appear from confidering merely the end of building of an house, which is for men to dwell in; but you muft take into the account the power, ftation, wealth, and other circumftances of the builder, and

then you may reasonably fay whether too much or too little pains and coft have been bestowed on it. To apply this to the prefent cafe: When you view the works of nature, you think them too great and too magnificent to be intended for the use of man: but confider a little, Who is the builder? Is it not one of whose power and ability you cannot poffibly judge? How do you know then that it was not as eafy (and doubtless it was as easy) to God to produce this beautiful and wonderful order of things, as to have produced a much worse, and more adapted, as you may imagine, to the circumftances of man, the inhabitant of this world? You cannot fay, too much pains, or too much coft, has been beftowed for all these confiderations are relative to the power of the agent; and, when the agent has infinite power, this confideration is wholly excluded..

But farther; in order to judge rightly in the cafe before us, we ought perfectly to comprehend the end propofed. If you fee a great building, but know not for what use it was intended, nor what ufe is made of it, it is impoffible to judge whether it be too large or too confined; for that judgment muft arife neceffarily from knowing to what purpose and to what use it was erected. And where is the man, who will pretend to know all the ends of God in the creation of the universe? What relates to ourselves we know tolerably well from fenfe and

experience: we feel the influence of the heavenly bodies, and are fure that we are the better for them; but, that no others are befides ourselves, we can never be fure.

Since then we know nothing of the power of God but that it is infinite; the true confequence from which is, that all poffible things are equally easy to be effected by his hand; fince the purposes of God to be ferved in the creation of the universe are various, and more than we can discover, probably more than we can even imagine; we act the abfurdest part in the world, when we pretend to judge of the works of Providence by comparing the greatnefs of the works of nature with fuch ends and purposes as we can discover to be ferved by them: for, with respect to the infinite power of God, we talk childishly, when we call his works great, or little; and, with respect to the ends and purposes of Providence, fuppofing a just measure of his works were to be taken from thence, yet it is a measure of which we are not masters.

As this reasoning muft neceffarily hold in the works of nature; fo is it equally strong, when applied to the works of grace. It is indeed a furprifing and wonderful event, the coming of the Son of God into this world, being made man, and born of a pure virgin, living and dying as a man, to redeem finners. But what is there that fhocks your faith in this? You think perhaps the means too great and too confiderable to be made ufe of for the fake of the end propofed, which might have been obtained at a cheaper rate. But, when you fay or think this, do you pretend to know by what other

way all the purposes of God in fending his Son into the world might have been answered? If you do not, poffibly this was the only way to answer all the ends and intentions of Providence in this great work; and, if it was, the means used were neceffary, and therefore, without doubt, proper: and, fuppofing them proper, you will not furely be furprised, that God fhould defign, and his blessed Son undertake to perform, what was proper to execute the wife ends of Providence. It was indeed a very great thing for a man to be born of a virgin : but in what fenfe was it great? only as being unusual, and contrary to the established course, in our eyes: with refpect to God, I fee no reafon to call it fo. Were God to form a new race under this new law of nature, that all should be born of virgins, I conceive, there would be nothing in it more wonderful than in the present established course of na

ture.

It is more wonderful ftill to think of the Son of God living on earth in the form and fashion of a man and, if we speak in relation to our own abilities of searching into this myfterious work, it is, and it ever muft continue to be, a wonder: but, with respect to God, have you any reason to think this .wonderful and mysterious, or a thing difficult to be performed? God has united our fpirits, our fouls, to these bodies: a wonderful and myfterious thing it is to us but can you imagine there is any thing in the works of God, that is wonderful, myfterious, or difficult in the execution to him? If not, how weakly do we amufe ourselves, when we fet ourselves with great wifdom to weigh the works of God in

our scales, and to judge which are great and difficult in the performance ?

But this is not the only mistake men are liable to, when they fet themselves up for judges in this matter. That the redemption and falvation of men is the end of Chrift's coming into the world, is cer tain, and is revealed in the Gofpel: but whoever fhall fay God had no other purpose in view than this only, will judge haftily, and, I doubt, rafhly. What relates to us immediately in this great dif penfation, God has been pleased to reveal to us dif tinctly; but he has no where told us that we are the only perfons concerned: that others probably are, may be collected from many intimations in Scripture. Our bleffed Redeemer has all power given him in heaven as well as in earth: principalities and powers, the invifible powers, are made fubject to him and they cannot be thought to be unconcerned in that work, for the fake of which their King was exalted, and every knee made to bow to him. How they are concerned, we know not: but this we know, that we are but a small part of the natural world. That there are many intelligent beings befides ourselves, we know: that they may be numberlefs, we have reafon to believe: that God is the common governor of all, is out of queftion: that all his difpenfations in the moral government of the world regard the whole, and will finally appear in the eyes of every rational creature to be just and equal, we have great reafon to conclude; and that God will be justified in his fayings, and clear when he is judged. If this be fo, the great work of our redemption, however immediately it relates to us,

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must be supposed adapted to answer the general ends and purposes of God's government in the univerfal moral world. And this plainly fhews, that we cannot judge of the propriety of the means made use of for redeeming the world by confidering only the relation they have to men; for probably they relate to others, and to other purposes, and are, upon the whole, in every respect proper and fit: but the propriety cannot be difcerned by us, nor will it, till we come into a clearer light, and fee the whole scheme of Providence together.

You fee then, upon the whole, that the objections against God's government in the natural and moral world, founded upon the disproportion between the means made ufe of, and the ends propofed, are really the effects of shortsightedness, and of that great propenfity which men have to judge, though they want proper materials to form a judgment upon.

But let us confider, whether the observations, which have given rife to these perverse reasonings, will not, if duly attended to, open a way to far other and far jufter conclufions. That men are weak and wretched, and not worthy of the care of Providence over them, we know by fad experience; and have reafon enough, in this view, to fall into the Pfalmift's reflection, Lord, what is man, that thou regardeft him? But ftill most certain it is, that God does regard man all nature bears witness to the truth of this; for he is ferved by the works of nature: and, though the works of nature may ferve an hundred purposes more, yet it cannot be doubted but that they were made to ferve man, though