law of substance, irre- 
 sistibly applied to themselves, elevate us immediately 
 to their cause and their substance ; and as they are 
 absolute, they elevate us to an absolute cause and an ab- 
 solute substance. But an absolute cause and an abso- 
 lute substance are identical in essence ; since every 
 absolute cause must be substance in so far as it is ab- 
 solute, and every absolute substance must be cause in 
 order to be able to manifest itself. Besides, an ab- 
 solute substance must be one, in order to be absolute ; 
 two absolutes are a contradiction ; and the absolute 
 substance must be one or not at all. We may even 
 say that all substance is absolute so far as it is sub- 
 stance, and consequently one ; for relative substances 
 destroy the very idea of substance, and finite ^sub- 
 stances, which suppose beyond them another substance 
 to which they belong, bear a strong resemblance to 
 phenomena. The unity of substance, therefore, is 
 involved in the very idea of substance, which is derived 
 from the law of substance, an incontestible result of 
 psychological observation ; so that experience applied 
 to consciousness, at a certain degree of profoundness, 
 gives that which appears at first view to be the most 
 opposed to it, namely, ontology. In fact substantial 
 causality is being in itself ; the rational laws, there- 
 fore, are laws of being, and reason is the true exist- 
 ence,' &c.* 
 
 Writing of this sort is fortunately placed beyond the 
 reach of refutation, by being far beyond the sphere 
 of human comprehension. So far as any glimmering 
 of meaning is perceptible, it seems to embody a sort 
 
 * Exposition of Eclecticism, pp. 64, 65. 
 
NOTES. 209 
 
 of idealistic fatalism, all things being resolved into 
 ' the absolute,' * absolute laws of thought,' * absolute 
 pnnci])les,' ' absolute cause,' ' absolute substance,' 
 ' absolute unity,' and reason, the true existence, as 
 if the external world were illusory. 
 
 The space devoted in the text to animadversions on 
 the philosophy of Cousin, will probably by many, 
 not specially acquainted with recent jihilosophical 
 speculations and their influence, be deemed quite dis- 
 proportioned to the occasion. But those will be of a 
 different opinion who are aware how deeply the highest 
 literature of the age is imbued with the spirit of the 
 German philosophy, of which Cousin is the apostle 
 and expounder. We have already seen how entirely 
 it pervades the system, (if it may be so called) of 
 Coleridge. And through the poetry of Wordsworth, 
 which if not the most popular of the age, has gained, 
 and in many respects deservedly, the highest reputa- 
 tion of any, there runs a subtle pantheistic spirit, 
 which needs not the less to be guarded against, that ic 
 presents itself to us in such forms of beauty. A por- 
 tion of our periodical criticism is infected with some- 
 thing of the same spirit ; and instances are not wanting, 
 of its manifestation in works of physical science. 
 
 A philosophy which aims at accrediting all forms of 
 faith, and all systems of opinion, which teaches that 
 every system represents an order of phenomena and of 
 ideas, which is perfectly real and true, though ' not the 
 only one,' in consciousness, — which proposing to it- 
 self ' no other task, than that of comprehending things 
 as they are, accepts, explains, and respects every- 
 thing,' — such a philosophy is specially in harmony 
 
 * Exposition of Eclecticism, pp. 84, 85. 
 P 
 
210 NOTES. 
 
 with the tendency and spirit of the age, as it mani- 
 fests itself in very much of what prefers its claims so 
 loudly to be considered the liberal press ; which, where 
 factious or political interests do not interfere, usually 
 treats the worst forms of religion with the gi"eatest 
 favour. Better, both as more honest, and as present- 
 ing more distinct points of attack, was the open in- 
 fidelity of last century, than the insidious and half- 
 acknowledgement of the claims of Christianity in this, 
 which seems to allow to it little more of truth than is 
 conceived to be involved. in the fact of its existence 
 and prevalence, in common with every other fonn of 
 faith, which has obtained in the world. 
 
 NOTE F. p. 91. 
 
 If the principles evolved in this chapter be correct, 
 little reflection will be necessary to perceive, that they 
 go directly to invalidate the pretensions of those who 
 claim for the church infallibility, and Icdship over 
 the faith and consciences of men. The spirit of the 
 whole section, may be expressed in a single apt and 
 appropriate sentence of Pascal: — 'The zea! of the 
 pious to seek and practise excellence, would be use- 
 less if prohability was exchanged for certainty.' The 
 Romish Church claims infallibility, and the Oxford 
 tractarians are promulging principles which can have 
 little significance or force apart from a similar claim. 
 Now infallibility in judgment or action, cannot be 
 possessed without certainty of knowledge ; to say that 
 one might be infallible in regard to a matter about 
 
NOTES. 211 
 
 which he jiossessed but uncertain knowledge, would 
 be as absurd as to say, that a person though uncertain 
 which of two or three roads to take, is yet sure to take 
 the right one ; any such unconscious infallibility 
 would be nothing above instinct. The Church of 
 Rome, and those who fraternize with her, by claiming 
 infallibility for the Church's interpretation of Scrip- 
 ture, and allowing no other, as they preclude the 
 exercise, and annul the right of individual or private 
 judgment, preclude also moral election or choice ; 
 consequently so far as such Church authority takes 
 effect, it extinguishes moral agency. The doctrines 
 of our religion are revealed, and its facts narrated in 
 a way which admits of, and even requires examination 
 and inquiry, — in a way which on a vast variety of 
 points gives scope for a choice between different views, 
 and by consequence between such different modes of 
 action, as these different views may prompt to, — a 
 freedom essential to all moral agency. The Romish 
 Church, or any other which annihilates this freedom, 
 countervails the fundamental law of the moral universe. 
 The assumption of a more inflexible and sterner 
 authority over our faith than God himself has claimed 
 in his word, certainly calls for the most searching and 
 severe scrutiny of their claim to exercise it, by whom 
 it is assumed ; and the most determined resistance, 
 if that claim is found to be invalid. And it will need 
 other warrant surely than a dubious and polluted 
 episcopal succession to command the submission of 
 thinking and independent men, — Britons too, who 
 glory in a birthright of freedom. To justify such claims 
 we are entitled to demand credentials as decisive as 
 ever attested the divine legation of ])rophet or apostle. 
 Till such are produced, we must be excused from 
 P 2 
 
212 NOTES. 
 
 yielding ; and to the calls of those, whoever they may 
 be, who may demand our submission, we will feel 
 entitled to respond — as the spirits did to the exorcist 
 priests who pretended to act in the name of Jesus and 
 of Paul, " Jesus and Paul we know, but who are ye ? " 
 
 NOTE G. p. 123. 
 
 This is the view given of death in ' Combe's Con- 
 stitution of Man,' a work that made a good deal of 
 noise some years ago, and which embodies a consi- 
 derable amount of one-sided and exaggerated truth, 
 blended with some fundamental and pernicious errors. 
 One of the fundamental and distinctive principles of 
 the work is, ' the independent existence and operation 
 of the natural laws of creation,' which the author 
 divides into three classes — the physical, the organic, 
 and the moral. The peculiarity of the new doctrine, 
 he says, is that these operate independently of each 
 other. A favourite illustration of the independent 
 operation of the physical law, is the sinking of an un- 
 sound ship at sea : — ' The most pious and benevolent 
 missionaries,' says Mr. Combe, ' sailing to civilize 
 and christianize the heathen, may if they embark in 
 an unsound ship, be drowned by disobeying a physi- 
 cal law, without their destruction being averted by 
 their morality.' Mr. Combe represents the infringe- 
 ment of the physical and organic laws as punished 
 by physical and organic suffering, without such 
 suffering being intended to have any moral influ- 
 ence ; and in his observations on the moral advan- 
 tages of punishment, he sneers at that view of the 
 
NOTES. 213 
 
 sufferings of man in the present life, which regards 
 a moral influence as their highest end. * If,' says he, 
 evils and misfortunes are mere mercies of providence, 
 it follows that a headache consequent on a debauch, 
 is not intended to prevent repetition of drunkenness 
 so much as to prepare the debauchee for the invisible 
 world ; and shipwreck in a crazy vessel is not designed 
 to render the merchant more cautious, but to lead 
 him to heaven.' Now we regard these sufferings as 
 intended and adapted to have both sorts of influence — 
 the prudential and the moral too ; and by the way we 
 should be curious to know, what class of serious 
 Christians would regard that as a jireparation for ' the 
 invisible world,' which did not prevent ' a repetition 
 of drunkenness ! ' 
 
 Now these principles kept in view, let us examine 
 Mr. Combe's notion of death : — In page 65,* there 
 occurs the following statement : * This then,' the pre- 
 vious reasoning, ' leaves death in old age, as a natural 
 and unavoidable institution of the Creator.' On this 
 principle decay and death will take place, though no 
 physical or organic law has been infringed : of what 
 then are they the punishment P Though a person 
 should ever live and act in harmony with all the natural 
 laws, death in old age is on this principle unavoida- 
 ble : — in these circumstances then, is death no evil ? 
 This is what the author is evidently most anxious that 
 he could show, and that too without regard being had 
 at all, to a future state ; and no wonder, for the credit 
 of his theory depends upon it. 'It will not be de- 
 nied,' says he, ' that if old persons, when their powers 
 of enjoyment are fairly exhausted, and their cup of 
 
 * Combe's Constitution of Man. — People's Edition. 
 
214 NOTES. 
 
 pleasure is full, could be removed from this world, as 
 we have supposed the lower auiuials to be, in an in- 
 stant, and without pain or consciousness, to make 
 way for a fresh and vigorous offspring, about to run 
 the career which the old have terminated, there would 
 be no lack of benevolence and justice in the arrange- 
 ment.' ' In old persons the powers of enjoyment are 
 fairl}' exhausted : ' of what portion of these powers will 
 this be true if they have never been abused ? Will 
 it of any but a few of the lowest ? We have always 
 been taught by what we have been accustomed to 
 regard as sound philosophy, that the higher orders of 
 these powers are enlarged and strengthened by proper 
 exercise, and if such be the case, when shall their 
 capacity for enjoyment be exhausted ? Not until the 
 sources from which enjoyment may be derived shall 
 fail ; and amid such a universe, when should this be ? 
 Whatever might be said of the justice of the arrange- 
 ment, by which creatures thus situated, and who had 
 acted in harmony with all the laws of their nature, would 
 have to suffer the inconceivable calamity of a dissolu- 
 tion of their being ; its benevolence would certainly 
 be more than questionable, unless they were removed 
 to something better, a provision which forms no ele- 
 ment of the theory. 
 
 Mr. Combe is strenuous in asserting that if man- 
 kind would live in harmony with the physical and or- 
 ganic laws, they would be nearly if not altogether free 
 from corporeal suffering. But do we live under a 
 constitution of external nature which admits of this ? 
 Are not the vicissitudes of the weather alone, not to 
 speak of earthquakes and volcanoes, fatal to such a 
 theory ? Notwithstanding the very advanced state of 
 science and the arts, man can see but dimly into 
 
NOTES. 215 
 
 futurity regarding what may intimately concern his 
 safety, and is often exposed to dangers he could neither 
 anticipate nor guard against. A storm may arise at 
 sea, which may wreck the strongest vessel. One may 
 catch the contagion of fever, where he could not be 
 aware of there being any danger. A horse may stum- 
 ble that never stumbled before, and fracture its rider's 
 limb. Or one may have his neck broken by a slight 
 trip of the foot on a stair. And though it were pos- 
 sible for mankind to obtain such a knowledge of all 
 the agencies of nature, and such a control over its 
 elements, as would place them in a condition of per- 
 fect security, how on these principles shall the moralist 
 dispose of the long transition-ages of suffering and 
 danger ? If organic suffering has no relation to any- 
 thing but the violations of organic law, how can its 
 justice be vindicated in the case of those who would 
 become aware of the existence of some such law, only 
 by suffering the consequences of its infringement ; as 
 in Mr. Combe's own illustration of the effects of eat- 
 ing fox-glove or hemlock, how could persons in the 
 infancy of science possibly know that certain quanti- 
 ties of these taken into the stomach would produce 
 death, until experience had taught them by the actual 
 occurrence ? If it is one of the natural laws, (' which 
 admit of no exceptions ') that organic suffering occurs 
 only in consequence of, and as punishment for, vio- 
 lation of organic law, how will Mr. Combe vindicate 
 the benevolence of an arrangement involving such 
 consequences ? 
 
 Moreover, if, as is not denied, some pain would be 
 experienced at death, even though no organic law 
 were infringed during life, pain in that case could not 
 be imitive as regards that law, no, nor yet preventive 
 
216 NOTES. 
 
 either, for there could be no evil to prevent regarding 
 the organic frame when it was just dissolving ; — if the 
 cause of such suffering must not be sought in the ope- 
 ration of any other law, it will follow that God in- 
 flicts or allows suffering for no cause at all. If we 
 are not prepared to admit this, then we must disallow 
 the independent operation of the physical and organic 
 laws, and acknowledge that physical and organic 
 suffering have another relation and purpose than the 
 punishment of the infringement of these laws. 
 
 NOTE H. p. 150. 
 
 In regard to some of the most important of the 
 principles set forth in these pages, and in the inter- 
 pretation of more than one of the Scripture texts there 
 cited, I fortify myself by the authority of an eminent 
 and very learned living divine, Dr. John Brown of 
 Edinburgh. 
 
 'The apostle (ITim. ii. 1 — 6.) speaks of the 
 " One God, as our Saviour." It may not be very easy 
 to determine whether, when Paul used the word our 
 here, he spake as a Christian or as a man. It is 
 certain that God is, in a peculiar sense, the Saviour 
 of those who through the faith of the Gospel, receive 
 the blessings of the Christian salvation ; but it is 
 equally plain, that God stands in the relation of Sa- 
 viour, as well as of Creator, and preserver, and bene- 
 factor, and governor to the human race. The living 
 God is the Saviour of all men, specially of them that 
 believe. The words plainly teach us that there is a 
 
NOTES. 217 
 
 sense in which God is the Saviour of all men, while 
 there is another and a higher sense in which he is the 
 Saviour only of them who helieve. 
 
 ' He is the Saviom- of all men, inasmuch as, moved 
 by that infinite benignity which prevents him from 
 having pleasure in the sufferings, even of the most 
 guilty of his creatures ; in the death of him who dietb, 
 he has ])rovided a Saviour and salvation, such as are 
 ■needed by all men, such as are suited to all men; and 
 inasmuch, too, as he has made a revelation of that 
 salvation, addressed to all mankind, proclaiming him- 
 self " God in Christ, reconciling the world to him- 
 self, not imputing their trespasses unto them. " There 
 is nothing restrictive either in the nature of the salva- 
 tion, or in the form of the revelation. Both respect 
 the common character of mankind as rational, respon- 
 sible, guilty, depraved, miserable, mortal, immortal 
 beings. In the salvation there is every thing man 
 needs, and the language of the revelation is, " To you, 
 O MEN, I call, and my voice is to the Sons of 
 Men." He is thus the Saviour, not of a particular 
 nation, but of men of " every kindred, and jieople, and 
 tongue, and nation." 
 
 ' This Saviour-God would have all men to be 
 saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth. 
 From Scripture nothing is plainer, than that the sal- 
 vation of man is wliolly of God, and the destruction of 
 man wholly of himself. If man perishes, he is the 
 suicide of his own soul. For God has sworn by him- 
 self, that he has no pleasure in the death of him w'ho 
 dieth, but that he has pleasure in his turning from his 
 evil ways, and living. " Turn ye, turn ye," says he, 
 " why will ye die." 
 
 ' And in order to their being saved, he willeth that 
 
218 NOTES. 
 
 they come to the knowledge of the truth. From the 
 constitution of the economy of nature, a constitution 
 admirably illustrative of the wisdom, and righteous- 
 ness, and benignity of God, and admirably suited to 
 the intellectual and moral frame of man's nature, the 
 only way in which individuals can become partakers 
 of the salvation provided by God, is by thus under- 
 standing and believing the truth, that plain, well-ac- 
 credited, and most indubitable statement of the way of 
 salvation made in the Holy Scriptures. This state- 
 ment God wills that all men should become acquainted 
 with, and that all who become acquainted with it, 
 should believe it. In regard to the first of these facts, 
 what can be more satisfactory evidence than the words 
 of our Lord, invested " with all power in heaven and 
 on earth," the fully accredited revealer of the divine 
 will, " Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel 
 to every creature.''' It is the commandment of the 
 everlasting God, that the mystery kept secret from 
 former generations, but now made manifest, should 
 by the Scriptures of the prophets be made known to 
 all nations for the obedience of faith, and arrange- 
 ments, in the appointment of the Gospel ministry, are 
 made for carrying this commandment into eflect. 
 
 ' If mankind have not the knowledge of the truth, 
 the cause is to be sought for anywhere, rather than in 
 God's not willing that it should be so. It is to be 
 found in men's neglecting to comply with, in men 
 opposing the plainly revealed will of God. And it is 
 equally plain that it is the will of God, that all to 
 whom the truth comes, should know and believe, 
 wherever the Gospel comes. " He commands all 
 men every where to repent," i. e. to change their minds 
 by believing the truth. If men continue ignorant and 
 
NOTES. 219 
 
 unbelieving under a dispensation of the Gospel, this 
 is not in accordance with, but in direct opposition to, 
 the will of God. God, as the Saviour of men, appears 
 in the Gospel, holding forth a salvation which all men 
 need, and which he is ready to bestow on every sinner 
 
 believing in Jesus. 
 
 * * -A- * 
 
 ' This one Mediator of men, has given himself a 
 ransom for all. '" * This giving himself a 
 
 ransom was not, as some would have it, the yielding 
 the exact amount of duty and suffering, neither more 
 nor less, due by those who are ultimately to be saved 
 through his mediation, a doctrine nowhere explicitly 
 taught in Scripture, replete with most perplexing 
 difficulties, and utterly irreconcilable with many in- 
 spired declarations ; but the doing and suffering as the 
 substitute of sinners, what, in the estimation of infinite 
 wisdom and righteousness, was necessary and suffi- 
 cient to make the pardon of sin, and the salvation of 
 sinners consistent with, illustrative of the perfections 
 of the divine character, and the principles of the 
 divine government. 
 
 ' When it is said our Lord, as the Mediator of 
 men, gave himself a ransom for all, we are not to 
 undei'stand that our Lord secured the salvation of all 
 men, for it is plain that all men will not ultimately be 
 saved, nor are we to understand that our Lord antici- 
 pated any result from his mediatorial exertions, which 
 will not flow from them, for he sees and shall see of 
 the travail of his soul, so as to be satisfied ; but we are 
 to understand that as, if Christ had not given himself 
 a ransom, in the sense in which we have explained it, 
 the perfections of the divine character, and the princi- 
 ples of the divine government, would have presented 
 
220 NOTES. 
 
 insurmountable obstacles in the way of the salvation 
 o^ any sinner; so, because Christ has given himself a 
 ransom, these obstacles are completely removed, so 
 that, if sinners perish, their perdition must be traced 
 to some other cause than to the absolute impossibility 
 which, without the mediation of Christ, umst have 
 existed of their being saved ; and that every sinner, 
 be he Jew or Gentile, however guilty, however de- 
 praved, believing in Jesus, is assured of salvation in a 
 way infinitely glorious to the righteousness, as well as 
 to the grace of Jehovah. Not only is the ransom 
 paid by him, that is, his obedience to the death, of 
 sufficient value, that if God pleased, it might avail for 
 the pardon and salvation of all the sinning beings in 
 the universe, but it is intended by God, is in its own 
 nature fitted, and has in fact been found effectual, for 
 removing all the obstacles arising out of the divine 
 moral government, to the pardon and salvation of the 
 lost race of men, so that " whosoever believeth in him 
 shall assuredly not perish, but have everlasting life." ' 
 On the Design and Effects of Christ's Death. In 
 ' Opinions on Faith, Divine Influence,' &c. By 
 John Brown, D.D. 
 
 NOTE I. p. 167. 
 
 In addition to, and elucidation of, the paragraph 
 in the text, it should be borne in mind that in a moral 
 agent * knowledge is ' emphatically ' power.' And such 
 an agent is not to be regarded as free from guilt in not 
 doing what is required of him, or in doing what he is 
 
NOTES. 221 
 
 forbidden to do, because he was ignorant of such 
 connnands or prohibitions, wlien he might have known 
 liad he attended to them, or made inquiry respecting 
 them. So in other respects; the capacity for yielding 
 obedience, or the power of doing so, is increased by 
 a heahhfal exercise and ap})lication of the powers of 
 the mind, such as moral law calls for, in this way the 
 physical capabilities of the living agent are enhanced, 
 as well as amoral promptitude and decision generated. 
 Man's moral Governor then justly looks for and de- 
 mands from him, all along through his life, whatever 
 he might be fit to yield by adequately and unceasingly 
 improving all the elements and means of moral pro- 
 gress in his constitution and condition, and not merely 
 what he might be able at any time to render though 
 he had habitually neglected to improve these. 
 
 NOTE K. p. 183. 
 
 " Hath not the potter power over the clay of the 
 same lump, to make one vessel unto honour, and ano- 
 ther unto dishonour ? " That the " clay " here is 
 intended to represent the Jewish people, is evident 
 from the reasoning in the context, viewed in connec- 
 tion with the passage in the prophecies of Jeremiah, 
 from which the figure seems to be borrowed ; and the 
 Jewish people too, in that state of spiritual apostacy 
 and moral vileness into which they had sunk them- 
 selves, iind in which they had become utterly unfit to 
 answer the intentions of heaven in their selection and 
 separation from the other nations of the earth, a state 
 
222 NOTES. 
 
 of such sinfulness and rebelliousness, in spite of special 
 forbearance and favour, as made the having mercy 
 on any an act of the highest and most sovereign 
 grace. From such a lump, the making vessels unto 
 dishonour was not in any inscrutable sovereignty, but 
 on the highest and most obvious reasons : — " The 
 word which came to Jeremiah from the Lord, saying, 
 Arise, and go down to the potter's house, and there I 
 will cause thee to hear my vrords. Then T went down 
 to the j50tter's house, and, behold, he wrought a work 
 on the wheels. And the vessel that he made of clay 
 was marred in the hand of the potter; so he made it 
 again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to 
 make it. Then the word of the Lord came to me, 
 saying, house of Israel, cannot I do with you as 
 this potter? saith the Lord. Behold, as the clay is 
 in the potter's hand, so are ye in mine hand, O house 
 of Israel. At what instant I speak concerning a 
 nation to pluck up, and to pull down, and to destroy 
 it; if that nation, against whom I have pronounced, 
 turn from their evil, I will repent of the evil that I 
 thought to do unto them. * * Now, there- 
 fore, go speak to the men of Judah, and to the inhab- 
 itants of Jerusalem, saying, thus saith the Lord, Be- 
 hold, I frame evil against you, and devise a device 
 against you : return ye every one from his evil way, 
 and make your ways and your doings good. And thev 
 said, There is no hope ; but we will walk after our 
 own devi( es, and we will every one do the imagina- 
 tion of his evil heart." It is obvious then from this 
 passage, that the " vessels " assigned to dishonour are 
 not only made from a lump, which like the " clay" of 
 the potter is all vile, but also that they had been 
 marred when under a previous process, fitted and 
 
NOTES. 223 
 
 intended to make them vessels of honour. Compare 
 the passage just cited, with Rom. ix. 22, and ii. 4, o. 
 The great principle which the apostle reasons out in 
 • Rom. ix, appears to be this, that the being of the 
 stock of Abraham, would not in the least protect any 
 person from being treated according to his own proper 
 desert ; but of the same lump, God would assign one 
 vessel to honour and another to dishonour, according 
 as they were found respectively fitted. 
 
 NOTE L. p. 184, 
 
 Much doctrinal confusion and even error, and much 
 unwarrantable assumption have resulted from not 
 rightly apprehending and keeping in view the distinc- 
 tion between the general love, or love of benevolence 
 which God bears towards the whole race of men, with 
 the grace bestowed on them in consequence ; and that 
 love of complacency and communion which he bears 
 to his chosen. Nothing could be more full and distinct 
 than the Scripture enunciations of both, yet how fre- 
 quently has either the one or the other been overlooked 
 or denied. The high Calvinist has disallowed any love 
 of benevolence on the part of God towards all man- 
 kind, while the low Arminian or Universalist, while 
 contending for this, has merged in it all the love of 
 God towards any of our race, denying any discrimi- 
 native regard for a peculiar and chosen ])eople. 
 Scripture passages in abundance, declaratory and ex- 
 pressive, of the benevolence of God towards the whole 
 of mankind have been cited or refeiTed to in the course 
 
224 NOTES. 
 
 of the previous treatise : nor, though it came not 
 within our plan to advert to it, is his special love 
 to his chosen less distinctly or copiously expressed. 
 " The secret of the Lord is with them that fear 
 him." " Like as a father pitieth his children, so 
 the Lord pitieth them that fear him." " Oh how 
 great is thy goodness, which thou hast laid up for 
 them that fear thee ; which thou hast wrought for 
 them that trust in thee before the sons of men." " He 
 that hath my commandments and keepeth them," 
 says Christ, " he it is that loveth me, and he that 
 loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will 
 love him, and will manifest myself unto him." " Then 
 they that feared the Lord spake often one to another, 
 and the Lord hearkened, and heard it, and a book of 
 remembrance was written before him for them that 
 feared the Lord, and that thought upon his name. 
 And they shall be mine, saith the Lord of Hosts, 
 in that day when I make up my jewels; and I will 
 spare them as a man spareth his own son that serveth 
 him." It is said of God in respect to his chosen, — 
 " He will rejoice over thee with joy,, he will rest in 
 his love, he will joy over thee with singing.'' 
 
 NOTE M. p. 185. 
 
 ' It is apparently,' (evidently) says Howe, ' to be 
 resolved into the wickedness of the world, that there 
 is not a universal diffusion of the Gospel into every 
 part. For it being evident to any one's reflection, 
 that men are in a state of apostacy and defection from 
 their Maker and common Lord : and therefore subject 
 
NOTES. 225 
 
 to his displeasure. Whereas the merciful God hath 
 done his own part, and so much beyond what was to 
 be expected from him ; issued out his proclamations 
 of peace and pardon, upon so easy and indulgent 
 terms, as are expressed in his Gospel ; ifhereu])on, 
 men also did their part, behaved themselves suitably 
 to the exigency of their case, and as did become 
 reasonable creatures, fallen under the displeasure of 
 their Maker, (whereof their common condition affords 
 so innumerable, so pregnant proofs) the gospel where- 
 soever it should arrive, would have been entertained 
 with so great a transport of joy, and so ready and 
 universal acceptance, as very soon to have made a 
 great noise in the world ; and being found to be of a 
 universal tenour and concernment, and that what it 
 says to one nation, it equally says the same to every 
 one ; it could not but be, that messengers would in- 
 terchangeably have run from nation to nation ; some 
 to communicate, others to inquire after those strange 
 tidings of great joy unto all people, lately sent from 
 heaven ; concerning the Emmanuel, God with us ; 
 God, again upon his return to man, and now in Christ 
 reconciling the world unto himself. And thus how 
 easily, and even naturally, would the gospel soon have 
 spread itself through the world, especially the merci- 
 ful God having so provided, that there should be an 
 office constituted, and set up ; a sort of men, whose 
 whole business it should be, to propagate and publish 
 those happy tidings. But that men should so in- 
 dulge their sensual, teiTene inclination, as not at all 
 to use their understandings and considering power 
 about other matters than only what are within the 
 sight of their eye, when by so easy and quick a turn 
 of thought they might feel and find out who made 
 Q 
 
226 NOTES. 
 
 them, and was the origmal of their life and heing, and 
 that things are not right, and as they should be, be- 
 tween him and them ; and so by what is within the 
 compass of natural revelation, be prepared for what is 
 supernatural. And not that only, but to that stupi- 
 dity by which they are unapt to inquire after and 
 receive, to add that obstinate malignity by which they 
 are apt to regret and oppose the merciful discoveries 
 and overtures of their offended, reconcilable Creator 
 and Lord. How manifestly doth this devolve the 
 whole business of the little, slow progress of the gospel 
 in the world, upon themselves only. As suppose we a 
 prince of the greatest clemency, benignity, and good- 
 ness, from whom a whole country of his subjects had 
 made a most causeless defection ; hereupon to send to 
 the whole body of the rebels, a gracious proclamation 
 of free pardon upon their return to their allegiance 
 and duty : and it only from hence comes to pass, that 
 every individual person of them distinctly under- 
 stands not what the message from their prince did 
 import, because they that heard it would not, many of 
 them, allow themselves to consider and regard it ; and 
 others of them with despiteful violence, fell upon the 
 heralds, barbarously butchering some of them, and 
 ignoniiniously repulsing the rest. Who would not 
 say that prince had fully done his part, and acquitted 
 himself answerably to the best character, though he 
 should send to the rebels no further overtures. Much 
 more, if through a long tract of time, he continues the 
 same amicable endeavours for their reducement, not- 
 withstanding the constant experience of the same ill 
 success. Who would not cast the whole business of 
 the continued ill understanding, between him and the 
 revolters, upon themselves ? and reckon it impossible 
 
any sliould be ignorant of his kind and benign incli- 
 nations and intentions, if an implacable enmity, and 
 disaflection to him and his government, were not their 
 common temper.' — Works in 8 vols. London. F. 
 Westley, 1822. Vol. II, p. 258, 259. 
 
 Since the last sheets of the present work were put 
 to press, I perceive in perusing Sir James Mackin- 
 tosh's Preliminary Dissertation to the Encyclopaedia 
 Britannica, which I had not before met with, that he 
 advocates the dogma, that en'oneous opinion is blame- 
 less ; or, in other words, that man is not responsible 
 for his opinions and belief: this the writer deems a 
 subject of regret in a work of such distinguished 
 merit, — a work embodying so much original and suc- 
 cessful disquisition on moral subjects. From this opi- 
 nion has obviously proceeded, what is perhaps the only 
 fault in the execution of the work, — the absence of 
 any adequate or merited censure of the pernicious 
 scepticism of such writers as Mr. Hume. The inde- 
 structible convictions of mankind, however, as embo- 
 died in the very structure of language, revolt against 
 such a conclusion ; and Sir James while stating and 
 defending this opinion, accordingly uses language 
 which appears to be utterly incompatible with it, and 
 to embody the elements of its complete refutation : — 
 
 ' The Scotists,' says Sir James, ' steadily affirmed 
 the blamelessness of erroneous opinion ; a principle 
 which is the only effectual security for conscientious 
 inquiry, for mutual kindness, and for public quiet.' * 
 
 * Preliminary Dissertation to the Ency. Brit. p. 312. 
 Q 2 
 
228 NOTES. 
 
 Much ignorance and error subsist in consequence of 
 men neglecting to inquire : if inquiry is a matter of 
 conscience, or what we are morally bound to, neglect- 
 ing to inquire must be a violation of moral obligation, 
 or a sin ; and how can those states of the understand- 
 ing (ignorance or erroneous opinion) be blameless 
 which subsist solely in consequence of neglecting what 
 we are morally bound to perform ? Is it meant that the 
 manner in which we pursue inquiry is a matter of con- 
 science — that we are morally bound to pursue it fairly; 
 — then there is much inquiry not so conducted ; men 
 examine, but they often do not examine impartially, — 
 they do not inquire after, and weigh duly, all the reasons 
 for and against an opinion, — they look on this side, — 
 they search on this side more than on that, according 
 as they wish the result to be : are ' those states of the 
 understanding ' altogether blameless which are thus 
 produced ? Again : — ' We morally approve industry, 
 desire of knowledge, and love of truth, and all the 
 habits by which the understanding is strengthened 
 and rectified, because their formation is subject to the 
 will. But we do not feel a moral anger against igno- 
 rance or folly, because they are involuntary.* If ' we 
 morally approve ' desire of knowledge and love of truth, 
 must we not morally disapprove or condemn their 
 opposites, and what are these but prejudice and unin- 
 quiring indolence, and by these ignorance and folly 
 subsist. The opinions men form on moral subjects en- 
 ter into their principles of action ; if erroneous opinion 
 here be blameless, how can the conduct be blameable 
 which is in accordance with it. Hume held and pub- 
 lished to the world the opinion that ' female infidelity 
 
 * Preliminary Dissertation to the Ency. Brit. p. 312. 
 
NOTES. 229 
 
 when known is a small thing, and when r.nknown, 
 nothing'.' If the holding of this opinion was hlame- 
 less, how could there be blameableness in acting on it ? 
 Yet, Sir James, though he treats Mr. Hume with a 
 very unmerited leniency in regard to this detestable 
 insinuation, regards the conduct it would lead to as 
 amongst the most debasing and disastrous both to 
 human nature and to society. Sir James continues : 
 ' No one but a religious persecutor, a mischievous and 
 overgrown child, wreaks his vengeance on involuntary, 
 inevitable, compulsory acts or states of the understand- 
 ing, which are no more affected by blame than the 
 stone which the foolish child beats for hurting him.' 
 I know of no acts or states of the understanding which 
 are ' inevitable,' or in any intelligible sense, ' com- 
 pulsory,' except it be those induced by strict demon- 
 stration, and such as result from the immediate per- 
 ceptions of the senses ; and these are the farthest from 
 having relation to religion that any states of the 
 understanding can be, and are not likely to expose 
 any to religious persecution. And why should the 
 principle, that erroneous opinion is blameless, be the 
 only safeguard against religious persecution, and ' the 
 only security for public quiet ' ? To regard ' acts and 
 states of the understanding' as morally blameable, is 
 one thing, to regard them as coming within the range 
 of civil authority, — or as ranking among things which 
 should be forcibly suppressed, is quite another, unless 
 civil authority be regarded as co-extensive with moral 
 obligation, and even religious duty, — a principle now 
 wisely abjured in all free communities, and one we are 
 sure Sir James Mackintosh would have been the last 
 to have knowingly sanctioned. And why, finally, 
 should the principle that erroneous opinion is blame- 
 
230 NOTES. 
 
 less, be regarded as ' the only security for mutual 
 kindness.' If we are not prepared to treat each other 
 with kindness notwithstanding the perception of blame- 
 worthiness, we are yet strangers to the highest order 
 of philanthropy. In the eyes of God we are all deeply 
 blameable ; yet with what kindness and compassion 
 are we treated by him : yea, it was our very guilt 
 which was the occasion of the highest manifestation of 
 his love towards us. Jesus Christ when he sojourned 
 on earth was kind even ' to the evil and unthankful,' 
 and manifested the tenderest concern for those who 
 had formed the falsest and most injurious opinions 
 respecting him, and he has left us " an example that 
 we should follow his steps." 
 
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