an ancient Greek poet of Megara in Achaia, flourished about the 50th Olympiad, 144 B.C. We have a moral work of his extant, containing a summary of precepts and reflections, usually found in the collections of the Greek minor poets.

THEOLOGY

Definition. IS a Greek word (θεολογία), and signifies that science which treats of the being and attributes of God, his relations to us, the dispensations of his providence, his will with respect to our actions, and his purposes with respect to our end. The word was first used to denote the fables of those poets and philosophers who wrote of the genealogy and exploits of the gods of Greece. It was afterwards adopted by the earliest writers of the Christian church, who styled the author of the Apocalypse, by way of eminence, ἰδιαίτερος, the Divine.

Although every pagan nation of antiquity had some tutelary deities peculiar to itself, they may yet be considered as having all had the same theology, since an intercommunity of gods was universally admitted, and the heavenly bodies were adored as the divi maiorum gentium over the whole earth. This being the case, we are happily relieved from treating, in the same article, of the truths of Christianity and the fictions of paganism, as we have elsewhere traced idolatry from its source, and shewn by what means "the foolish hearts of men became so darkened that they changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things." See POLYTHEISM.

The absurdities and inconsistency of the pretended revelation of the Arabian impostor have been sufficiently exposed under the words ALCORAN and MAHOMETANISM; so that the only theology of which we have to treat at present is the Christian theology, which comprehends that which is commonly called natural, and that which is revealed in the scriptures of the Old and New Testaments. These taken together compose a body of science so important, that in comparison with it all other sciences sink into insignificance; for without a competent knowledge of the attributes of God, of the several relations in which he stands to us, and of the ends for which we were created, it is obvious that we must wander through life like men groping in the dark, strangers to the road on which we are travelling, as well as to the fate awaiting us at the end of our journey.

But if this knowledge be necessary to all Christians, it is doubly so to those who are appointed to feed the flock of Christ, and to teach the ignorant what they are to believe, and what to do, in order to work out their own salvation. The wisdom and piety of our ancestors fully by themselves in all our universities, where the principles of our religion the service are taught in a systematic and scientific manner; and of the church has ordained, that no man shall be admitted to the office of a preacher of the gospel who has not attended a regular course of such theological lectures.

It must not, however, be supposed, that, by merely listening to a course of lectures however able, any man will become an accomplished divine. The principles of this science are to be found only in the word and works of God; and he who would extract them pure and unsophisticated, must dig for them himself in that exhaustless mine. To fit a man for this important investigation, much previous knowledge is requisite. He must study the works of God scientifically before he can perceive the full force of that testimony which they bear to the power, the wisdom, and the goodness of their author. Hence the necessity of a general acquaintance with the physical and mathematical sciences before a man enter on the proper study of theology, for he will not otherwise obtain just and enlarged conceptions of the God of the universe. See PHYSICS, N° 115.

But an acquaintance with the physical and mathematical sciences is not alone a sufficient preparation for the study of theology. Indeed it is possible for a man to devote himself wholly to any of these sciences, as to make it counteract the only purposes for which it can be valuable to the divine; for he who is constantly immersed in matter, is apt to suspect that there is no other substance; and he who is habituated to the routine of geometrical demonstration, becomes in time incapable of reasoning at large, and eliminating the force of the various degrees of moral evidence. To avert these disagreeable consequences, every man, before he enter on the study of that science which is the subject of the present article, should make himself acquainted with the principles of logic, the several powers of the human mind, and the different sources of evidence; in doing which he will find the greatest assistance from Bacon's Novum Organum, ganum, Locke's Essay on the Human Understanding, Reid's Essays on the Intellectual and Active Powers of Man, and Tatham's Chart and Scale of Truth. These works will teach him to think justly, and guard him against a thousand errors, which those who have not laid such a foundation are apt to embrace as the truths of God.

The man who proposes to study theology ought to have it in view, as the ultimate end of his labours, to impart to others that knowledge which he may procure for himself. "Amongst the many marks which distinguish the Christian philosopher from the Pagan, this (says a learned writer 5) is one of the most striking—the Pagan fought knowledge in a selfish way, to secrete it for his own use; the Christian seeks it with the generous purpose (first in view, though last in execution) to impart it to others. The Pagan philosopher, therefore, having cultivated the art of thinking, proceeds to that of speaking, in order to display his vanity in the dexterous use of deceit. On the other hand, the Christian philosopher cultivates the art of speaking, for the sole purpose of disseminating the truth in his office of preacher of the gospel."

As every man, before he enters on the proper study of theology, receives, at least in this country, the rudiments of a liberal education, it may perhaps be superfluous to mention here any books as peculiarly proper to teach him the art of speaking: we cannot however forbear to recommend to our student the attentive perusal of Quintilian's Institutions, and Dr Blair's Lectures on Rhetoric and the Belles Lettres. A familiar acquaintance with these works will enable him, if he be endowed by nature with talents fit for the office in which he proposes to engage, to express his thoughts with correctness and elegance; "without which, it has been well observed, that science, especially in a clergyman, is but learned lumber, a burden to the owner, and a nuisance to every body else."

No man can proceed thus far in the pursuits of general science without having been at least initiated in the learned languages; but he who intends to make theology his profession should devote himself more particularly to the study of Greek and Hebrew, because in these tongues the original scriptures are written. He who is incapable of consulting the original scriptures, must rest his faith, not on the sure foundation of the word of God, but on the credit of fallible translators; and if he be at any time called on to vindicate revelation against the scoffs of infidelity, he will have to struggle with many difficulties which are easily solved by him who is master of the original tongues.

The student having laid in this stock of preparatory knowledge, is now qualified to attend with advantage the theological lectures of a learned professor; but in doing this, he should be very careful neither to admit nor reject any thing on the bare authority of his matter. Right principles in theology are of the utmost importance, and can rest on no authority inferior to that of the word of God. On this account we have long been of opinion, that a professor cannot render his pupils so much service by a systematical course of lectures, as by directing their studies, and pointing out the road in which they may themselves arrive in the shortest time at the genuine sense of the sacred scriptures. In this opinion we have the honour to agree with the ablest lecturer* in theology that we have ever heard. The authors of all systems are more or less prejudiced in behalf of some particular and artificial mode of faith. He, therefore, who begins with the study of them, and afterwards proceeds to the sacred volume, sees with a jaundiced eye every text supporting the peculiar tenets of his first matter, and acts as absurd a part as he who tries not the gold by the copel, but the copel by the gold. Before our young divine, therefore, sit down to the serious perusal of any one of those institutes or bodies of theology which abound in all languages, and even before he read that which the nature of our work compels us to lay before him, we beg leave to recommend to his consideration the following

PRELIMINARY DIRECTIONS FOR THE STUDY OF THEOLOGY.

CHRISTIAN theology is divided into two great parts, Christian natural and revealed; the former comprehending that theology which may be known of God from the creation of the world, even his eternal power and Godhead; the latter, that which is discovered to man nowhere but in the sacred volume of the Old and New Testaments.

Concerning the extent of natural theology many opinions have been formed, whilst some have contended that there is no such thing. Into these disputes we mean not at present to enter. We believe that one could have had no existence among sober and enlightened men, had the contending parties been at due pains to define with accuracy the terms which they used. Whatever be the origin of religion, which we have endeavoured to ascertain elsewhere (see RELIGION, No 6—17.), it is obvious, that no man can receive a written book as the word of God till he be convinced by some other means that God exists, and that he is a Being of power, wisdom, and goodness, who watches over the conduct of his creature man. If the progenitor of the human race was instructed in the principles of religion by the Author of his being (a fact of which it is difficult to conceive how a confident thief can entertain a doubt), he might communicate to his children, by natural means, much of that knowledge which he himself could not have discovered had he not been supernaturally enlightened. Between illustrating or proving a truth which is already talked of, and making a discovery of what is wholly unknown, every one perceives that there is an immense difference (A).

To beings whose natural knowledge originates wholly from

(A) The discriminating powers of Aristotle will not be questioned; and in the following extract made by Cicero from some of his works which are now lost, he expresses our sentiments on this important subject with his usual precision:—"Praeclare ergo Aristoteles, si essent, inquit, qui sub terra temper habavitent, bonis, et illustribus domiciliis, quae essent ornata signis atque picturis, instructaque rebus omnibus, quibus abundant ii, qui beati putantur, nec tamen essent unquam supra terram: ACCEPISSENT AUTEM FAMA ET AUDITIONE, ESSE QUODDAM NUMEN, Preliminary from sensation, and whose minds cannot, but by much discipline, advance from sense to science, a long series of revelations might be necessary to give them at first just notions of God and his attributes, and to enable them to perceive the relation between the effect and its cause, so as to infer by the powers of their own reason the existence of the Creator from the presence of his creatures. Such revelations, however, could be satisfactory only to those who immediately received them. Whenever the Deity has been pleased by supernatural means to communicate any information to man, we may be sure that he has taken effectual care to satisfy the person so highly favoured that his understanding was not under the influence of any illusion; but such a person could not communicate to another the knowledge which he had thus received by any other means than an address to his rational faculties. No man can be required to believe, no man indeed can believe, without proof, that another, who has no more faculties either of sensation or intellect than himself, has obtained information from a source to which he has no possible access. An appeal to miracles would in this case serve no purpose; for we must believe in the existence, power, wisdom, and justice of God, before a miracle can be admitted as evidence of anything but the power of him by whom it is performed. See MIRACLE.

It is therefore undeniable that there are some principles of theology which may be called natural; for though it is in the highest degree probable that the parents of mankind received all their theological knowledge by supernatural means, it is yet obvious that some parts of that knowledge must have been capable of a proof purely rational, otherwise not a single religious truth could have been conveyed through the succeeding generations of the human race but by the immediate inspiration of each individual. We indeed admit many propositions as certainly true, upon the sole authority of the Jewish and Christian scriptures, and we receive these scriptures with gratitude as the lively oracles of God; but it is self-evident that we could not do either the one or the other, were we not convinced by natural means that God exists, that he is a Being of goodness, justice, and power, and that he inspired with divine wisdom the penmen of these sacred volumes. Now, though it is very possible that no man or body of men, left to themselves from infancy in a desert world, would ever have made a theological discovery; yet whatever propositions relating to the being and attributes of the first cause and the duty of man, can be demonstrated by human reason, independent of written revelation, may be called natural theology, and are of the utmost importance, as being to us the first principles of all religion. Natural theology, in this sense of the word, is the foundation of the Christian revelation; for without a previous knowledge of it, we could have no evidence that the scriptures of the Old and New Testaments are indeed the word of God.

Our young divine, therefore, in the regular order of his studies, ought to make himself master of natural theology before he enter upon the important task of searching the scriptures. On this subject many books have been published in our own and other languages; but perhaps there is none more worthy of attention than the Religion of Nature delineated by Mr Wollaston (B). It is a work of great merit, and bears ample testimony to its author's learning and acuteness; yet we think it ought to be read with caution. Mr Wollaston's theory of moral obligation is fanciful and groundless; and commend-whilest we readily acknowledge that he demonstrates many truths with elegance and perspicuity, we cannot deny that he attempts a proof of others, for which we believe no other evidence can be brought than the declarations of Christ and his apostles in the holy scriptures. To supply the defects of his theory of morals, we would recommend to the student an attentive perusal of Cumberland on the Law of Nature, and Paley's Elements of Moral Philosophy. A learned author * affirms of Cumberland, that "he excels all men in fixing the

NUMEN, ET VIM DRORUM; deinde aliquo tempore, patefactis terrae faucibus, ex illis abditis sedibus evadere in haec loca, que nos incolumis, atque exire potuisset: cum repente terram, et maria, columique vidissent: nubium magnitudinem, ventorumque vim cognovissent, adspexitentque solem, ejusque tum magnitudinem, pulchritudinemque, tum etiam efficientiam cognovissent, quod is diem effecerit, toto coelo luce diffusa: cum autem terras nox opacasset, tum coelum totum cerneret astris distinctum et ornatum, lunaeque luminum varietatem tum crescens, tum fene- scens, eorumque omnium ortus et occasus, atque in omni reternitate ratos, immutabilesque cursus: 'haec cum vi- dentur, PROPECTO ET ESSE DEOS, et HAE TANTA OPERA DEORUM ESSE arbitarentur." De Nat. Deorum, lib. ii. § 37.

From this passage it is evident, that the Stagyrite, though he considered the motions of the heavenly bodies, the ebbing and flowing of the sea, and the other phenomena of nature, as affording a complete proof of the being and providence of God, did not however suppose that from these phenomena an untaught barbarian would discover this fundamental principle of religion. On the contrary, he expressly affirms, that before a man can feel the force of the evidence which they give of this important truth, he must have heard of the existence and power of God.

(b) It may not be improper to inform the reader, that Mr Wollaston, the author of the Religion of Nature, was a different man from Mr Woolston, who blasphemed the miracles of our Saviour. The former was a clergyman of great piety, and of such moderate ambition as to refuse one of the highest preferments in the church of England when it was offered to him; the latter was a clergyman likewise, but remarkable only for gloomy infidelity, and a perverse desire to deprive the wretched of every source of comfort. In the mind of the former, philosophy and devotion were happily united; in the mind of the latter, there was neither devotion nor science. Yet these writers have been frequently confounded; sometimes through inadvertence from the similarity of their names; and sometimes, we are afraid, deftly, from a weak and bigoted abhorrence of every system of religion that pretends to have its foundation in reason and in the nature of things. the true grounds of moral obligation, out of which natural law and natural religion both arise; and we have ourselves never read a work in which the various duties which a man owes to his Maker, himself, and his fellow-creatures, are more accurately stated or placed on a surer basis than in the moral treatise of the arch-deacon of Carlisle.

As Wollaston demonstrates with great perspicuity, the being and many of the attributes of God, it may perhaps appear superfluous to recommend any other book on that subject. The present age, however, having among other wonderful phenomena, witnessed a revival of Atheism, we would advise our student to read with much attention Cudworth's Intellectual System, and to read it rather in Mosheim's Latin translation than in the author's original English. It is well known that Cudworth wrote his incomparable work in contumacy of Hobbes's philosophy; but instead of confining himself to the whimsies of his antagonist, which were in a little time to sink into oblivion, he took a much wider range, and traced atheism through all the mazes of antiquity, exposing the weakness of every argument by which such an absurdity had ever been maintained. In exhausting the metaphysical questions agitated among the Greeks concerning the being and perfections of God, he has not only given us a complete history of ancient learning, as far as it relates to these inquiries, but has in fact anticipated most of the sophisms of our modern atheists, who are by no means such discoverers as they are supposed to be by their illiterate admirers.

The student having made himself master of natural theology, and carefully endeavoured to ascertain its limits, is now prepared to enter on the important task of searching the scriptures. In doing this, he ought to devote himself as much as possible of the prejudices of education in behalf of a particular system of faith, and sit down to the study of the sacred volume as of a work to which he is an entire stranger. He ought first to read it as a moral history of facts and doctrines, beginning with the books of Moses, and proceeding through the rest, not in the order in which they are commonly published, but in that in which there is reason to believe they were written (see SCRIPTURES). If he be master of the Hebrew and Greek languages, he will doubtless prefer the original text to any version; and in this perilous we would advise him to consult no commentator, because his object at present is not to study the doctrines contained in the bible, but merely to discover what are the subjects of which it treats. Many histories of the bible have been written; and were we acquainted with a good one, we should recommend it as a clue to direct the young divine's progress through the various books which compose the sacred volume. Stackhouse's history has been much applauded by some, and as much censured by others. It is not a work of which we can express any high degree of approbation; but if read with attention, it may no doubt be useful as a guide to the series of facts recorded in the scriptures. Between the Old and New Testaments there is a great chasm in the history of the Jewish nation; but it is supplied in a very able and satisfactory manner by Dr Prideaux, whose Old and New Testament connected is one of the most valuable historical works in our own or any other language. Suckford's Sacred and Profane History of the World connected is likewise a work of merit, and may be read with advantage as throwing light on many passages of the Old Testament: but this author is not entitled to the same confidence with Prideaux, as his learning was not so great, and his partialities seem to have been greater.

In thus making himself master of the history of the Old and New Testaments, the student will unavoidably acquire some general notion of the various doctrines which they contain. These it will now be his business to study more particularly, to ascertain the precise meaning of each, and to distinguish such as relate to the whole human race, from those in which Abraham and his posterity were alone interested. He must therefore travel over the sacred volume a second time; and still we would advise him to travel without a guide. From Walton's Polyglot bible, and the large collection called Critici sacri, he may indeed derive much assistance in his endeavours to ascertain the sense of a difficult text; but we think he will do well to make little use of commentators and expounders, and still less of system-builders, till he has formed some opinions of his own respecting the leading doctrines of the Jewish and Christian religions.

"Impressed (says an able writer) with an awful sense of the importance of the sacred volume, the philosophical divine will shake off the bias of prejudices however formed, of opinions however sanctioned, and of passions however constitutional, and bring to the study of it the advantage of a pure and impartial mind. Instead of wasting all his labour upon a number of minute and less significant particulars, and of refining away plain and obvious sense by the subtleties of a narrow and corruptive mind, his first object will be to institute a theological inquiry into the general design of the written word, and from principles fully contained and fairly understood, to illustrate the true nature and genius of the religious dispensation in all its parts. He will mark the difference between the first and second covenants, and observe the connection that subsists between them. He will trace the temporary economy of the Old Testament, and weigh the nature and intent of the partial covenant with the Jews; observing with astonishment how it was made introductory of better things to come: and he will follow it through the law and the prophets in its wonderful evolutions, till he see this vast and preparatory machine of providence crowned and completed in the eternal gospel. This New Testament, the last and best part of the religious dispensation, he will pursue through the sacred pages of that gospel with redoubled attention; contemplating the divine foundation on which it claims to be built, the supernatural means by which it was executed, and the immortal end which it has in view."* * Tatbam's Chart and Scale of Truth. Preliminary forms may often be erroneous, they will seldom be dangerous errors, and may easily be corrected by mature reflection, or by consulting approved authors who have treated before him of the various points which have been the subject of his studies. Of this mode of proceeding one good consequence will be, that, having from the sacred scriptures formed a system of theology for himself, he will afterwards study the systems of other men without any violent prejudices for or against them; he will be so much attached to his own opinions as not to relinquish them in obedience to mere human authority, at the same time that he will be ready to give them up when convinced that they are not well founded; and if he have read the scriptures attentively, he will have acquired such a love of truth as to embrace her wherever she may be found.

As we have supposed that every man, after having formed a theological system of his own, will consult the systems of others, it may perhaps be expected that we should here recommend those which, in our opinion, are most worthy of his attention. To do this, however, would, we apprehend, be an interference with the rights of private judgement. But lest we should be suspected of wishing to bias the mind of the young student toward the short system which we are obliged to give, we shall just observe, that by the divines of what is called the Arminian school, Episcopus's Theologica Institutiones, Limborch's Theologia Christiana, and Locke's Reasonableness of Christianity, have long been held in the highest esteem; whilst the followers of Calvin have preferred the Institutiones of their master, Turretine's Institutione Theologica Elementae, and Gill's Body of Divinity. This last work has many merits and many defects. Its style is coarse and tedious; and the author embraces every opportunity of introducing the discriminating tenets of his sect; but his book is fraught with profound learning, breathes the spirit of piety, and may be read with advantage by every divine who has previously formed the outlines of a system for himself.

As the Jewish and Christian dispensations are closely linked together, being only parts of one great whole, it is impossible to have an adequate notion of the latter without understanding the design of the former. Now, though the Mosaic religion is nowhers to be learned but in the Old Testament, it may be convenient for our student, after he has formed his own opinions of it from that sacred source, to know what has been written on the subject by others. For illustrating the ritual law, a learned prelate warmly recommends the Doctor Dubitantium of Maimonides, and Spencer's book entitled De Legibus Hebraeorum Ritualibus. Both works have undoubtedly great merit; but our young divine will do well to read along with them Hermann Witthi Ægyptica, and Dr. Woodward's Discourse on the Worship of the Ancient Egyptians, where some of Spencer's notions are shortly and ably refuted. On the other parts of this dispensation, such as the nature of its civil government; the rewards and punishments peculiar to it (c); its extraordinary administration by appointed agents, endowed with supernatural powers, and Directions, with the gifts of miracles and prophecy; the double sense in which the latter is sometimes involved; and the language consequent on its nature and use—the reader will find much erudition and ingenuity displayed in the second part of Warburton's Divine Legation of Moses demonstrated. That work is entitled to a serious perusal; for it displays great learning and genius, and, we believe, the heaviest censures have fallen on it from those by whom it was never read.

Having preceded thus far in the course, the student's Inquiry to next business should be to inquire seriously what evidence there is that the doctrines which he has so carefully studied were indeed revealed in times past by God. He must already have perceived, in the nature and tendency of the doctrines themselves, strong marks of their origin being more than human; but he must likewise have met with many difficulties, and he must prepare himself to repel the attacks of unbelievers. Here he will find opportunities of exerting the utmost powers of his reasoning faculties, and of employing in the service of religion all the stores he may have amassed of human learning. The scriptures pretend to have been written by several men who lived in different ages of the world; but the latest of them in an age very remote from the present. His first business therefore must be to prove the authenticity of these books, by tracing them up by historical evidence to the several writers whose names they bear. But it is not enough to prove them authentic. They profess to have been written by men divinely inspired, and of course infallible in what they wrote. He must therefore inquire into the truth of this inspiration. The Bible contains a number of truths doctrinal and moral, which are called mysteries, and asserted to be the immediate dictates of God himself. To evince this great point to man, a number of supernatural tests and evidences are inseparably connected with those mysteries; so that if the former be true, the latter must be so likewise. He must therefore examine these tests and evidences, to establish the divinity of the Holy Scriptures;" and in this part of his course he will find much assistance from many writers whose defences of the truth and divinity of the Christian religion do honour to human nature.

The first step towards the embracing of any truth is, to get fairly rid of the objections which are made to it; and the general objections made by deistical writers to the Christian revelation are by no writer more completely removed than by Bishop Butler, in his celebrated work entitled The Analogy of Religion natural and revealed to the Constitution and Course of Nature. This book therefore the student should read with attention, and meditate on with patience; but as it does not furnish a positive proof of the divinity of our religion, he should pass from it to Grotius de Veritate Religionis Christianae, and Stillinger's Origines Sacrae. Both these works are excellent; and the latter, which may be considered

(c) On this subject the reader will find many excellent observations in Bishop Bull's Harmonia Apostolica, with its several defences, and in a small book of Dr Wells's, entitled A Help for the Right Understanding of the several Divine Laws and Covenants, whereby man has been obliged through the several ages of the world to guide himself in order to salvation. Preliminary considered as an improvement of the former, is perhaps the fullest and ablest defence of revelation in general that is to be found in any language. In this part of the united kingdom it is now indeed scarcely mentioned, or mentioned with indifference; but half a century ago the English divines thought it a subject of triumph, and styled its author their incomparable Stillingfleet. Other works, however, may be read with great advantage, and none with greater than Paley's Evidences of the Christian Religion, and Leslie's Short Method with the Deists; which last work, in the compass of a very few pages, contains proofs of the divinity of the Jewish and Christian revelations, to which the celebrated Dr Middleton confessed (d), that for 20 years he had laboured in vain to fabricate a specious answer (e).

Having satisfied himself of the truth of revelation in general, it may be worth the young divine's while to provide a defence of the Christian religion against the objections of modern Judaism. In this part of his studies he will need no other instruction than what he may reap from Limborch's work entitled De Veritate Religions Christianae amica collatio cum erudito Judeo.

"In that disputation, which was held with Orobio, he will find all that the stretch of human parts on the one hand, or science on the other, can produce to vanish error or unravel sophistry. All the papers of Orobio in defence of Judaism, as opposed to Christianity, are printed at large, with Limborch's answers, edition by edition; and the subtlest sophisms of a very superior genius are ably and satisfactorily detected and exposed by the strong, profound, and clear reasoning, of this renowned remonstrant." See OROBIO and LIMBORCH.

The various controversies subsisting between the several denominations of Christians, about points which separate them into different churches, ought next to be studied in the order of the course; for nothing is unimportant which divides the followers of that Master whose favourite precept was love. It has indeed been long fashionable to decry polemical divinity as an useless, if not a pernicious, study; but it is not impossible that this fashion has had its origin in ignorance, and that it tends to perpetuate those schisms which it professes to lament. We are, however, far from recommending to the young divine a perusal of the works of the several combatants on each side of a disputed question, till he has fitted himself for judging between them by a long course of preparatory study; and the only preparation which can fit him for this purpose is an impartial study of ecclesiastical history. He who has with accuracy traced the progress of our holy religion from the days of the apostles to the present time, and marked the introduction of new doctrines, and the rise of the various sects into which the Christian world is divided, is furnished with a criterion within himself by which to judge of the importance and truth of the many contested doctrines; whilst he who, without this preparation, shall read a multitude of books on any religious controversy, will be in danger of becoming a convert to his last author, if that author possess any tolerable share of art and ingenuity.

There are many histories of the Christian church which possess great merit, but we are acquainted with none which appears to us wholly impartial. Mosheim's practical hifory, and its greatest excellencies is, that on every subject the best writers are referred to for fuller information. These ed. indeed should often be consulted, not only to supply the defects necessarily resulting from the narrowness of the limits which the author, with great propriety, prescribed to himself; but also to correct his partial obliquities; for with all his merits, and they were many and great, he is certainly not free from the influence of prejudice. Indeed there is no coming at the true history of the primitive church, but by studying the works of the primitive writers; and the principal works of the first four centuries will amply reward the labour of perusing them (g). The rise and progress of the reformation in general, the most important period of church-history, may be best learned from Sleidan's book De Statu Religiosi et Reipublicae, Caroli V. Cæsare, Commentarii; the History of the Reformation of the Church of Scotland from Knox and Spottiswood; and that of the Church of England from the much applauded work of Bishop Burnet.

After this course of ecclesiastical history, the young divine may read with advantage the most important controversies which have agitated the Christian world. To enumerate these controversies, and to point out the ablest authors who have written on each, would be a tedious, and perhaps not a very profitable task. On one controversy, however, we are induced to recommend a very masterly work, which is Chillingworth's book against Knott, entitled The Religion of Protestants a safe way to Salvation; in which the school jargon of that Jesuit is admirably expostled, and the long dispute between

(d) This piece of information we had from the late Dr Berkeley, prebendary of Canterbury, who had it from Archbishop Secker, to whom the confession was made.

(e) To these defences of revelation we might have added the collection of sermons preached at Boyle's lecture from 1691 to 1732, published in three volumes folio, 1739; the works of Leland; Bishop Newton's Dissertations on Prophecy; and above all, Lardner's Credibility of the Gospel History, with the Supplement to it. But there would be no end of recommending eminent writers on this subject. We have mentioned such as we most approve among those with whom we are best acquainted; but we must, once for all, caution the reader against supposing that we approve of every thing to be found in any work except the sacred Scriptures.

(f) The bishop of Landaff, in the catalogue of books published at the end of his Theological Tracts, recommends several other ecclesiastical histories as works of great merit; such as, Dupin's, Echard's, Gregory's and Formey's, together with Paul Ernesti Jablonksi Institutiones Historiae Christianae, published at Frankfort in three volumes, 1754-67.

(g) For a proof of this position, and for a just estimate of the value of the Fathers, as they are called, see the introduction to Warburton's Julian, and Kett's Sermons at Bampton's Lectures. Preliminary between the Popish and Reformed churches placed on its proper ground, the Holy Scriptures.

One of the most plausible objections to the study of polemical divinity, is its tendency to give a rigid turn to the sentiments of those long engaged in it; whilst we know, from higher authority that "the end of the commandment is charity." But for preserving charity in the minds of Christians, there are better means than absolute ignorance or indifference to truth. Charity is violated only when a church unreasonably restrains the inquiries of its own members, or exercises intolerance towards those who have renounced its jurisdiction. The injustice of the first species of ecclesiastical tyranny is exposed in a very masterly manner by Jeremy Taylor in his Liberty of Prophecying, and by Stillingtonfleet in his Irenicum; the injustice of the second, by Locke in his celebrated Letters on Toleration. The man who shall peruse these three works, and impartially weigh the force of their arguments, will be in little danger of thinking uncharitably of those from whose principles the love of truth may compel him to dissent.

In these directions for the study of theology, we might have enumerated many more books on each branch of the subject well deserving of the most attentive perusal; but he who shall have gone through the course here recommended, will have laid a foundation on which he may raise such a superstructure as will entitle him to the character of an accomplished divine. His diligence must indeed be continued through life; for when a man ceases to make acquisitions in any department of learning, he soon begins to lose those which he has already made; and a more contemptible character is nowhere to be found than that of a clergyman unacquainted with the learning of his profession. This learning, however, is not to be acquired, and indeed is scarcely to be preferred, by studying bodies or institutes of theology; and though we have mentioned a few generally approved by two rival sects of Christians, and must, in conformity with the plan of our work, give another ourselves, we do not hesitate to declare, that the man who has carefully gone through the course of study which we have recommended, though it be little more than the outlines on which he is to work, may, with no great loss to himself, neglect ours and all other systems. For as an excellent writer*, whom we have often quoted, well observes, "to judge of the fact whether such a revelation containing such a principle, with its mysteries and credentials, was actually sent from God and received by man, by examining the evidences and circumstances which accompanied it—the Preliminary time when, the place where, the manner how, it was delivered—the form in which it descends to us—and in what it is contained—together with the particular substance and burden of it—and how every part is to be rightly understood: these are the various and extensive subjects which constitute the sublime office of THEOLOGIC REASONING and the PROPER STUDY OF DIVINITY." On this account we shall pass over slightly, many things which every clergyman ought thoroughly to understand, and confine ourselves, in the short compend which we are to give, to the chief articles of Christian theology. In doing this, we shall endeavour to divest ourselves of party prejudices; but as we are far from thinking that this endeavour will be completely successful (for we believe there is no man totally free from prejudice), we cannot conclude this part of the article more properly than with the following solemn Charge, with Dr Taylort which a very learned divine† always prefaced his Theology of Norwich Lectures.

I. "I do solemnly charge you, in the name of the A charge God of Truth, and of our Lord Jesus Christ, who is the students Way, the Truth, and the Life, and before whole Judge of theology, ment-leaf you must in no long time appear, that in all your studies and inquiries of a religious nature, present or future, you do constantly, carefully, impartially, and conscientiously, attend to evidence, as it lies in the Holy Scriptures, or in the nature of things, and the dictates of reason; cautiously guarding against the fallacies of imagination, and the fallacy of ill-grounded conjecture.

II. "That you admit, embrace, or assent, to no principle or sentiment by me taught or advanced, but only so far as it shall appear to you to be supported and justified by proper evidence from revelation or the reason of things.

III. "That if, at any time hereafter, any principle or sentiment by me taught or advanced, or by you admitted or embraced, shall, upon impartial and faithful examination, appear to you to be dubious or false, you either suspect or totally reject such principle or sentiment.

IV. "That you keep your mind always open to evidence: That you labour to banish from your breast all prejudice, prepossession, and party-zeal: That you study to live in peace and love with all your fellow Christians; and that you steadily assert for yourself, and freely allow to others, the unalienable rights of judgement and conscience."

PART I. OF NATURAL THEOLOGY.

SECT. I. Of the Being and Attributes of God.

HE who cometh to God, says an ancient divine*, deeply read in the philosophy of his age, must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them who diligently seek him. This is a truth as undeniable as that a man cannot concern himself about a nonentity. The existence of God is indeed the foundation of all religion, and the first principle of the science which is the subject of this article. It is likewise a principle which must command the assent of every man who has any notion of the relation between effects and their causes, and whose curiosity has ever been excited by the phenomena of nature. This great and important truth we have elsewhere endeavoured to demonstrate (see Metaphysics, Part III., Chap. vi.); but it may be proved by arguments less abstracted than the nature of that article required us to use. Of these we shall give one or two, which we hope will be level to every ordinary capacity; while, at the same time, we earnestly recommend to the young divine a diligent study of those books on the Being and the subject which we have mentioned in the preceding directions.

We see that the human race, and every other species of animals, is at present propagated by the co-operation of two parents; but has this process continued from eternity? A moment's reflection will convince us that it has not. Let us take any one man alive, and let us suppose his father and mother dead, and himself the only person at present existing: how came he into the world? It will be said he was produced mechanically or chemically by the conjunction of his parents, and that his parents were produced in the same manner by theirs. Let this then be supposed; it must surely be granted, that when this man was born, an addition was made to the series of the human race. But a series which can be enlarged may likewise be diminished; and by tracing it backwards, we must at some period, however remote, reach its beginning. There must therefore have been a first pair of the human race, who were not propagated by the conjunction of parents. How did these come into the world?

Anaximander tells us*, that the first men and all animals were bred in warm moisture, inclosed in crustaceous skins like crab-fish or lobsters; and that when they arrived at a proper age, their shelly prions growing dry, broke, and made way for their liberty. Empedocles informs us, that mother Earth at first brought forth vast numbers of legs, and arms, and heads, &c. which, approaching each other, arranging themselves properly, and being cemented together, started up at once full grown men.

Surely those sages, or their followers, should have been able to tell us why the earth has not in any climate this power of putting forth vegetable men or the parts of men at present. If this universal parent be eternal and self-existent, it must be incapable of decay or the smallest change in any of its qualities; if it be not eternal, we shall be obliged to find a cause for its existence, or at least for its form and all its powers. But such a cause may have produced the first human pair, and undoubtedly did produce them, without making them spring as plants from the soil. Indeed the growth of plants themselves clearly evinces a cause superior to any vegetative power which can be supposed inherent in the earth. No plant can be propagated but from seed or slips from the parent stock; but when one contemplates the regular process of vegetation, the existence of every plant implies the prior existence of a parent seed, and the existence of every seed the prior existence of a parent plant. Which then of these, the oak or the acorn, was the first, and whence was its existence derived? Not from the earth: for we have the evidence of universal experience that the earth never produces a tree but from seed, nor feed but from a tree. There must therefore be some superior power which formed the first seed or the first tree, planted it in the earth, and gave to it those powers of vegetation by which the species has been propagated to this day.

Thus clearly do the processes of generation and vegetation indicate a power superior to those which are usually called the powers of nature. The same thing appears no less evident from the laws of attraction and repulsion, which plainly prevail through the whole system of matter, and hold together the stupendous structure. Experiment shows that very few particles of the most solid body are in actual contact with each other (see Being and Optics, N° 62—68. Physics, N° 23.); and that there are considerable interlices between the particles of every elastic fluid, is obvious to the smallest reflection. Yet the particles of solid bodies strongly cohere, whilst those of elastic fluids repel each other. How are these phenomena accounted for? To say that the former is the effect of attraction and the latter of repulsion, is only to say that two individual phenomena are subject to those laws which prevail through the whole of the classes under which they are respectively arranged; whilst the question at issue is concerning the origin of the laws themselves, the power which makes the particles of gold cohere, and those of air repel each other. Power without substance is inconceivable; and by a law of human thought, no man can believe a being to operate but where it is in some manner or other actually present: but the particles of gold adhere, and the particles of air keep at a distance from each other, by powers exerted where no matter is present. These must therefore be some substance endowed with power which is not material.

Of this substance or being the power is evidently immense. The earth and other planets are carried round the sun with a velocity which human imagination can scarcely conceive. That this motion is not produced by the agency of these vast bodies on one another, or by the interposition of any material fluid, has been shown elsewhere (see Metaphysics, N° 196—200, and Optics, N° 67.); and since it is a law of our best philosophy, that we are not to multiply substances without necessity, we must infer that the same Being which formed the first animals and vegetables, endowing them with powers to propagate their respective kinds, is likewise the cause of all the phenomena of nature, such as cohesion, repulsion, elasticity, and motion, even the motions of the heavenly bodies themselves.

If this powerful Being be self-existent, intelligent, and independent in his actions and volitions, he is an original or first cause, and that Being whom we denominate GOD. If he be not self-existent and independent, there must be a cause in the order of nature prior and superior to Him, which is either itself the first cause, or a link in that series of causes and effects, which, however vast we suppose it, must be traced ultimately to some one Being, who is self-existent, and has in himself the power of beginning motion, independent of everything but his own intelligence and volition. In vain have Atheists alleged, that the series may ascend infinitely, and that for that reason have no first mover or cause. An infinite series of successive beings involves an absurdity and contradiction (see Metaphysics, N° 288.): of an infinity but not to insist on this at present, we shall only beg the reader to consider such a series as a whole, and see what consequences will flow from the supposition. That we may with logical propriety consider it in this light, is incontrovertible; for the birth of each individual of the human race shows that it is made up of parts; but parts imply a whole as necessarily as an attribute implies its subject. As in this supposed series there is no cause which is not likewise an effect, nor any body moving another which was not itself moved by a third, the whole is undeniably equivalent to an infinite effect, or an infinite body moved: but if a finite effect must necessarily have proceeded from a cause, and a finite body Part I.

Being and Attributes of God.

in motion must have been put into that state by a mover; is there a human mind which can conceive an infinite effect to have proceeded from no cause, or an infinite body in motion to have been moved by nothing? No, surely! An infinite effect, were such a thing possible, would compel us to admit an infinite cause, and an infinite body in motion a mover of infinite power.

This great cause is God, whose wisdom, power, and goodness, all nature loudly proclaims. That the phenomena which we daily see evince the existence of one such Being, has just been shewn; and that we have no reason to infer the existence of more than one, is very evident. For, not to lay more stress than it will bear on that rule of Newton's, which forbids us to multiply substances without necessity, such a harmony prevails through the whole visible universe, as plainly shows it to be under the government of one intelligence. That on this globe the several elements serve for nourishment to plants, plants to the inferior animals, and animals to man; that the other planets of our system are probably inhabited, and their inhabitants nourished in the same or a similar manner; that the sun is so placed as to give light and heat to all, and by the law of gravitation to bind the whole planets into one system with itself—are truths so obvious and so universally acknowledged, as to supersede the necessity of establishing them by proof. The fair inference therefore is, that the solar system and all its parts are under the government of one intelligence, which directs all its motions and all the changes which take place among its parts for some wise purposes. To suppose it under the government of two or more intelligences would be highly unreasonable; for if these intelligences had equal power, equal wisdom, and the same designs, one of them would evidently be superfluous; and if they had equal power and contrary designs, they could not be the parents of that harmony which we clearly perceive to prevail in the system.

But the Being capable of regulating the movements of so vast a machine, may well be supposed to possess infinite power, and to be capable of superintending the motions of the universe. That the widely extended system of nature is but one system, of which the several parts are united by many bonds of mutual connection, has been shewn elsewhere (see Physics), and appears daily more and more evident from our progress in physical discoveries; and therefore it is in the highest degree unreasonable to suppose that it has more than one author, or one supreme governor.

Of infinite power, wisdom, and dominion.

As the unity of design apparent in the works of creation plainly proves the unity of their Author, so do the immensity of the whole, and the admirable adjustment of the several parts to one another, demonstrate His power and His wisdom. On this subject the following beautiful reflections by Mr Wollaston are deserving of the most serious attention.

* Religion of Nature, sect. v. prop. 14.

"In order (lays that able writer*) to prove to any one the grandness of this fabric of the world, one needs only to bid him consider the sun, with that inappurtable glory and lustre that surrounds it; to demonstrate its vast distance, magnitude, and heat; to represent to him the chorus of planets moving periodically, by uniform laws, in their several orbits about it; guarded some of them by secondary planets, and as it were emulating the state of the sun, and probably all possessed by proper inhabitants; to remind him of those surprising visits which the comets make to us, and the large trains of uncommon splendor which attend them, the far country from which they come, and the curiosity and horror which they excite not only among us, but in the inhabitants of other planets, who may also be up to see the entry and progress of these ministers of fate; to direct his eye and contemplation through those azure fields and vast regions above him up to the fixed stars, that radiant numberless host of heaven; and to make him understand how unlikely a thing it is that they should be placed there only to adorn and bespangle a canopy over our heads; to convince him that they are rather to many other uses, with their several systems of planets about them; to show him by the help of glasses still more and more of these fixed lights, and to beguile in him an apprehension of their inconceivable numbers, and those immense spaces that lie beyond our reach and even our imagination: One needs but to do this (continues our author), and explain to him such things as are now known almost to every body; and by it to shew, that if the world be not infinite, it is infinite similitude, and undoubtedly the work of an Infinite Architect.

"But if we would take a view of all the particulars contained within that astonishing compass which we have thus hastily run over, how would wonders multiply upon us? Every corner, every part of the world, is as it were made up of other worlds. If we look upon this our earth, what scope does it furnish for admiration? The great variety of mountains, hills, valleys, plains, rivers, seas, trees, and plants! The many tribes of different animals with which it is stocked; the multifarious inventions and works of one of these, i.e. of us men; with the wonderful instincts of others, guiding them uniformly to what is best for themselves, in situations where neither sense nor reason could direct them. And yet when all these (heaven and earth) are surveyed as nicely as they can be by the help of our unassisted senses and of telescopes, we may discover by the assistance of good microscopes, in very small parts of matter, as many new wonders as those already discovered, new kingdoms of animals, with new and curious architecture. So that as our senses and even conception fainted before in the vast journeys we took in considering the expanse of the universe, they here again fail us in our researches into the principles and minute parts of which it is composed. Both the beginnings and the ends of things, the least and the greatest, all confine to baffle us; and which way ever we prosecute our inquiries, we will meet with fresh subjects of amazement, and fresh reasons to believe that there are indefinitely more and more behind, that will forever escape our eager pursuits and deepest penetration.

"In this vast assemblage, and amidst all the multifarious motions by which the several processes of generation and corruption, and the other phenomena of nature, are carried on, we cannot but observe that there are stated methods, as so many forms of proceeding, to which things punctually and religiously adhere. The fame causes circumstanced in the same manner produce always the same effects; all the species of animals among us are made according to one general idea; and so are those of plants also, and even of minerals. No new species are brought forth or have arisen anywhere; and the old are preferred and continued by the old ways.

"It appears, lastly, beyond dispute, that in the part and model of the world there is a contrivance for accomplishing certain ends. The sun is placed near the centre of our system, for the more convenient dispensing of his benign influences to the planets moving about him; the place of the earth's equator intersects that of her orbit, and makes a proper angle with it, in order to diversify the year, and create an useful variety of seasons; and many other things of this kind will be always observed, and though a thousand times repeated, be meditated upon with pleasure by good men and true philosophers. Who can observe the vapours to ascend, especially from the sea, meet above in clouds, and fall again after condensation, without being convinced that this is a kind of distillation, in order to clear the water of its grosser salts, and then by rains and dews to supply the fountains and rivers with fresh and wholesome liquor; to nourish the vegetables below by showers, which descend in drops as from a watering-pot upon a garden? Who can view the structure of a plant or animal, the indefinite number of its fibres and fine vessels, the formation of larger vessels, and the several members out of them, with the apt disposition of all these; the means contrived for the reception and distribution of nutriment; the effect this nutriment has in extending the vessels, bringing the vegetable or animal to its full growth and expansion, continuing the motion of the several fluids, repairing the decays of the body, and preserving life? Who can take notice of the several faculties of animals, their arts of faving and providing for themselves, or the ways in which they are provided for; the uses of plants to animals, and of some animals to others, particularly to mankind; the care taken that the several species should be propagated, without confusion, from their proper seeds; the strong inclination planted in animals for that purpose, their love of their young and the like.—Who (says our author) can observe all this, and not see a design in such regular pieces, so nicely wrought and so admirably preserved? If there were but one animal in existence, and it could not be doubted but that his eyes were formed that he might see with them, his ears that he might hear with them, and his feet to be instruments by which he might remove himself from place to place; it design and contrivance can be much less doubted, when the same things are repeated in the individuals of all the tribes of animals; if the like observations be made with respect to vegetables and other things; and if all these classes of things, and much more the individuals comprehended under them, be inconceivably numerous, as most unquestionably they are—one cannot but be convinced, from what so plainly runs through the nobler parts of the visible world, that not only they, but other things, even those that seem to be less noble, have their ends likewise, though not always perceived by capacities limited like ours. And since we cannot, with the Epicureans of old, suppose the parts of matter to have contrived among themselves this wonderful form of a world, to have taken by agreement each its respective part, and then to have purified in conjunction conant ends by certain methods and measures concerted, there must be some other Being, whose wisdom and power are equal to such a mighty work as is the structure and preservation of the world. There must be some Almighty MIND who modelled and preserves it; lays the causes of things so deep; prescribes them such uniform and steady laws; defines and adapts them to certain purposes; and makes one thing to fit and answer another so as to produce one harmonious whole. Yes,

These are thy glorious works, Parent of good! Almighty, thine this universal frame, Thus wondrous fair; THYSELF how wondrous then!

How wondrous in wisdom and in power!"

But the goodness of God is not less conspicuous in goodness in his works than His power or His wisdom. Contrivance proves design, and the predominant tendency of the contrivances indicates the disposition of the designer. "The world (says an elegant and judicious writer *) * Dr Paley, abounds with contrivances, and all the contrivances in it with which we are acquainted are directed to beneficial purposes. Evil no doubt exists; but it is never that we can perceive the object of contrivance. Teeth are contrived to eat, not to ache; their aching now and then is incidental to the contrivance, perhaps inseparable from it; but it is not its object. This is a distinction which well deserves to be attended to. In delineating implements of husbandry, one would hardly say of a sickle that it is made to cut the reaper's fingers, though from the construction of the instrument, and the manner of using it, this mischief often happens. But if he had occasion to describe instruments of torture or execution, this, he would say, is to extend the finesse; this to dislocate the joints; this to break the bones; this to scourch the foles of the feet. Here pain and misery are the very objects of the contrivance. Now nothing of this sort is to be found in the works of nature. We never discover a train of contrivance to bring about an evil purpose. No anatomist ever discovered a system of organization calculated to produce pain and disease; or, in explaining the parts of the human body, ever said, this is to irritate, this to inflame, this duct is to convey the gravel to the kidney, this gland to secrete the humour which forms the gout. If by chance he come to a part of which he knows not the use, the most that he can say is, that to him it appears to be useless: no one ever supposes that it is put there to inconvenience, to annoy, or to torment. If God had wished our misery, he might have made sure of his purpose, by forming our senses to be as many fores and pains to us as they are now instruments of gratification and enjoyment; or, by placing us among objects so ill suited to our perceptions as to have continually offended us, instead of ministering to our refreshment and delight. He might have made, for instance, every thing we tasted bitter, every thing we saw loathsome, every thing we touched a thing, every smell a stench, and every sound a discord."

Instead of this, all our sensations, except such as are excited by what is dangerous to our health, are pleasures to us: The view of a landscape is pleasant; the taste of nourishing food is pleasant; sounds not too loud are agreeable, while musical sounds are exquisite; and scarcely any smells, except such are excited by effluvia obviously pernicious to the brain, are disagreeable; while some of them, if not too long indulged, are delightful. Our lives are preserved and the species is continued by obeying the impulse of appetites; of which the gratification is exquisite when not repeated too frequently, to answer the purposes of the Author of our being. Since, then, God has called forth his consummate Part I.

Being and mate wisdom to contrive and provide for our happiness, attributes and has made those things which are necessary to our existence and the continuance of the race sources of our greatest sensual pleasures, who can doubt but that benevolence is one of his attributes; and that, if it were not impious to draw a comparison between them, it is the attribute in which he himself most delighteth?

But it is not from sensation only that we may infer the benevolence of the Deity: He has formed us with minds capable of intellectual improvement, and he has implanted in the breast of every man a very strong desire of adding to his knowledge. This addition, it is true, cannot be made without labour; and at first the requisite labour is to most people irksome: but a very short progress in any study converts what was irksome into a pleasure of the most exalted kind; and he who by study, however intense, enlarges his ideas, experiences a complacency, which, though not so poignant perhaps as the pleasures of the sensuous, is such as endears him to himself, and is what he would not exchange for any thing else which this world has to bestow, except the still sweeter complacency arising from the conscious- nes of having discharged his duty.

That the practice of virtue is attended with a peculiar pleasure of the purest kind, is a fact which no man has ever questioned, though the immediate source of that pleasure has been the subject of many disputes. He who attributes it to a moral sense, which instinctively points out to every man his duty, and on the performance of it rewards him with a sentiment of self-approbation, must of necessity acknowledge benevolence to be one of the attributes of that Being who has so constituted the human mind. That to protect the innocent, relieve the distressed, and do to others as we would in like circumstances will to be done by, fills the breast, previous to all reflection, with a holy joy, as the com- mission of any crime tears it with remorse, cannot indeed be controverted. Many, however, contend, that this joy and this remorse spring not from any moral in- stinct implanted in the mind, but are the consequence of early and deep-rooted associations of the practice of virtue with the hope of future happiness, and of vice with the dread of future misery. On the respective merits of these two theories we shall not now decide, but only observe, that they both lead with equal certainty to the benevolence of the Deity, who made us capable of forming affections, and subjected these affections to fixed laws. This being the case, the moral sense, with all its instantaneous effects, affords not a more con- vincing proof of his goodness, than that principle in our nature by which remote circumstances become so linked together, that the one circumstance never occurs with- out bringing the other also into view. It is thus that the pleasing complacency, which was perhaps first excited by the hopes of future happiness, comes in time to be so associated with the consciousness of virtuous conduct, the only thing entitled to reward, that a man never performs a meritorious action without experiencing the most exquisite joy diffused through his mind, though his attention at that instant may not be directed either to heaven or futurity. Were we obliged, before we could experience this joy, to estimate by reason the merit of every individual action, and trace its connection to heaven and future happiness through a long train of intermediate reasoning, we should be in a great measure deprived of the present reward of virtue; and therefore this associating principle contributes much to our happiness. But the benevolence of a Being, who seems thus anxious to furnish us with both sensual and intellectual enjoyments, and who has made our duty our greatest pleasure, cannot be questioned; and therefore we must infer, that the Author of Nature wishes the happiness of the whole sensible and intelligent creation.

To such reasoning as this in support of the Divine Benevolence many objections have been made. Some of them appear at first sight plausible, and are apt to flatter the faith of him who has bestowed no time on the study of that branch of general science which is called physis (see Physics). To omit these altogether in such an article as this might be construed into neglect; while it is certain that there is in them nothing worthy the attention of that man who is qualified either to estimate their force, or to understand the arguments by which they have often been repelled.

It has been asked, Why, if the Author of Nature be a benevolent Being, are we necessarily subject to pain, diseases, and death? The scientific physiologist replies, Because from these evils Omnipotence itself could not in our present state exempt us, but by a constant series of miracles. He who admits miracles, knows likewise that mankind were originally in a state in which they were not subject to death; and that they fell under its dominion through the fault of their common progenitors. But the fall and restoration of man is the great subject of revealed religion; and at present we are dif- ficulting the question like philosophers who have no other data on which to proceed than the phenomena of nature. Now we know, that as all matter is divisible, every system composed of it must necessarily be liable to decay and dissolution; and our material system would decay and be dissolved long before it could serve the purposes of nature, were there not methods contrived with admirable wisdom for repairing the waste occasioned by perpetual friction. The body is furnished with different fluids, which continually circulate through it in proper channels, and leave in their way what is necessary to repair the solids. These again are supplied by food ab extra; and to the whole process of digestion, circulation, and nutrition, the air we breathe is absolutely necessary. But as the air is a very heterogeneous fluid, and subject to violent and sudden changes, it is obvious that these changes must affect the blood, and by consequence the whole frame of the human body. The air indeed in process of time consumes even marble itself; and therefore we cannot wonder, that as it is in one state the parent of health, it should in another be the source of disease to such creatures as man and other terrestrial animals. Nor could these consequences be avoided without introducing others much more deplorable. The world is governed by general laws, without which there could be among men neither arts nor sciences; and though laws different from those by which the system is at present governed might perhaps have been established, there is not the smallest reason to imagine that they could on the whole have been better, or attended with fewer inconveniences. As long as we have material and solid bodies capable of motion, liable to resistance from other solid bodies, supported by food, subject to the agency of the air, and divisible, they must necessarily be liable to pain, disease, corruption, and death, and that too by the very influence of those laws which preserve the order and harmony of the universe. Thus gravitation is a general law so good and so necessary, that were it for a moment suspended, the world would instantly fall to pieces; and yet by means of this law the man must inevitably be crushed to death on whom a tower shall chance to tumble. Again, the attraction of cohesion is a general law, without which it does not appear that any corporeal system could possibly exist: it is by this law too, or a modification of it, that the glands and lacteals of the human body extract from the blood such particles as are necessary to nourish the solids; and yet it is by means of the very same modification of the very same law that a man is liable to be poisoned.

Although the human body could not have been preserved from dangers and dilution but by introducing evils greater on the whole than those to which it is now liable, why, it has sometimes been asked, is every disorder to which it is subject attended with sickness or with pain? and why is such a horror of death implanted in our breasts, seeing that by the laws of nature death is inevitable? We answer, That sickness, pain, and the dread of death, serve the very best purposes. Could a man be put to death, or have his limbs broken without feeling pain, the human race had long ago been extinct. Felt we no uneasiness in a fever, we should be insensible of the disease, and die before we suspected our health to be impaired. The horror which generally accompanies our reflections on death tends to make us more careful of life, and prevents us from quitting this world rashly when our affairs prosper not according to our wishes. It is likewise an indication that our existence does not terminate in this world; for our dread is seldom excited by the prospect of the pain which we may suffer when dying, but by our anxiety concerning what we may be doomed to suffer or enjoy in the next stage of our existence; and this anxiety tends more perhaps than anything else to make us live while we are here in such a manner as to ensure our happiness hereafter.

Thus from every view that we can take of the works and laws of God, and even from considering the objections which have sometimes been made to them, we are compelled to acknowledge the benevolence of their Author. We must not, however, suppose the Divine benevolence to be a fond affection like that which is called benevolence among men. All human affections and passions originate in our dependence and wants; and it has been doubted whether any of them be at first disinterested (see PASSION): but he to whom existence is essential cannot be dependent; he who is the Author of every thing can feel no want. The divine benevolence therefore must be wholly disinterested, and of course free from those partialities originating in self-love, which are alloys in the most sublime of human virtues. The most benevolent man on earth, though he wishes the happiness of every fellow-creature, has still, from the ties of blood, the endearments of friendship, or, perhaps from a regard to his own interest, some particular favourites whom, on a competition with others, he would certainly prefer. But the equal Lord of all can have no particular favourites. His benevolence is therefore coincident with justice; or, that which is called *divine justice*, is only benevolence exerting itself in a particular manner for the propagation of general felicity. When God prescribes laws for regulating the conduct of his intelligent creatures, it is not because he can reap any benefit from their obedience to those laws, but because such obedience is necessary to their own happiness; and when he punishes the transgressor, it is not because in his nature there is any disposition to which the prospect of such punishment can afford gratification, but because in the government of free agents punishment is necessary to reform the criminal, and to intimidate others from committing the like crimes.

The essence of this self-existent, all-powerful, infinite, God incom- ly wise, and perfectly good Being, is to us wholly in- comprehensible. That it is not matter, is shewn by the process of argumentation by which we have proved it to exist: but what it is we know not, and it would be impious presumption to inquire. It is sufficient for all the purposes of religion to know that God is some how or other present to every part of his works; that existence and every possible perfection is essential to him; and that he wishes the happiness of all his creatures. From these truths we might proceed to illustrate the perpetual superintendence of his providence, both general and particular, over every the minutest part of the universe: but that subject has been discussed in a separate article; to which, therefore, we refer the reader. (see PROVIDENCE). We shall only observe at present, that the manner in which animals are propagated affords as complete a proof of the constant superintendence of divine power and wisdom, as it does of the immediate exertion of these faculties in the formation of the parent pair of each species. For were propagation carried on by *necessary* and mechanical laws, it is obvious, that in every age there would be generated, in each species of animals, the very same proportion of males to females that there was in the age preceding. On the other hand, but con- sidered generation depend on *fortuitous* mechanism, it is not conceivably but that, since the beginning of the world, several species of animals should in *some* age have gene- rated nothing but *males*, and others nothing but *females*; and that of course many species would have been long since extinct. As neither of these cases has ever happened, the preservation of the various species of animals, by keeping up constantly in the world a due, though not always the same, proportion between the sexes of male and female, is a complete proof of the superinten- dence of divine providence, and of that saying of the apostle, that it is "in God we live, move, and have our being."

Sect. II. Of the Duties and Sanctions of Natural Religion.

From the short view that we have taken of the di- vine perfections, it is evidently our duty to reverence in and grati- tude due to our minds the self-existent Being to whom they belong. This is indeed not only a duty, but a duty of which no man who contemplates these perfections, and believes them to be real, can possibly avoid the performance. He who thinks irreverently of the Author of nature, can never have considered seriously the power, the wis- dom, and the goodness, displayed in his works; for whoever has a tolerable notion of these must be con- vinced, that he who performed them has no imperfec- Part I.

Duties and Sanctions of Natural Religion.

tion; that his power can accomplish every thing which involves not a contradiction; that his knowledge is intuitive, and free from the possibility of error; and that his goodness extends to all without partiality and without any alloy of selfish design. This conviction must make every man on whose mind it is impressed ready to prostrate himself in the dust before the Author of his being; who, though infinitely exalted above him, is the source of all his enjoyments, constantly watches over him with paternal care, and protects him from numberless dangers. The sense of so many benefits must excite in his mind a sentiment of the liveliest gratitude to him from whom they are received, and an ardent wish for their continuance.

While filial gratitude and devotion thus glow in the breast of the contemplative man, he will be careful not to form even a mental image of that all-perfect Being to whom they are directed. He knows that God is not material; that he exists in a manner altogether incomprehensible; that to frame an image of him would be to assign limits to what is infinite; and that to attempt to form a positive conception of him would be impiously to compare himself with his Maker.

The man who has any tolerable notion of the perfections of the Supreme Being will never speak lightly of him, or make use of his name at all but on great and solemn occasions. He knows that the terms of all languages are inadequate and improper, when applied directly to him who has no equal, and to whom nothing can be compared; and therefore he will employ these terms with caution. When he speaks of his mercy and compassion, he will not consider them as feelings wringing the heart like the mercy and compassion experienced by man, but as rays of pure and disinterested benevolence. When he thinks of the stupendous system of nature, and hears it, perhaps, said that God formed it for his own glory, he will reflect that God is so infinitely exalted above all his creatures, and so perfect in himself, that he can neither take pleasure in their applause, nor receive any accession of any kind from the existence of ten thousand worlds. The immense fabric of nature therefore only displays the glory or perfections of its Author to us and to other creatures who have not faculties to comprehend him in himself.

When the contemplative man talks of serving God, he does not dream that his services can increase the divine felicity; but means only that it is his duty to obey the divine laws. Even the pronoun He, when it refers to God, cannot be of the same import as when it refers to man; and by the philosophical divine it will seldom be used but with a mental allusion to this obvious distinction.

As the man who duly venerates the Author of his being will not speak of him on trivial occasions, so will he be still further from calling upon him to witness impertinences and falsehood, (see OATH). He will never mention his name but with a pause, that he may have time to reflect in silence on his numberless perfections, and on the immense distance between himself and the Being of whom he is speaking. The slightest reflection will convince him that the world with all that it contains depends every moment on that God who formed it; and this conviction will compel him to wish for the divine protection of himself and his friends from all dangers and misfortunes. Such a wish is in effect a prayer, and will always be accompanied with adoration, confes-

37 Of whom no positive idea should be formed.

38 How he ought to be spoken of; and

39 What is meant by serving him.

sion, and thanksgiving (see PRAYER). But adoration, confessions, supplication, and thanksgiving, constitute what is called worship, and therefore the worship of God is a natural duty. It is the addressing of ourselves as his dependants to him as the supreme cause and governor of the world, with acknowledgements of what we enjoy, and petitions for what we really want, or he knows to be convenient for us. As if, ex. gr. I should in some humble and composed manner (says Mr Wollaston) pray to that " Almighty Being, upon whom depends the existence of the world, and by whose providence I have been preserved to this moment, and enjoyed many undeserved advantages, that he would graciously accept my grateful sense and acknowledgments of all his beneficence towards me; that he would deliver me from the evil consequences of all my transgressions and follies; that he would endue me with such dispositions and powers as may carry me innocently and safely through all future trials, and may enable me on all occasions to behave myself conformably to the laws of reason piously and wisely; that He would suffer no being to injure me, no misfortunes to befall me, nor me to hurt myself by any error or misconduct of my own; that he would vouchsafe me clear and distinct perceptions of things; with so much health and prosperity as may be good for me; that I may at least pass my time in peace, with contentment and tranquillity of mind; and that having faithfully discharged my duty to my family and friends, and endeavoured to improve myself in virtuous habits and useful knowledge, I may at last make a decent and happy exit, and find myself in some better state."

That an untaught savage would be prompted by instinct to address the Supreme Being in such terms as this, we are so far from thinking, that to us it appears not probable that such a savage, in a state of solitude, would be led by instinct to suppose the existence of that Being. But as soon as the being and attributes of God were, by whatever means, made known to man, every sentiment expressed in this prayer must necessarily have been generated in his mind; for not to be sensible that we derive our existence and all our enjoyments from God, is in effect to deny his being or his providence; and not to feel a wish that he would give us what we want, is to deny either his goodness or his power.

The worship of God therefore is a natural duty resulting from the contemplation of his attributes and a sense of our own dependence. But the reasoning which has led us to this conclusion respects only private devotion; for it is a question of much greater difficulty, and far enough from being yet determined, whether public worship be a duty of that religion which can with any propriety be termed natural. Mr Wollaston indeed positively affirms that it is, and endeavours to prove his position by the following arguments.

" A man (says he) may be considered as a member of some society; and as such he ought to worship God for it, if he has the opportunity of doing it, if there be proper prayers used publicly to which he may refer, and if his health, &c. permit. Or the society may be considered as one body, that has common interests and concerns, and as such is obliged to worship the Deity, and offer one prayer. Besides, there are many who know not of Duties and themselves how to pray; perhaps cannot so much as read. These must be taken as they are; and consequently some time and place appointed where they may have suitable prayers read to them, and be guided in their devotions. And further, towards the keeping mankind in order, it is necessary there should be some religion professed, and even established, which cannot be without public worship. And were it not for that sense of virtue which is principally preserved (so far as it is preserved) by national forms and habits of religion, men would soon lose it all, run wild, prey upon one another, and do what else the worst of savages do."

These are in themselves just observations, and would come with great force and propriety from the tongue or pen of a Christian preacher, who is taught by revelation that the Master whom he serves has commanded his followers "not to forsake the assembling of themselves together," and has promised, "that if two of them shall agree on earth as touching any thing that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of his Father who is in Heaven." As urged by such a man, and on such grounds, they would serve to show the fitness of the divine command, and to point out the benefits which a religious obedience to it might give us reason to expect. But the author is here professing to treat of natural religion, and to state the duties which result from the mere relation which subsists between man as a creature and God as his creator and constant preserver. Now, though we readily admit the benefits of public worship as experienced under the Christian dispensation, we do not perceive any thing in this reasoning which could lead a pious theft to expect the same benefit previous to all experience. When the author thought of national forms and establishments of religion, he certainly lost sight of his proper subject, and, as such writers are too apt to do, comprehended under the religion of nature what belongs only to that which is revealed. Natural religion, in the proper sense of the words, admits of no particular forms, and of no legal establishment. Private devotion is obviously one of its duties, because sentiments of adoration, confession, supplication, and thanksgiving, necessarily spring up in the breast of every man who has just notions of God and of himself; but it is not so obvious that such notions would induce any body of men to meet at stated times for the purpose of expressing their devotional sentiments in public. Mankind are indeed social beings, and naturally communicate their sentiments to each other; but we cannot conceive what should at first have led them to think that public worship at stated times would be acceptable to the self-existent Author of the universe. In case of a famine, or any other calamity in which the whole tribe was equally involved, they might speak of it to each other, inquire into its cause, and in the extremity of their distress join perhaps in one fervent petition, that God would remove it. In the same manner they might be prompted to pour forth occasional ejaculations of public gratitude for public mercies; but it does not follow from these incidental occurrences that they would be led to institute times and places and forms of national worship, as if they believed the omniscient Deity more ready to hear them in public than in private. That the appointment of such times and forms and places is beneficial to society, experience teaches us; and therefore it is the duty, and has been the practice, of the supreme magistrate, in every age and in every civilized country, to provide for the maintenance of the national worship. But this practice has taken its rise, not from the deductions of reason, but either from direct revelation, as among the Jews and Christians; or from tradition, which had its origin in some early revelations, as among the more enlightened Pagans of ancient and modern times.

We hope none of our readers will imagine that we mean, in any degree, to call in question the fitness or the duty of public worship. This is far from our intention; but while we are convinced of the importance and necessity of this duty, we do not apprehend that we lessen its dignity, or detract from the weight of almost universal practice, by endeavouring to derive that practice from its true source, which appears to us to be not human reason, but divine revelation.

But whatever doubts may be entertained with respect to the origin of public worship, there can be none as to the foundation of moral virtue. Reason clearly perceives it to be the will of our Maker, that each individual of the human race should treat every other individual as, in similar circumstances, he would expect to be treated himself. It is thus only that the greatest sum of human happiness can be produced (see Moral Philosophy, No. 17. and 135.) for were all men temperate, sober, just in their dealings, faithful to their promises, charitable to the poor, &c. it is obvious that no miseries would be felt on earth, but the few which, by the laws of corporal nature, unavoidably result from the union of our minds with systems of matter. But the design of God in forming sentient beings was to communicate to them some portion, or rather some resemblance, of that felicity which is essential to himself; and therefore every action which in its natural tendency co-operates with this design must be agreeable to him, as every action of a contrary tendency must be disagreeable.

From this reasoning it follows, that we are obliged not only to be just and beneficent to one another, but also to abstain from all unnecessary cruelty to inferior animals. That we have a right to tame cattle, and employ them for the purposes of agriculture and other arts where strength is required, is a position which we believe has seldom been controverted. But if it is the intention of God to communicate a portion of happiness to all his creatures endowed with sense, it is obvious that we sin against him when we subject even the horse or the ass to greater labour than he is able to perform; and this sin is aggravated when from avarice we give not the animal a sufficient quantity of food to support him under the exertions which we compel him to make. That it is our duty to defend ourselves and our property from the ravages of beasts of prey, and that we may even exterminate such beasts from the country in which we live, are truths which cannot be questioned; but it has been the opinion of men, eminent for wisdom and learning, that we have no right to kill an ox or a sheep for food, but in consequence of the divine permission to Noah recorded in the ninth chapter of the book of Genesis. Whether this opinion be well or ill founded we shall not positively determine, though the arguments on which it rests are of such a nature as the reasoners of the present day would perhaps find it no easy talk to answer; but it cannot admit of a doubt, that, in killing such animals, we are, in duty to their Creator and ours, bound to put them to the least possible pain. If this be granted, it is still more evident Duties and evident that we act contrary to the divine will when we torture and put to death such animals as are confessedly not injurious to ourselves, or to any thing on which the comforts of life are known to depend. We are indeed far from being convinced with the poet, that insects and reptiles "in mortal suffering feel as when a giant dies:" but their feelings on that occasion are certainly such, as that, when we wantonly inflict them, we thwart, as far as in our power, the benevolent purpose of the Creator in giving them life and sense. Let it be observed too, that the man who practices needless cruelty to the brute creation is training up his mind for exercising cruelty towards his fellow-creatures, to his slaves if he have any, and to his servants; and, by a very quick progress, to all who may be placed beneath him in the scale of society.

Such are the plain duties of natural religion; and if they were universally practised, it is evident that they would be productive of the greatest happiness which mankind could enjoy in this world, and that piety and virtue would be their own reward. They are however far from being universally practised; and the consequence is, that men are frequently raised to affluence and power by vice, and sometimes sunk into poverty by a rigid adherence to the rules of virtue.

This being the case, there can be no question of greater importance, while there are few more difficult to be answered, than "What are the sanctions by which natural religion enforces obedience to her own laws?" It is not to be supposed that the great body of mankind should, without the prospect of an ample reward, practice virtue in those instances in which such practice would be obviously attended with injury to themselves; nor does it appear reasonable in any man to forego present enjoyment, without the well-grounded hope of thereby securing to himself a greater or more permanent enjoyment in reversion. Natural religion therefore, as a system of doctrines influencing the conduct, is exceedingly defective, unless it affords sufficient evidence, intelligible to every ordinary capacity, of the immortality of the soul, or at least of a future state of rewards and punishments. That it does afford this evidence, is strenuously maintained by some divots, and by many philosophers of a different description, who, though they profess Christianity, seem to have some unaccountable dread of being deceived by their bibles in every doctrine which cannot be supported by philosophical reasoning.

One great argument made use of to prove that the immortality of the soul is among the doctrines of natural religion, is the universal belief of all ages and nations that men continue to live in some other state after death has separated their souls from their bodies. "Quod si omnium consensus nature vix est: omnique, qui ubique sunt, consentiunt esse aliquid, quod ad eos pertineat, qui vita cesserint: nobis quoque idem existimandum est: et si, quorum aut ingenio, aut virtute animus excellit, eos arbitramur, quia natura optimae sunt, cernere nature vim maxime: verisimile est, omnium optimus quique maxime poteritatis serviet, esse aliquid, cuius est morte sensum finit habiturus. Sed ut deos esse natura opinamur, qualeque sint, ratione cogitativum, sic permanere animos arbitramur consensu nationum omnium."*

That this is a good argument for the truth of the doctrine, through whatever channel men may have received it, we readily acknowledge; but it appears not to us to be any proof of that doctrine's being the deduction of Duties and human reasoning. The popular belief of Paganism, both ancient and modern, is so fantastic and absurd, that it could never have been rationally inferred from what nature teaches of God and the soul. In the Elysium of the Greek and Roman poets, departed spirits were vi, not the offable to mortal eyes; and must therefore have been spring of clothed with some material vehicle of sufficient density to reflect the rays of light, though not to resist the human touch. In the mythology of the northern nations, as deceased heroes are represented as eating and drinking, they could not be considered as entirely divested of matter; and in every popular creed of idolatry, future rewards were supposed to be conferred, not for private virtue, but for public violence, on heroes and conquerors and the destroyers of nations. Surely no admirer of what is now called natural religion will pretend that these are part of its doctrines; they are evidently the remains of some primeval tradition obscured and corrupted in its long progress through ages and nations.

The philosophers of Greece and Rome employed much time and great talents in disquisitions concerning the human soul and the probability of a future state; and if reflecting the genuine conclusions of natural religion on this subject are anywhere to be found, one would naturally look for them in the writings of those men whose genius and virtues did honour to human nature. Yet it is a fact, that the philosophers held such notions concerning the substance of the soul and its state after death as could afford no rational support to sustaining virtue. (See Metaphysics, Part III. chap. 4.). Socrates is indeed an exception. Confining himself to the study of ethics, that excellent person inferred by the common moral arguments (see Moral Philosophy, No 232—246), that the reality of a future state of rewards and punishments is in the highest degree probable. He was not, however, at all times absolutely convinced of this important truth; for a little before his death he said to some who were about him, "I am now about to leave this world, and ye are still to continue in it; which of us have the better part allotted us, God only knows." And again, "Plato in the end of his most admired discourse concerning the Apology, immortality of the soul, delivered at a time when he must have been serious, he said to his friends who came to pay their last visit, 'I would have you to know that I have great hopes that I am now going into the company of good men; yet I would not be too peremptory and confident concerning it.'"

Next to Socrates, Cicero was perhaps the most respectable of all the philosophers of antiquity; and he seems to have studied this great question with uncommon care: yet what were his conclusions? After retailing the opinions of various fages of Greece, and showing that some held the soul to be the heart; others, the blood in the heart; some the brain; others, the breath; one, that it was harmony; another, that it was number; one, that it was nothing at all; and another, that it was a certain quintessence without a name, but which might properly be called ethereal—he gravely adds, "Harum sententiarum qua vera sit, Deus aliquis videt: quaque verissimilis, magno quefio est." He then proceeds to give his own opinion; which was, that the soul is part of God.

To us who know by other evidence that the soul is immortal, and that there will be a future state in which Duties and all the obliquities of the present stall be made straight, the argument drawn from the moral attributes of God, and the unequal ditribution of the good things of this life, appears to have the force of demonstration. Yet none of us will surely pretend to say that his powers of reasoning are greater than were those of Socrates and Cicero: and therefore the probability is, that had we been like them deitute of the light of revelation, we should have been disturbed by the same doubts, and have said with the latter, on reading the arguments of the former as detailed by Plato. "Necio quomodo, dum lego, attentior: cum posui librum, et mcccum ipse de immortalitate animorum ceepi cogitare, attentio illa elabitur *."

Without the light of revelation we should have doubted like them.

No one, we hope, will suspect us of an impious attempt to weaken the evidence of a future state. God forbid! The expectation of that state is the only support of virtue and religion; and we think the arguments we have stated elsewhere, and referred to on the present occasion, make the reality of it to highly probable, that, though there were no other evidence, he would act a very foolish part who should confine his attention wholly to the present life. But we do not apprehend that we can injure the cause either of virtue or of religion, by confessing, that those arguments which left doubts in the minds of Socrates and Cicero appear not to us to have the force of complete demonstration of that life and immortality which our Saviour brought to light through the gospel.

Were the case, however, otherwise; were the arguments which the light of nature affords for the immortality of the human soul as convincing as any geometrical demonstration—natural religion would still be defective; because it points out no method by which such as have offended God may be restored to his favour, and to the hopes of happiness which by their sin they had lost. That he who knows whereof we are made would show himself placable to sinners, and that he would find some way to be reconciled, might perhaps be reasonably inferred from the consideration of his benevolence displayed in his works. But when we come to inquire more particularly how we are to be reconciled, and whether a propitiation will be required, nature stops short, and expects with impatience the aid of some particular revelation. That God will receive returning sinners, and accept of repentance instead of perfect obedience, cannot be certainly known by those to whom he has not declared that he will. For though repentance be the most probable, and indeed the only means of reconciliation which nature suggests; yet whether he, who is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity, will not require something further before he restore sinners to the privileges which they have forfeited, mere human reason has no way of discovering. From nature therefore arises no sufficient comfort to sinners, but anxious and endless solicitude about the means of appeasing the Deity. Hence those different ways of sacrificing, and those numberless superstitions which overspread the heathen world, but which were so little satisfactory to the wiser part of mankind, that, even in those days of darkness, the philosophers frequently declared that, in their opinion, those rites and oblations could avail nothing towards appeasing the wrath of an offended God, or making their prayers acceptable to him. Hence Socrates and one of his disciples are represented by Plato as expecting a person divinely commissioned to inform them whether sacrifices be acceptable to the deity, and as resolving to offer no more till that person's arrival, which they piously hoped might be at no great distance.

This darkness of the pagan world is to us who live under the sunshine of the gospel happily removed by the various revelations contained in the scriptures of the Old and New Testaments. These taken together exhibit such a display of providence, such a system of doctrines, and such precepts of practical wisdom, as the ingenuity of man could never have discovered. The Christian, with the scriptures in his hands, can regulate his conduct by an infallible guide, and rest his hopes on the surest foundation. These scriptures it is now our business to examine.

PART II. OF REVEALED THEOLOGY.

IN every civilized country the popular system of theology has claimed its origin from divine revelation. The Pagans of antiquity had their augurs and oracles; the Chinese have their inspired teachers Confucius and Fohi; the Hindoos have their sacred books derived from Brahma; the followers of Mahomet have their Koran dictated by an angel; and the Jews and Christians have the scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, which they believe to have been written by holy men of old, who spake and wrote as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.

That the claims of ancient Paganism to a theology derived from heaven, as well as the similar claims of the Chinese, Hindoos, and Mahometans, are ill founded, has been shewn in various articles of this work, (see CHINA, HINDOSTAN, MAHOMETANISM, MYTHOLOGY, and POLYTHEISM); whilst under the words RELIGION, REVELATION, and SCRIPTURE, we have sufficiently proved the divine inspiration of the Jewish and Christian scriptures, and of course the divine origin of Jewish and Christian theology. These indeed are not two systems of theology, but parts of one system which was gradually revealed as men were able to receive it; and therefore both scriptures must be studied by the Christian divine.

There is nothing in the sacred volume which it is not true, of importance to understand; for the whole proceeds from the fountain of truth: but some of its doctrines are much more important than others, as relating immediately to man's everlasting happiness; and these it has been customary to arrange and digest into regular systems, called bodies or institutes of Christian theology. Could these artificial systems be formed with perfect impartiality, they would undoubtedly be useful, for the bible contains many historical details, but remotely related to salvation; and even of its most important truths, it requires more time and attention than the majority of Christians have to bestow, to discover the mutual connection and dependence.

Artificial systems of theology are commonly divided into two great parts, the theoretic and the practical; and and these again are subdivided into many inferior branches.

Under the theoretic part are sometimes classed,

1. Dogmatic theology; which comprehends an entire system of all the dogmas or tenets which a Christian is bound to believe and profess. The truth of these the divine must clearly perceive, and be able to enforce on his audience: and hence the necessity of studying what is called,

2. The exegesis, or the art of attaining the true sense of the holy scriptures; and,

3. Hermeneutic theology, or the art of interpreting and explaining the scriptures to others; an art of which no man can be ignorant who knows how to attain the true sense of them himself.

4. Polemical theology, or controversy; and,

5. Moral theology, which is distinguished from moral philosophy, or the simple doctrine of ethics, by teaching a much higher degree of moral perfection than the mere light of reason could ever have discovered, and adding new motives to the practice of virtue.

The practical sciences of the divine are,

1. Homiletic or pastoral theology; which teaches him to adapt his discourse from the pulpit to the capacity of his hearers, and to pursue the best methods of guiding them by his doctrine and example in the way of salvation.

2. Catechetic theology, or the art of teaching youth and ignorant persons the principal points of evangelical doctrine, as well with regard to belief as to practice.

3. Confessional theology, or the science which decides on doubtful cases of moral theology, and that calms the scruples of conscience which arise in the Christian's soul during his journey through the present world.

We have mentioned these divisions and subdivisions of the science of theology, not because we think them important, but merely that our readers may be at no loss to understand the terms when they meet with them in other works. Of such terms we shall ourselves make no use, for the greater part of them indicate distinctions where there is no difference, and tend only to perplex the student. As the truths of Christianity are all contained in the scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, it is obvious that dogmatic theology must comprehend the speculative part of that which is called moral, as well as every doctrine about which controversy can be of importance. But no man can extract a single dogma from the bible but by the practice of what is here called the exegesis; so that all the subdivisions of this arrangement of theoretical theology must be studied together as they necessarily coalesce into one. The same thing is true of the three branches into which practical theology is here divided. He who has acquired the art of adapting his homilies to the various capacities of a mixed audience, will need no new study to fit him for instructing children, and the most ignorant persons who are capable of instruction; and the complete matter of moral theology will find it no very difficult task to resolve all the cases of conscience which he can have reason to suppose will ever be submitted to his judgement. For these reasons we shall not trouble our readers with the various divisions and subdivisions of theology. Our preliminary directions will show them how we think the science should be studied; and all that we have to do as system-builders is to lay before them the view which the scriptures present to us of the being and perfections of God, his various dispensations to man, and the duties thence incumbent on Christians. In doing this, we shall follow the order of the divine dispensations as we find them recorded in the Old and New Testaments, dwelling longest on those which appear to us of most general importance. But as we take it for granted that every reader of this article will have previously read the whole sacred volume, we shall not scruple to illustrate dogmas contained in the Old Testament by texts taken from the New, or to illustrate doctrines peculiar to the Christian religion by the testimony of Jewish prophets.

Sect. I. Of God and his Attributes.

In every system of theology the first truths to be believed are those which relate to the being and attributes of God. The Jewish lawgiver, therefore, who records the earliest revelations that were made to man, begins his history with a display of the power and wisdom of a known God in the creation of the world. He does not inform his countrymen, and expect them to believe, on the authority of his divine commission, that God exists; for he well knew that the being of God must be admitted, and just notions entertained of his attributes, before man can be required to pay any regard to miracles which afford the only evidence of a primary revelation. "In the beginning (says he) God created the heavens and the earth." Here the being of God is assumed as a truth universally received; but the sentence, short as it is, reveals another, which, as we shall afterwards shew, human reason could never have discovered.

There is nothing which the scriptures more frequently or more earnestly inculcate than the unity of the divine nature. The texts asserting this great and fundamental truth are almost numberless. "Unto thee (says Moses to his countrymen *) it was shewed, that thou mightest know that the Lord is God; there is none else beside thee." Deut. iv. 39. "Know therefore that the Lord he is God in heaven above and upon the earth beneath: there is none else." And again, "Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord," or, as it is expressed in the original, "Jehovah our God is one Jehovah," one Being to whom existence is essential, who could not have a beginning and cannot have an end. In the prophecies of Isaiah, God is introduced as repeatedly declaring, "I am Je- + Isaiah xiv. hovah, and there is none else; there is no God besides me; that they may know from the rising of the sun and from the west, that there is none besides me: I am Jeho- vah, and there is none else: Is there a God besides me? Yea there is no God; I know not any." In perfect harmony with these declarations of Moses and the prophets, our Saviour, addressing himself to his Father, says, "This is life eternal, that they might know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom Thou hast sent;" and St Paul, who derived his doctrine from his divine Master, affirms, "that 'an idol is no- + 1 Cor. viii. thing in the world; and that there is none other God but one.'"

The unity of the divine nature, which, from the order and harmony of the world, appears probable to human reason, these texts of revelation put beyond a doubt. Hence the first precept of the Jewish law, and, according to their own writers, the foundation of their whole religion, was, "Thou shalt have none other gods before Me." Me." Hence, too, the reason of that strict command to Jews and Christians to give divine worship to none but God: "Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve;" because he is God alone. Him only must we fear, because he alone hath infinite power; in him alone must we trust, because "he only is our rock and our salvation;" and to him alone must we direct our devotions, because "he only knoweth the hearts of the children of men."

The word דָּתִי does not indicate a plurality of gods. In the opinion, however, of many eminent divines, it denotes, by its junction with the singular verb, a plurality of persons in the one Godhead; and some few have contended, that by means of this peculiar construction, the Christian doctrine of the Trinity may be proved from the first chapter of the book of Genesis. To this latter opinion we can by no means give our assent. That there are three distinct persons in the one divine nature may be inferred with sufficient evidence from a multitude of passages in the Old and New Testaments diligently compared together; but it would perhaps be rash to rest the proof of so sublime a mystery on any single text of holy scripture, and would certainly be so to rest it on the text in question. That Moses was acquainted with this doctrine, we may reasonably conclude from his so frequently making a plural name of God to agree with a verb in the singular number; but had we not possessed the brighter light of the New Testament to guide us, we should never have thought of drawing such an inference. For supposing the word דָּתִי to denote clearly a plurality of persons, how could we have known that the number is neither more or less than three, had it not been ascertained to us by subsequent revelations?

There are indeed various passages in the Old Testament, of the phraseology of which no rational account can be given, but that they indicate more than one person in the Godhead. Such are those texts already noticed; "and the Lord God said, let us make man in our image, after our likeness;" and "the Lord God said, behold the man is become like one of us." To these may be added the following, which are to us perfectly unintelligible on any other supposition; "and the Lord God said, let us go down, and there confound their language."* "If I be a Master (in the Hebrew adonim, masters), where is my fear?"† "The fear of the Lord (Jehovah) is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy (in the Hebrew holy ones) is understanding."‡ "Remember thy Creator (Hebrew, thy Creators) in the days of thy youth.§" "And now the LORD GOD and his SPIRIT hath sent me."‖ "Seek ye out of the book of the LORD and read; for MY mouth it hath commanded, and his SPIRIT it hath gathered them."*

That these texts imply a plurality of divine persons, seems to us incontrovertible. When Moses represents God as saying, let us make man, the majesty of the plural number had not been adopted by earthly sovereigns; and it is obvious that the Supreme Being could not, as has been supposed, call on angels to make man; for in different places of scripture ‡ creation is attributed to God alone. Hence it is that Solomon speaks of Creators in the plural number, though he means only the one Supreme Being, and exhorts men to remember them in the days of their youth. In the passage first quoted from Isaiah, there is a distinction made between the Lord God and his Spirit; and in the other, three divine persons are introduced, viz. the Speaker, the Lord, and the Spirit of the Lord. It does not, however, appear evident from these passages, or from any other that we recollect in the Old Testament, that the persons in Deity are three and no more: but no sober Christian will harbour a doubt but that the precise number was by some means or other made known to the ancient Hebrews; for inquiries leading to it would be naturally suggested by the form in which the high priest was commanded to bless the people. "The LORD bless thee and keep thee. The LORD make his face to shine upon thee, and be gracious unto thee. The LORD lift up his countenance upon thee, and give thee peace."*

The form of Christian baptism establishes the truth of a Trinity the doctrine of the Trinity beyond all reasonable ground in unity of dispute. "Go (lays our blessed Saviour) and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost." What was it the apostles were to teach all nations? Was it not to turn from their vanities to the living God; to renounce their idols and false gods, and fo to be baptized in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost? What now must occur to the Gentile nations on this occasion, but that, instead of all their deities, to whom they had before bowed down, they were in future to serve, worship, and adore, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, as the only true and living God? To suppose that God and two creatures are here joined together in the solemn rite by which men were to be admitted into a new religion, which directly condemns all creature-worship, would be so unreasonable, that we are persuaded such a supposition never was made by any converted Polytheist of antiquity. The nations were to be baptized in the name of three persons, in the same manner, and therefore, doubtless, in the same sense. It is not said in the name of God and his two faithful servants; nor in the name of God, and Christ, and the Holy Ghost, which might have suggested a thought that one only of the three is God; but in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Whatever honour, reverence, or regard, is paid to the first person in this solemn rite, the fame is paid to all three. Is he acknowledged as the object of worship? So are the other two likewise. Is he God and Lord over us? So are they. Are we enrolled as subjects, servants, and soldiers, under him? So are we equally under all. Are we hereby regenerated and made the temple of the Father? So are we likewise of the Son and Holy Ghost. "We will come (lays our Saviour †) and John xiv, and make our abode with him."

If those who believe the inspiration of the scriptures could require any further proof that the Godhead comprehends a trinity of persons in one nature, we might urge the apostolical form of benediction; "The grace of our LORD JESUS CHRIST, and the love of God, and the communion of the HOLY GHOST, be with you all." Would St Paul, or any other man of common sense, have in the same sentence, and in the most solemn manner, recommended his Corinthian converts to the love of God, and to the grace and communion of two creatures? We should think it very absurd to recommend a man at once to the favour of a king and a beggar; Part II.

God and his Attributes.

gar; but how infinitely small is the distance between the greatest earthly potentate and the meanest beggar when compared with that which must for ever subsist between the Almighty Creator of heaven and earth and the most elevated creature?

But how, it will be asked, can three divine persons be but one and the same God? This is a question which has been often put, but which, we believe, no created being can fully answer. The divine nature and its manner of existence is, to us, wholly incomprehensible; and we might with greater reason attempt to weigh the mountains in scales, than by our limited faculties to fathom the depths of infinity. The Supreme Being is present in power to every portion of space, and yet it is demonstrable, that in his essence he is not extended (see Metaphysics, No. 399, 310). Both these truths, his inextension and omnipresence, are fundamental principles in what is called natural religion; and when taken together they form, in the opinion of most people, a mystery as incomprehensible as that of the Trinity in unity. Indeed there is nothing of which it is more difficult to form a distinct notion than unity simple, and absolutely indivisible. Though the Trinity in unity, therefore, were no Christian doctrine, mysteries must still be believed; for they are as inseparable from the religion of nature as from that of revelation; and atheism involves the most incomprehensible of all mysteries, even the beginning of existence without a cause. We must indeed form the best notions that we can of this and all other mysteries; for if we have no notions whatever of a Trinity in unity, we can neither believe nor disbelieve that doctrine. It is however to be remembered, that all our notions of God are more or less analogical; that they must be expressed in words which, literally interpreted, are applicable only to man; and that propositions understood in this literal sense may involve an apparent contradiction, from which the truth meant to be expressed by them would be seen to be free, had we direct and adequate conceptions of the divine nature. On this account it is to be wished that men treating of the mystery of the Holy Trinity, had always expressed themselves in scripture language, and never aimed at being wise above what is written; but since they have acted otherwise, we must, in justice to our readers, animadvert on one or two statements of this doctrine, which we have reason to believe are earnestly contended for by some who consider themselves as the only orthodox.

In the scriptures, the three persons are denominated by the terms Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, or by God, the Word, who is also declared to be God, and the Spirit of God. If each be truly God, it is obvious that they must all have the same divine nature, just as every man has the same human nature with every other man; and if there be but one God, it is equally obvious that they must be of the same individual substance or essence, which no three men can possibly be. In this there is a difficulty; but, as will be seen by and by, there is no contradiction. The very terms Father and Son imply such a relation between the two persons so denominated, as that though they are of the same substance, possessed of the same attributes, and equally God, just as a human father and his son are equally men, yet the second must be personally subordinate to the first. In like manner, the Holy Ghost, who is called the Spirit of God, and is said to proceed from the Father, and to be sent by the Son, must be conceived as subordinate to both, much in the same way as a son is subordinate to his parents, though possessed of equal or even of superior powers. That this is the true doctrine, appears to us undeniable from the words of our Saviour himself, who, in a prayer addressed to his Father, styles him "by way of pre-eminence, 'the only true God,' as * John being the fountain or origin of the Godhead from which xvii. 3. the Son and the Holy Ghost derive their true divinity. In like manner, St. Paul, when opposing the polytheism of the Greeks, says expressly, that 'to us there is but one God, the Father, of whom are all things,' and viii. 6. we in, or for, him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by him.'"

That the primitive fathers of the Christian church maintained this subordination of the second and third persons of the blessed Trinity to the first, has been evinced with complete evidence by Bishop Bull. We shall transcribe two quotations from him, and refer the reader for fuller satisfaction to sect. 4. of his Defensio fidei Nicene. The first shall be a passage cited from Novatian, in which the learned prelate affirms us the sense of all the ancients is expressed. "Quia quid est Filius, non ex se est, quia nec innatus est; sed ex patre est, quia genus est: five dum verbum est, five dum virtus est, five dum sapientia est, five dum lux est, five dum Filius est, et quicquid horum est, non aliunde est quam ex Patre, Patri tao originem suam debens." The next is from Athanasius, who has never been accused of holding low opinions respecting the second person of the holy Trinity. This father, in his fifth discourse against the Arians, says, μαλα γαρ τον λογον ει ταυτα τη αειχι και ο λογος και ο λογος, η προς τον θεον. Γενες γαρ ειναι αειχι, και τουτον ει αειχι νοι, ουκ ευτοι και θεος ο ο λογος; according to John, the Word was in this first principle, and the Word was God. For God is the principle; and because the Word is from the principle, therefore the Word is God. Agreeably to this doctrine, the Nicene fathers, in the creed which they published for the use of the universal church, style the only begotten Son, God of God, θεος του θεου.

Regardless however of antiquity, and of the plain sense of scripture, some modern divines of great learning contend, that the three persons in Deity are all confounded, co-eternal, co-ordinate, without derivation, subordination, or dependence, of any sort, as to nature or essence; while others affirm, that the second and third persons derive from the first their personality, but not their nature. We shall consider these opinions as different, though, from the obscurity of the language in which we have always seen them expressed, we cannot be certain but they may be one and the same. The maintainers of the former opinion hold, that the three persons called Elohim in the Old Testament, naturally independent on each other, entered into an agreement before the creation of the world, that one of them should in the fulness of time assume human nature, for the purpose of redeeming mankind from that misery into which it was foreseen that they would fall. This antemundane agreement, they add, constitutes the whole of that paternal and filial relation which subsists between the first and second persons whom we denominate Father and Son; and they hold, that the Son is said to be begotten before all worlds, to indicate that He who was before all worlds was begotten, or to be begotten, into the office of redeemer; or, more decisively, to signify that he undertook that office before the creation, and affirmed to himself some appearance or figure of the reality in which he was to execute it; and he is called only begotten, because he alone was begotten into the office of redeemer*.

To many of our readers we doubt not but this will appear a very extraordinary doctrine, and not easy to be reconciled with the unity of God. It is however sufficiently overturned by two sentences of holy scripture, about the meaning of which there can be no dispute. "In this (says St John †) was manifested the love of God towards us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him." Taking the word son in its usual application, this was certainly a wonderful degree of love in the Father of mercies to send into the world on our account a person so nearly related to him as an only son; but if we substitute this novel interpretation of the words only begotten son in their stead, the apostle's reasoning will lose all its force. St John will then be made to say, "In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent a divine person equal to himself, and no way related to him, but who had before the creation covenanted to come into the world, that we might live through him." Is this a proof of the love of the person here called God? Again, the inspired author of the epistle to the Hebrews, treating of our Saviour's priesthood, says, among other things expressive of his humiliation, that "though he was a son, yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered ‡." If the word son be here understood in its proper sense, this verse displays in a very striking manner the condescension of our divine Redeemer, who, though he was no less a person than the proper Son of God by nature, yet vouchsafed to learn obedience by the things which he suffered; but if we substitute this metaphorical notion in place of the natural, the reasoning of the author will be very extraordinary. "Though this divine personage agreed before all worlds to suffer death for the redemption of man, yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered." What sense is there in this argument? Is it a proof of condescension to fulfil one's engagement? Surely, if the meaning of the word son, when applied to the second person of the blessed Trinity, were what is here supposed, the inspired writer's argument would have been more to the purpose for which it is brought had it run thus; "Though he was not a son, i.e. though he had made no previous agreement, yet condescended he to learn," &c.

The other opinion, which supposes the Son and the Holy Ghost to derive from the Father their personality, but not their nature, is to us wholly unintelligible; for personality cannot exist, or be conceived in a state of separation from all natures, any more than a quality can exist in a state of separation from all substances. The former of these opinions we are unable to reconcile with the unity of God; the latter is clothed in words that have no meaning. Both, as far as we can understand them, are palpable polytheism; more palpable indeed than that of the Grecian philosophers, who though they worshipped gods many, and lords many, yet all held one God supreme over the rest. See Polytheism, No. 32.

But if the Son and the Holy Ghost derive their nature as well as their personality from the Father, will it not follow that they must be posterior to him in time, since every effect is posterior to its cause? No; this consequence seems to follow only by reasoning too closely from one nature to another, when there is between the two but a very distant analogy. It is indeed true, that among men, every father must be prior in time as well as in the order of nature to his son; but were it essential to a man to be a father, so as that he could not exist otherwise than in that relation, it is obvious that his son would be coeval with himself, though still as proceeding from him, he would be posterior in the order of nature. This is the case with all necessary causes and effects. The visible sun is the immediate and necessary cause of light and heat, either as emitting the rays from his own substance, or as exciting the agency of a fluid diffused for that purpose through the whole system. Light and heat therefore, must be as old as the sun; and had he existed from eternity, they would have existed from eternity with him, though still, as his effects, they would have been behind him in the order of nature. Hence it is, that as we must speak analogically of the Divine nature, and when treating of mind, even the Supreme mind, make use of words literally applicable only to the modifications of matter, the Nicene fathers illustrate the eternal generation of the second person of the blessed Trinity by this procession of light from the corporeal sun, calling him God of God, light of light.

Another comparison has been made use of to enable us to form some notion, however inadequate, how three Divine persons can subsist in the same substance, and thereby constitute but one God. Moses informs us, that man was made after the image of God. That this relates to the soul more than to the body of man, has been granted by all but a few gross anthropomorphites; but it has been well observed*, that the soul, though in itself one indivisible and unextended substance, is conceived as consisting of three principal faculties, the understanding, the memory, and the will. Of these, though they are all coeval in time, and equally essential to a rational soul, the understanding is in the order of nature obviously the first, and the memory the second; for things must be perceived before they can be remembered; and they must be remembered and compared together before they can excite volitions, from being some agreeables, and others disagreeable. The memory therefore may be said to spring from the understanding, and the will from both; and as these three faculties are conceived to constitute one soul, so may three Divine persons partaking of the same individual nature or essence constitute one God.

These parallels or analogies are by no means brought forward as proofs of the Trinity, of which the evidence is to be gathered wholly from the word of God; but they serve perhaps to help our labouring minds to form the jutest notions of that mystery which it is possible for any of us to form in the present state of our existence; and they seem to refute the doctrine sufficiently from the charge of contradiction, which has been so often urged against it by Unitarian writers. To the last analogy we are aware it has often been objected, that the soul may as well be said to consist of ten or twenty faculties as of three, since the passions are equally essential to it with the understanding, the memory, and the will, and are as different from one another as these three faculties are. Part II.

This, however, is probably a mistake; for the best philosophy seems to teach us, that the passions are not innate; that a man might exit through a long life a stranger to many of them; and that there are probably no two minds in which are generated all the passions (see PASSION); but understanding, memory, and will, are absolutely and equally necessary to every rational being. But whatever be in this, if the human mind can be conceived to be one indivisible substance, consisting of different faculties, whether many or few, why should it be thought an impossibility for the infinite and eternal nature of God to be communicated to three persons acting different parts in the creation and government of the world, and in the great scheme of man's redemption.

Objections. To the doctrine of the Trinity many objections have been made, as it implies the divinity of the Son and the Holy Ghost; of whom the former assumed our nature, and in it died for the redemption of man. These we shall notice when we come to examine the revelations more peculiarly Christian; but there is one objection which, as it respects the doctrine in general, may be properly noticed here. It is said that the first Christians borrowed the notion of a Triune God from the later Platonists; and that we hear not of a Trinity in the church till converts were made from the school of Alexandria. But if this be the case, we may properly ask, whence had those Platonists the doctrine themselves? It is not surely so simple or so obvious as to be likely to have occurred to the reasoning mind of a Pagan philosopher; or if it be, why do Unitarians suppose it to involve a contradiction? Plato indeed taught a doctrine in some respects similar to that of the Christian Trinity, and so did Pythagoras, with many other philosophers of Greece and the East (see PLATONISM, POLYTHEISM, and PYTHAGORAS); but though these fages appear to have been on some occasions extremely credulous, and on others to have indulged themselves in the most mysterious speculations, there is no room to suppose that they were naturally weaker men than ourselves, or that they were capable of inculcating as truths what they perceived to involve a contradiction. The Platonic and Pythagorean trinities never could have occurred to the mind of him who merely from the works of creation endeavoured to discover the being and attributes of the Creator; and therefore as those philosophers travelled into Egypt and the East in quest of knowledge, it appears to us in the highest degree probable, that they picked up this mysterious and sublime doctrine in those regions where it had been handed down as a dogma from the remotest ages, and where we know that science was not taught systematically, but detailed in collections of tendentious maxims and traditional opinions. If this be so, we cannot doubt but that the Pagan trinities had their origin in some primeval revelation. Nothing else indeed can account for the general prevalence of a doctrine so remote from human imagination, and of which we find vestiges in the sacred books of almost every civilized people of antiquity. The corrupt state in which it is viewed in the writings of Plato and others, is the natural consequence of its descent through a long course of oral tradition; and then falling into the hands of men who bent every opinion as much as possible to a conformity with their own speculations. The trinity of Platonism therefore, instead of being an objection, lends, in our opinion, no feeble support to the Christian doctrine, since it affords almost a complete proof of that doctrine's having made part of the first revelations communicated to man.

Having thus discovered that the one God comprehends three persons, let us now inquire what this triune God existed when he created the heaven and the earth. That by the heaven and the earth is here meant the whole universe, visible and invisible, is known to every person acquainted with the phraseology of Scripture; and we need inform no man conversant with English writers, that by creation, in its proper sense, is meant bringing into being or making that to exist which existed not before. It must, however, be acknowledged, that the Hebrew word יְהֹוָה does not always imply the production of substance, but very often the forming of particular organized bodies out of pre-existent matter. Thus when it is said * that "God created great whales, and * Gen. 1. every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly after their kind," and again, "that he created man male and female;" though the word יְהֹוָה is used on both occasions, we are not to conceive that the bodies of the first human pair, and of these animals, were brought into being from nonentity, but only that they were formed by a proper organization being given to pre-existent matter. But when Moses says, "In the Creation beginning God created the heaven and the earth," he taught by cannot be supposed to mean, that "in the beginning God Moses only gave form to matter already existing of itself;" for in the very next verse we are assured that after this act of creation was over, "the earth was still without form and void," or, in other words, in a chaotic state.

That the Jews, before the coming of our Saviour, understood their lawgiver to teach a proper creation, is plain from that passage in the second book of the Maccabees, in which a mother, to persuade her son to suffer the cruellest tortures rather than forsake the law of his God, uses the following argument: "I beseech thee, my son, look upon the heaven and the earth, and all that is therein, and consider that God made them of things that were not." To the same purpose the inspired author of the epistle to the Hebrews, when magnifying the excellence of faith, says, "Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear;" where, as Bishop Pearson has ably proved †, the phrase μηχανήματα is equivalent to εκείνων ἐξ ὑποστάσεων, in the quotation from the Maccabees.

The very first verse, therefore, of the book of Genesis informs us of a most important truth, which all the uninspired wisdom of antiquity could not discover. It assures us, that as nothing exists by chance, so nothing is necessarily existing but the three divine persons in the one Godhead. Every thing else, whether material or immaterial, derives its substance, as well as its form or qualities, from the fiat of that self existent Being, "who was, and is, and is to come."

It does not, however, follow from this verse, or from any other passage in the sacred Scriptures, that the whole universe was called into existence at the same instant; neither is it by any means evident that the chaos of our world was brought into being on the first of those six days during which it was gradually reduced into form. From a passage ‡ in the book of Job, in which we are told by God himself, that when the "foundation of the earth earth was laid the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy," it appears extremely probable that worlds had been created, formed, and inhabited, long before our earth had any existence. Nor is this opinion at all contrary to what Moses says of the creation of the stars; for though they are mentioned in the same verse with the sun and moon, yet the manner in which, according to the original, they are introduced, by no means indicates that all the stars were formed at the same time with the luminaries of our system. Most of them have been created long before, and some of them since, our world was brought into being; for that clause (verse 16.) "he made the stars also," is in the Hebrew no more than "and the stars;" the words he made being inserted by the translators. The whole verse therefore ought to be rendered thus, "and God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light with the stars to rule the night;" where nothing is intimated with respect to the time when the stars were formed, any more than in that verse of the Psalms*, which exhorts us to give thanks to God who made the moon and stars to rule by night; for his mercy endureth "for ever." The first verse of the book of Genesis informs us, that all things spiritual and corporeal derive their existence from God; but it is nowhere said that all matter was created at the same time.

That the whole corporeal universe may have been created at once must be granted; but if so, we have reason to believe that this earth, with the sun and all the planets of the system, were suffered to remain for ages in a state of chaos, "without form and void;" because it appears from other scriptures, that worlds of intelligent creatures existed, and even that some angels had fallen from a state of happiness prior to the era of the Mosaic cosmogony. That the sun and the other planets revolving round him were formed at the same time with the earth, cannot indeed be questioned; for it is not only probable in itself from the known laws of nature, but is expressly affirmed by the sacred historian, who relates the formation of the sun and moon in the order in which it took place; but there is one difficulty which has furnished ignorance with something like an objection to the divine legation of the Hebrew lawgiver, and which we shall notice.

Moses informs us, that on the first day after the production of the chaos, the element of light was created; and yet within a few sentences he declares, that the sun, the fountain of light, was not made till the fourth day. How are these two passages to be reconciled? We answer, That they may be reconciled many ways. Moses wrote for the use of a whole people, and not for the amusement or instruction of a few astronomers; and in this view his language is sufficiently proper, even though we suppose the formation of the sun and the other planets to have been carried on at the same time, and in the same progressive manner, with the formation of this earth. The voice which called light into existence would separate the fiery and luminous particles of the chaos from those which were opaque, and, on this hypothesis, consolidate them in one globe, diffusing an obscure light through the planetary system; but if the earth's atmosphere continued till the fourth day loaded with vapours, as from the narrative of Moses it appears to have done, he fun could not till that day have been seen from the earth, and may therefore, in popular language, be said with sufficient propriety to have been formed on the fourth day, as it was then made to appear. (See Creation, n° 13.) But though this solution of the difficulty serves to remove the objection, and to secure the credit of the sacred historian, candour compels us to confess that it appears not to be the true solution.

The difficulty itself arises entirely from supposing the sun to be the sole fountain of light; but the truth of this opinion is not self-evident, nor has it ever been established by satisfactory proof. It is indeed to a mind divested of undue deference to great names, and considering the matter with impartiality, an opinion extremely improbable. The light of a candle placed on an eminence may in a dark night be seen in every direction at the distance of at least three miles. But if this small body be rendered visible by means of rays emitted from itself, the flame of a candle, which cannot be supposed more than an inch in diameter, must, during every instant that it continues to burn, throw from its own substance luminous matter sufficient to fill a spherical space of six miles in diameter. This phenomenon, if real, is certainly surprising; but if we pursue the reflection a little farther, our wonder will be greatly increased. The matter which, when converted into flame, is an inch in diameter, is not, when of the consistence of cotton and tallow, of the dimensions of the 20th part of an inch; and therefore, on the common hypothesis, the 20th part of an inch of tallow may be so rarefied as to fill a space of 113,5976 cubic miles! a rarefaction which to us appears altogether incredible. We have indeed heard much of the divisibility of matter ad infinitum, and think we understand what are usually called demonstrations of the truth of that proposition; but these demonstrations prove not the actual divisibility of real solid substances, but only that on trial we shall find no end of the ideal process of dividing and subdividing imaginary extension.

On the whole, therefore, we are much more inclined to believe that the matter of light is an extremely subtle fluid, diffused through the corporeal universe, and only excited to agency by the sun and other fiery bodies, than that it consists of streams continually issuing from the substance of these bodies. It is indeed an opinion pretty generally received, and certainly not improbable in itself, that light and electricity are one and the same substance (see ELECTRICITY Index); but we know that the electrical fluid, though pervading the whole of corporeal nature, and, as experiments show, capable of acting with great violence, yet lies dormant and unperceived till its agency be excited by some foreign cause. Just so it may be with the matter of light. That substance may be "diffused from one end of the creation" to the other. It may traverse the whole universe, form a communication between the most remote spheres, penetrate into the inmost recesses of the earth, and only wait to be put in a proper motion to communicate visible sensations to the eye. Light is to the organ of sight what the air is to the organ of hearing. Air is the medium which, vibrating on the ear, causes the sensation of sound; but it equally exists round us at all times, though there be no fororous body to put it in motion. In like manner, light may be equally extended at all times, by night as well as by day, from the most distant fixed stars to this earth, though it then only strikes our eyes so as to excite visible sensations when impelled by the sun or some other masts Part II.