20. The second and third aspects of this great theological controversy have a very intimate relation to the first, and to each other. They embrace the questions of the moral characters respectively of God and of man. But as men necessarily make God after their own image, the moral character which they ascribe to God is necessarily dependent upon their ideas of the moral character of man. Hence the second and third aspects of this controversy do but present the dispute respecting the origin, nature, or law, of moral dis

all things, and so well suited to excite and gratify the sentiment of admiration, that it has always been a great favorite with cloistered and closet theorists. Hence those pantheistic systems, ancient and modern, Oriental and Occidental, constantly reproduced under slight changes of expression, which confound God and nature, and reduce every thing to unity and infinity. Nothing, say the mystics, exists absolutely but God.. It follows that all apparent existences are but manifestations of God, God under special forms. This appears to be substantially the doctrine of Schelling, at present patronized by the king of Prussia and by the conservative politicians and orthodox theologians of his dominions.

But even into closets and cloisters philosophical ideas will creep. From the united idea of God and nature, if the absolute existence of nature be expunged, why not also the absolute existence of God? Pushing the subjective doctrine to extremes, these pantheistic theorists arrive at the conclusion, that nothing exists absolutely, that both God and nature are but conceptive emanations from the intelligent, conscious I. Such, in substance, appears to be the doctrine of Fichte, carried out by Hegel, and at present so popular with the liberal party of Germany. The doctrine of Schelling, as it reduces the individual almost or quite to nothing, is naturally patronized by kings. The other doctrine, which makes the individual every thing, is naturally more agreeable to subjects. Such is the political condition of Germany, that its thinkers are obliged to discuss the most important practical questions under vague, mystic, abstract, almost unintelligible forms. It is childish for those not subject to the same necessity, to affect the same disguise, which none can wear without danger of deceiving others, if not themselves.

tinctions, transferred from morals to theology; and we may arrange the whole body of the disputants into three great schools, according to the theory of morals which they respectively adopt.

21. The partisans of the selfish theory of morals, among whom must be reckoned most of those who deny the freedom of the human will, framing their image of God in consistence to that theory, taught that God created man solely to promote his own. pleasure and glory. Having made man for that purpose, God expects and demands its fulfilment. It is men's duty to satisfy that expectation, to comply with that demand. Such as do not fulfil and comply, become, in consequence, chargeable with demerit, the proper objects of God's wrath commonly disguised under the epithet of justice; and deserve, and will receive, on account of their disobedience and rebellion, misery here and eternal damnation hereafter.

Such was the foundation upon which these doctors attempted to rest the idea of duty, responsibility, and punishment. But they still rejected the notion of merit, or reward. For as man's utmost efforts cannot go beyond the fulfilment of his bare duty, which requires that every thought, word, and deed should be devoted to God's glory and pleasure, therefore, even in perfect obedience there can be no such thing as merit; and if God choose to confer any benefits, here or hereafter, upon any number of men, large or small, it is not a right of theirs; it is not a reward; but free grace and pure gratuity, demanding of the favored the most devout gratitude.

But is man naturally capable either of obedience or of gratitude? Here intervenes the question as to the moral character of man; a matter as to which this theory seems at total variance with itself; for if men were created by God to promote his pleasure, are we not justified in concluding that they do promote his pleasure? Are we to suppose that God failed in accomplishing the end at which he aimed? If he has accomplished it, must not every thing men do be right in his eyes? So far as he is concerned, can there be any such thing as demerit, or any justice in punishment ?

To escape that negative answer to these interrogations which their theoretical theology imperatively demanded, and to account for that universal state of rebellion against God, which, according to these theologians, actually prevails among men, they fled from metaphysic to Scripture, and, abandoning argument, required us to believe, on authority, in direct contradiction to their own arguments, that God, for his own glory, in order to make manifest his infinite grace, though he made the first human pair pure, holy, free, and capable of perfect obedience to his will, yet suffered them to be seduced by the Devil — who, in this seduction, is represented sometimes as the instrument and servant of God, and at others, as an independent, or almost independent, power, the malignant enemy of man, the prince of this world, having more influence over its affairs than even the Deity himself, in consequence of which seduction, the first human pair, and their posterity to the end of time, lost their freedom of will, fell from their

original pure and holy state, became totally depraved, and incapable, and not only incapable, but positively disinclined to fulfil the object of their creation; so that, instead of doing God's pleasure, all men, except an elected and predestined few, who, by the influence of irresistible grace, undergo a miraculous change of heart, are constantly employed, and find a pleasure, in inflicting pain upon God. They hate God; and so, in their turn, are proper objects of his hatred; and, except the elect, who are saved not by any merit of their own, but out of mere grace, will be justly damned to all eternity. So great, indeed, has the demerit of man thus become, that it was only by assuming a human shape, and, as Jesus, dying himself upon the cross, that God has so far satisfied his own infinite justice, as to be able, out of pure grace, to save some few.

Thus was derived corroboration from Scripture to the scholastic doctrine of salvation by grace alone; and also to the doctrine of the mere uselessness and inefficacy, theologically considered, of good works. Indeed these theologians held, that what might seem to be good works, in the unregenerate non-elect, were a mere delusion; that really good works could be performed only by the elect. But even in them. they were a sign, not a means; since resulting from irresistible grace, they implied no merit; the only merit being the merit of God, voluntarily dying, as Jesus, on the cross.

22. All who had not made a total sacrifice of reason on the altar of faith; even those who, though sacrificing reason, felt benevolence active in their

hearts, started back, the rational with incredulity, the benevolent with horror, from a doctrine highly gratifying, no doubt, to the sentiment of self-comparison, in the self-complacent few, who believe themselves the precious elect, alone capable of goodness here or happiness hereafter, and calculated to produce in such an enraptured exhilaration; but a horrible doctrine indeed for the doubting and the timid, to whom it presents the Deity as an object not of hope and love, but of terror and aversion, and whom, under this image of him, as if to give corroboration to the doctrine, they find themselves compelled to hate.

These and those who spoke for them protested against this representation of the divine character as false and impious; and the idea of the Deity has been variously remodelled by a variety of sects, who, framing their image of God according to their several views of the nature of virtue, have given to the attribute of benevolence a greater or less extension.

In admitting the salvation of any, however few the number, those who made the doctrine of pure selfishness the basis of their theology, yielded to their opponents an irrecoverable advantage. The very idea of grace, which is only another word for benevolence, is inconsistent with the doctrine of pure selfishness; and the notion of grace once admitted, why limit it to a few, why not extend it to all? For to say that God's sacrifice of himself is not sufficient to atone for the sins of all, is to exalt the attribute of infinite justice above that of infinite power.

But is it necessary to rest the salvation of men