al government, therefore, there must undoubtedly be some supreme authority, to which those who are governed are amenable.

Now if men are under government, they are under law. To be governed is obviously to be regulated, guided, or controlled, in a greater or less degree. To say that men are governed, and are, at the same time, exempt from law, is but little short of a verbal contradiction, and is certainly a real one. But when we speak of men as being under laws, we do not mean to assert a mere abstraction. We mean to express something actually existing; in other words, we intend to assert the fact, that the actions of men, whatever may be true of their freedom, are in some way or other reached by an effective (that is to say, by a true or real) supervision. But when we consider the undenied and undoubted dependence of the outward act on the inward volition, we very naturally and properly conclude that the supervision of the outward act is the result of the antecedent supervision of the inward principle of the Will; in other words, the

WILL HAS ITS LAWS.

§ 58. Inferred also from the fact that the subjects of a moral government must be endued with adequate powers of obedience.

Moral government implies, in the second place, that there is not only a higher or ruling power, but an inferior one, which may be held accountable to such higher power. And consequently, as all moral gov ernment has the right, within certain limits, of exacting obedience from those that are properly under its control, it follows necessarily that the inferiors or subjects of such government must possess the requisite powers of obedience; not a mere transitory obedience yielded for a moment, but one which is accordant to a prescribed course, and yielded for a length of time. But if the Will, which is the governing power over men's actions, be not subject to laws, it is selfevident that such a continued or protracted course of obedience cannot be rendered, even with the most fa

vourable dispositions on the part of those from whom it is due. Man is, in this case, not under the control of himself; he can never tell at one moment what he may do or be the next; and it is altogether inadmissible, therefore, to suppose that he can, by his own act, conform himself to the control of another. There may indeed be an occasional and momentary coincidence between his actions and the requisitions laid upon him; but, whenever this is the case, it is merely a matter of accident, and neither in fact nor in spirit comes up to the idea of that obedience which is due to a moral governor. In a word, if the acts of the Will are not based, as the occasions, at least, of their being called forth, upon any conditions whatever, and are truly contingent, man has no power to obey. And if he has no power of obedience (using the term to mean a continued or protracted, as well as momentary obedience), then he is under no obligation so to do. And moral government under such circumstances can never exist in respect to the human race.

§ 59. Laws of the will inferred from that rationality which is essential to the subjects of a moral government.

In the third place, if we look further into the elementary principles of moral government, we shall find that this sort of administration differs from all natural or physical government in this respect, that its subjects are not only agents, but are necessarily rational agents. The attribute of rationality is absolutely essential to them, as accountable and moral beings. That is to say, their actions, so far as they are of a moral nature, are ultimately based upon the perceptions of our intellectual part or understanding.

We can undoubtedly conceive of a purely sentient being, formed wholly of instincts, appetites, desires, and passions, without the intellectual endowments (at least to any extent worthy of especial notice) of perceiving, comparing, abstracting, and reasoning. Nor is the possibility of such a being left wholly to imagination, since we have abundant instances in the brute

creation around us. But such beings, wherever they may be found, and whatever purposes, more or less important, they may answer in the arrangements of the universe, are not the subjects of moral emotions and of feelings of obligation, nor are they morally accountable. A sort of instinctive perception at once adjudges them incapable of that higher destiny. Rationality, therefore, is an incident, or, rather, prerequisite of a moral nature.

If man, therefore, is a rational being, which must be conceded as indispensable to the fact of his being in subjection to a moral government, then his actions, as has been stated, are ultimately based upon the perceptions of the understanding. And if his actions are susceptible of being thus based and regulated, then the operations of the Will may be regulated (and must be regulated to the extent that the outward actions are) in the same way, since the outward actions have their origin in the decisions of the voluntary or volitional power. But if it be true that the operations of the Will are in this way connected, indirectly and ultimately at least, with the antecedent perceptions of the intellect, then they are subject to laws. There may indeed be, and there certainly are, emotions in their various kinds, and also desires and feelings of obligation, intervening between the perceptions of the intellect and the acts of the Will. But still the latter, which stand in immediate proximity with the acts of the will, in all cases strike their roots, if we may be allowed the expression, through the intervening mental elements, and thrust themselves into the intellect as their original basis and support. Without this, man could not, with propriety, be denominated a rational being; and with this, he cannot, with propriety, be deemed a being, the acts of whose Will are in any real sense accidental or contingent.

§ 60. Laws of the will inferred from the fact that in the administration of a moral government motives are employed.

Let it further be remembered, as a fixed principle

in moral government, that it is sustained in its character of a moral government, not by the application of physical power, but by the presentation of motives. The fact that men are influenced and directed by the motives set before them is an encouragement in the making of moral efforts, and in the use of such means as are adapted to reclaim the vicious, or to strengthen habits of virtue. When men go astray, what can we do more in our attempts at reclaiming them than apply promises, threatenings, and exhortations? We address these to them as motives, expecting that they will be received and have their influence as such. These are the means which we employ, and we find that they meet with success. But liberate the Will from all particular tendencies and law; show that we are utterly unable to predict the nature of its acts, under all circumstances whatever, and then there is no encouragement to apply means for the attainment of moral ends; there is no encouragement to moral efforts of any kind. When this is the case, we can never tell what is suitable to be addressed to men, in order to induce them to change their course of conduct. And moral government, under such circumstances, cannot exist.

§ 61. Inferred also from the application of rewards and punishments. There is another point of view in which the subject may be contemplated.-Accountability, it will of course be admitted, is essentially and fundamentally involved in the idea of a moral government. But accountability implies that the person or persons who are subject to it may be called to an account; and this, of course, implies that the being who has the right of calling them to such account may inflict punishment in case of delinquency. In other words, wherever there is accountability on the one part, there is the correlative right of enforcing it on the other; that is to say, of punishing, if necessary. But if volitions are independent of motives, and are entirely contingent, no man can tell, as has already been inti

mated, at one hour or one moment what he will do the next; he cannot possibly have any foresight, even of his own actions, and cannot take measures to prevent those which are evil. In the estimation of a right conscience, there would be no more propriety in punishing such a man's actions, than in punishing a stone or a billet of wood which may have accidentally been the occasion of some injury to us. As his Will is beyond the reach of all laws, there are no principles by means of which its exercises can be subjected (we do not say to the power of others merely, but) even to his own power. He is the sport of an unfathomable fortuity, a sort of football, impelled in every possible contrariety of direction; the ceaseless but imbecile plaything of inexplicable chance. Such a man certainly is not the proper subject of punishment. And, for like reasons, he is not the proper subject of rewards.

§ 62. The same inferred from the fact that the moral government of the present life is in its nature disciplinary.

And there is yet another and distinct view of that moral government under which men are placed, which is especially worthy of notice in connexion with the subject under consideration. The moral administration to which men are subject in the present life is in its nature disciplinary. As far as man is concerned, it is not to be denied that the present state of being is incipient and preparatory to another and ampler field of existence. It is here, on the field of action where we are now placed in the present life, that it is proposed to train up men for glory, honour, and immortality.

The present is a state of probation preparatory to this end. And it will be kept in mind, that it is proposed to secure this result by trial, exposure, exercise, training, discipline. But a moral regimen of this kind implies that there are evils to be encountered; that there are duties to be performed; that there are obstacles to be overcome; that there are temptations to