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counsel, and the result of laws which he has established for the government of his subjects. It is neither a necessary adjunct, nor a casual accident of our nature; not necessary, for omniscient wisdom and almighty power might constitute even a created being without suffering,—such are now the angels in heaven, and such was man before the Fall; nor accidental, for that were to exempt the happiness of his creatures from God's control, and virtually to set aside his overruling providence. It is true, that suffering sometimes proceeds so immediately and so manifestly from the conduct of individual men, that to their follies or vices it may be ascribed as its proximate cause,--the horrors of disease being the natural fruit of profligate manners, and the hardships of poverty resulting naturally from habits of indolent indulgence, or improvident thoughtlessness. But even in such cases, these afflictive results are determined by a law which God has established,—a law which attaches health and comfort to frugal and temperate habits, and entails disease and penury on the opposite vices; and God being the author of that constitution of things under which we live, to his sovereign will we must look as the ultimate cause of such a connexion betwixt sin and its appropriate misery. And, in other cases, as in the dread visitation of famine, or pestilence, or the more ordinary occurrence of family bereavement, we see his hand, as it were, visibly stretched forth: «Is there evil in a city," saith the sacred writer, "and the Lord hath not done it ?" "I form the light and create

darkness, I make peace and create evil; I the Lord do all these things." It was the Lord who rained fire and brimstone out of heaven on the cities of the plain; it was the Lord who sent the deluge on the earth, until all men and every living thing died; it was the Lord who glorified himself in the destruction of the Egyptian host; and he still guards us against the foolish notion that the sufferings of life are fortuitous or accidental, lest we should thereby be led to overlook his hand in them, and so "to despise the chastening of the Lord."

Every affliction, then, with which any of us is visited, is the result of God's deliberate purpose, and no evil befalls us without his permission or appointment. Nor are our afflictions to be regarded as the results of the careless or capricious exercise of almighty power; but, on the contrary, they are to be ascribed to the most comprehensive wisdom, acting according to principles which are fixed and determined as laws of the divine government. God is not a careless or inattentive spectator of what passes amongst his subjects; he does not send evil amongst them at random, nor without cause, nor without a well-defined end in view: such capricious. exercise of almighty power is incompatible with the possession of omniscient wisdom; and as his attributes forbid, so no exigency in his government can ever require it. He cannot be taken by surprise, neither can he act from the impulse of momentary feeling: every attribute of his nature, and every principle of his government, are alike stable and excellent; and from

these, not from caprice or passion, does affliction spring. Far less can affliction be ascribed to the deliberate exercise of cruelty, or the sudden gust of revenge. If the comprehensive wisdom, the almighty power, and the perfect independence of God, forbid us to imagine that he can, in any case, permit evil to arise through negligence or caprice, surely the infinite benevolence which prompted him to communicate being to his creatures, and to open up for them so many sources of enjoyment, may well forbid the thought that he is capable of cherishing one vindictive feeling, or of taking delight in the infliction of suffering. Infinitely great, and glorious, and happy in himself, what possible motive can exist in the divine mind for the exercise of these cruel and vengeful passions, which he has forbidden his own creatures to cherish, and by which, where they are indulged, his creatures are debased? Shall we attribute to the most glorious Being in the universe those passions by which only the basest of mankind are animated, and which, wherever they exist, render the character hateful, and the bosom which contains them wretched as well as guilty? God forbid: all nature bears witness to the benevolence of its author; and that benevolence assures us, that whatever evils may exist under his government, they are not inflicted in the exercise of cruelty, or for the gratification of passion,-that to whatever other cause they may be ascribed, they cannot be referred to any disposition on the part of God, that would lead him unnecessarily to make his creatures unhappy, or to take

pleasure in their suffering. And, in addition to the testimony of nature, God does most solemnly disclaim every such feeling, and assures us, "that he afflicts not willingly, nor grieves the children of men."

In these words, it is not denied that affliction proceeds from the hand of God; on the contrary, it is admitted that he does afflict and grieve the children of men: but then, in regard to the disposition and feelings with which he does so, it is affirmed that he "afflicteth not willingly." This cannot be understood to signify that affliction comes without the will, or contrary to the purpose of God, or that he does not approve of the painful discipline to which his people are subjected. On the contrary, every suffering which he inflicts is the fruit of his deliberate wisdom, and the object of his holy approbation. But when it is said that he "afflicteth not willingly," we are given to understand that he has no pleasure in the misery of his creatures, considered in itself, and apart from its causes and ends; that he does not lift the rod merely to render them unhappy, and far less to gratify his own passion; that, but for moral considerations, physical happiness is with him a far more pleasing thing than physical suffering; and that, while he has no pleasure in making his subjects wretched, he does delight in their comfort and well-being. This view, indeed, of the feelings with which God con- • templates the sufferings of his creatures, necessarily arises out of the simplest idea which we can form of his character, as a perfectly wise and good Being; and to

what cause, then, it may be asked, are we to ascribe the sufferings which do actually prevail under his administration? The Bible enables us fully to answer this question, by the views which it presents of God's character, as the Governor of the world; and of the present state, as one of respite and trial.

God is revealed, not only as a being of infinite moral perfection and blessedness, but as the righteous moral governor of his intelligent creatures; and the course of his providence is represented as not only comprehending the means by which he preserves them in existence, but also as constituting the discipline by which the ends of his moral government are fulfilled. To the idea of a moral government a law of some kind is absolutely essential, and a law of any kind being given, it was necessary that it should be accompanied with such sanctions of reward and punishment, as might put a difference betwixt the obedient and disobedient subjects of it. Hence, if by any means sin should appear, God determined that suffering should arise along with it; and in the very structure of our own being, he has instituted physical checks as well as moral restraints to disobedience, and has connected therewith not only the pangs of an accusing conscience, but also a numerous train of diseases, and the sentence of death. These arrangements, by which suffering is inseparably connected with sin, are far from being arbitrary; they flow necessarily from the perfections of the divine nature. Could we, indeed, entertain, for one instant, the monstrous idea,

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