its liberty. We ever choose the greatest apparent good, or, more accurately, the will is ever as the greatest apparent good. To fuppofe otherwife leads to a great abfurdity; for it would then imply, that we choose, in fome cafes, what, upon the whole, we deemed best for us not to choose: that is, we choose evil, as evil; which is incompatible with our mental conftitution. But if that be the limit of the intellect, and this the condition of liberty, it follows, that what appears to us preferable may be really and eventually not fo.

§ 6. Man, therefore, in the present flate, resembles one who employs the light of a candle for the purpose of seeking what he wants. He is in a large room, which is abundantly stored with objects, fome valuable, and many unfuitable to his immediate real wants, and therefore to him worthless. Whatever is illuminated, and falls under his obfervation, of that he forms an estimate. He gives invariably the preference to what appears to him preferable, all things confidered. Now his imperfection lies in his not employing his light to illuminate other objects, when he is confcious that those he views do not contain the chief good, or that he does not improve them for acquiring or retaining that momentous object. That appears to him preferable which a mind morally upright views as not preferable; and that appears to him a thing to be chofen for its own fake, which ought to be chofen only for a higher end.

Again: GOD has communicated to the foul, as a firm and invariable principle, a tendency towards

good

good in general. But it never chooses what is not represented to it by the light of the understanding. It is very capable, however, of quitting a good represented and enjoyed, though a better does not actually and distinctly appear; because it is conscious, from its general tendency, that a greater good than what it has yet experienced is attainable. Thus its general tendency to good keeps the mind ever in expectation, and its great fault confifts in a temporary but idolatrous refting in what is not the chief good. And this idolatry is committed not only when an inferior good is falfely deemed preferable to another, but also when a good which is really preferable is not chofen with reference and in fubordination to the chief.

Moreover the will, in its prefent progress to the chief good, is not unlike a traveller who aims at his wifhed for home. Were it perfect day-light, he might difcern a ftraight, plain path; but being overtaken by the night, he has only a torch or candle, as a light shining in a dark place, to direct his wandering steps. He has loft his path. His duty confifts in his employing the light he has to find it, as the means of conducting him to his deftined home; and his fault lies in his growing indifferent about the path of fafety, and indulging a temporary fatisfaction with what his light but partially and ineffectually represents to him. He never changes his courfe but by checking his guide, and ordering hin to feek another courfe which may prove more fatisfactory; and this, which is always in his power, Le neglects.

In

It

In this state of darkness and uncertainty, ever learning but never coming to the knowledge of the truth, divine revelation finds the children of men. proposes a brighter light, and a furer clue, than any they poffefs of their own. It proposes a divine leader to conduct into all neceffary truth. But alas! men love darkness rather than light because their deeds are evil. This is the great caufe of condemnation. All, if left to themselves, walk in the vanity of their mind, having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart. Chrift is the life of men, but they will not come unto him that they might have life. He is the fun of righteousness, and light of the world, but those who walk in the fhadow of death and on the brink of perdition, refuse his benefits. Hence the justice of their final ruin. And those whofe advantages are more circumfcribed tranfgrefs by mifimproving those they

have.

§ 7. But man's prefent state of darkness and depravity, the darkness of his understanding and the depravity of his difpofition, by no means excuses him from fubjection to the moral governor. His receding from perfect moral rectitude makes no difference in his obligations. For to say that a moral power is neceffary, as well as liberty and means of improvement, to lay him under obligation of conformity to the rule of right, is to fay, either, that man is incapable of abufing his liberty; or, that on fuch abuse GOD is bound to restore him imme

diately

diately to perfect rectitude, each of which is abfurd. In proportion, indeed, that phyfical power is wanting, the subject is not accountable; but the more a moral power is wanting the more culpable he is, for in that fame degree has he receded from rectitude. And this must be the cafe, except we fay that our moral ability remains perfectly the fame after difobedience as it was before; and then it would follow that our moral ability fuftains, in that respect, no inconvenience from innumerable tranfgreffions; but this is directly contrary to the well known fact of moral habits.

§ 8. Here it is natural to afk, Whence proceed thefe ftreams of depravity and confufion? The prefent race of human beings had an ultimate progenitor; the first man, Adam. As mankind, therefore, do not coexift independently, but rife to existence fucceffively by descent from father to fon, we are bound to confider the whole race as one great fyftem, of which every fucceeding part depends on the preceding, as much as any fucceeding fpecies of plants depends on the first plant of that species. Nor is it conceiveable, if the first of our race lost the enjoyment of the chief good prior to his having any defcendants, how his pofterity could rife fucceffively into being possessed of it. As well may we fay that streams of water may rife higher than their fource, or that we may gather grapes from thorns, and figs from thiftles. Can a fig-tree, my brethren, bear olive berries? or a vine figs? then, indeed, but not before, may the defcendants of Adam be con

ceived

ceived to spring into existence conformably to the moral standard of their original nature, or in poffeffion of holiness and happiness. By one man fin entered into the world, the fyftem of mankind, and death by fin: not only the diffolution of the body followed, (which in case of continued perfection would have been miraculously prevented from taking its natural course like other animal bodies,) but, what is far more important, the Spirit of life was loft from the foul. As a tree withers when the vital fap is gone, and the animal dies when the vital principle ceafes to operate; fo the fpiritual life or well-being of an accountable creature departs when it lofes the poffeffion of the chief good.

9. According to equity, man's obligations to be perfect are in proportion to the exhibition of means suited to that end. Thus, because the invisible things of God, from the creation of the world, are clearly feen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead, all men are without excufe. And in proportion as any have additional discoveries, are they additionally obliged to improve them. A mind reasonably affected with the human frame, fuppofing every other object were fealed in darkness, would fay devoutly: "I am fearfully "and wonderfully made; I am not my own, but "the property of an all-wife, almighty, and bene"volent being; let me never withhold his due from "him, but renounce myself to his abfolute dif"pofal perpetually." Thus the most benighted of human kind is not deftitute of means, fo far as to juftify his accountablenefs; what then fhall we fay

E

'

up

of