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near twenty times more rapid than that of the earth in its annual course! Now the swiftest speed of a horse that ever has been known, was at the rate of one mile in one minute, which continued, would give sixty miles in an hour, instead of more than a million, the comet's motion. The swiftest horse, at full speed, may move twenty feet in the time that one can pronounce one, or sixty feet, while one can say one, two, three. But to form some conception of the motion of the Newtonian comet, let the reader suppose himself placed upon such an eminence as will give him a prospect of fifty miles on each hand; the rapidity of that tremendous body, in the swiftest part of its course, was such, that in the time of pronouncing one syllable, or in the twinkling of an eye, it would fly across that space of one hundred miles, while the swiftest horse would have proceeded twenty feet. Yet those enormous bodies are, by the parallax they give, supposed to be nearly of the magnitude of our globe of earth and ocean, and some of them perhaps larger.

Now there is nothing more evident, than that in proportion to the quantity of matter to be moved, and the velocity with which it is to be moved, such must be the moving force. Let the reader, therefore, if he has any talent in calculation, try to estimate the force required to give such a furious rapidity to bodies of such stupendous magnitude; if he has any imagination, let him fill it with the sublime idea of Omnipotence; and if he has either reason or religion, let him prostrate his soul, and adore such tremendous and irresistible power.

Nor is less command of matter required to produce the astonishing appearances in the minute, than in the great world; to carry on the various secretions, circulations, and transmutations in vegetation, and the production, growth, and life of animals; especially when the degree of minuteness is such, as it must be in an animalcule, of which millions would only equal the bulk of a grain of sand. What power is required to wing the rapid light from its fountain, the sun, to us in seven or eight minutes, with such swiftness, that in the instant of pronouncing the word light, sixty thousand miles are passed through!

To a being possessed of rightful power over us, the

proper duty is evidently fear, or awe; and the consequences of that is obedience. If we consider the Supreme Being as possessed of infinite or boundless power over all his creatures, we must see the indispensable necessity of the most profound submission to him, both in our dispositions and practices. If we consider him as our Creator, we must be convinced that he has an absolute right to us and to all our services. If we think of him as irresistible, rebellion against him is a degree of madness beyond all computation. For what lasting and inconceivably dreadful punishments may not such power inflict upon those perverse and impenitent beings who become the objects of his vengeance? And what chance can the worms of the earth have to deliver themselves out of the hands of the Almighty?

There is no inconsistency between the fear we owe to God, and the duty of love. On the contrary, love ever implies a fear to offend the person beloved. As on one hand, nothing is so perfectly amiable as infinite perfection; so neither is there any so proper an object of fear as he who is infinitely great and awful. And there is a wide difference between the slavish fear which a criminal has for his judge, or that which a miserable subject has for a tyrant, and that of a son for an affectionate father. Of this last kind is the reverence with which we ought to think of our Creator r; only we must take the utmost care not to entertain any notion of God, as of one capable of any weakness resembling that of earthly parents: for it is certain, that the Judge of the world, whose rectitude and justice are absolutely perfect and inviolable, will not, cannot, be misled, by fondness for his own creatures, to make the obdurately wicked happy. For, though he loves his creatures, he loves justice more, and will not sacrifice his own eternal and immutable attribute for the sake of any number of worthless rebellious beings whatever.

As to the Divine Wisdom appearing in the works of creation, we are peculiarly at a loss to conceive properly of it. For we come into a world ready finished, and fit to be inhabited; and therefore have no conception of the immense stretch of thought, the amazing depth of invention, (if we may so speak,) that was necessary to plan an uni

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verse. Let any man imagine the state of things before there was any created being, if ever such a time was: when there was no plan, no model, or pattern to proceed upon; when the very idea of an universe, as well as the particular plan and execution of it, was to be drawn, so to speak, out of the Divine Imagination. Let the reader suppose himself to have been first produced, and to have had it revealed to him, by his Creator, that an universe was to be created. An universe! What idea could he have formed of an universe? Had he been consulted upon the plan of it, which part would he have begun at? Before light existed, could he have conceived the idea of light? Before there was either sun, stars, or earth, could he have formed any conception of a sun, stars, or earth? Could he have contrived light for the eye, or the eye for light? Could he have suited a world to its inhabitants, or inhabitants to a world? Could he have fitted bodies to minds, or minds to bodies?

If the reader should not clearly enough see the difficulty of inventing and planning an universe from nothing, nor the wondrous foresight and comprehensive wisdom that was necessary for fitting an almost infinite number of things to one another, in such a manner that every particular should answer its particular end, and fill its particular place at the same time that it should contribute to promote various other designs; if the depth of Wisdom which has produced all this, does not sufficiently appear to the reader, let him try to form a plan of a new world, quite different from all that he knows of in the present universe, in which none of our elements, nor light, nor animal life, nor any of the five senses, nor respiration, nor vegetation shall have any place. And when he has used his utmost efforts, and put his invention upon the utmost stretch, and finds that he cannot form a shadow of one single idea, of which the original is not drawn from nature; then let him confess his own weakness, and adore that boundless Wisdom which has produced, out of its own infinite fertility of invention, enough to employ and to confound the utmost human sagacity.

Have not the most acute penetration, and indefatigable industry of the wise and learned of all ages, been employ

ed (and how could they more worthily) in searching out the wonderful works of the Almighty Maker of the Universe? And have they yet found out one single article to the bottom? Can all the philosophers of modern times, who have added to the observations of the ancients, the discoveries made by their own industry and sagacity; can they give a satisfying account of the machinery of the body of a fly, or a worm? Can they tell what makes two particles of matter cohere? Can they tell what the substance of a particle of matter is? Is the science of physiology, delightful and noble as it is, and worthy of the study of angels, is it carried any farther than a set of observations, wonderful indeed, and striking, but as to real causes, and internal natures, altogether in the dark? How do we admire, and justly, the exalted genius of our seemingly inspired philosopher, for going a pitch beyond the sagacity of all mankind in discovering the laws by which the vast machine of the world is governed? Yet he modestly owns the cause of attraction and gravitation to lie too deep for his penetration. How do we stand astonished at the acuteness of a mind, which could pursue calculations to a degree of subtilty beyond the reach of by far the greatest part of mankind to follow him in, even after he has shown the way? What then ought we to think of that Wisdom, which in its meanest productions baffles the deepest penetration of a capacity whose acuteness baffles the general understanding of mankind?

From the consideration of the wisdom we trace in the natural world, it is manifest, past all doubt, that the moral system (for the sake of which that of nature was brought into existence) is under the same conduct, and will hereafter appear to be a scheme altogether worthy of God. For either both, or neither, must be the contrivance of Divine Wisdom. We cannot conceive of God as partly, or by halves, but wholly, the Creator and Governor of all beings, natural and moral. And if so, we may be assured, that, as in the system of nature, final causes are fitted to produce their effects, and every part of the machine of the world is properly adjusted to its place and purpose; so in the moral, every rational being will be determined to the state and place he is found fit for; the good to happiness,

and the wicked to punishment; the highly elevated and purified mind to a high and eminent station, and the corrupt and sordid to shame and misery; the soul which has perfected its faculties, and refined its virtues, by imitation of the Divine Perfections, to the conversation of angels and the beatific vision of God, and that which has by vice debauched and sunk itself below the brutes, to the place of demons and fallen spirits. And all this may probably proceed as much according to the original constitution of things, as a cause produces its effect in the natural world; as fire produces the dissipation of the parts of combustible substances; as nourishment tends to the support of animal life; and as matter tends to decay. So that the only thing which hinders a wicked embodied mind from being now in torments, may be, its being still embodied, and not yet let out into the world of spirits, where a new and dreadful scene will of course immediately open upon it, as soon as it comes to be divested of the earthly vehicle which now conceals those invisible horrors, and protects it from its future tormentors. And in the same manner, the virtuous and exalted mind would be now in a state of happiness, if it were not prevented from the commerce of blessed spirits, and the view of the invisible world, by the impenetrable veil of flesh which surrounds it. But this supposition does not at all affect the doctrine of positive rewards and punishments, nor of separate places appointed for receiving the good, and the wicked, after the final judgment.

If we find the mere material system of nature to be wrought by a degree of wisdom, altogether beyond our comprehension, it would be madness to suppose that we shall ever have sagacity enough to baffle the Divine Scheme in the moral government of the world; that we shall be able to contrive any way of escaping from the punishment we may deserve. No. His counsel will stand; and he will do all his pleasure. It will not be in our power to deceive his penetration, to get out of his reach, or to defend ourselves against his justice.

To frame some idea of the Divine Goodness in the creation of the world, it will be necessary to go back in imagination to the ages which preceded all creation, if such

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