the Gospel, it has been argued that human nature is not so entirely corrupt and disabled as the above representation would suppose; and, indeed, on the Calvinistic theory, which denies that all men are interested in the benefits procured by the death of Christ, it would be extremely difficult for any to meet this objection, and to maintain their own views of the corruption of man with consistency. On the contrary theory of God's universal love nothing is more easy; because, in consequence of the atonement offered for all, the Holy Spirit is administered to all, and to his secret operations all that is really spiritual and good, in its principle, is to be ascribed. Independent of this influence, indeed, it may be conceived that there may be much restraint of evil, and many acts of external goodness in the world, without at all impugning the doctrine of an entire estrangement of the heart from God, and a moral death in trespasses and sins.

1. The understanding of man is, by its nature, adapted to perceive the evidence of demonstrated truth, and has no means of avoiding the conviction but by turning away the attention. Wherever, then, revelations of the Divine law, or traditional remembrances of it, are found, notions of right and wrong have been and must be found also.

state of mind in, at least, the majority of cases, is clear from the frauds, injustice, oppressions, cruelties, and avarice with which it was generally connected. 5. It is a fact, too, which cannot be denied, that men have constitutional evil tendencies, some more powerfully bent to one vice, some to another. Whether it results from a different constitution of the mind that the general corruption should act more powerfully in one direction in this man, and in another in that; or from the temperament of the body; or from some law impressed by God upon a sinful nature (which it involves no difficulty to admit, inasmuch as society could scarcely have existed without that balance of evils and that check of one vice upon another which this circumstance produces),—such is the fact; and it gives a reason for the existence of much negative virtue in society. From all these causes, appearances of good among unregenerate men will present themselves, without affording any ground to deduct any thing from those statements as to man's fallen state which have been just made; but these negative virtues, and these imitations of actions really good from interest, ambition, or honour, have no foundation in the fear of God, in a love to virtue as such, in a right will, or in spiritual affections; and they afford, therefore, no evidence of spiritual life, or, in other words, of religious principle. To other vices, to which there is any temptation, and to those now avoided, whenever the temptation comes, men uniformly yield; and this shows, that though the common corruption varies its aspects, it is, nevertheless, unre lieved by a real virtuous principle in any, so far as they are left to themselves.

3. Though the seeds of sin lie hid in the heart of all, yet their full developement and manifestation in action can only take place slowly and by the operation of exciting circumstances. Much of the evil in the world, also, lies in the irregularities of those natural appetites and the excesses of those passions which are not in themselves evil, and such corrupt habits cannot be formed until after opportunities of frequent indulgence have been given. This will account for the comparative innocence of infancy, of youth, and of those around whom many guards have been thrown by providential arrangement.

4. We may notice, also, that it is not possible, were all men equally constituted as to their moral nature, that all sins should show themselves in all men; and that although there is nothing, in the proper sense, good in any, that society should present an unvarying mass of corruption, which some appear to think a necessary corollary from the doctrine of the universal corruption of human nature. Avarice, the strong desire of getting and of hoarding wealth, necessarily restrains from expensive vices. An obsequious and a tyrannical temper cannot coexist in the same circumstances, and yet, in other circumstances, the obsequious man is often found to be tyrannical, and the latter obsequious. Certain events excite a latent passion, such as ambition, and it becomes a master-passion, to which all others are subordinated, and even vicious dispositions and habits controlled in order to success: just on the same principle that the ancient athletæ(8) and our modern prize-fighters abstain from sensual indulgences, in order to qualify themselves for the combat; but who show, by the habits in which they usually live, that particular vices are suspended only under the influence of a stronger passion. Perhaps, too, that love of country, that passion for its glory and aggrandizement, which produced so many splendid actions and characters among the Greeks and Romans, a circumstance which has been urged against the doctrine of man's depravity, may come under this rule. That it was not itself the result of a virtuous

(8) "Qui studet optatam cursu contingere metam, Multa tulit fecitque puer; sudavit et alsit; Abstinuit venere, et vino."-HORACE.

But virtues grounded on principle, though an imperfect one, and therefore neither negative nor simulated, may also be found among the unregenerate, and have existed, doubtless, in all ages. These, however, are not from man, but from God, whose Holy Spirit has been vouchsafed to "the world," through the atonement. This great truth has often been lost sight of in this controversy. Some Calvinists seem to acknow

grace;" others choose rather to refer all appearances of virtue to nature, and thus, by attempting to avoid the doctrine of the gift of the Spirit to all mankind, attribute to nature what is inconsistent with their opinion of its entire corruption. But there is, doubtless, to be sometimes found in men not yet regenerate in the Scripture sense, not even decided in their choice, something of moral excellence, which cannot be referred to any of the causes above adduced; and of a much higher character than is to be attributed to a nature which, when left to itself, is wholly destitute of spiritual life. Compunction for sin, strong desires to be freed from its tyranny, such a fear of God as preserves them from many evils, charity, kindness, good neighbourhood, general respect for goodness and good men, a lofty sense of honour and justice, and, indeed, as the very command issued to them to repent and believe the Gospel in order to their salvation implies, a power of consideration, prayer, and turning to God, so as to commence that course which, persevered in, would lead on to forgiveness and regeneration. To say that all these are to be attributed to mere nature, is to surrender the argument to the semi-Pelagian, who contends that these are proofs that man is not wholly degenerate. They are to be attributed to the controlling influence of the Holy Spirit; to his incipient workings in the hearts of men; to the warfare which he there maintains, and which has sometimes a partial victory, before the final triumph comes, or when, through the fault of man, through "resisting,"" grieving," "vexing," "quenching" that Holy Spirit, that final triumph may never come. It is thus that one part of Scripture is reconciled to another, and both to fact; the declaration of man's total corruption, with the presumption of his power to return to God, to repent, to break off his sins, which all the commands and invitations to him from the Gospel imply and thus it is that we understand how, especially in Christian countries, where the Spirit is more largely effused, there is so much more general virtue than in others; and in those circles especially, in which Christian education, and the prayers of the pious, and the power of example are applied and exhibited.

The Scriptural proof that the Spirit is given to "the world" is obvious and decisive. We have seen that the curse of the law implied a denial of the Spirit; the

removal of that curse implies, therefore, the gift of the Spirit, and the benefit must be as large and extensive as the atonement. Hence we find the Spirit's operations spoken of, not only as to the good, but the wicked, in all the three dispensations. In the patriarchal, "the Spirit strove with men;" with the antediluvian race, before and all the time the ark was preparing. The Jews in the wilderness are said to have "vexed his Holy Spirit" Christ promises to send the Spirit to convince the world of sin; and the book of God's Revelations concludes by representing the Spirit as well as the Bride, the Holy Ghost as well as the Church in her ordinances, inviting all to come and take of the water of life freely. All this is the fruit of our redemption and the new relation in which man is placed to God; as a sinner, it is true, still; but a sinner for whom atonement has been made, and who is to be wooed and won to an acceptance of the heavenly mercy. Christ having been made a curse for us, the curse of the law no longer shuts out that Spirit from us; nor can justice exclaim against this going forth of the Spirit, as it has been beautifully expressed, "to make gentle trials upon the spirits of men;" to inject some beams of light, to inspire contrite emotions, which, if they comply with, may lead on to those more powerful and effectual. If, however, they rebel against them, and oppose their sensual imaginations and desires to the secret promptings of God's Spirit, they ultimately provoke him to withdraw his aid, and they relapse into a state more guilty and dangerous. Again and again they are visited in various ways, in honour of the Redeemer's atonement, and for the manifestation of the long-suffering of God. In some the issue is life; in others, an aggravated death; but in most cases this struggle, this "striving with man," this debating with him, this standing between him and death, cannot fail to correct and prevent much evil, to bring into existence some "goodness," though it may be as the morning cloud and the early dew, and to produce civil and social virtues, none of which, however, are to be placed to the account of nature, nor used to soften our views of its entire alienation from God; but are to be acknowledged as magnifying that grace which regards the whole of the sinning race with compassion, and is ever employed in seeking and saving that which is lost.

'We have established it as the doctrine of Holy Scripture, that all men are born with a corrupted nature, and that from this nature rebellion against the Divine authority universally flows, and that, in consequence, the whole world is, as St. Paul forcibly expresses it, guilty before God."

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Before any issue proceeded from the first pair, they were restored to the Divine favour. Had no method of forgiveness and restoration been established with respect to human offenders, the penalty of death must have been forthwith executed upon them, there being no doubt of the fact of their delinquency, and no reason, in that case, for delaying their punishment; and with and in them the human race must have utterly perished. The covenant of pardon and salvation which was made with Adam, did not, however, terminate upon him; but comprehended all his race. This is a point made indubitable by those passages we have already quoted from the apostle Paul, in which he contrasts the injury which the human race have received from the disobedience of Adam, with the benefit brought to them by the obedience of Jesus Christ. "For if, through the offence of one many be dead, much more the grace of GoD, and the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many."-"Therefore, as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life."

Since, then, the penalty of death was not immediately executed in all its extent upon the first sinning pair, and is not immediately executed upon their sinning descendants; since they were actually restored to the Divine favour, and the same blessing is offered

to us, our inquiries must next be directed to the nature and reason of that change in the conduct of the Divine Being, in which he lays aside, in so great a measure, the sternness and inflexibility of his office as Judge, and becomes the dispenser of grace and favour to the guilty themselves.

The existence of a Divine Law, obligatory upon man, is not doubted by any who admit the existence and government of GOD. We have already seen its requirements, its extent, and its sanctions, and have proved that its penalty consists not merely of severe sufferings in this life; but in death, that is, the separation of the body and the soul,-the former being left under the power of corruption, the other being separated from God, and made liable to punishment in another state of being.

It is important to keep in view the fact of the extent and severity of the punishment denounced against all transgressions of the law of GoD, because this is illustrative of the character of God; both with reference to his essential holiness and to his proceedings as Governor of the world. The miseries connected with sin, as consequences affecting the transgressor himself and society, and the afflictions, personal and national, which are the results of Divine visitation, must all be regarded as punitive. Corrective effects may be secondarily connected with them, but primarily, they must all be punitive. It would be abhorrent to all our notions of the Divine character, to suppose perfectly innocent beings subject to such miseries; and they are only, therefore, to be accounted for on the ground of their being the results of a supreme judicial administration, which bears a strict, and often a very terrible character. If, to the sufferings and death which result from offences in the present life, we add the future punishment of the wicked, we shall be the more impressed with the depth and breadth of that impress of justice which marks the character and the government of God. Say that this punishment is that of loss, loss of the friendship and presence of God, and all the advantages which must result from that immediate intercourse with him which is promised to righteous persons; and that this loss, which, confessedly, must be unspeakably great, is eternal; even then it must follow that the turpitude of moral delinquency is regarded by our Divine Legislator and Judge as exceedingly mighty and aggravated. But when to the punishment of loss in a future life, we add that of pain, which all the representations of this subject in Scripture certainly establish, whether they are held to be expressed in literal or in figurative phrase; to which pain also the all impressive circumstance of eternity is to be added; then is our sense of the guilt and deserving of human offence against God, according to the principles of the Divine law, raised, if not to a full conception of the evil of sin (for as we cannot measure the punishment we cannot measure the quality of the offence), yet to a standard of judging, which may well warrant the Scriptural exclamation, "it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God."

These premises are unquestionable, if any respect is paid to the authority of Scripture, and, indeed, God's severity against moral offence is manifested, as to this present life, by facts of universal observation and uninterrupted history, quite independent of Scripture. But it is to the testimony of God himself, in his own word, that we must resort for the most important illustrations of the Divine character, and especially of its HOLINESS and JUSTICE.

With respect to the former, they show us that HOLINESS in God is more than a mere absence of moral evil; more than approval and even delight in moral goodness; more than simple aversion and displeasure at what is contrary to it. They prove that the holiness of God is so intense, that whatever is opposed to it is the object of an active displacence, of hatred, of opposition, and resistance, and that this sentiment is inflexible and eternal. Agreeably to this, GoD is, in Scripture, said to be "of purer eyes than to behold iniquity" and we are taught that "the thoughts of the wicked are an abomination" to him.

With respect to the JUSTICE of God, it is necessary that we should enter into a larger view, since a righit conception of that attribute of the Divine nature lies at the foundation of the Christian doctrine of atonement.

Justice is usually considered as universal or particular. Universal justice or righteousness includes holi

ness, and, indeed, comprehends all the moral attributes of God, all the Divine virtues of every kind. Particular justice is either commutative, which respects equals; or distributive, which is the dispensing of rewards and punishments, and is exercised only by governors. It is the justice of God in this last view, but still in connexion with universal justice, with which we are now concerned; that rectoral sovereign justice by which he maintains his own rights, and the rights of others, and gives to every one his due according to that legal constitution which he has himself established. And as this legal constitution, under which he has placed his creatures, is the result of universal justice or righteousness, the holiness, goodness, truth, and wisdom of God united; so his distributive justice, or his respect to the laws which he has himself established, is, in every respect and degree, faultless and perfect. In this legal constitution no rights are mistaken or misstated; and nothing is enjoined or prohibited, nothing promised or threatened but what is exactly conformable to the universal righteousness or absolute moral perfection of God. This is the constant doctrine of Scripture; this the uniform praise bestowed upon the Divine law, that it is, in every respect, conformable to abstract truth, purity, holiness, and justice, and is itself truth, purity, holiness, and justice. "The statutes of the Lord are RIGHT, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the Lord is PURE, enlightening the eyes; the fear of the Lord is CLEAN, enduring for ever; the judgments of the Lord are TRUE and RIGHTEOUS altogether." Psalm xix. 8, 9. "The law is holy, and the commandment HOLY, JUST, and GOOD." Rom. vii. 12.

Of the strictness and severity of the punitive justice of God, the sentence of death, which we have already seen to be pronounced upon "SIN," and, therefore, upon all transgressions of God's law, for "sin is the transgression of the law," is sufficient evidence; and the actual infliction of death, as to the body, is the standing proof to the world, that the threatening is not a dead letter, and that in the Divine administration continual and strict regard is had to the claims and dispensations of distributive justice. On the other hand, as this distributive justice emanates from the entire holiness and moral rectitude of the Divine nature, it is established, by this circumstance, that the severity does not go beyond the equity of the case; and that, to the full extent of that punishment which may be inflicted in another life, and which is, therefore, eternal, there is nothing which is contrary to the full and complete moral perfection of God, to his goodness, holiness, truth, and Justice united; but that it is fully agreeable to them all, and is, indeed, the result of the perfect existence of such attributes in the Divine nature.

The Scriptures, therefore, are frequently exceedingly emphatic in ascribing a perfect righteousness to the judicial and penal visitations of sinful individuals and nations; and that not merely with reference to such visitations being conformable to the penalties threatened in the Divine law itself, in which case the righteousness would consist in their not exceeding the penalty threatened; but, more abstractedly considered, in their very nature, and with reference to even the highest standard of righteousness and holiness. "Shall not the Judge of the whole earth do RIGHT?” "It is a RIGHTEOUS THING with God to RECOMPENSE tribulation to them that trouble you." 2 Thess. i. 6. "The day of wrath and revelation of the RIGHTEOUS JUDGMENT of GOD." Rom. ii. 5. "Even so, Lord God Almighty, TRUE and RIGHTEOUS are thy judgments." Rev. xvi. 7.

The legal constitution, then, which we are under, secures life to the obedient, but dooms offenders to die. It is the office of distributive justice to execute this penalty, as well as to bestow the reward of obedience; and the appointment of the penalty and the execution of it are both the results of the essential rectitude of God.

This is most obvious as the doctrine of Scripture; but have we any means of discerning the connexion between the essential justice or universal righteousness of God, and such a constitution of law and government as, in the first instance, ordains so severe a penalty against sin as death, maintains it unchangeably through all the generations of time, and carries it into eternity? This is an important question, not without its difficulties, and yet it may not altogether elude our inquiries. Whether we succeed or not in discovering

this connexion, the fact remains the same, firmly grounded on the most explicit testimony of GoD in his own word. It is, however, an inquiry worthy our attention.

The creation of beings capable of choice, and endowed with affections, seems necessarily to have involved the possibility of volitions and acts contrary to the will of the Creator, and, consequently, it involved a liability to misery. To prevent this, both justice and benevolence were concerned. Justice, seeing that the Creator has an absolute right to the entire obedience of the creatures he has made, and all opposition to that will is the violation of a right, and the practice of a wrong, which justice is bound to prevent. Benevolence, because this opposition to the will of God, which will is the natural law of a creature, must be the source of misery to the offender, and that independent of direct punishment. This is manifest. Some end was proposed in creation, or it could not have been a work of wisdom; the felicity of the creature must also have been proposed as an end, either principal or subordinate, or creation could not have been a display of goodness; a capacity and power of holiness must also have been imparted to moral agents, or, in a moral nature, every act would have been morally corrupt, and therefore, the creature must have been constantly displeasing to the holy God, and not "very good," as all his works, including man, were pronounced to be at the beginning. The end proposed in the forming of intelligent creatures could only be answered by their continual compliance with the will of God. This implied both the power and the exercise of holiness, and with that the felicity of the creature was necessarily connected. It was adapted to a certain end, and in attaining that its happiness was secured. To be disobedient was to set itself in opposi tion to God, to exist and act for ends contrary to the wisdom and holiness of God, and was, therefore, to frustrate his benevolent intentions also as to its happiness, and to become miserable from its very hostility to God, and the disorder arising from the misapplication of the powers with which it had been endowed. To prevent all these evils, and to secure the purposes for which creative power was exerted, were the ends, therefore, of that administration which arose out of the existence of moral agents. This rule takes date from their earliest being. No sooner did they exist, than a Divine government was established over them; and to the ends just mentioned all its acts must have been directed.

The first act was the publication of the will or law of God, for where there is no declared law there is no rational government. The second act was to give motives to obedience, for to creatures liable to evil, though created good, these were necessary; but as they were made free and designed to yield a willing service, more than motives, that is, rational inducements, operating through the judgment and affections, could not be applied to induce obedience :-external force or necessary impulse could have no place in the government of such creatures. The promise of the continuance of a happy and still improving life comprehended one class of motives to obedience; the real justice of yielding obedience another. But was no motive arising from fear also to be applied? There was much to be feared from the very nature of things; from the misery which, in the way of natural and necessary consequence alone, must follow from opposition to the will of God, and the wilful corrupting of a nature created upright. Now, since this was what the creature was liable to, the administration of the Divine government would have been obviously defective, had this been concealed by HIM, who had himself established that natural order, by which disobedience to the will of God, in a moral being, should be followed by certain misery, and he would apparently have been chargeable with not having used every means, consistent with free agency, to prevent so fatal a result. So far we conceive that this is indubitable.

But now let us suppose that nothing less than a positive penalty, of the most tremendous kind, could be a sufficient motive to deter these free and rational beings from transgression; that, even that threatened penalty itself, though the greatest possible evil, would not, in all cases, be sufficient; but that, in none a less powerful motive would prove sufficiently cautionary: then, in such circumstances, the moral perfection of the Divine nature, his universal rectitude and benevo

lence, would undoubtedly require the ordination of that penalty, however tremendous. The case might be a choice between the universal disobedience of all, and their being left to the miseries which follow from sin by natural consequence; and the preservation of some, perhaps the majority, though the guilty remainder should not only be punished by the misery which is the natural result of vice; but, in addition, should be subject to that positive penalty of death, which, as to the soul, runs on with immortality, and is, therefore, eternal.

On such an alternative as this, which may surely be conceived possible, and which contradicts no attribute of God, does the essential justice or rectitude of the Divine nature demand that such a penalty should be adopted? The affirmative of this question will be supported, I think, by the following considerations:

1. The holiness of God, which, as we have seen, is so intense as to abhor and detest every kind and degree of moral evil, would, from its very nature, its active and irreconcilable opposition to evil, determine to the adoption of the most effectual means of preventing its introduction among the rational beings which should be created, and, when introduced, of checking and limiting its progress. So that, in proportion to that aversion, must be his propension to adopt the most effectual means to deter his creatures from it; and if nothing less than such a penalty could be effectual, even in the majority of cases, then it resulted necessarily, from the holiness of GOD, that the penalty of death, in all its scriptural extent, should be attached to transgression.

2. The consideration of the essential justice or rectitude of God, that principle which leads to an unchangeable respect to what is right and equitably fit, leads to the same conclusion. God has his own rights as maker, and, therefore, proprietor and Lord of all creatures, and it is fit they should be maintained and vindicated. To surrender them, or unsteadily and uncertainly to assert them, would be an encouragement to evil, and his very regard to mere abstract right and moral fitness must, therefore, be considered as determining God to a steady and unchangeable assertion of his rights, since their surrender could present no end worthy of his character, or consistent with his holiness. But wherever more created beings exist than one, the rights of others also come into consideration; both the indirect right of a dependent creature, under government, to be protected, as far as may be, from the contagion of bad example, and the more direct right of protection from those injuries which many sins do, in their own nature, imply. For no man can be ambitious, unjust, &c. with out inflicting injury upon others. The essential rectitude of God was concerned, therefore, to regard these rights in the creatures dependent upon him, and to adopt such a legal constitution and mode of government, under which to place them, as should respect the maintenance of his own rights of sovereignty, and the righteous claims which his creatures, that is, the general society of created beings, had upon him. All this, it may be said, only proves that the essential rectitude of God required that such a government should be adopted as should inflict some marked penalty on offences. It proves this, but it proves more, namely, that the Divine rectitude required that the most effectual means should be adopted to uphold these rights, both as they existed primarily in God, and secondarily in his creatures. This must follow: for if there was any obligation to uphold them at all, it was an obligation to uphold them in the most effectual mauner, since, if ineffectual means only had been adopted, when more effectual means were at hand, a wilful abandoninent of those rights would have been implied. If, therefore, there were no means equally effectual for these purposes as the issuing of a law, accompanied by a sanction of death as its penalty, the essential rectitude of GOD required its adoption.

3. The same may be said of the Divine goodness and wisdom, for, as the former is tenderly disposed to preserve all sentient creatures from misery, so the latter would, of necessity, adopt the most effectual means of counteracting moral evil, which is the only source of misery in the creation of GOD.

The whole question, then, depends on this, whether the penalty of death, as the punishment of sin, be the most effectual means of accomplishing this end; the answer to which is, to all who believe the Bible, that as this has actually been adopted as the universal

penalty of transgressing the Divine law (see Chapter xviii.), and as this is confessedly the highest possible penalty, nothing less than this could be effectual to the purpose of government, and to the manifestation of the Divine holiness and rectitude. If it could, then a superfluous and excessive means has been adopted, for which no reason can be given, and which impeaches the wisdom of God, the office of which attribute it is to adapt means to ends by an exact adjustment; if not, then it was required by all the moral attributes of the Divine nature to which we have referred.

The next question will be, whether, since, as the result of the moral perfection of God, a legal constitution has been established among rational creatures which accords life to obedience, and denounces death against transgression, the justice of God obliges to the execution of the penalty; or whether we have any reason to conclude, that the rights of God are in many, or in all cases, relaxed, and punishment remitted. All the opponents of the doctrine of atonement strenuously insist upon this; and argue, first, that God has an unquestionable power of giving up his own rights, and pardoning sin on prerogative, without any compensation whatever; second, that when repentance succeeds to offence, there is a moral fitness in forgiveness, since the person offending presents an altered and reformed character; and finally, that the very affections of goodness and mercy, so eminent in the Divine character, require us to conclude that he is always ready, upon repentance, to forgive the delinquencies of all his creatures, or, at most, to make their punishments light and temporary.

In the first of these arguments, it is contended that God may give up his own rights. This must mean either his right to obedience from his creatures, or his right to punish disobedience, when that occurs. With respect to God's right to be obeyed, nothing can be more obvious than that the perfect rectitude of his nature forbids him to give up or to relax that right at all. No king can morally give up his right to be obeyed in the full degree which may be enjoined by the laws of his kingdom. No parent can give up his right to obedience, in things lawful, from his children, and be blameless. In both cases, if this be done voluntarily, it argues an indifference to that principle of rectitude on which such duties depend, and, therefore, a moral imperfection. Now this cannot be attributed to God, and, therefore, he never can yield up his right to be obeyed, which is both agreeable to abstract rectitude, and is, moreover, for the benefit of the creature himself, as the contrary would be necessarily injurious to him. But may he not give up his right to pu. nish, when disobedience has actually taken place? Only, it is manifest, where he would not appear by this to give up his claim to obedience, which would be a winking at offence; and where he has not absolutely bound himself to punish. But neither of these can occur here. It is only by punitive acts that the Supreme Governor makes it manifest that he stands upon his right to be obeyed, and that he will not relax it. If no punishment ensue, then it must follow, that that right is given up. From the same principle that past offences are regarded with impunity, it would also follow, that all future ones might be overlooked in like manner, and thus government would be abrogated, and the obligation of subjection to God be, in effect, cancelled. If, again, impunity were confined to a few offenders, then would there be partiality in God; if it were extended to all, then would he renounce his sovereignty, and show himself indifferent to that love of rectitude which is the characteristic of a holy being, and to that moral order which is the character of a righteous governor. But in addition to this, we have already seen that, by a formal law, punishment is actually threatened, and that in the extreme, and in all cases of transgression whatever. Now, from this it follows, that nothing less than the attachment of such a penalty to transgression was determined by the wis dom of God to be sufficient to uphold the authority of his laws among his creatures; that even this security, in all instances, would not deter them from sin; and, therefore, that a less awful sanction would have been wholly inadequate to the case. If so, then not to exact the penalty is to repeal the law, to reduce its sanction to an empty threat, unworthy the veracity of God, and to render it altogether inert, inasmuch as it would be soon discovered whether sin were followed by punish,

ment or not. This is a principle so fully recognised in numan governments, that their laws have generally defined the measure of punishment, and the fact being proved, the punishment follows as a thing of course in the regular order of administration. It is true, that a power of pardon is generally lodged with the prince; but the reason of this is the imperfection which must necessarily cleave to all human institutions, so that there may be circumstances in the offence which the law could not provide against; or there may be an expediency or reason of state which supposes some compromise of strict principle, some weakness on the part of the sovereign power, some desire to disarm resentment, or to obtain popularity, or to gratify some powerful interest. But these are the exceptions, not the rule; for, in general, the supreme power proceeds calmly and firmly in the exercise of punitive justice, in order to maintain the authority of the laws, and to deter others from offending. Now none of those imperfections, or sinister interests, which interfere to produce these exceptions, can have any place in the Divine government; and even if it could be proved, that in some special cases, exceptions might occur in the administration of God, yet this would not meet the case of those who would establish the hope of pardon in behalf of offending men, upon the prerogative of God to relax his own rights and to remit punishment, since what is required is to prove that there is a general rule of pardon, not a few special cases of exemption from the denounced penalty. It may, therefore, be confidently concluded, that there is no relaxation of right in the Divine administration, and no forgiveness of sin by the exercise of mere prerogative.

venant. In both, something more is referred to, as the means of human recovery, besides repentance, and of which, indeed, repentance itself is represented as an effect and fruit. Wherever the Divine Being and his creatures are regarded simply in their legal relation, one as governor, the other as subjects, there is certainly no such qualification of the threatenings of his violated law, as to warrant any one to expect remission of punishment upon repentance.

2. It is not true, that repentance changes, as they urge, the legal relation of the guilty to God whom they have offended. They are offenders still, though penitent. The sentence of the law is directed against transgression, and repentance does not annihilate, but, on the contrary, acknowledges the fact of that transgression. The charge lies against the offender; he may be an obdurate or a penitent criminal; but, in either case, he is equally criminal of all for which he stands truly charged, and how then can his relation to the lawgiver be changed by repentance? In the nature of the thing, nothing but pardon can change that relation; for nothing but pardon can cancel crime, and it is clear that repentance is not pardon.

3. So far from repentance producing this change of relation, and placing men in the same situation as though they had never offended, we have proofs to the contrary, both from the Scriptures and from the established course of Providence. For the first, though men are now under a dispensation of grace, yet, after long continued obstinacy and refusal of grace, the Scriptures represent repentance as incapable of turning away the coming vengeance. "Because I have called and ye refused; I have stretched out my hand, and no man

This argument assumes that, in a case of impeniteuce, the moral fitness which is supposed to present itself, in the case of penitents, to claim the exercise of forgiveness, does not exist, and, therefore, that it would be morally unfit, that is, wrong, to exercise it. This is, indeed, expressly conceded by Socinus, who says, that not to give pardon in case of impenitence, is due to the rectitude and equity of God.(1) It follows, then, that the principle before stated, that the prerogative of God enables him to forgive sin, must be given up by all who hold that it is only when repentance takes place, that a moral fitness is created for the exercise of this act of grace. Upon their own showing, sin is not, and cannot, consistently with rectitude, be forgiven by a voluntary surrender of right, or from mere compassion; but, in order to make this an act of moral fitness, that is, a right and proper proceeding, some consideration must be presented, independent of the misery to which the offender has exposed himself, and which misery is the object of pity; something which shall make it right as well as merciful, in God to forgive. Those who urge that repentance is this consideration, do thus, unwittingly, give up their own principle, and tacitly adopt that of the satisfactionists, differing only as to what does actually constitute it right in God to forgive. But the sufficiency of mere repentance to constitute a moral fitness in forgiveness, all who consider the death of Christ as a necessary atonement for sin do, of course, deny; and there are, indeed, many considerations suggested to us by turning to our true guide, the Scriptures, wholly unfavourable to this opinion.

In the first place, we find no intimation in them that the penalty of the law is not to be executed in case of repentance-certainly there was none given in the promulgation of the law to Adam; there is none in the Decalogue; none in any of those passages in the Old and New Testaments which speak of the legal consequences of sin, as "that the wages of sin is death;" "the soul that sinneth it shall die," &c. Repentance is enjoined both in the Old and New Testaments, it is true, but then it is in connexion with a system of atonement and satisfaction, independent of repentance; with sacrifices under the Mosaic institution, and with the death and redemption of Christ under the new co

(1)" Non resipiscentibus veniam non concedere, id demum naturæ divinæ, et decretis ejus, et propterea rectitudini, et equitati debitum est ac consentaneum." -SOCIN. de Servat,

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your destruction as a whirlwind ; when distress and anguish cometh upon you; then shall they call upon me, but I will not answer; they shall seek me early, but they shall not find me." Here, to call upon God, and to seek him early, that is, earnestly and carefully, are acts of repentance and reformation too, and yet they have no effect in changing the relation of the guilty to God, their judge, and they are proceeded against for their past offences, which, according to the theory of the Socinians, they ought not to be. The course of Providence in this life is, also, in opposition to the notion of the efficacy of mere repentance to arrest punishment. For, as Bishop Butler has so well shown, (2) the sufferings which follow sin in this present life by natural consequence, and the established constitution of things, are as much the effect of GOD'S appointment as the direct penalties attached by him to the violation of his laws; and though they may differ in degree, that does not affect the question. Whether the punishment be of long or of short duration, inflicted in the present state or in the next, if the justice or benevolence of God requires that punishment should not be inflicted, when repentance has taken place, it cannot be inflicted consistently with those attributes in any degree whatever. But repentance does not prevent these penal consequences-repentance does not restore health injured by intemperance, property wasted by profusion, or character dishonoured by an evil practice. The moral administration under which we are, therefore, shows that indemnity is not necessarily the effect of repentance in the present life, and we have, consequently, no reason to conclude that it will be so in another.

4. The true nature of repentance, as it is stated in the Scriptures, seems entirely to have been overlooked or disregarded by those who contend that repentance is a reason for the non-execution of the penalty of the law. It is either a sorrow for sin, merely because of the painful consequences to which it has exposed the offender, unless forgiven, or it arises from a perception also of the evil of sin, and a dislike to it as such, with real remorse and sorrow that the authority of God has been slighted, and his goodness abused. Now if by repentance is meant repentance in the former sense, then to give pardon on such a condition would be tantamount to the entire and absolute repeal of all law, and the annihilation of all government, since every criminal, when convicted, and finding himself in immediate danger of punishment, would as necessarily repent as he would necessarily be sorry to be liable to pain; and this sorrow being, in that case, repentance,

(2) Analogy of Natural and Revealed Religion.