ture, and the opinion of the highest christian antiquity appear to favour the doctrine of the Roman church, yet the violence of the disputes which appear, in the progress of this controversy, between them and their Grecian brethren is a deep reproach to both parties.

OF THE

DECREES OF GOD.

HAVING treated of the being of God, and of that idea of the divine nature and perfection presented to us in Holy Scripture, the subject which next occurs to our consideration is his immediate agency and control over all the works of his hand, usually styled, in our theological systems, his Decrees. By this term is intended the sovereign and holy will of God concerning all things that exist, not only in their being, but in all their changes and actions from the greatest to the most minute. They embrace the entire system of the universe, both physical, and moral, corporeal and spiritual, and, in the language of philosophy, constitute the universal laws both of matter and of mind; which are so ordained, in their original structure, as, by their natural operation, to attain every purpose of the all-wise Creator. But divines with justice, perhaps, entertaining a suspicion of the language of philosophy, as if it kept the immediate agency of God too much out of view, by interposing the natural law between him and the event, and willing to present him always to the mind, in all the changes of the universe, have chosen to employ the terms ordination, and predestination as exhibiting

hate cause of whatever takes place in heaven or on earth. No event can happen but in consequence of the laws which he has established, and established with a full, immediate and present view of every result which should spring from them. And as the whole creation was, at all times, present before him, from the beginning, and nothing, strictly speaking, can be considered as either past, or to come in the view of omniscience, his preordination or decree is justly reregarded as embracing every event, and all events are seen as being immediately obvious to his view, and arising naturally out of the train of causes which he has ordained.

This term, as it has been adopted by theologians, is merely technical, and has an appropriate meaning, being used to signify the divine purposes with respect to the whole order of nature, but chiefly with respect to the moral states and destinies of mankind. It is evidently borrowed from an analogy supposed to exist between the divine and human governments, and is consequently employed to express the will of Almighty God as the supreme legislator and governor of the universe.

Few words, in the Old Testament, have been translated by this term, and in every place where they are employed they might, with equal propriety, have been rendered by the terms statute, law, or purpose. In the version of the New Testament it is no where found, although the equiva

lent terms counsel, purpose, foreknowledge, predestination, frequently occur; which language, especially when it relates to the moral states, and conditions of men, evidently imply all that is intended by decree, as it has been introduced into the systems of theology.

To many, who appear not to have justly reflected on the subject, this term carries in it somewhat gloomy and austere, as implying that all the actions, and the final states of mankind have been fixed by an arbitrary will, and that their whole moral government turns on principles of necessity, equally with those which govern the material world. But when we identify his decrees, with the laws of universal being, producing their effects, with certainty, indeed, but freely or necessarily, according to the nature of each subject, this apparent harshness ceases to exist. No reasonable doubt can be entertained by any reflecting man, but that all things, from the beginning have been determined by the Creator in a certain order, which order must arise out of the laws of their respective natures, and the combinations of each subject with all other things. And these all having been framed by their glorious Author with the most perfect foresight, their infinitely various results must have been present from the beginning, to his all comprehensive view. On the most obvious principles of reason, therefore, the divine foreknowledge of events, must have been founded on the divine will in framing the universal structure of things, and impressing upon them respectively.