fibility of it. It cannot be doubted, but that there are an infinite number of forms, all equally poffible to mere phyfical power; yet many of thefe fo dif fonant to certain reafons of existence, as not to be the objects at all of power influenced by wif dom. For instance.

VIRTUE and VICE may be fuppofed to be prefent to the divine mind before the creation of angels or men; that is, before there were creatures to practise one, and commit the other, It was certainly in the divine power, either to create, or not to create beings, capable of knowing the difference between virtue and vice, and of acting according to fuch knowledge: But I believe it will be allowed, that things could not be fo conftituted, that vice fhould be obligatory, and virtue not; that vice should be rewarded with eternal happiness, and virtue punished with eternal mifery: That is, that although thousands of worlds, exceedingly different from this, might have been created, yet a world, totally contradicting this, could not have been made: And the reafon is, the relations of things, being clearly feen by the Creator before the act of creation, are to him a rule of determination."

But this kind of reafoning is what we must not go far in; for it is launching into an unknown fea, beyond the bounds of limited minds, into the conduct of an infinite intelligence. Yet there is an use arifing from the attempt: For hereby we know, that we do not know the relations of things, fo as to discover a moral law thereby; but that we are beholden to the goodnefs of God in revealing it to us, by his prophets, and by his fon.

Upon the will of a felf exiftent being Des Cartes makes the certainty of felf evident propofitions, or axioms, as well as of all other neceffary truths to depend. According to him, the three Angles of a triangle are equal to two right ones, merely because the Deity would, that they fhould be fo:

Such philofophers are bad fupporters of religion; Spinofą has made the worft ufe of the principles of Des Cartes.

And

And there is also a further use of this knowledge of our own ignorance, inafmuch as we are hereby Jed to allow the juftice of many divine Acts, the reafons of which we do not, and cannot, fee. The fall of Angels beyond redemption, the deftruction of the Canaanites, and the facrificing of an innocent fon, by the hand of a good father, with many inftances of extraordinary providence in national rewards and chastisements, may be difficulties to fome, who pretend to know the foundation of morality in the relations of things, but not to those who acknowledge, that the Supreme Being knows them accurately, but his creatures very imperfectly. For though the rule of God's juftice be the fame with that of ours, yet his knowledge is much greater, and confequently his juftice, in many cafes, not to be thoroughly accounted for by us. We can in general fay, and with truth, though in every particular inftance we can not prove it, that God is juft, by the fame rule that man ought to be fo: But the objects of his juftice being collective bodies, as well as individuals, nations, worlds, and the universe; no finite creature can pretend to ascertain the interests of all nations in the world, of all the worlds, or of the whole col. lection of intelligent Beings, Angels and Men, inhabitants of thefe planets, and other immensely diftant fyftems: Confequently in many cafes, for want of knowledge, men are incapable of judging of divine justice, notwithstanding it be determined by the eternal rule of giving to all their due, and not doing injury to any one.

ECONDLY, the doctrine of one moral law to

Sall moral Beings leads to another very ufeful

reflection.

From hence it appears there is a close alliance be tween the human and divine nature; one is made in the likeness of the other, and both obfervant of the eternal rules of righteoufnefs. The divine conduct

G 4

is.

is propofed as a pattern to the human; and, left, there thould be any mistake in judging of that conduct, God himself becomes man, and pays obedience to it: We need therefore look no further than JE SUS CHRIST, to know what perfect morality is.

Men may puzzle themfelves, to know how to form proper notions of the Divine morality, or the original fountains of it. But after all (fetting afide enthufiafm, which thinks that it can fee into a fourth heaven beyond St. Paul), we must judge of morality from human reafon influencing human conduct; reafon, improved by revelations, or rather discovering nothing of itself, but merely judging of the rea fonablenefs of revelations.

We fee in JESUS CHRIST a perfect morality: This must be our idea of the Divine; and adding infinity, or whatever you please, is only adding what we do not conceive.The morality of CHRIST is divine morality; and we have no idea of any thing higher, and need not afpire to any thing more excellent; for nothing can be more fo.This, therefore, we are to imitate: And our higheft attainment must be, to be like him, whofe loweft debafement was to be like US-For to erring, ignorant, finful men, he is the way, and the truth, and the life. He has propofed himself to us, as a very difcernible object of imitation and knowledge; to know and imitate whom, is to know and imitate the Divinity itself, as far as it is poffible for hu man nature to do fo. Ne man, fays our Saviour, cometh unto the Father, but by me. If ye had known me, ye fhould have known my Father alfo : And from benceforth ye know him, and have feen him.

Can the human mind conceive any thing more beneficent, and more aftonishing, than this fociety, between the first of BEINGS, and the lowest order of moral creatures.

GOD, and celeftial Spirits, are in themselves too glorious objects for human contemplation: But, in

the

the perfon of the fon of God become incarnate, and obedient to the eternal laws of morality, the Supreme Being is made our acquaintance, and the object of our knowledge and imitation.-God being in Hea ven, and we upon Earth, the knowledge of him is bigh; we cannot attain unto it, by any other me thod, but that of knowing his fon in the flesh; tớ know whom, is to know God; and to know him, is no other, than to know a Man like ourselves.

In this wonderful manner is the higheft wifdom brought down to the loweft capacity. And as the knowledge of religion is thus reduced to our low conceptions; fo is the practice of it, to the mutual offices between man and man. Three of the four commandments which refpect God, and make the first table of the decalogue, are negative, and rather confift in inaction, than any thing pofitive. The fourth which is the active one, is to hallow his fabbaths. The reft of the commandments refpect our neighbour, in the practice of which is the fum of religion. For does not the laft revelation reduce all to two precepts, love GoD, and love thy neighbour? And does not St. John reduce thefe again to one? If a man fay, I love GOD, and bateth bis brother, he is a lyar; for he that loveth not his brother, whom he hath feen, how can be love GOD, whom he bath not feen? And this our Saviour had done before, when, as his laft legacy, he said, A new command I give unto you, that ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye alfo love one another.

GOD is a fpirit, and therefore not the object of any fort of favour from us, or benevolent acts: the fon of God is in Heaven, and therefore is now incapable of receiving any kindness from us: But our neighbour is prefent; with him we converse, and fupport fociety; and every action towards him fhall be rated, as if done to GOD and CHRIST: For CHRIST has faid, Verily, I say unto you, inasmuch as

ye

ye bave done it (that is, have fed the hungry, vifited the fick, lodged the ftranger) unto one of the leaft of thefe my brethren, ye bave done it unto me.

So eafy a knowledge is religion, when studied with a mind difpofed to learn; and fo obvious is the practice of it, to fuch as have hearts willing to obey truth. Even abstracted reasoning upon eternal relations of things, made neceffary only by the perverfe difputing of mankind, does at last end in the clearest knowledge of divine truths, and the most obvious practice of divine precepts; that is, in CHRISTIANITY, the great end and defign of all the difpenfations of divine providence, from the creation of the World, to the preaching of Jefus ; which is as full a revelation of that eternal morality, to which the whole fyftem of moral beings is fub. ject, as the gracious FOUNTAIN of all beings has thought fit to give us ; and which that We, the loweft order of them, may fincerely obey, may that BEING, who is the FIRST, and Creator of the reft, of his infinite mercy grant.

THE