adaptations; but these have also their constituents, by means of which they are what they are in themselves, and what they are relatively to the whole system; and then these again, these subordinates, have their constituents also, with their relations and adaptations; and so downward in an indefinite gradation. Now, it is evident that, throughout this retiring series, the state or constitution of things at each further remove, must depend on the state or constitution of things at the next remoter condition of their existence; and so onward, to that state of things, whatever it is, in which created existence has its essence and its primary constitution: so that the ultimate state of things, as appearing in a perfectly constituted universe, depends, through a long and continuously dependent gradation, on the nature and adaptations of their primary constituents. And how, therefore, can a given state of things in their ultimate constitution be secured without a certain condition of things being maintained in the primary mode of their existence ? And how can this be without the divine inspection and power being constantly exerted on them all in that, their original mode?

But not to seek the aid of these subtleties:-It is immediately obvious that an incomparably more glorious idea is entertained of the Divinity, by conceiving of him as possessing a wisdom and a power competent, without an effort, to maintain an infinitely perfect inspection and regulation, distinctly, of all subsistences, even the minutest, comprehended in the universe, than by conceiving of him as only maintaining some kind of general superintendence of the system,-only general, because a perfect attention to all existences individually would be too much, it is deemed, for the capacity of even the Supreme Mind. And for the very reason that this would be the most glorious idea of him, it must be the true one. that we can, in the abstract, conceive of a magnitude of intelligence and power which would constitute the Deity, if he possessed it, a more glorious and adorable Being than he actually is, could be nothing less than flagrant impiety.

To say

On even such general and à priori grounds the preacher is authorized to meet the infidel objection by the following position:

"That God, in addition to the bare faculty of dwelling on a multiplicity of objects at one and the same time, has this faculty in such wonderful perfection, that he can attend as fully, and provide as richly, and

manifest all his attributes as illustriously, on every one of these objects, as if the rest had no existence, and no place whatever in his government or his thoughts."

But, he insists chiefly and wisely on the strong and accumulated proofs of fact, that the divine intelligence and energy are thus all-pervading and all-distinguishing. He appeals, in the first place, to the personal history of each of his hearers, and of each individual of the species, as most simple and perfect evidence that God is maintaining, literally without the smallest moment's intermission, an exercise of attention and power inconceivably minute, and complex, and as it were concentrated, on each unit. Each is conscious of a being totally distinct from all the rest; as absolutely self-centered and circumscribed an individual as if there were no other such being on earth. And thus distinct is each as an object of the divine attention, which in a perfect manner recognizes the infinite and to us mysterious difference between the greatest possible likeness and identity. But think of the prodigious multitude of these separate beings, each requiring and monopolizing a regard and action of the Divine Spirit perfectly distinct from that which each of all the others requires and engages. A mere perception of every one of the perhaps thousand millions of human beings, a perception that should simply keep in view through every moment each individual as a separate object, and without distinguishing any particulars in the being or circumstances of that object,—would evince a magnitude and mode of intelligence quite overwhelming to reflect upon. But then consider, that each one of these distinct objects is itself what may justly be denominated a system, combined of matter and spirit, comprising a vast complexity of principles, elements, mechanism, capacities, processes, liabilities, and necessities. What an inconceivable kind and measure, or rather magnitude beyond all measure, of sagacity, and power, and vigilance, are required to preserve one such being in a state of safety, and health, and intellectual sanity! But then, while the fact is before us, that so many millions are every moment so preserved, and that during thousands of years the same economy has been maintained, and that not a mortal has the smallest surmise but that it can, with perfect ease, be maintained for ages to come, the suggestion that all this is too much for the Almighty, never once obtruding itself to disturb any man's tranquillity—while there is before us the

practical illustration of a power combining such immense comprehension with such exquisite discrimination, how well it becomes our intellect and our humility to take upon us to decide what measure and manifestations of his attention such a Being may or may not confer upon one world, in a consistency of proportion with the attention which is to be perfect in its exercise on each and all!

The argument from the demonstrated perfect and continuous attention of the Divine Mind to objects comparatively insignificant, becomes indefinitely stronger when carried down to those forms of life which are brought to our knowledge by the utmost powers of the microscope. A doctrine or a disbelief founded on inference from one view of the works of God, must, to be rational, comport with the just inferences from every other. Yet those who justify their infidelity by the discoveries of the telescope, seem to have chosen to forget that there is another instrument, which has made hardly less wonderful discoveries in an opposite direction; discoveries authorizing an inference completely destructive of that made from the astronomical magnitudes. And it is very gratifying to see the lofty assumptions drawn, in a spirit as unphilosophical as irreligious, from remote systems and the immensity of the universe, and advanced against Christianity with an air of irresistible authority,—to see them encountered and annihilated by evidences sent forth from tribes and races of beings, of which innumerable millions might pass under the intensest look of the human eye imperceptible as empty space. No need, for the discomfiture of these assailants making war in the pomp of suns and systems, of any thing even so gross as beetles," or as the hornets, locusts, and flies, which were arrayed against the pagans of former ages and other regions. In all their pride they are "crushed before" less than "the moth," beyond all conception less. Indeed the diminutiveness of the victorious confronters of infidel arrogance, is the grand principle of their power; insomuch that the further they decline in an attenuation apparently toward nothing, the greater is their efficiency for this controversy; and a might altogether incalculable and unlimited, for this holy service, resides in those beings of which it is no absurdity nor temerity to assume that myriads may inhabit an atom, itself too subtile for the perception of the eye of man.

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Let a reflective man, when he stands in a garden, or a

meadow, or a forest, or on the margin of a pool, consider what there is within the circuit of a very few feet around him, and that too exposed to the light, and with no veil for concealment from his sight, but nevertheless invisible to him. It is certain that within that little space there are organized beings, each of marvellous construction, independent of the rest, and endowed with the mysterious principle of vitality, to the amount of a number which could not have been told by units if there could have been a man so employed from the time of Adam to this hour. Let him indulge for a moment the idea of such a perfect transformation of his faculties as that all this population should become visible to him, each and any individual being presented to his perception as a distinct object of which he could take the same full cognizance as he now can of the large living creatures around him. What a perfectly new world! What a stupendous crowd of sentient agents! What an utter solitude, in comparison, that world of living beings of which alone his senses had been competent to take any clear account before! And then let him consider, whether it be in his power, without plunging into gross absurdity, to form any other idea of the creation and separate subsistence of these beings, than that each of them is the distinct object of the attention and the power of that one Spirit in which all things subsist. Let him, lastly, extend the view to the width of the whole terrestrial field, of our mundane system, of the universe,—with the added thought how long such a creation has existed, and is to exist!

And now, with such a view of what that Spirit is doing, has been doing through an unimaginable lapse of ages, and may do through an unbounded futurity,—is it within the possibilities of human presumption and absurdity, vast as they are, to do any thing more presumptuous and absurd, than to pretend to decide beforehand what is beyond the competence of the power, or out of proportion for the benevolence of that Spirit? Yes, it is within those possibilities; for the presumption and absurdity may be inconceivably aggravated by that decision being made in express and intentional contradiction to a powerful combination of evidence, that he actually has done a given work of signal mercy to the human race.

The topic of the infinite multitude of beings impalpable and invisible from their minuteness, attesting, in every spot of the earth, a Divine care and energy indefatigably acting on each,

is vigorously illustrated and applied by our author, who considers the infidel objection as by this time fairly disposed of. It is hardly necessary to recapitulate; but the argument stands briefly thus: No inference drawn from the stupendous extent and magnificence of the whole creation, is of the slightest authority, unless it consists with the inferences justly to be drawn from what we know of particular parts; the antichristian inference drawn from that magnificent whole is decisively contradicted by the known facts in this particular part that we inhabit, which give such a demonstration of infinite greatness fixed in benevolent attention on indefinite littleness, while superintending the mighty aggregate of all things, as to leave no ground for a presumption that such an interposition as that affirmed by Christianity, implies too great a measure of Divine attention and action toward man, to be believed: therefore it may be believed, and authoritively demands to be believed, if it comes with due evidence of its own. The whole object of the argument is to show that the ground is perfectly clear for that evidence to come with its full appropriate force: the statement of that evidence was no part of the author's object.

At the close of this argument, one or two considerations may deserve to be briefly adverted to. The infidels whose objection the Doctor is resisting, would never have thought of raising that objection as against that theory of Christianity which has in recent times assumed to itself, as its exclusive right, the distinction of “rational." And to professors of that system our author's whole effort of argument and eloquence appears, with the exception of the display of the Modern Astronomy, little better than a piece of splendid impertinence ; since there could be nothing very wonderful or mysterious in the circumstance of God's appointing and qualifying, among any race of his rational but fallible creatures, a succession of individuals, of the mere nature of that race, to be teachers of truth and patterns of moral excellence to the rest, and in distinguishing one of them by the endowment of a larger portion of light and virtue than any of the others. It is only against what we shall not hesitate to denominate the evangelical theory, which is founded on the doctrine of a divine incarnation and an atoning sacrifice, that the objection in question can be advanced with any serious force.

And this suggests another consideration. This being assumed as the true theory, a doubt may perhaps be raised,