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CHAPTER VII.

OF THE GOVERNMENT OF GOD, CONSIDERED AS A SCHEME OR CONSTITUTION, IMPERFECTLY COMPREHENDED.

THOUGH it be, as it cannot but be, acknowledged that the analogy of nature gives a strong credibility to the general doctrine of Religion, and to the several particular things contained in it considered as so many matters of fact; and likewise that it shows this credibility not to be destroyed by any notions of Necessity: yet still objections may be insisted upon against the wisdom, equity, and goodness of the divine government implied in the notion of Religion, and against the method by which this government is conducted; to which objections analogy can be no direct answer1. For the credibility or the certain truth of a matter of fact does not immediately prove anything concerning the wisdom or goodness of it; and analogy can do no more, immediately or directly, than show such and such things to be true or credible considered only as matters of fact. But still, if, upon supposition of a moral constitution of nature and a moral government over it, analogy suggests and makes it credible that this government must be a scheme, system, or constitution of government, as distinguished from a number of single unconnected acts of distributive justice and goodness, and likewise that it must be a scheme, so imperfectly comprehended, and of such a sort in other respects, as to afford a direct general answer to all objections against the justice and goodness of it; then analogy is remotely of great service in answering those objections, both by suggesting the answer and showing it to be a credible one.

In chap. iii. objections were urged against the fact of God's moral government in respect of rewards and punishments, and they were directly answered from analogy by showing that the seeds, as it were, of a moral government, are discernible in the world around us. But objections may be raised, not only against the fact of God's moral government, but also against its perfect moral character. Admitting that government as a fact, it still may be urged that it is not wise, just, and good. Can analogy answer such an objection? Not directly, indeed, but indirectly, by suggesting as the proper answer our present inperfect comprehension of so vast a scheme. Two arguments are urged in support of this position: the one drawn from the general analogy existing between God's natural and moral governments; the other from particular points of analogy between them.-Ed.

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Now this, upon inquiry, will be found to be the case. For, First, Upon supposition that God exercises a moral government over the world, the analogy of his natural government suggests and makes it credible that his moral government must be a scheme quite beyond our comprehension; and this affords a general answer to all objections against the justice and goodness of it. And, Secondly, A more distinct observation of some particular things contained in God's scheme of natural government, the like things being supposed, by analogy, to be contained in his moral government, will further show how little weight is to be laid upon these objections.

I. Upon supposition that God exercises a moral government over the world, the analogy of his natural government suggests and makes it credible that his moral government must be a scheme quite beyond our comprehension, and this affords a general answer to all objections against the justice and goodness of it. It is most obvious, analogy renders it highly credible, that, upon supposition of a moral government, it must be a scheme; for the world, and the whole natural government of it, appears to be so; to be a scheme, system, or constitution, whose parts correspond to each other, and to a whole, as really as any work of art, or as any particular model of a civil constitution and government. In this great scheme of the natural world individuals have various peculiar relations to other individuals of their own species. And whole species are, we find, variously related to other species upon this earth. Nor do we know how much further these kinds of relations may extend. And, as there is not any action or natural event which we are acquainted with so single and unconnected as not to have a respect to some other actions and events, so possibly each of them, when it has not an immediate, may yet have a remote, natural relation to other actions and events much beyond the compass of this present world. There seems indeed nothing from whence we can so much as make a conjecture whether all creatures, actions, and events, throughout the whole of nature have relations to each other. But as it is obvious that all events have

1 This argument was evidently a favourite instrument in the hands of Butler; he draws it out at greater length in Serm. xv. upon the "Ignorance

of Man."

future unknown consequences, so if we trace any, as far as we can go, into what is connected with it, we shall find that if such event were not connected with somewhat further in nature unknown to us, somewhat both past and present, such event could not possibly have been at all. Nor can we give the whole account of any one thing whatever; of all its causes, ends, and necessary adjuncts, those adjuncts, I mean, without which it could not have been. By this most astonishing connection, these reciprocal correspondences and mutual relations, everything which we see in the course of nature is actually brought about. And things seemingly the most insignificant imaginable are perpetually observed to be necessary conditions to other things of the greatest importance; so that any one thing whatever may, for aught we know to the contrary, be a necessary condition to any other. The natural world, then, and natural government of it, being such an incomprehensible scheme, so incomprehensible that a man must, really in the literal sense, know nothing at all who is not sensible of his ignorance in it; this immediately suggests and strongly shows the credibility, that the moral world and government of it may be so too. Indeed the natural and moral constitution and government of the world are so connected, as to make up together but one scheme; and it is highly probable that the first is formed and carried on merely in subserviency to the latter, as the vegetable world is for the animal, and organized bodies for minds'. But the thing intended here is, without inquiring how far the administration of the natural world is subordinate to that of the moral, only to observe the credibility that one should be analogous or similar to the other; that therefore every act of divine justice and goodness may be supposed to look much beyond itself and its immediate object, may have some reference to other parts of God's moral administration, and to a general moral plan; and that every circumstance of this his moral

1 There is no manner of absurdity in supposing a veil, on purpose, drawn over some scenes of infinite power, wisdom, and goodness, the sight of which might, some way or other, strike us too strongly; or that better ends are designed and served by their being concealed, than could be by their being exposed to our knowledge. The Almighty may cast clouds and darkness round about Him for reasons and purposes of which we have not the least glimpse or conception.-Butler's Sermon xv. (Ed.)

government may be adjusted beforehand with a view to the whole of it. Thus for example: the determined length of time, and the degrees and ways in which virtue is to remain in a state of warfare and discipline, and in which wickedness is permitted to have its progress; the times appointed for the execution of justice, the appointed instruments of it, the kinds of rewards and punishments, and the manners of their distribution; all particular instances of divine justice and goodness, and every circumstance of them, may have such respects to each other as to make up altogether a whole, connected and related in all its parts; a scheme or system, which is as properly one as the natural world is, and of the like kind. And supposing this to be the case, it is most evident that we are not competent judges of this scheme from the small parts of it which come within our view in the present life, and therefore no objections against any of these parts can be insisted upon by reasonable men.

This our ignorance, and the consequence here drawn from it, are universally acknowledged upon other occasions, and though scarce denied, yet are universally forgot when persons come to argue against Religion. And it is not perhaps easy, even for the most reasonable men, always to bear in mind the degree of our ignorance, and make due allowances for it. Upon these accounts it may not be useless to go on a little further, in order to show more distinctly how just an answer our ignorance is to objections against the scheme of Providence. Suppose, then, a person boldly to assert that the things complained of, the origin and continuance of evil, might easily have been prevented by repeated interpositions; interpositions so guarded and circumstanced as would preclude all mischief arising from them; or, if this were impracticable, that a scheme of government is itself an imperfection; since more good might have been produced without any scheme, system, or constitution at all, by continued single unrelated acts of distributive justice and goodness, because these would have occasioned no irregularities. And farther than this, it is presumed, the objections will not be carried. Yet the answer is obvious; that were these assertions true, still the observations above, concerning our ignorance in the scheme of divine govern1 Pp. 183, 184.

ment and the consequence drawn from it, would hold in great measure, enough to vindicate Religion against all objections from the disorders of the present state. Were these assertions true, yet the government of the world might be just and good notwithstanding; for, at the most, they would infer nothing more than that it might have been better. But indeed they are mere arbitrary assertions; no man being sufficiently acquainted with the possibilities of things, to bring any proof of them to the lowest degree of probability. For however possible what is asserted may seem, yet many instances may be alleged in things much less out of our reach, of suppositions absolutely impossible and reducible to the most palpable self-contradictions, which not every one by any means would perceive to be such, nor perhaps any one at first sight suspect. From these things it is easy to see distinctly how our ignorance, as it is the common, is really a satisfactory answer to all objections against the justice and goodness of Providence. If a man, contemplating any one providential dispensation which had no relation to any others, should object, that he discerned in it a disregard to justice or a deficiency of goodness; nothing would be less an answer to such objection than our ignorance in other parts of providence, or in the possibilities of things no way related to what he was contemplating. But when we know not but the parts objected against may be relative to other parts unknown to us, and when we are unacquainted with what is, in the nature of the thing, practicable in the case before us, then our ignorance is a satisfactory answer, because some unknown relation, or some unknown impossibility, may render what is objected against just and good; nay, good in the highest practicable degree.

II. And how little weight is to be laid upon such objections will further appear by a more distinct observation of some particular things contained in the natural government of God, the like to which may be supposed, from analogy, to be contained in his moral government.

First. As in the scheme of the natural world, no ends appear to be accomplished without means, so we find thatmeans very undesirable often conduce to bring about ends in such a measure desirable as greatly to overbalance the disagreeableness of the means; and in cases where such