utmost powers of persuasion, the people should be left in a labyrinth, a mizmaze of difficulties, respecting the possibility or the impossibility of doing that, to which they are so zealously urged.

We have intended to intimate, that this state of things among the people, has, to some extent, been brought about by the religious instruction to which to which they have been accustomed from the pulpit, particularly in respect to the point in question. We will now advert to what we consider unhappy specimens of preaching, in respect to this point, as preliminary to an exhibition of what we think a more excellent way. These, with few exceptions, may conveniently be reduced to three sorts.

The first, (which we shall notice very briefly,) is grounded on a denial of all power in man, in every sense, to obey the divine commands. Preachers who conceive of man as thus absolutely powerless, blame him for his sins, because, as they hold, he once had power in Adam; but they do not insist upon his immediate repentance. He had power to obey in Adam; but having disobeyed in him, he has no power to repent. He had none to do this in Adam; he has none in himself: and thus, being in every sense powerless, and it being obviously necessary, that there must be power somewhere, to do what is to be done, these preachers cannot but see it to be unreasonable, to enforce upon men obligation to instant repentance. Accordingly, they do not enforce it, or do not enforce at least the immediate discharge of it. On the con

trary, expressly telling their hearers, that they have no power to repent, they set them about other things, for the performance of which they have power; namely, reading, praying, and attending externally upon religious ordinances. These, as performed without repentance, are admitted to be sinful; but on the ground, that the omission of them would be yet more sinful, the hope is encouraged, sometimes, strange to say, by appeals to scripture-promises, that they will sooner or later be followed by an interposition of saving mercy. On the procedure of these preachers, it were easy to animadvert; but animadversion on it, at the present day, may be spared. To state it, is sufficient censure: Men directed to do what is admitted to be sin, in order to their coming to repentance, or securing the divine favor! Nor is the theory on which the direction proceeds, less strange than the direction itself. On this too, however, we forbear all remark. Happily this strain of preaching is much less common than it has been. It will, we hope, speedily pass away. A work* of a distinguished English divine, the late

•The Gospel worthy of all Acceptation. Though this admirable performance is doubtless very familiar to the preachers of our country, we are inclined to think, that a general re-perusal of it, together with Part II. chap. iv. sec. 9, of Hopkins' System of Divinity, and certain other well-known productions on the VOL. VII. 29

Rev. Andrew Fuller has, perhaps, been chiefly instrumental in producing this result. It has been greatly promoted, however, in our own land, by our numerous and powerful revivals of religion. Let our revivals multiply, and it will certainly disappear. Preaching of this kind, and religious revivals, are mutually repugnant and fatal to each other. This is now almost universally understood. This preaching has but little favor, except among those who oppose, or stand in doubt of, revivals of religion.

The second kind of preaching in relation to the present point, according to our classification, is, in the precise shape now to be examined, but in the beginning of its course amongst us.* It professes to be very different from the former; but the difference, we apprehend, is more apparent than real. In its tendencies and bearings, we deem it nearly the same; and we doubt not, that, but for the peculiar philosophy of which it is the fruit, and certain doctrinal assumptions and consequent negations with which it is associated, its appearance would give pleasure to the class of preachers to whom we have been just adverting. It discards, or at least does not avow, the notion of our being blamable for disobedience, because we had power to obey in Adam; but it denies, with great emphasis, that we have any power IN OURSELVES. Power to obey, nevertheless, in some sort, it seems reluctant to deny us altogether; but it makes that power, previously at least to our actual obedience, wholly external to us; and even in our very obedience, if we have not misunderstood its peculiar phraseology, it is not power distinctively belonging to us, as separate or individual beings, but the Divine power itself, in some inconceivable way, exerting itself in our exercises and acts. We find it difficult to state positively, what its theory is, as to the proximate power with which our acts of holiness are performed; and should be happy, if it had distinctly and intelligibly done this task for us. Thus much, however, it does affirm, without qualification,―That man cannot do what God requires of him, without the aid of divine grace. It disallows, or at least makes no use of, the com

same subject, would be seasonable and useful at the present time. The thing which hath been, it is that which shall be so we fear at least, unless proper means be used to prevent its recurrence. See some reasons for our apprehension in the sequel.

*The prose writings of Mr. Coleridge, especially his "Aids to Reflection," have chiefly, if not exclusively, originated the strain of preaching to which we here allude; but we do not say, that those writings directly countenance it in all particulars. They do so, unquestionably, in the main points: in other points, we think some of Mr. C's American friends are making a use of his philosophy, never contemplated by him, and of which he might complain as an abuse. But "transcendental metaphysic," is finding its way into our schools and our pulpits, under the sanction of other names, besides that of the Platonizing and meditative Coleridge.

t See Note, p. 230.

mon distinction between natural and moral inability; and roundly asserts the impossibility of man's doing what the law of God requires, without gracious aid. And it rests this bold assertion on ground, which, if it were tenable, would be adequate to sustain it; namely: That the will of man has become corrupted,* by having received a NATURE into itself, or subjected itself, in some mysterious manner, to the determination of NATURE; that is, by explanation, to physical necessity, or the mechanism of cause and effect. If the fact were as here declared, we should readily concede, that no affirmation of human inability could be too bold or unqualified. Indeed, to say, that man's will is subjected to the mechanism of cause and effect, or physical necessity, is equivalent to, nay, it is the same thing with saying, that man himself, in respect to the faculty or power of willing, of course of obeying God, is a mere machine, without God's gracious, and we should add, miraculous aid.‡

If, in our examination of the doctrine in question, we should seem to the reader strangely particular and argumentative, upon points hitherto deemed incontrovertibly certain; our apology is, that these incontrovertible points at length are controverted, and that no alternative seems to be left us, but either to be silent, or to speak as we have done.

Let us begin by obtaining, if possible, a clear understanding of what is meant by gracious aid. Is it aid granted to all mankind;

"The will is ultimately self-determined, or it is no longer a will, under the law of perfect freedom, but a nature under the mechanism of cause and effect. And if by an act, to which it had determined itself, it has subjected itself to the determination of nature, (in the language of St. Paul, to the law of the flesh,) it receives a nature into itself, and so far it becomes a nature: and this is a corruption of the will, and a corrupt nature. It is also a full of man, in as much as his will is the condition of his personality; the ground and condition of the attribute which constitutes him man." Aids to Reflection, London ed. pp. 278, 279. Read the whole of the paragraph. It shows, if we have not misunderstood it, that Mr. Coleridge had no objection to the notion, that the will is determined by a previous act of volition ; though Edwards has, as we have thought, proved that notion an absurdity.

"Whatever is comprised in the chain and mechanism of cause and effect, of course necessitated, and having its necessity in some other thing, antecedent or concurrent. This is said to be natural; and the aggregate and system of all such things is NATURE." Aids, p. 71.

Mr. Coleridge does not think, that the faculty of reason in fallen man, is wholly impotent, (Aids, p. 138.) or, that man now has no will, which, he says, is what the doctrine of Edwards amounts to, (p. 155.) Man's will, he holds, is diseased, enslaved, corrupted, but yet not passive in his recovery to holiness, (p. 153.) That it has any power, however, to escape out of a state of impenitence and unbelief, he ascribes to the supernatural aids vouchsafed in the christian dispensation. (pp. 153, 190, 311.) How a will, subjected to the determination of nature, or physical necessity, can, even with those aids, such as in fact they are, be otherwise than absolutely impotent, he does not explain.

"By the phrase, "in Christ," I mean all the supernatural aids vouchsafed, and conditionally promised, in the christian dispensation; and among them, the

or, that special influence of the Holy Spirit, which actually renews and saves a fore-chosen part? If the latter, then all mankind, except the elect, being without gracious aid, are in fact subject, as to their will, to the mechanism of cause and effect, and by uncontrollable physical necessity, must abide in sin and perish! If the former, we have several questions to ask:

In the first place, is the aid strictly gracious? If so, then God, without being unjust, might have denied it to man. What then, if it had been denied to him? The race commencing their existence with a corrupted will, (for so it is maintained they do commence it, though the fact, it is said, is a mystery,)* beginning their existence with a will subject to evil by a mechanical necessity, and so remaining until they go away into everlasting punishment! Other suppositions on this subject are strange; but is not this wholly and palpably inadmissible?-Is it said, that God could not, in equity, have denied this aid to man? So, as we understand, it has been said; but if it be really so, the sense should be explained in which the aid is called gracious. It may be said, perhaps, that there was grace in making us men, rather than brutes, and also in dealing with us equitably after we were created; but this certainly is using the term grace, out of the ordinary signification. By grace is commonly meant favor, or blessing, which, without injustice, might have been withheld from existing creatures. God could not have equitably required us to exercise rational faculties, if he had not made us with such faculties; and if the aid in question be such as he could not have denied us, and at the same time justly required us to obey him, this aid was as much, and in the same sense, due to us, as rational faculties themselves.

Assuming, then, that it was due, we ask again, What is gained, by placing man's power to obey God, out of, rather than in, himself? We should of course suppress this question, if we supposed it certain, from either scripture or consciousness, that the seat of man's power is not in himself; but, allowing this to be doubtful, the question may not be without some significance. As the power itself could not be denied to man, without injustice, what matter,

Spirit of truth, which the world cannot receive." Aids, p. 153. How is this,― and which the world cannot receive? Is it, bona fide, aid, if it cannot be received? Or, was it not designed as aid to the world?

* Aids pp. 278, 282.

t Is not this Mr. Coleridge's meaning, where he says, p. 270, "Now what would the idea of equity,-what would the law, inscribed by the Creator on the heart of man, seem to dictate in this case?" (that is, of God's requiring the same perfect obedience of Adam's fallen posterity, that he had required of Adam himself;) "Surely, that the supplementary aids, the supernatural graces, correspondent to a law above nature," (so he calls the law demanding perfect obedience,) "should be increased in proportion to the diminished strength of the agents, and the ingreased resistance to be overcome by them"?

whether the seat of it be within or without him? It must be in him, surely, when it is exerted by him, wherever its seat may be at other times. It must, moreover, be always at hand, and why not as well be always in him?

But it may not be irrelevant to ask, thirdly, Is it admitted, that it is always at hand? Is it truly at the command of men? If not, what is our state the better for it? If it be, is it not remarkable, that (as the fact is, supposing the doctrine of special grace to be true,) no man since the world began, ever used it? This question, we think, is not unjustly put to those who would make man's not having, in any instance, used natural power, a proof of his not having it. It is an argument, by them at least, deserving consideration. Why has no individual used this ever-present aid? For if the doctrine of SPECIAL grace be not set aside by this other doctrine of grace universal and due, it is the fact, that no one, of himself, has ever used it.

The doctrine of special grace, however, though it has ever been a leading article of the christain faith, may be held in doubt by those whom we are now opposing; and it may be insisted on by them, (as, if we are not mistaken, it has been, and will be yet more and more,) that men who obey God, do it by the sole help of grace universal and common; in which case, our last question were inapposite. But another question, we think, is apposite. If this gracious aid' is always at hand and ready for use, why, in every instance, is it not actually used? What is plainer than this, -that, if a gracious ability may be possessed and not be used, then a natural ability may be possessed and not be used? The common argument, then, to prove that the sinner has not natural ability, derived from the fact, that he does not use it, we think, must be abandoned. We proceed to ask, once more:

6

Admitting the fact to be as here alledged, that when man obeys God, he does it by power dwelling out of himself,-power in Jesus Christ, vouchsafed conditionally to the race, must it not follow, that the power which directly and proximately originates human obedience, is not human, but divine power? It is, we suppose, the common opinion of christians, that it is by the operation of the gracious power of God, that men are brought to obey him; but that, when they do obey him, they do it, strictly speaking, with their own attribute of power, not their Maker's. So it must be. Obedience to God, if it is any thing, is right moral action; and right moral action is the right exercise or use of the moral powers of a moral being. Love to God, repentance for sin, faith in the Savior, are and must be the sinner's own acts or exercises, that is, his own powers or faculties, exercised in these forms. The proximate powers in exercise, must be his own subjective mental powers, or the acts cannot be his own acts. Is this, how