pofition which will reconcile their existence with the perfect goodness of God.

IF any fhould inquire, how evil can produce good? it must be acknowledged, that this is an exceeding difficult question to answer fully and fatisfactorily in all cases: however, many inftances of it are obvious. 'Tis an evil to cut off a limb from a living man; but if this be done to preserve life, it is confequentially good. Pain and fickness are evils; but if, as many think, conftant health and uninterrupted ease do not afford fo great a degree of pleasure, as a return of health after fickness, or of eafe after pain, then these evils produce good. Befides, they may be of fervice in weaning men from this world, and in caufing them to leave it with willingness inftead of regret. Nay, death itself, commonly esteemed the greateft of temporal evils, if it be the entrance of a better life, is a moft fubftantial good; but if of eternal misery, is then a real and terrible evil.

THESE indeed are inftances only of phyfical evil producing good: how moral evil can be any way beneficial, the writer of this Effay acknowledges himself ignorant: but, as man is formed and circumftanced, moral evil feems inevitable; and if it be really fo, this is a very strong reason why God will pardon

it.

it. The well-known and good-natured opi nion of Origen was, that not only bad men, but even devils should be finally happy.

A

SECTION VII.

FTER all, fome may ask,―Are the good and the bad to fare alike in a future ftate? Before this query is answered, a previous queftion may be neceffary: Is it not possible, nay, is it not highly probable, that the good only will arrive at a future ftate? One of the best writers of our nation, and perhaps of any other, feems at least much inclined to this opinion.

MR. Locke, in his treatife intitled The ReaJonableness of Chriftianity, &c. fets out with endeavouring to prove, that the penalty incurred by Adam and his pofterity, on account of the fin he committed, was not, as fome will have it, a ftate of endless torments in hell-fire, but death literally speaking. "It

feems," fays this author, "a ftrange way "of understanding a law, which requires the plaineft and directeft words, that by death "fhould be meant eternal life in mifery. "Could any one be fuppofed by a law that fays, For felony thou shalt die, not that he fhould

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"fhould lofé his life, but be kept alive in "perpetual exquifite torments? And would

any one think himself fairly dealt with "that was fo ufed ?" Again, “ I must "confefs by death here I can understand

nothing but a ceafing to be." And a little further he says, "Immortality and bliss belong to the righteous; but an exclufion "from Paradife and a LOSS OF IMMOR"TALITY is the portion of finners *.”

THE fcriptures do in many places favour this opinion, that death, literally fpeaking, and not eternal mifery, is the portion of finners: but as we muft acknowledge, that these writings do alfo in other places feem to affert the contrary, their authority therefore will not, on this occafion, be pleaded.

HOWEVER, we fhall endeavour to fhew, if the apoftle Paul meant, by God's making one veffel unto honour and another unto difhonour, not that one man was defigned only for everlasting life and happiness, and another for death, but that one was made for eternal blifs, and another for eternal mifery; St. Paul would in that cafe appear to have given a most shocking account of the Deity and his dealings with his creature man. Might not man then, in the words the apostle puts into his mouth, with great reafon

* P. 15.

L. P. 8.

i P. 9.

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reafon fay to his Creator? Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath refifted his will?" And what folution of this difficulty, or what fatisfaction or confolation would it be to fay?"Nay but, O man, "who art thou that replieft against God? "Shall the thing formed fay to him that "formed it, Why haft thou made me thus ?". Yes, no doubt, if he is made to be eternally miferable, he has great reafon to afk, WHY? And pray, what fatisfaction will he receive by the apostle's other question?" Hath not "the potter power over the clay, of the same "lump to make one veffel unto honour, and "another unto difhonour?" Undoubtedly he hath and no injury is done to the clay for it fignifies nothing to the unfeeling, infenfible clay what is done with it, neither, ftrictly speaking, is one veffel more or the other lefs honourable. But furely this cannot be said of man; if by the vessel of honour is meant a perfon defigned for, and to enjoy everlasting happiness; and by the veffel of dishonour one defigned for, and to fuffer everlasting mifery. What a fimile, in this fenfe, would here be of the potter and his clay, and man and his maker ? Might it not, were this the cafe, be truly faid, that nothing is lefs like the subject intended to be illuftrated than fuch a fimile. If, as fome

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have

have supposed, the apostle really intended by: veffels of difhonour, and veffels of wrath, men that were created by God to be eternally miserable, he certainly had the greatest rea fon here to have faid, as he did fay in another place before cited, "That which I speak, "I fpeak it not after the Lord, but as it "were foolishly:" for furely the Lord never taught, that he created fome men, nay, far the greatest part of mankind, to make them everlaftingly miferable; neither could it be wife in any one to fay fo. But if nothing more was defigned by the apostle than to fhew, that fome men were formed to die and abfolutely cease to be; and others, tho' alfo to die, fhould nevertheless rife again to perpetual happiness; this would greatly alter the cafe. And,

IF we fuppofe this to be the distinction between the good and the bad, the wife and the unwife, will not their ftates be vaftly different? Will not the latter be fufficiently punished, and yet without cruelty, by the lofs of immortality and eternal happiness? I fay without cruelty; for if when men die they ceafe to be, they are then no more miferable than before they had a being.

But this, it may be faid, is all conjecture. Very true: and what more than conjecture can be expected on a fubject which will not