them as soon as we are brought to recognize God's authority, and to confide in his goodness, we can say to our unruly hearts, what he said to the tempestuous waves, Peace, be still. Though all is perplexity, we know who can reduce confusion into order: once assured of the protection of the Supreme Intelligence, we shall possess our souls in patience, and resign our will with submission. As soon as this conviction is fully established, we become persuaded that a being of infinite love would never have placed us in a scene beset with so many trials, and exposed to so many dangers, had he not intended them as necessary materials by which, under his guidance, we are to work out our future happiness;-as so many warnings not to set up our rest here;-as so many incentives to draw us on in pursuit of that better state to which eternal mercy is conducting us through this thorny way. To keep God habitually in view, as the end of all our aims, and the disposer of all eventsto see him in all our comforts, to admire the benignity with which he imparts them-to adore the same substantial, though less obvious mercy, in our afflictions-to acknowledge at once the unwillingness with which he dispenses our trials, and the necessity of our suffering them-to view him in his bounties of creation, with a love which makes every creature pleasant-to regard him in his providential direction with a confidence which makes every hardship supportable to observe the subserviency of events to his eternal purposes: all this solves difficulties otherwise insuperable, vindicates the divine conduct, composes the intractable passions, settles the wavering faith, and quickens the too reluctant gratitude. The fabled charioteer, who usurped his father's empire for a day, is not more illustrative of their presumption, who, virtually snatching the reins of government from God, would involve the earth in confusion and ruin, than the denial which the ambitious supplicant received to his mad request, is applicable to the goodness of God in refusing to delegate his power to his creatures: My son, the very tenderness I show in denying so ruinous a petition, is the purest proof that I am indeed thy father. Many seem to ascribe to chance the common circumstances of life, as if they thought it would be an affront to the Almighty to refer them to him; as if it were unbecoming his dignity to order the affairs of beings whom he thought it no derogation of that dignity to create. It looks as if, while we were obliged to him for making us, we would not wish to encumber him with the care of us. But the gracious Father of the universal family thinks it no dishonour to watch over the concerns, to supply the wants, and dispose the lot of creatures who owe their existence to his power, and their redemption to his mercy. He did not create his rational subjects in order to neglect them, or to turn them over to another, a capricious, an imaginary power. We do not it is true, so much arraign his general providence, as his particular appointments. We will allow the world to be nominally his, if he will allow us our opinion in respect to his management of certain parts of it. Now, that he should not put forth the same specific energy individually to direct as to create, is supposing an anomaly in the character of the all-perfect God.-Whatever was his design in the forma tion of the world and its inhabitants, the same reason would beyond a doubt, influence him in their superintendence and preservation.-David, in describing the simple grandeur of omnipotent benignity, sets us a beautiful pattern. He does not represent the belief of God's providential care as an effort, but describes our continual sustenance as the necessary unlaboured effect of infinite power and goodness. He openeth his hand, and filleth all things living with plenteousness; thus making our blessings rather, as it were, a result than an operation. And as we are not under the divided control Sounds to which we are accustomed, we fancy of a greater and a subordinate power, so neither have a definite sense. But we often fancy it are we, as the Persian mythology teaches, the unjustly; for familiarity alone cannot give subjects of two equal beings, each of whom dismeaning to what is in itself unintelligible. Thus tributes respectively good and evil according to many words, without any determinate and pre-his peculiar character and province. Nor are cise meaning, pass current in common discourse. Some talk of those chimerical beings, nature, fate, chance, and necessity, as positively as if they had a real existence, and of almighty power and direction as if they had none. · we the sport of the conflicting atoms of one school, nor of the fatal necessity of another. There is one omnipotent, omniscient, perfect, supreme Intelligence, who disposes of every person and of every thing according to the counsel of his own infinitely holy will. The help that is done upon earth, God doth it himself." The comprehensive mind, enlightened by Christian faith, discovers the same harmony and design in the course of human events, as the philosopher perceives in the movements of the material system. In speaking of ordinary events as fortuitous, or as natural, we dispossess Providence of one half of his dominion. We assign to him the credit of great and avowedly supernatural operations, because we know not how else to dispose of them. For instance: We ascribe to him power and wisdom in the creation of the world, while we talk as if we thought the keeping it in Without a thorough conviction of this most order might be effected by an inferior agency. consolatory doctrine, what can we make of the We sometimes speak as if we assigned the go-events which are now passing before our eyes? vernment of the world to two distinct beings: What can we say to the perplexed state of an crees, his omnipotence executes the purposes of his will.-His wisdom may see some things to be best for a while to answer certain temporary purposes, which would not be good for a continuance. When the present appointment shall have answered the end to which it was determined, a new one, to which that was preparatory, takes place. The two arrangements may appear to us not to be of a piece, to be even contradictory; while yet this determination and this succession are perfectly consistent in the mind of a being who sees all things at once, and calls things that are not as though they were. God's views of all men and all events throughout all ages, is one clear, distinct, simultaneous view. Infinite knowledge takes in present, past, and future, in one comprehensive survey, pierces through all distance at a glance, and collects all ages into the focus of the existing moment. almost desolated world? There is no way of disentangling the confusion but by seeing God in every thing. Not to adore his providence as having some grand scheme which he is carrying on, some remote beneficial end in view, some unrevealed design to accomplish, by means not only inscrutable, but seemingly contradictory, is practical atheism. To contemplate the events which distract the civilized world, the tyranny which tears up order and morality by the roots; to behold the calamities of some, the crimes of others-such blackness gathering over the heads of some countries, such tempests bursting over those of others-these scenes must subvert the faith, must extinguish the hope, of all who do not firmly believe that the same power which 'stilleth the raging of the sea and the noise of the waves,' can in his own good time also still the madness of the people; will in his appointed season enable us to say, ' And where is the fury of the oppressor?' He may, and we know not how soon, enable us to ask, Where is the man that made the earth to tremble-that did shake kingdoms-that made the world a wilderness that destroyed the cities thereof-that opened not the house of his prisoners? Yes-disorganized as the state of the world appears to be, let us be assured that it is not turned adrift, that things are not left to go on at random. Though the people are rebellious, the Sovereign has not renounced his dominion over them. The most oppressive and destructive agents are his mysterious ministers: they are carrying on, though unconsciously, his universal plan-a plan, which though complicated is consistent; though ap. parently disorderly will be found finally harmo-pressor, though he employs him as his instru nious. In some pieces of mechanism we have observed different artists employed in different branches of the same machinery; in this division of labour, each man performs his allotted portion, in utter ignorance perhaps, not only of the portions assigned to the others, but also of the ultimate application of his own. Busy in executing his single pin, or spring, or wheel, it is no part of his concern to understand the work assigned to others, still less to comprehend the scheme of the master. But though the workman is ignorant how the whole is to be arranged, the machine would have been incomplete without his seemingly inconsiderable contribution. In the mean time, the master unites, by apt junctures and articulations, parts which were not known to be susceptible of connexion; combines the separate divisions without difficulty, because the several workmen have only been individually helping to accomplish the original plan which had previously existed in his inventive mind. Once thoroughly grounded and established in this faith and sense of the divine perfections, we shall never look upon any thing to be so monstrous or so minute, so insignificant or so exhorbitant, as to be out of the precincts and control of eternal Providence. We shall never reduce, if the allusion be forgiven, the powers of omnipotence to a level with that of some Indian rajah who has a territory too unwieldy for his management, or of an emperor of China who has more subjects than one monarch can govern. We ask why evil rulers are permitted ?-We answer, though rather mechanically, our own question, by acknowledging that they are the appointed scourges of divine displeasure. Yet God does not delegate his authority to the op ment of correction; he still keeps the reins in his own hand. And besides that an offending world stood in need of the chastisement, these black instruments who are thus allowed to ravage the earth, may be, in the scheme of Providence, unintentionally preparing the elements of moral beauty. When divine displeasure has made barren a fruitful land for the wickedness of them that dwell therein,' the ploughshare and the harrow, which are sent to tear up the unproductive soil, know not that they are providing for the hand of the sower, who is following their rude traces in order to scatter the seeds of future riches and fertility. Or take the conflagration of a town. They whose houses are burnt, are objects of our tenderest commiseration. The scene, if we beheld it, would alike excite our terror and our pity. But, after we have mourned over the devastation, and seen that despair is fruitless, at length necessity impels to industry; we see a new and fairer order of things arise; the convenience, symmetry, and beauty which spring out of the ashes make us eventually not only cease to regret the deformity and unsightliness to which they have succeeded, but almost reconcile us to the calamity which has led to the improvement. The prescience of God is among his peculiar ly incommunicable attributes. Happy is it for us indeed that it is as incommunicable, for if any portion of it were imparted to us, how inconceivably would the distress of human life be aggravated! But if we allow his omniscience, we cannot doubt his Providence. He would not Often have the earthquake, the hurricane, the foresee contingencies, for which he could not bolt of heaven, kindling and throwing far and provide. His attributes are in fact so inter-wide its baleful light on this earthly stage, realwoven that it is impossible to separate them. ized in their ultimate effects this image. And His omniscience foresees, his understanding, we are reminded of a future general conflagrawhich is infinite, arranges, his sovereignty de- tion, when the elements shall melt with fervent ⚫ heat, and the earth itself shall be burned up,' means to a higher, and assists its object without which is to prove only the signal and the pre- usurping its place. Some who begin by abstainparatory scene for a new heaven and a new earthing from evil, or set about doing good from a wherein dwelleth righteousness. Let us, in principle not entirely pure, are graciously led to every stage leading to this final restitution of the principle by doing or forbearing the action; all things,' wait with patience for its sure com- and are finally landed at the higher point, from pletion. Let us, in the mean time, give credit beginnings far below those at which we might to the great Author of the book of Fate for the rashly have asserted they could only set out with consistency of its catastrophe! any hope of success. When we peruse the compositions of a human Though this may not very frequently occur, author, we look for unity and consistency in his yet as it is by means God works, rather than by whole plan; we expect connexion and relation miracles; and as the world does not overflow between its several parts, and an entireness in with real piety, what a chaos would this earth the general combination. We are not so much become, if God did not permit inferior motives delighted with a fine passage incidentally intro- to operate to a certain degree for the general duced, a short episode, of which we discern at good! Many whom the utmost stretch of chaonce the rise and the end, and take in all the in- rity cannot induce us to believe that they are cidents and beauties at a single glance, as we acting from the purest principles, are yet conare with the judgment which discovers itself in tributing to the comfort and good order of societhe distribution of the whole work, and the skill, ty. Though they are sober only from a regard not without difficulty discerned, which arranges, to their health, yet their temperance affords a connects, and, as it were, links together the se- good example; though they are prudent from no veral divisions. Yet do we not sometimes pre- higher motive than the love of money, yet their sume to insinuate as if the great Author of all frugality keeps them within the same bounds as created nature cannot reduce the complexity of if they were influenced by a better motive; its parts into one consistent whole? Do we not though they may be liberal only to raise their intimate objections as if there were no concert, reputation, yet their liberality feeds the hungry; no agreement in the works of the Almighty though they are public-spirited merely from am. mind? Do not the same persons who can speak bition, yet their patriotism, by rousing the spirit in raptures of a perfect poem, a perfect scheme of the country, saves it. If such right actions, of reasoning, a perfect plan in architecture, yet performed from such low motives, can look for presume to suspect that the concerns of the uni. no future retribution;-if, being done without verse are carried on with less system, and on reference to the highest end, they do not advance a more imperfect design, than the rude sketches the eternal interests of the doer, nor the glory of a frail creature, who is crushed before the of God, they are yet his instruments for promoth? moting the good of others, both by utility and But if we go so far as to leave to God the di-example. On this ground we may be thankful rection of the natural world, because we know not well, after all, to whom else to commit its management, yet we frequently make little scruple to take the government of the moral world into our own hands. If we consent to his ruling matter, we reluctantly allow that he governs mind. We reason as if we suspected that the passions of men lay beyond his controul, and that their vices have overturned his dominion. But we should particularly call to mind what is the daily language of our lips, not only that His is the kingdom,' but that the 'power' is the source, and the glory' the result of his administration. He does not, it is true, by an arbitrary compulsion of men's minds, rob them of that freedom by which they offend him, nor by a force on their liberty, prevent those sins and follies which, if he arbitrarily hindered, he would convert rational beings into mechanical ones; but he turns their sins and follies to such uses, that while by the voluntary commission of them they are bringing down destruction on their own heads, they are not impeding his purposes. Nor does Providence, in his wide arrangements, exclude the operation of subordinate causes and motives, but allows them to assist the greater, and thereby to work his will; as subalterns in the battle contribute severally their share to the victory, while, like those inferior causes, they are compelled to keep their ranks, and not to aspire to the command. As we have a higher end, we must have a Supreme direction to our aims. Yet a lower end is sometimes made a that there is so much refinement, generosity, and politeness among the higher orders of society, while we confess that tear away the action from its motive, sunder their virtue from its legiti mate reference, the act and the virtue lose their present character and their ultimate reward. The means by which an infinitely wise God often promotes the most important plans, are apt illustrations of the blindness and obliquity of man's judgment. May we be allowed to of fer an instance or two, in which human wisdom would probably have taken a course, in the appointment of instruments and events, directly opposite to that pursued by infinite wisdom? What earthly judge, if he had been questioned as to means likely to produce one of the strongest evidences of the truth of Christianity to unbelievers, but would have named an agreement between Jews and Christians, as its fullest corroboration? If we ourselves had an important cause depending-for instance, the ascertaining our right to a litigated estate;-If the success of the trial depended on the testimony of the witnesses, and on the authenticity of our titled deeds, whose testimony should we endeavour to obtain; into whose hands should we wish ourselves to be committed? According to all human prudence should we not desire witnesses who had no known hostility to us; should we not object to a jury of avowed enemies; and should we not refuse to lodge our records in the hands of our opponents? But His wisdom, in whose sight ours is folly, THE WORKS OF HANNAH MORE.. has seen fit to make one of the most striking, proofs of the truth of Christianity depend on the living miracle of the enmity of the Jews; to them also were committed the oracles of God,' so that to both their ancient testimony and their present opposition we are to look for the most striking proofs of a religion they hold with perpetual hatred. And now that Christianity is actually made to stand upon such evidence, what Reason itself test can be more satisfactory? owns its validity; for what collusion can now be charged upon the concurrent witnesses of Christianity, when each party in court is decidedly Who can rationat variance with the other? ally question the strength of that title which is contained in their genuine archives-that evidence resulting from their hereditary denial of facts, of which they persist to reverence the predictions? Where can we more confidently look for the truth of a religion they detest, than to the verifications conferred on it by their original history, their irreversible antipathy their actual condition, and existing character? To venture another specimen. If we had presumed to point out instruments for the destruction of Jerusalem, we should probably have thought none so appropriate as Constantine; we might have supposed the first christian emperor would have been the fittest avenger of the Redeemer's blood. Omniscience selected for the awful retribution a pagan prince, a virtuous one it is true, but one who seems to have no personal interest in the business, one to whom Jews and Christians, as such, were alike indifferent. While this utter desolation was the obvious accomplishment of a prophecy, which was to be a lasting evidence of the truth of our religion, the choice of the destroyer was one of those secret things which belong to God,' and is only to be alleged as a proof that his ways are not our ways.' tion of the priests, as completely contradict this CHAP. III. Practical uses of the doctrine of Providence. are indications of Almighty displeasure few dispute; but having admitted the general fact, who almost does not ascribe the cause of offence to others? How few consider themselves as awfully contributing to draw down the visitation ! We look with an exclusive eye to the abandoned and the avowedly profligate, and ascribe the whole weight of the divine indignation to their misdeeds. We will advert to another event, the most important since the incarnation of him whose pure We do not sufficiently make the doctrine of worship it has restored-the reformation. This occurrence is a peculiarly striking instance of Providence a practical doctrine.-That the preour ignorance of the operations of supreme wis-sent dark dispensations which afflict the earth dom, and of the means which, to our short sight, seem fit or unfit for the accomplishment of his purposes. If ever the hand of providence was conspicuous as the meredian sun, it was so in this mighty work-it was so in the selection of apparently discordant instruments-it was so, in over-ruling the designs of some, to a purpose opposite to their intention, in making the errors of others contribute to the general end. If this grand scheme had been exposed to our review for advice, if we had been consulted in its formation and its progress, how should we have critiHow cised both the plan and its conductors? should we have censured some of the agents as inadequate, condemned others as ill chosen, rejected one as unsuited, another as injurious! One critic would have insisted that the vehemence of Luther would mar any enterprise it might mean to advance; that so impetuous a projector would inevitably obstruct the establishment of a religion of meekness. Another would have pronounced, that among the human faculties, wit was, of all others, the least likely to assist the cause of piety; yet did Erasmus, by his exquisite satires on the ignorance and supersti But we forget that when a sudden tempest threatened destruction to the ship going to Tarshish, in which there was only Jonah who feared God, those who inquired into the cause of the storm, found him to be the very man. The cause of the present desolating storm, as a pious divine observed of that which darkened his day, may as probably be the offences of professing christians, as the presumptuous sins of the bolder transgressor. This apprehension should set us all on searching our hearts, for we cannot repent of the evil of which we are not conscious. It should put us upon watching against negligence; it should set us upon distrusting a false security, upon examining into the ground of our confidence. No dependence on the goodness of our spiritual condition, no trust in our exactness in some peculiar duties, no fancied superiority of ourselves, to others, no exemption from gross and palpable disorders, should soothe us into a belief that we have no concern in the visitation. Throwing off their own guilt upon others was the second sin of the first offenders. Another practical use of the doctrine of Providence is, to enable us to maintain a composed frame of spirit under his ordinary dispensations. If we kept up a sense of God's agency in common as well as in extraordinary occurrencesif we were practically persuaded that nothing happens but by divine appointment, it might still those fluctuations of mind, quiet those uncertainties of temper, conquer that unreasonable exaltation or depression, which arise from our not habitually reflecting that all things are determined in number, or weight, or measure, by infinite love. If we acted under the full conviction that he who first set the world in motion governs every creature in it-that we do not take our place upon that stage in space, or that period in time, which we choose, but where and when He pleases: that it is he who 'ordereth the bounds of our habitation, and fixeth our lot in life,' we should not only contemplate with sober awe the strange events of the age in which we may be living, but cheerfully submit to our individual difficulties, as arising from the same predisposition of causes. Our neglecting to cultivate the train of thought may account for those murmurs which arise in our hearts, both for the public calamities of the world, and the private vexations of life. that he should govern, makes it right that we should obey; and the avowal of that obedience is alike consistent with the character of the subject, and the claims of the sovereign. Thus used, there is no consolation to an afflicted world like that which is derived from the position contained in the proclamation of the imperial penitent of Babylon, 'that the most High ruleth in the kingdoms of men;' that he ruleth not by an arbitrary will, but, to borrow the emphatic language of the Apocalypse, by the perfections of THE MIND THAT HATH WISDOM. But, as we seem virtually to divide the affairs of the world into two portions, we talk as if we did not think certain ordinary trials considerable enough to come from God, nor of course to require that we should meet them with temper. Under these, therefore, we make ourselves what amends we can for the vexation of trials more severe, by indulging fretfulness, secure of impunity. But let us be assured of these two things, if it be a trial at all it comes from God, if it disturb our peace, however trivial in itself, it is not small to us, and therefore claims submission. It is worth our observation that they who are ready to quarrel with Omnipotence for the infliction of pain and suffering, poverty and distress, seldom arraign him for their intellectual or moral deficiencies. Most men are better satisfied with their allotment of capacity than of health; of virtue than of riches; of skill than of power. We seldom grudgingly compare our mental endowments with those of others who are obviously more highly gifted, while we are sufficiently forward to repine at their superiority in worldly advantages. Though too sensibly alive to the narrower limits in which our fortune is confixed, we do not lament our severer restrictions in the article of personal merit. In the latter instance vanity supports as completely as in the former envy disturbs. If we took God into the account, we should feel that, as rational subjects of his moral government, we are bound to submit to it: we should not indulge discontent and resentment at events which we should then allow were either by his appointment or permission, as we now acknowledge in the more extraordinary cases. But how few are there who think themselves Most of the calamities of human life originate obliged to endure without repining, the effects with ourselves. Even sickness, shame, pain, of accident, or the provocation of men ? and this and death were not originally the infliction of is because they see only the proximate cause, God. But out of many evils, whether sent us and do not perceive that God is the grand effi. by his immediate hand, or brought on us by our cient. In our difficulties, if the sense of his pre-own faults, much eventual good is educed by sence were as strongly impressed upon us as the trial is powerfully felt, it would make the heart strong, and render the temptation feeble. Nor would it only strengthen us under temptation, but sustain us under affliction; we should be come both humble by correction, and patient under it; we should be grateful in prosperity, without being elated by it. A deep conviction of God's authority over us and his property in us, would also make us kind to others as an acknowledgment that all is his. The very heathen entertained some sense of his sovereignty; they acknowledged at least their victories to proceed from him, when they dedicated their spoils to the deliverer. Him, who by turning our suffering to our benefit, repairs by grace the evils produced by sin. Without being the author of evil, the bare suggestion of which is blasphemy, he converts it to his own glory, by causing the effects of it to promote our good. If the virtuous suffer from the crimes of the wicked, it is because their imperfect goodness stood in need of chastisement. Even the wicked, who are suffering by their own sins, or the sins of each other, are sometimes brought back to God by mutual injuries, the sense of which awakens them to compunction for their own offences. God makes use of the faults even of good men to show them their own insufficiency, to abase them in their own eyes, If we maintained this constant sense of his to cure them of vanity and self-dependence. He providential government, we should be more in- makes use of their smaller failings, to set them stant in prayer, we should more fervently sup- on the watch against great ones; of their implicate him in our distresses, and more devoutly perfections, to put them on their guard against adore him for his mercies. The recognition of sins; of their faults of inadvertency, to increase his sovereignty infers the duty of prayer to him, their dread of such as are wilful. This superf implicit trust in him, of unqualified submis-induced vigilance teaches them to fear all the sion to him; for the same argument which proves resemblances, and to shun all the approaches to |