foresight or purpose? No, the very term, providence, includes the notion of foresight, and may be illustrated also from the omniscience of Deity, another necessary attribute.

It may be difficult to give you a clear notion of that power by which God embraces within his actual knowledge the present, the past, and the future. But, perhaps, your conceptions may be assisted by recollecting that things appear past or present to us, in consequence of the continued succession of our thoughts, passing one at a time through our minds; for thus only we get the idea of duration. But, since in the intellect of God, in consequence of its infinite diffusion in every part of creation, innumerable ideas must exist, at the same instant, of all that happens in that creation, of course that succession of individual thoughts, which alone furnishes us with the idea of duration, can have no place in the Divine mind. For, if we can suppose two ideas to be contemplated, at the same precise moment, in any mind, we may suppose any indefinite number; the idea of succession is lost. Therefore we may conclude that what to us, and to all beings with minds like ours, appears past, or present, or future, exists simultaneously in the Divine mind, comprehended in one glance, present at one and the same moment. This eternal now includes all that we call endless duration; a duration, if I may say so, in the mind of God always instantaneous. Hence he comprehends, at the same moment, the origin, the progress, and the termination of every event; at the same moment, the meditated plan, the progress, and the development of creation; at the same moment, every motion of every man's will, whether abortive or effectual; at the same moment, the birth, life, and death of every

creature now living, or that has ever lived; at the same moment are present to his mind all the grand eras of history, the most interesting periods of time, the most remotely connected events of the past and of the future. The fate of every man and every angel, of every country and every world, of every unorganized atom, and every organized system, is discerned simultaneously by the great Omniscient, through the successive periods of their continuance. And is all this knowledge without purpose, without wisdom, without design, without use? It cannot be admitted. From the very nature, then, of God, we see the necessity of his providence, the regularity and universality of his administration.

The second proof of the government of God's providence is drawn from his being the Creator. Can it be supposed, that he, who made the universe, lost all interest in it, as soon as the act of creation had passed? Would he bestow powers, and not be curious to know how they were exercised? Would he adjust a stupendous system, and not wait to observe its operation? Would he have peopled the world with intelligences, and have taught them to know that they had a celestial Father, and then have left them, cast, as it were, upon a desolate island in the boundless ocean of the universe, to struggle through a solitary existence, abandoned by the very Being who may be supposed to love them the most tenderly, because they were the creatures of his power? Suppose it for his glory, that they were created; is it not as much for his glory, to sustain and control them? Suppose they are prepared for his pleasure; and is his pleasure exhausted at the first view of creation? Did he bring the world and its inhabitants into existence from a principle of benevolence? Suppose this,

(and it is the only rational hypothesis,) and the conclusion is irresistible, that benevolence must be equally engaged in sustaining, guiding, guarding, and perfecting his creation. I appeal to you, ye fathers and mothers. Did your interest in your children cease from the moment that they were ushered into life? Would you leave them, from that moment, to their fate? I appeal to that interest which you take in their growth, their fortunes, and their end, an interest which increases with their years, and their improvement. And is it to be supposed, that a care like this, which in man is esteemed an excellence, is not to be found in the great Parent of mankind? "If ye, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children," is it to be believed, that God has left the world unguarded and unobserved, and that his children are born and die he knows not how, and cares not when? Where is the architect who would leave a nice and curious machine, which was acknowledged to be an illustrious monument of his skill, to fall into disuse and decay in consequence of his neglect? And has God, the great mechanician, left the system, which he has so curiously composed, to the revolutions of unnumbered ages, undirected by one who can understand its complicated motions, preserve in place its innumerable parts, restore its irregularities, and guide its movements to the grand and glorious purpose for which alone it was constructed?

Thirdly. As I am adducing reasons rather than appealing to testimony, it is not my design, to bring forward the direct assertions of Scripture in favor of the doctrine of this discourse. But I cannot refuse myself this remark, that the single circumstance, that a revelation has ever been made to mankind, is an irresistible demonstration of a providence, whatever the character, the design, the reception,

or the fate of that revelation may be. It proves that the affairs of men are not overlooked; that God sometimes discerns the benevolent propriety of immediately interposing in the course of events; that the progress of man's character and improvement is not so unalterably fixed by what are called the laws of nature that it may not sometimes be accelerated by special assistance; and, if God's love has ever induced him to overstep what may be called the ordinary limits of his bounty, for the more certain and rapid felicity of his creatures, what may we not conclude respecting the final issue of his universal government of the world?

Again; if it can be shown, that a single prophecy has been fulfilled, the same conclusion is irresistible; for prediction implies the most intimate knowledge of characters and events, with all their connexions, bearings, and dependences; and, whether the prediction is made merely from a foresight of the event, or whether the event is afterwards determined and the circumstances arranged to accomplish the prediction, the conclusion is the same. Look, then, I pray you, at the series of prophecies which the Scriptures contain, and tell me, can you find nothing there which has been accomplished, nay, nothing which is, perhaps, even now accomplishing?

Lastly, let us come to the proof from fact. Look around upon creation, and observe the good order of the universe; powers nicely adjusted, systems accurately balanced, worlds rushing undisturbed, with astonishing and noiseless rapidity, through fields of immeasurable space, where nothing interferes, nothing stops, but all is inconceivably vast and harmonious, and answer me, what preserves this complex wonder of a world? Is it less neces

sary, that some power should continue, than that some power should have established it? Whence the regularity of summer and winter, seed-time and harvest? Is there no care in this? Whence the unfailing succession of the generations of men? Whence the ordinary regularity of their numbers, the progressive perfection of the species, the prodigious variety of the individuals, the curiously accommodated circumstances, characters, and stations of men in the world? Is there no providence in this?

But it is not in great operations that the intelligence, and, consequently, the providence of God is to be most clearly discerned. It is evident in a thousand minute and accurate adaptations of man's nature, and of every other creature's nature, to his place in the system.

If you ask why the birds were not placed in the sea, and the fishes in the air, I can give no answer but that such is the ordination of their Creator. They were made for the element in which they live; and you may say, if you please, that it was chance that produced this distribution, and believe it, if you can.

But the most easy proof of the providence of God in the visible works of his hands is found, I think, in the power of foresight and anticipation, with which man is endowed. We are enabled to look forward into futurity, to provide for what is to come, to form ardent expectations, and cherish reasonable hopes. If God, then, has given the power to a rational creature to make provision beyond the present moment, does it not prove irresistibly that the bestower of this faculty and this disposition possesses them in perfection himself, that he knows and is interested in what is to come, that he has provided beforehand for his creatures? And, if his providence extends, for a single