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Lastly, if God be benevolent at all, he must be infinitely fo; at least we can fee no reason why he should wish to make his creation happy at all, and not wish to make it as happy as poffible. If this be the cafe, the reason why all his creatures are not, at all times, as happy as their natures can bear, must be because variety and a gradual advance are, in the nature of things, neceffary to their complete and final happiness.

Befides, as there is reafon to believe that the other perfections of God, his wisdom, power, &c. are infinite, it feems to follow, by analogy, that his goodnefs must be fo too, though we may not be able to prove it demonftrably and confequentially.

It must be owned to be impoffible completely to answer every objection that may be made to the fuppofition of the infinite benevolence of God; for, fuppofing all his creatures to be conftantly happy, ftill, as there are degrees of happiness, it may be afked, why, if their maker be infinitely benevolent, do not his creatures enjoy a higher degree

degree of it. But this queftion may always be asked, so long as the happiness of any creature is only finite, that is less than infinite, or less than the happiness of God himfelf, which, in its own nature it must neceffarily be. It must be confiftent, therefore, even with the infinite benevolence of God, that his creatures, which are neceffarily finite, be finitely, that is imperfectly happy. And when all the circumstances relating to any being are condered at once, as they are by the divine mind, pofitive evils have only the fame effect as a diminution of pofitive good, being balanced, as it were, against a degree of good to which it was equivalent; fo that the overplus of happiness which falls to the fhare of any being, after allowance has been made for the evils which he fuffers, is to be confidered as his fhare of unmixed happiness.

It is only owing to our imperfection, or the want of comprehenfion of mind (in which, however, we advance every day) that we are not able to make all our pleafures and pains perfectly to coalefce, fo as that we shall be

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affected by the difference only. And whenever we shall be arrived at this ftate; whenever, by long experience, we fhall be able to connect in our minds the ideas of all the things which are causes and effects to one another, all partial evils will abfolutely vanish in the contemplation of the greater good with which they are connected. This will be perfectly the case with respect to all intellectual pleasures and pains, and even painful fenfations, will be much moderated, and more tolerable under the lively perfuafion of their contributing to our happiness on the whole. However, in the light in which the divine being, who has this perfect comprehenfion, views his works (and this must be the true light in which they ought to be confidered) there is this perfect coincidence of all things that are connected with, and fubfervient to one another; fo that, fince all evils are neceffarily connected with fome good, and generally are directly productive of it, all the works of God, appear to him at all times very good, happinefs greatly abounding upon the whole. And fince the works of God are infinite, he VOL. I. contemplates

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contemplates an infinity of happiness, of his own production, and, in his eye, happiness unmixed with evil.

This conclufion, however, is hardly consistent with the supposition that any of the creatures of God are neceffarily miserable in the whole of their exiftence. In the ideas of fuch creatures, even when they have arrived at the most perfect comprehenfion of mind, their being must seem a curfe to them, and the author of it will be confidered as malevolent with respect to them, though not fo to others.

It seems, likewise, to be a reflection upon the wisdom of God, that he should not be able to produce the happiness of some, without the final mifery of others; and fo incapable are we of conceiving how the latter of these can be neceffary to the former; that, if we retain the idea of the divine benevolence, together with that of his power and wisdom in any high degree, we cannot but reject the fuppofition. That any of the creatures of God fhould be finally, and upon

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the whole, miferable, cannot be a pleafing circumftance to their benevolent author. Nay, it must, in its own nature, be the last means that he would have recourse to, to gain his end; because, as far as it prevails, it is directly oppofed to his end. We may, therefore, reft fatisfied, that there is no fuch blot in the creation as this; but that all the creatures of God are intended by him to be happy upon the whole. He ftands in an equal relation to them all, a relation in which they must all have reason to rejoice. He is their common father, protector, and friend.

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