one who has followed the same course in opposition to his own moral convictions. The former he contends might be reclaimed by argument; the latter he considers as incurable. In such a

state of mind therefore it follows by an induction which cannot be controverted, either that the evil is irremediable and hopeless, or that we must look for a power from without the mind which may afford an adequate remedy. We are thus led to perceive the adaptation and the probability of the provisions of Christianity, where an influence is indeed disclosed to us, capable of restoring the harmony which has been lost, and raising man anew to his place as a moral being. We cannot hesitate to believe that the power, who framed the wondrous fabric, may thus hold intercourse with it, and redeem it from disorder and ruin. On the contrary, it accords with the highest conceptions we can form of the Deity, that he should thus look upon his creatures in their hour of need. ** Sound philosophy teaches us, that there is a state in which nothing less than such a complete transformation can restore the man to a healthy moral condition, and that for producing it nothing will avail but an influence from without the mind; a might and a power from the same Almighty One who originally framed it. Philosophy teaches in the clearest manner that a portion of mankind require such a transformation ;-Christianity informs us that it is required by all. When the inductions of science and the dictates of Revelation harmonize to this

extent, who shall dare to assert that the latter are not truth? Who that places himself in the presence of a Being of infinite purity, will say,— he requires not such a change; or that for the production of it he requires no agency beyond the resources of his own mind? If none be found who is entitled to believe he forms the exception, we are forced into the acknowledgment of the truth so powerfully impressed upon us in the sacred writings, that in the eye of the Almighty One, no man in himself is righteous;—and that his own power avails not for restoring him to a state of moral purity."* And we are forced into the acknowledgment of a further truth: truth of incalculable importance; and the omission of which from many writings on the immortality of the soul, vitiates all the rest, and tends to induce impressions upon the too easily satisfied mind of man, directly hostile to the interests of practical Christianity-that unless the Deity should in His mercy vouchsafe to interfere before death, to restore the moral purity of man, we are forbidden to hope that He will interfere after death, to restore life to man. Such an interference, we know from Scripture, was destined from the first, has actually been made, is still in active operation. Reason can show our need of it, but can never prove its existence, nor do more than establish a slender, even a desperate hope that it might one day be made known. But

• Abercrombie on the Moral Feelings. Part II. page 132.

they who, upon principles which presuppose no knowledge of this, promise man an immortality of more perfect existence, are not laying a foundation upon the true corner stone, are building a house upon the sand. "Awake, thou that sleepest, and arise FROM THE DEAD; and Christ shall give thee light," says the warning voice of Scripture; but our too easy moralists and natural theologians, not being with Him, are against Him; are lulling the apprehensions of men by vain speculations; and like the Old Serpent are instilling into the minds of their too credulous hearers, under the disguise of wisdom, and with the form of knowledge, the fatal doctrine, that man may eat the fruit; but "he shall not surely die."

The systems of natural religion present at many points difficulties, which are insuperable by reason; and which Revelation removes, only to introduce analogous and sometimes greater difficulties in their stead. Such a difficulty lies over the whole question, in part created by Scripture, as to the future condition of the heathen, which on account of its relation to this part of our subject, has been briefly considered in another place.* We never can know how far they who have, comparatively speaking, walked uprightly in this present world, by the light of nature, or with the addition of a very imperfect form of Revelation,

See Appendix.

may hereafter be accepted for the sake of Christ. But our general view of the condition of the heathen must undoubtedly be a gloomy one. And, Revelation apart, we are in an analogous difficulty. We never can know how far they who have fallen but little below the standard of moral purity which we, arbitrarily and doubtfully, construct and adapt to the condition of humanity, may be here aided by their Maker, and hereafter restored, and more than restored by Him. We may HOPE for a restoration,—not in consequence of any reference to the principles of strict justice, but with reference rather to one part of the truth which we can discern, the general desire of the Deity for the happiness of his creature.

At this point the author must lay down the inquiry; leaving it to each reader to determine or to conjecture for himself, according to the disposition of his mind, towards hope or towards fear only reminding him that it appears from Scripture, that the truest, if not the most natural conclusion to be formed without the aid of Scripture, is, that happiness hereafter is to be looked for, through some interference first made here; and originating in some entirely unmerited and freely given mercy of God.

BOOK III.

THE FUTURE STATES AS REVEALED IN

SCRIPTURE.

CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTORY.

N the preceding Book, the fundamental truths of Natural Religion, the power, wisdom, and goodness of God, and the moral responsibility and actual guilt of man, were assumed to furnish the only basis for any probable conjectures that some future states were reserved for man: and it was contended that the aspect of the moral world, such as it must appear to one ignorant or regardless of Revelation, does not completely vindicate the perfection of the Divine attributes, nor sufficiently declare His intentions towards man, to establish any solid ground of comfort: that it speaks not of remedial love, of intervening mercy, of ultimate salvation; but merely convinces us of our own natural helplessness and hopelessness, and of our inability to solve even in part the fearful mystery of evil,—of depravity, pain, and death,-by the help of that doctrine of Divine permission, which alone can afford us hope,though not, even then, certainty,-of its ultimate removal. But in this Book the authority of Revelation is to be called in, to establish on a

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