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whose minds are fettered by ignorance and excess, and whose imagination can just make shift to flutter from the tavern to the play house and back again. By a parity of reason, they who enjoy "the glorious liberty of the children of God," who can in a moment collect their thoughts, fix them upon the noblest objects, and raise them not only to the stars, like Archytas, but to the throne of God, like St. Paul;-they who can "become all things to all men, be content" in every station, and even "sing at midnight" in a dungeon, regardless of their empty stomachs, their scourged backs, and their feet made fast in the stocks;" they who can command their passions and appetites, who "are free from sin," and find "God's service perfect freedom;" these happy people, I say, enjoy far more liberty of heart, than the brutish men who are so enslaved to their appetites and passions, that they have just liberty enough left them, not to ravish the women they set their eyes upon, and not to murder the men they are angry with. But although the liberty of God's children is "glorious" now, it will be far more glorious when their regenerate souls shall be matched in the great day with bodies blooming as youth, beautiful as angels, radiant as the sun, powerful as lightning, immortal as God, and capable of keeping pace with the Lamb, when he shall lead them to new fountains of bliss, and run with them the endless round of celestial delights.

To return innumerable are the degrees of liberty peculiar to various orders of creatures; but no animals are accountable to their owners for the use of their powers, but they which have a peculiar degree of knowledge. Nor are they accountable, but in proportion to the degree of their knowledge and liberty. Your horse, for instance, has power to walk, trot, and gallop: you want him to do it alternately; and, if he does not obey you, when you have intimated your will to him in a manner suit. able to his capacity, you may, without folly and cruelty, spur or whip him into a reasonable use of his liberty and powers; for inferior creatures are in subjection to their possessors in the Lord. But if his feet were tied, or his legs broken, and you spurred him to make him gallop; or if you whipped a hen to make her swim, or an ox to make him fly, you would exercise a foolish and tyrannical dominion over them. This cruel absurdity, however, or one tantamount, is charged upon Christ by those who pretend to "exalt him" most. They thus dishonour him, as often as they insinuate that the children of men have no more power to be. lieve, than hens to swim, or oxen to fly; and that the Father of mercies will damn a majority of them, for not using a power which he determined they should never have.

Some people assert that man has a little liberty in natural, but none in spiritual things. I dissent from them for the following reasons: (1.) All men (monsters not excepted) having a degree of the human form, they probably have also a degree of human capacity, a measure of those mental powers by which we receive the knowledge of God; a knowledge this, which no horse can have, and which is certainly of a spiritual nature. (2.) The same apostle, who informs us that "the natural man” (so called) the man who quenches the Spirit of grace under his dispensations, "cannot know the things of the Spirit of God, because they are discerned" only by the light of the Spirit, which he quenches or resists,—the same apostle, I say, declares, that "what may be known of

God, is manifest in them, [the most abandoned heathens;] for God hath showed it unto them; so that they are without excuse; because when they knew God, [in some degree,] they glorified him not as God," according to the degree of that knowledge; but became brutish, besotted persons; or, to speak St. Paul's language," they became vain in their imaginations; they became fools; their foolish heart was darkened; wherefore God gave them up to a reprobate mind," and they were left in the deplorable condition of the Christian apostates described by St. Jude, "sensual, having not the Spirit :" in a word, they became YuXixo,* mere animal men, the full reverse of spiritual men, 1 Cor. ii, 14. Far from being the wiser for "the light that [graciously] enlightens every man that cometh into the world," they became " inexcusable, by changing the truth of God into a lie," and turning their light to darkness, through the wrong use which they made of their liberty.

When the advocates for necessity deny man the talent of spiritual liberty, which Divine wisdom and grace have bestowed upon him, they fondly exculpate themselves, and rashly charge God with Calvinistic reprobation. For who can think that an oyster is culpable for not flying as an eagle? And who can help shuddering at the cruelty of a tyrant, who, to show his sovereignty, bids all the idiots in his kingdom solve Euclid's problems, if they will not be cast into a fiery furnace? Nor will it avail to say, as Elisha Coles and his admirers do, that though man has lost his power to obey, God has not lost his power to command upon pain of eternal death: for this is pouring poison into the wound, which the doctrine of natural necessity gives to the Divine attributes. Your slave runs a sportive race, falls, dislocates both his arms, and by that accident loses his power or liberty to serve you: in such circumstances you may indeed find fault with him, for bringing this misfortune upon himself; but you show a great degree of folly and injustice if you blame him for not digging with his arms out of joint; and when you refuse him a surgeon, and insist upon his thrashing, unless he choose doubly to feel the weight of your vindictive hand, you betray an uncomon want of good nature. But in how much more unfavourable a light would your conduct appear if his misfortune had been entailed upon him by one of his ancestors, who lost a race near six thousand years ago; and if you had given him a bond stamped with your own blood, to assure him that "your ways are equal," and that you are "not an austere man," that "your mercy is over all your household," and that punishing is your "strange work?"

God is not such a master as the Calvinian doctrines of grace make him. For Christ's sake he is always well pleased with the right use we make of our present degree of liberty, be that degree ever so little. For unconverted sinners themselves have some liberty. Fast tied and bound as they are with the chain of their sins, like chained dogs, they may move a little. If they have a mind they may, to a certain degree, come out

Tex is sometimes taken only for the principle of animal life. Thus, Rev. vui, 9. The third part of the sea became blood, and the third part of the crea tures which wer in the sea, and had vxas [not natural but] animal life, died." Hence Calvin himself renders the word Yuyukos, animal man, though our translators render it "natural man," as if the Greek word were quoikos. And upon their mistakes a vast majority of mankind are rashly represented as being absohately destitute of all capacity to receive the saving truths of religion.

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of Satan's kennel. When they are pinched with hunger or trouble, like the prodigal son, they may go a little way toward the bread and the cordial that came down from heaven; and when their chains gall their minds, they may give the Father of mercies to understand that they want "the pitifulness of his great mercy to loose them." Happy the souls who thus meet God with their little degree of power! Thrice happy they who go to him so far as their chain allows, and then groan with David, "My belly cleaveth to the dust. Bring my soul out of prison, that I may praise thy name!" When this is the case, "the captive exile hasteneth that he may be loosed;" they that are thus "faithful over a few things," will soon be "set over many things;" they will soon experience an enlargement, and say with the psalmist, "Thou hast enlarged my steps under me:" my liberty is increased. "I will run the way of thy commandments."

The defenders of necessity are chiefly led into their error by considering the imperfection of our liberty, and the narrow limits of our powers: but they reason inconclusively who say, "Our liberty is imperfect: therefore we have none. Without Christ we can do nothing:' therefore we have absolutely no power to do any thing." As some observations upon this part of my subject may reconcile the judicious and candid on both sides of the question, I venture upon making the following remarks:

All power, and therefore all liberty, has its bounds. The king of England can make war or peace when he pleases, and with whom he pleases; and yet he cannot lay the most trifling tax without his parliament. The power of Satan is circumscribed by God's power. God's own power is circumscribed by his other perfections: he cannot sin, because he is holy; he cannot cause two and two to make six, because he is true; nor can he create and annihilate a thing in the same instant, because he is wise. Our Lord's power is circumscribed also: "Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do."

If a degree of confinement is consistent with the liberty of omnipotence itself, how much more can a degree of restraint be consistent with our natural, civil, moral, and spiritual liberty! Take an instance of it: (1.) With regard to natural liberty. Although you cannot fly, you may walk, but not upon the sea, as Peter did; nor thirty miles at once, as some people do; nor one mile when you are quite spent ; nor five yards when you have a broken leg. (2.) With respect to civil liberty. You are a free-born Englishman: nevertheless, you are not free from taxes; and probably you have not the freedom of two cities in all the kingdom. On the other hand, St. Paul is Nero's "prisoner, bound with a chain,” and yet he swims to shore, he gathers sticks, makes a fire, and preaches "two years in his own hired house, nobody forbidding him." (3.) With respect to moral liberty. When Nabal is in company with his fellow sots, has good wine before him, and is already heated by drinking, he cannot refrain himself, he must get drunk: but might he not have done violence to his inclination before his blood was inflamed? Conscious of his weakness, might he not at least have avoided the dangerous company he is in, and the sight of the sparkling liquor, in which all his good resolutions are drowned?

Take one instance more of the imperfect liberty I plead for. Is not what I have said of civil, applicable to devotional liberty? You have not the power to LOVE God with all your heart; but may you not FEAR him a little? You cannot wrap yourself for one hour in the sublime contemplation of his glory; but may you not meditate for two minutes on death and judgment? St. Paul's burning zeal is far above your sphere; but is not the timorous inquistiveness of Nicodemus within your reach? You cannot attain the elevations of him who has ten talents of piety; but may you not so use your one talent of consideration, as to gain two, four, eight, and so on, till the unsearchable riches of Christ are all yours? And, if I may allude to the emblematic pictures of the four evangelists, may you not ruminate upon earth with the ox of St. Luke, till you can look up to heaven with St. Matthew's human face, fight against sin, with the courage of St. Mark's lion, and soar up toward the Sun of righteousness, with the strong wings of St. John's eagle? Did not our Lord expect as much from the Pharisees, when he said to them, "Ye hypocrites, how is it that you do not discern this [accepted] time? Yea, and why even of yourselves judge ye not what is right?" Alas! how frequently do we complain of the want of power, when we have ten times more than we make use of! How many slothfully bury their talent, and peevishly charge God with giving them none! And how common is it to hear people, who are sincerely invited to the Gospel feast, say, "I cannot come," who might roundly say, if they had Thomas' honesty, "I will not believe!". The former of these pleas is indeed more decent than the latter: but is it not shamefully evasive? And does it not amount to the following excuse :-"I cannot come without taking up my cross; and as I will not do that, my coming is morally impossible?" A lame excuse this, which will pull down aggravated vengeance upon those who, by making it, trifle with truth, and their own souls, and with God himself.

From the whole I conclude that our liberty, or free agency, consists in a limited ability to use our bodily and spiritual powers right or wrong at our option; and that to deny mankind such an ability is as absurd as to say that a man cannot work, or beg, or steal, as he pleases; bend the knee to God, or to Ashtaroth; go to the house of prayer, or to the play house; turn a careless, or an attentive ear to a Divine message; disbelieve, or give credit to an awful report; slight, or consider a matter of fact; and act in a reasonable, or unreasonable manner, at his option. Is not this doctrine agreeable to the dictates of conscience, as well as to plain passages of Scripture? And when we maintain that, as often as our free will inclines to vital godliness since the fall, it is touched, though not necessarily impelled by free grace: when we assert, in the words of our tenth article, that "we have no power to do good works acceptable to God, without the grace of God, by Christ preventing [not forcing] us that we may have a GOOD will;" do we not sufficiently secure the honour of free grace? Say we not as much as David does in this passage: "Thy people [obedient believers] shall [or will] be willing [to execute thy judgments upon* thine enemies] in the day of thy power,'

That this is the true meaning of Psalm cx, 3, is evident from the context. Read the whole Psalm; compare it with Psalm exlix, 6; Mal. iv, 1, 2, 3; and Kes. xix, 19; and you will see that "the day of God's power," or "the day of

i. e. in the day of thy powerful wrath? Or, as we have it in the Common Prayer, "In the day of thy power shall the people offer free will [not bound will] offerings?" Do we not grant all that St. Paul affirms, when he says to the Philippians, "Work out your own salvation with fear, &c, for it is God that worketh in you both to wILL and to Do?" i. e. God of his own good pleasure gives you a gracious talent of will and power: bury it not use it "with fear:" lay it out "with trembling;" lest God take it from you, and "give you up to a reprobate mind." And is it not evident that these two passages, on which the rigid bound willers chiefly rest their mistake, are perfectly agreeable to the doctrine of the moderate free willers which runs through all the Scriptures, as the preceding pages demonstrate?

THIRD OBJECTION OF ZELOTES. Rational and Scriptural as the doctrine of liberty is, President Edwards will root it up and to succeed in his attempt, he fetches ingenious arguments from heaven and hell.

Superos, Acheronta movendo,

he musters up all the subtleties of logic and metaphysics, with all the refinements of Calvinism, to defend his favourite doctrine of necessity. To the best of my remembrance, a considerable part of his book may be summed up in the following paragraph, which contains the most ingenious objections of the Calvinists :—

The Arminians say that if we act necessarily we are neither punishable nor rewardable; because we are neither worthy of blame, nor of praise. But the devil, who is punished, and who therefore is blameworthy, is necessarily wicked; he has no liberty to be good. And God, who deserves ten thousand times more praises than we can give, is necessarily good; he has no liberty to be wicked. Hence it appears that the reprobates may be necessarily wicked like the devil, and yet may be justly punishable like him; and that the elect may be necessarily good like God and his angels, and yet that they may be, in their degree, praiseworthy like God, and rewardable like his angels. Therefore, the doctrine of the Calvinists is rational, as only supposing what is undeniable, namely, that necessary sins may justly be punished in the reprobates; and that necessary obedience may wisely be rewarded in the elect. And, on the other hand, the doctrine of the Arminians, who make so much ado about reason and piety, is both absurd and impious: absurd, as it supposes that the devil is not worthy of blame, because he sins necessarily; and impious, as it insinuates that God does not deserve praise, because his goodness is necessary.

This argument is plausible, and an answer to it shall conclude this dissertation. God is enthroned in goodness far above the region of evil; neither "can he be tempted of evil;" the excellence, unchange. ableness, and self sufficiency of his nature being every way infinite. He does not then exercise his liberty in choosing moral good or evil; but, (1.) In choosing the various manners of enjoying himself according to all the combinations that may result from his unity in trinity, and from his trinity in unity. (2.) In regulating the infinite variety of his external productions. (3.) In appointing the boundless diversity of God's army," is the day of his wrath against his enemies: a day this which is expressly mentioned two verses after, and described in the rest of the Psalm.