when, by the unhappy fall of our first parents, guilt did contaminate a world which the voice of its Omniscient Creator had before pronounced perfectly "good "," the change which had been threatened immediately followed. Its Almighty Governor could not withhold the punishment, which his infinite justice necessarily awarded to the guilty. The world had become wicked; and it was requisite to show, that the unavoidable consequence of wickedness was misery. The honour of God's attributes required this vindication of their essential rectitude; his righteousness and holiness demanded to be cleared from the imputation of favouring the introduction of sin into the world. And they were vindicated before men and angels. The agents in this unhappy transgression of Divine law were put under a curse proportioned to their several degrees of guilt, and banished from the presence of God, who is the only source of good, natural and moral. The whole creation was made subject to vanity 。", on their account; no longer

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n Gen. i. 31.

F

o Rom. viii. 20.

preserved in its original integrity, no longer constant in its motions or productions, no longer wearing the same uniform appearance of peace and harmony, but obnoxious to decay, and perpetually fluctuating; deceiving the hopes of man with delusive promises of enjoyment, and alarming his fears with portentous threatenings of ruin and devastation; and affording to the wisest of human preachers, who had tried and examined the best of its proffered advantages, cause to exclaim at last, that all was "va"nity and vexation of spirit "," unsound and hollow, unstable and uncertain.

But if God on the very first departure from virtue took care thus to vindicate his own attributes, He has taken no less care to manifest that vindication, and to support it, in the whole of his transactions with mankind, through all their generations from Adam to the present day. In profane history indeed this is not so distinctly seen; because, though the interference of Divine Providence was often displayed in a very remarkable manner, yet the compilers of

p Eccles. i. 14.

that history, being mere uninspired men, and ignorant besides of true theology, could not interpret the providential bearing of the events which they recorded; and therefore the particular instances of God's hatred of vice and regard for virtue are not always brought so clearly under our notice. And yet, whoever shall read, with a mind properly disposed and duly prepared by moral tuition, even this account of the rise and progress, the decline and fall of the various empires, which one after another have exercised dominion on the earth, will see and acknowledge, that they rose by virtue, and fell by vice; thus affording a plain attestation, that there is a God who ruleth in the heavens, and that that God is just. This appears plain even on a superficial view of the records of mankind, as exhibited by the ordinary historians of human affairs. Nor will it lessen the weight of this testimony to God's moral government, and the manifest interference which it implies in favour of moral rectitude, to say, that the success and failure of these nations was rather the natural result of

their virtue and vice respectively, than any reward or punishment assigned by the judgment of God. For allowing this in a certain degree, yet must it be acknowledged by all who own any providential superintendance, that it was the ordinance of God which originally appointed this natural connection between virtue and prosperity on the one hand, and vice and adversity on the other. It should ever be remembered, that both natural and moral good take their rise from the same source, and therefore it was to be expected that they should flow in one united stream. But however true it is, that virtue is generally attended with ultimate success, and vice for the most part involved in ruin and destruction, still it is evident, that in this world it is not always and invariably so, which it would be, if the one necessarily resulted from the other. Originally, no doubt, this connection was certain and infallible, and the immutable justice of the Divine intention will at last be made apparent to the universe; but the truth is, sin has brought difficulty and confusion into every thing that concerns the

present state of man. When human virtue ceased to be perfect and steady, human happiness became broken and inconstant. It is this, that by its own real fluctuations has introduced seeming inequalities into the proceedings of Divine Providence. God might fairly address the whole race of men as He once addressed the house of Israel; "Are not my ways equal? are not your

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ways unequal P?" Surely it must be confessed, that the ways of man, even when he endeavours to order them aright, are most evidently "unequal," and therefore he should neither be surprised nor offended, if, being thus unsteady in his integrity, he is rewarded with a success that partakes of his own defectibility. Rather should he bless God for his mercy, in thus condescending to notice a being so little worthy of his regard, and who had so justly merited his displeasure! The imperfection and unsteadiness of human virtue must be frankly acknowledged by the stoutest advocate for the excellency of our nature; and it must be clear, that imperfect and unsteady

P Ezek. xviii. 29.