thoughts which exhibit to us the moral law of our nature as the sole guide of our will, the only rightful authority which can govern the world. The opposition which was suggested between virtue as obedience to God, and virtue as conformity to the rule of conscience, vanishes as we examine it. For the power of God which surrounds us corresponds to the moral power which is within us. The moral law written upon the heart is God's writing. Conscience is the reflexion of Divine holiness in man, and Command is the expression of the same holiness as it exists in God. There can therefore be no discord between the spirit of obedience to the divine commands, and the spirit of conformity to the dictates of the enlightened and instructed conscience. If we pursue these guiding clues to their remote origin, they are formed of one common thread. When we illuminate the depths of our minds, we see that the two separate lines, as they at the surface appeared, run together and coincide. And thus if, like Elihu, we "fetch our knowledge from afar, and ascribe righteousness to our Maker,” the difficulties to which we referred vanish, and the opposition disappears which might be alleged to exist between the truths of religion and the views which we have presented of morality.

That a righteous God must govern the world by rewards and punishments, our reason assures us, with a conviction that well prepares us for the clear declaration of God's word. And when we are told of the penal tribulation and anguish which await the wicked in a future condition ;when we are told that they, by their impenitence and hardness of heart treasure up to themselves wrath against the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God;-are we told aught which is at variance with our doctrine, that the actions of the good proceed from the love of goodness, and that fear alone cannot make man perfect in heart? Surely there is here no discrepancy. It is precisely because such men are not good, that these forms of terror are displayed to their souls. It is because they are incapable of acting from a motive of pure morality, that God has appointed that they shall thus be urged by such motives as their minds can feel. It is because they have not in them the living and moving principle of right action, that they must thus be carried along by the stress of external force. Their hearts are diseased and perverted ;—sunk down from the region of pure moral feeling; and therefore the impulses by which they are to be acted upon, are, by the Divine government, ac

commodated to their distorted and degraded condition. And when the righteous are encouraged in their advance by the hope of rewards, are not these rewards always held forth as such which righteous souls alone can relish? What Christian heart does not assent to those who tell us that heaven would be no heaven for us, except we should there have heavenly dispositions. "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." This is their prize ;-the very satisfaction, in eternal fulness, of that purified nature which impels them to obedience and rectitude in this their mortal pilgrimage.

But may we not now venture onwards; and on plainer and more pleasant ground? The call which summons us to obey the divine commands is, as we have seen, only the echo of the voice in our own bosoms, which assures us that all his commands are holy, just, and true. The denunciations of his wrath which stand between us and all wickedness, only drive us back from that which we know to be, in its own nature, vile and polluted. Here then the feelings of our hearts go along with the commands of our Governor. He exhorts us to nothing but what is in itself bright and lovely, the genuine object of all our purest and noblest affections: he withholds us from no

thing but that which is of itself pernicious and foul; that which to our clearer vision is hideous, loathsome, and painful. Can we then look with terror and awe only upon the inducements and warnings by which we are led to choose what our own hearts approve and delight in? Is the service of God a service of force and fear alone? Or is it not rather far otherwise? Shall we not be led to forget the terrors of the law in our contemplation of its beauties? Will not our hearts run on before our hopes and fears? Will not our labour become a labour of love?—and our service of God become a service, not of a rigid and terrible rule, but of a good and perfect Master, whose thoughts only anticipate ours, in the promotion of all that we admire and love, as most fair and excellent ;— whom we obey, not for fear, but through that perfect love which casteth out fear?

We would fain answer yea to these enquiries. But when we endeavour to frame our lips to such a reply, our hearts misgive us :—our recollections of the imperfections and inconsistencies of our nature, of the wayward and perverse course of our affections, rise upon us; and we do not dare to claim for ourselves this state of our thoughts, though this alone we see to be sound and consistent with our moral nature. We dare not say that we thus

love the Lord our God with all our heart, and all our mind, and all our soul, and all our strength. And we are thus checked and frustrated when we attempt to build up, upon the foundation of the moral faculties, a structure which is in harmony with the other portions of man's constitution,— with his place in the universe, and his relation to his Divine Master. We cannot divest the law of its terrors, we cannot bring man into conformity with the rule of his own nature. We cannot make of the world a temple of God, in which man shall worship him with a perfect heart.

On the contrary, in spite of the light within, man's will goes astray; his passions delude him, even his conscience becomes darkened. He has another law in his members, warring against the law in his mind ;-powers which rebel against their rightful sovereign and bring her into captivity. The law is spiritual, but he is carnal. That which he does he allows not; that which he would he does not; he does that which his better nature hates. He consents unto the law that it is good; but how to perform that which is good he finds not; when he would do good evil is present with him. Well may he exclaim, with him whose expressions *

* Rom. vii.