than God has revealed, nor to remain ignorant of what he HAS revealed. I desire to advance, and to halt, just when where the pillar of God's word stays, or goes forward. I am content that the impenetrable veil, divinely interposed between his purposes and my comprehension, be not drawn aside, till faith is lost in sight, and my spirit return to HIM who gave it. But of this I am assured, that echo does not reverberate sound so punctually, as the actual disposal of things answers to God's predetermination concerning them.This cannot be denied, without dethroning providence, as far as in us lies, and setting up fortune in its room. There is no alternative. I defy all the sophistry of man, to strike out a middle way. He that made all things, either directs all things he has made, or has consigned them over to chance. But what is chance? a nothing. Arminianism, therefore, is name for Atheism. * * The late learned and indefatigable Mr. Chambers has, in his valuable Dictionary of Arts and Sciences, under the word chance, two or three observations so pertinent and full to this remark, (viz. of chance being a name for nothing) that I cannot help transcribing them. "Our ignorance and precipitancy lead us to attribute effects to chance, which have a necessary and determinate cause. "When we say a thing happens by chance; we really mean no more than that its cause is unknown to us and not, as some vainly imagine, that chance itself can be the cause of any thing. From this consideration, Dr. Bentley takes occasion to expose the folly of that old tenet, the world was made by chance. I grant that the twin doctrines of Predestination and Providence are not without their difficulties. But the denial of them is attended with ten thousand times more and greater. The difficulties on one side, are but as dust upon the balance those in the other, as mountains in the scale. To imagine that a Being of boundless wisdom, power, and goodness, would create the universe, and not sit at the helm afterwards, but turn us adrift to shift for ourselves, like an huge vessel without a pilot, is a supposition that subverts every notion of Deity, gives the lie to every page in the Bible, contradicts our daily experience, and insults the common reason of mankind. Say'st thou, the course of nature governs all? The whole creation, from the seraph down to the invisible atom, ministers to the supreme will, and is under the special observation, government, and "The case of the painter, who, unable to express the foam at the mouth of an horse he had painted, threw his sponge in despair at the piece, and by chance did that which he could not before do by design, is an eminent instance of the force of chance. Yet, it is obvious, all we here mean by chance is, that the painter was not aware of the effect: or, that he did not throw the sponge with such a view. Not but that he actually did every thing necessary to produce the effect. Insomuch that, considering the direction wherein he threw the sponge, together with its form, and specific gravity; the colours wherewith it was smeered, and the distance of the hand from the piece; it was impossible, on the present system of things, that the effect should not follow." direction of the Omnipotent mind: who sees all, himself unseen; who upholds all, himself unsustained; who guides all, himself guided by none; and who changes all, himself unchanged. "But does not this doctrine tend to the estabHishment of fatality?" Supposing it even did, were it not better to be a Christian fatalist, than to avow a set of loose Arminian principles, which if pushed to their natural extent, inevitably terminate in the rankest Atheism? For, without predestination, there can be no Providence ; and, without Providence, no God. After all, What do you mean by fate? If you mean a regular succession of determined events, from the beginning to the end of time; an uninterrupted chain, without a single chasm; all depending on the eternal will and continued influenence of the great First Cause: this is fate, it must be owned, That it and the scripture predestination are, at most, very thinly divided; or, rather, entirely coalesce.-But if by fate is meant, either a constitution of things antecedent to the will of God; by which he himself was bound, ab origine; and which goes on of itself, to multiply causes and effects, to the exclusion of the all-pervading power and unintermitting agency of an intelligent, perpetual, and particular Providence : neither reason nor Christianity allows of any such fate as this. Fate, thus considered, is just such an extreme, on one hand, as chance is on the other. Both are alike, unexistable. It having been not unusual with the Arminian writers to tax us with adopting the fate of the ancient Stoics; I thought it might not be unacceptable to the English reader, to subjoin a brief view of what those philosophers generally held, (for they were not all exactly of a mind) as to this particular. It will appear to every competent reader, from what is there given, how far the doctrine of fate as believed and taught by the Stoics, may be admitted upon Christian principles. Having large materials by me for such a work, it would have been very easy for me to have annexed a dissertation of my own upon the subject but I chose to confine myself to a small extract from the citations and remarks of the learned Lipsius, who seems in his Physiologia Stoicorum, to have almost exhausted the substance of the argument, with a penetration and precision which leave little room either for addition or amendment. In a cause, therefore, where the interest of truth is so eminently concerned, I would rather retain the ablest counsel when it can be had, than to venture to be myself her sole ad vocate. For my own particular part, I frankly confess that, as far as the coincidence of the Stoical fate, with the Bible predestination, holds good; I "Now I am in some measure enlightened," (says the Rev. Mr. Newton, of Olney,) "I can easily perceive, that it is in the adjustment and concurrence of seemingly fortuitous circumstances, that the ruling power and wisdom of God are see no reason why we should be ashamed to acknowledge it. St. Austin, and many other great and excellent men, have not scrupled to admit both the word [viz. the word fate] and the thing properly understood.* I am quite of Lip most evidently displayed in human affairs. How many such casual events may we remark in the history of Joseph, which had each a necessary influence in his ensuing promotion!—If the Midianites had passed by a day sooner, or a day later ;--If they had sold him to any person but Potiphar ;—If his mistress had been a better woman ;-If Pharaoh's officers had not displeased their Lord; or, if any, or all these things had fallen out in any other manner or time than they did, all that followed had been prevented: the promises and purposes of God concerning Israel, their bondage, deliverances, polity, and settlement, must have failed: and as all these things tended to and centred in CHRIST, the promised Saviour; the desire of all nations would not have appeared. Mankind had been still in their sins, without hope; and the counsels of God's eternal love, in favour of sinners, defeated. Thus we may see a connexion between Joseph's first dream and the death of our Lord Christ, with all its glorious consequences. So strong, though secret, is the CONCATENATION between the greatest and the smallest events!What a comfortable thought is this to a believer, to know, that amidst all the various, interfering designs of men, the Lord has one constant design, which he cannot, will not miss: namely, his own glory, in the complete salvation of his people! And that he is wise, and strong, and faithful, to make even those things, which seem contrary to this design, subservient to promote it!" See p. 96..and seq. of a most entertaining and instructive piece, entitled An authentic Narrative of some remarkable and interesting Particulars, in the Life of ******, in a Series of Letters, 1765. * For a sample, the learned reader may peruse the judicious chapter, De Fato, in Abp. Bradwardin's immortal book De Causa Dei, lib. i. cap. 28. |