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INFATUATION, INFIDELITY.

year or two, without the intellectual and moral powers of moral agents? [Vide Intuition.]

Em. If conscience be an essential faculty of the human mind, it must belong to it in infancy. And if infants possess this faculty of moral discernment, then they must of necessity become moral agents as soon as they become agents. There seems to be no way to avoid this conclusion, but to suppose that conscience cannot be exercised so early as the other faculties of the mind. But how does it appear that conscience cannot be exercised as early as any other intellectual faculty? It does not appear from experience. For every person knows that he has been able to distinguish right from wrong, and to feel a sense of guilt, ever since he can remember. It does not appear from observation; for infants discover plain marks of moral depravity, and appear to act wrong as soon as they begin to act. And it does not appear from Scripture; for the Bible represents infants as sinful, guilty creatures, as soon as they are born; which plainly implies that they are moral agents. In a word, Scripture, reason, observation, and experience, are all in favor of the moral agency of infants. And if we do not admit that moral agency commences in infancy, it is impossible to determine, or even to form a probable conjecture, when it does commence. [See 492.]

466. INFATUATION.

Quem Deus, vult perdere prius dementat. That is, Whom God intends to destroy, he first infatuates.

Ed. The infatuation of mankind is very common, and very great. It appears in the desire and pursuit of sensual lusts, — of sensual and sordid pleasures; of wealth; of worldly honor and fame; it appears in worldly ambition, politics, ethics and religion, which are all capable of madness.

467. INFIDELITY, SKEPTICISM, ETC.

Infidels, as lawyers say, "admit themselves out of court.” Thompson, O. Infidelity is seated in the heart. It is as easy, therefore, for great men, as for small; for the learned, as for the ignorant, to be infidels.

Ed. If things are to be esteemed according to their useful

ness, then are Atheism, Deism, Infidelity, and semi-infidelity, despicable; for they have accomplished nothing for morality, religion, or government.

It requires a vast amount of credulity to be an infidel.

Bellamy. Hume took unwearied pains to prove that nothing can be proved.

Ed. A boasting skeptic once said to Dr. Emmons, “Can you tell me what I am to understand by the soul of man?" No, replied the Dr., I can't tell a man who has none.

Ed. The fool first says in his heart, No God, and then denies him with his lips. Atheism can never boast an intellectual origin, though some great intellects have attempted its defence.

Headly. To the thorough skeptic, the world has no plan or purpose, and the busy centuries no object. The heavens and the earth are an unmeaning poem; the history of man a short episode, and all is accident. A talented mind without a God, is a most melancholy spectacle.

Ed. An intellectual man, somewhat skeptical, once called on Rev. Thomas Williams, and asked him to tell him the precise difference between the Calvinists, or the thoroughly orthodox, and their opponents. Mr. Williams observed, Calvinists

believe that God knew what he was about, when he created the world and its inhabitants, and fixed all their characteristics, relations, conditions, and events, according to his infinite wisdom and goodness, while their opponents do not. The observation took such hold of the man, as to lead to his conversion from skepticism to Christianity.

Davies. A man's wickedness sets Christianity against him, before he can have any temptation to set himself against Christianity.

Bible. Thou thoughtest that I was altogether such a one as thyself: but I will reprove thee.

Young. Not thus our infidels the Eternal draw;

A God all o'er consummate, absolute,

Full orb'd, in his whole round of rays complete :
They set at odds heaven's jarring attributes;

And, with one excellence, another wound;

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INFIDELITY INCREASING.

Maim heaven's perfection, break its equal beams,
Bid mercy triumph over God himself,
Undeified by their opprobrious praise:

A God all mercy, is a God unjust. [See 53.]

468. INFIDELITY INCREASING.

Clark, R. W. Foreign skepticism has reached our country, and made its impression upon a portion of our literature, our science, our theology. It has taken captive a class of minds of a mystical and transcendental tendency, and has been reproduced in various forms. It is diffused abroad among the com

munity through pamphlets, and the periodical publications. It appears often in the lyceum lecture. Coming as it does with the profession of high authority, and decorated with the beauties of rhetoric, the grace of appropriate and striking imagery, the fervor of earnestness, and the glare of eloquence, it poisons those who deem themselves the most fortified against every form of infidelity. It becomes enthroned in the circles of fashion and refinement, and obtains a lodgement in the heart, while the scientific principles which it has accompanied, are instructing the intellect.

Ed. The Patriarchal dispensation closed with the almost universal infidelity of the old world, and the consequent deluge. The Mosaic dispensation closed with the formalism and semiinfidelity of the Jews, so that the Son of God scarcely found faith on the earth. The present Christian dispensation will close with the battle of the great day of God Almighty, and be followed with the dispensation of the Spirit, or latter-day glory. It is a serious question with those awake to the signs of the times, whether the present dispensation will not also close with a flood of infidelity and vice. By his apostles, Christ gave his followers some intimations that it will thus terminate. In several instances they speak of the general wickedness of the "last days" and last times," which seems most evidently to denote the closing scenes of the dispensation upon which they had entered. Vide 2 Thess. 2: 3-8. 2 Tim. 3: 1-5. 2 Pet. 3:3. 1 John 2:18. Jude 18, with much in Ezek., Rev., and other portions of Scripture, to confirm this view. [See 77, 211, 752, 875.]

INFINITY, INFIRMITIES, INFLUENCE, INGRATITUDE.

267

469. INFINITY.

Burke. Where is the subject that does not branch out into infinity! Ed. The perpetual and accelerated progress of saints and seraphs is a species of prospective infinity, that is beyond our comprehension. If objects of thought branch out into infinity, so does the power of thought.

Ib. Though God is infinite to us, he is comprehensible and comprehended by himself.

Em. Some philosophers have told us that matter is infinitely divisible but the doctrine of absolute infinities is infinitely absurd.

470. INFIRMITIES.

Deride not any man's infirmities.

Ed. To bear with each other's infirmities, is only common civility.

Cowper.

The kindest and the happiest pair,

Will find occasion to forbear,

And something, every day they live,
To pity, and perhaps forgive.

471. INFLUENCE.

Roscoe. Our minds are formed, and our characters modified by those master-spirits, who survive alike the attacks of envy, the storms of persecution, and the oblivious efforts of time.

The influence of great men and their works may extend through all time, and even down the cycles of eternity.

All moral beings desire influence, in proportion to their zeal, in order to accomplish their desires and ends.

Ed. In heaven, where influence is always well employed, it will be always increasing. Influence there, will be glory.

Mankind are ordinarily swayed more by superiority of intellectual and moral qualities, than by pomp, power, or splendor. 472. INGRATITUDE.

To say that a man is ungrateful, is to say all evil of him.
Ingratitude is as blind as it is base.

Em. Ingratitude for prosperity in the morning and meridian of life, God often punishes with sorrow upon sorrow in the decline or close of life.

Swift. He that calls a man ungrateful, sums up all the evil that a man can be guilty of.

Men charge Providence for sicknesses, but forget to give credit for health.

Is. 1:2. Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth; for the Lord hath spoken: I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against me.

473. INJURIES, ABUSES.

The injurer never forgives.

The injuries we do, and those we suffer, are seldom weighed in the same balance.

Remembering and avenging an injury, is often more hurtful to us than receiving it.

Insults-it is man-like to resent them, Godlike to forgive

them.

The noblest remedy for injuries is oblivion.

Franklin. Christianity commands us to pass by injuries,policy, to let them pass by us.

Ed. Before resenting or avenging an injury, let time enough lapse to reflect upon the precious opportunity it affords to augment your substantial reputation and happiness, — by returning good for evil, and thus endeavoring to overcome evil with good.

Ib. 'Tis glorious to bear injuries and abuses in silence, or would be, if any had virtue enough for it.