Imagini ale paginilor
PDF
ePub

feel no hesitation in saying, that the hypothesis which would remove Him from the immediate superintendence and government of the works which he has made, is founded in the ignorance of man;-and proceeds from a secret tendency to measure the divine understanding by the feeble efforts of the human mind. Can it derogate from the majesty of a Being, who is omnipresent, and whose will can instantaneously ac complish all that comes within the limit of possibility, to suppose that he effects by his own immediate efficiency whatever is in spaceor in duration? Whereever he is, there must of necessity be an almighty and uncontrollable efficiency; for his will is that which ushers a universe into being; and to say of him, that he wills the creation of a world, is to say that a world is created.

"All things that are done in the world, are done either immediately by God himself," says Dr. Samuel Clark," or by created intelligent beings: matter being evidently not at all capable of intelligence, excepting only this one negative power, that every part of it will always and necessarily continue in that state, whether of rest or motion, wherein it at present is. So that all those things which we commonly say are the effects of the natural powers of matter and laws of motion; of gravitation, attraction, or the like, are indeed the effects of God's acting upon matter continually and every moment, either immediately by himself, or mediately by some created intelligent beings. Consequently, there is no such thing as what men commonly call the course of nature, or the power of nature. The course of nature, truly and properly

Z

speaking, is nothing else but the will of God, producing certain effects in a continued, regular, constant, and uniform manner: which course or manner of acting being in every moment perfectly arbitrary, is as easy to be altered at any time, as to be preserved *."

In every department of human knowledge we only see certain phenomena preceding or following other phenomena. We may by habits of closer research and observation accumulate facts; we may ascertain some of the intermediate phenomena by which the events that are already known to us are connected : but our increased knowledge will only amount to an enlarged acquaintance with events joined, indeed, by the will of the Deity, but which of themselves are not necessarily connected;-to a fuller view of the mode of acting which the Creator has been pleased to prescribe to himself in governing the universe.

All power is God's, and whatsoe'er he wills,
The will itself, omnipotent, fulfils.

We might with as much truth and propriety consider the several events recorded in the first chapter of the book of Genesis as the causes of one another, as ascribe the efficiency of causation to the phenomena of nature. As in the most perfect mechanism produced by man we see not the volition and the intelligence of which it is the product,―those being inherent in the mind which is invisible,-neither can we witness amidst the works of God any thing but the effects of his power and wisdom. Sound philosophy, no less than genuine piety, will lead us to trace all events to his will

* Evid. of Nat. and Rev. Religion.

and agency. He wills the creation of a world, and a world is created; he wills the continued preservation of the universe, and the universe is preserved. He speaks, and it is done, he commands, and it stands fast. Not a sparrow falls to the ground without his appointment.

BOOK II.

ON THE ACTIVE AND MORAL POWERS OF MAN.

CHAPTER I.

ON MAN.

THE dignity and destination of man are intimated by the language in which his original creation is recorded. "God said, Let us make man in our own image, after our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth on the earth. So God created man in his own image: in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life: and man became a living soul." It was after the materials of the chaotic mass had been reduced to order and beauty;—it was after the world was replenished with the stores of the divine goodness, and the heavenly bodies had been fixed in the firmament to give light and warmth and comfort to every living creature on the face of the earth, that man was called into being. How lovely and magnificent was the abode which the hand of God had prepared for him, in which he might immediately enjoy a profusion of divine bounty, and

« ÎnapoiContinuă »