HE Providence of God is the right direction of all the departments, occurrences, and affairs of the universe, by the divine wisdom, power, and goodness, to its final end-the promotion of the glory of its Author. It is the superintending care of the Great Creator, exercised over all events, all beings, and all worlds.

The existence of Providence is sufficiently proved, by the character of God as the Creator. It is impossible to believe, that after having formed this beautiful and wonderful universe, in which " the invisible things of Him . . . are clearly seen, being understood by the things which are made, even His eternal power and Godhead," He should suffer His object to be frustrated, and His glory to be tarnished, by

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the abandonment of His mighty work to contingency and confusion. If the ever-blessed God has created the world, His wisdom requires that He should have been actuated by design; this design can only be accomplished by the uniform subserviency of all that He has called into existence, to the grand object He has proposed; and this subserviency cannot be secured without the continual and efficient control of His Providence. To affirm the non-existence of Providence, in referring from the Creation to the Creator, is to deny the perfections of His nature, and to assail the foundations of His throne. There can be no appeal from the ancient aphorism, "Si Deus est, mundus regitur Providentiâ." There is no medium between the denial of a Providence, and the denial of a God.

The Providence of God, though certain in its existence, is mysterious in its dispensations. In contemplating the transactions of the Supreme Governor to His dependent universe

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from the hour of creation, through the long succession of ages and generations, to the present period of time, whether those transactions have referred to nations or to individuals, to the events which have been limited in their influence, or to those which have convulsed the globe, the mind is confounded and overwhelmed in the midst of its investigations; and the observer, as though standing on the brink of an awful and unfathomable abyss, finds abundant reason for the solemn exclamation, "O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are His judgments, and His ways past finding out!" In the mode of its administration-in the extraordinary and, sometimes, apparently incompetent instrumentality by which its purposes are accomplished-in the frequent prosperity and impunity of the wicked, opposed to the oppressions, the persecutions, the distresses, and the destitution of the righteous-in the occasional protraction of lives which are evidently injurious, and the premature dissolution of many who are the ornaments of the church and the blessings of the world-in the diffusive prevalence of desolating evils, and the continued limitation of inestimable mercies-in the humiliation of some, and the exaltation of others-in the general distribution of human affairs-and in innumerable other affecting and impressive instances, Providence is so mysterious, that upon every page of its annals the declaration is found to be inscribed, " Clouds and darkness are round about Him: righteousness and judgment are the habitation of His throne."

It ought never, however, to be forgotten, that this mystery of Providence arises neither from any deficiency in the arrangements of its Author, not from any imperfections inseparable from itself, but from the incapacity and infirmity of the human mind. Reason, which finds incomprehensible mystery in every object of perception, in every blade of grass, in every particle of light, in every atom of matter, can never, in its present state of depravation and debility, form any adequate conception of the proceedings of Him, whose way is in the sea, whose path is in the great

waters, and whose footsteps are not known. It is the ignorance and imbecility of man, and not the confusion and imperfection of Providence, which is the origin of its incomprehensibleness; and to the noblest and sublimest human intellect, the inquiry is as applicable, as to the feeblest infant that slumbers upon the bosom of maternal tenderness, "Canst thou by searching find out God? canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection? It is as high as heaven; what canst thou do? deeper than hell; what canst thou know?"

The Providence of God is universal. There is no place beyond its influence, no time excluded from its control.

It extends to heaven. The innumerable company of the bright and happy angels wing their rapid flight according to the command, and devote their immortal faculties to the service, of God-His ministers to do His pleasure-and their brilliant world incessantly resounds with their melodious acclamation, "Alleluia: for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth."

It extends to hell. The dreadful spirits that occupy that gloomy world of woe, are convinced by evidence blazing in all the brightness of the everlasting burnings, of the power of His Providence, as well as the terrors of His wrath. The devils believe and tremble. Though the malignity of Satan is as comprehensive as mankind, though his circuit is wide as the world, though his design. is as vast as eternity, he cannot move beyond the limits prescribed to his rage-and however high the tide of his temptations may rise, and however irresistible its course may appear, there is a voice which can arrest its billows by the mandate, "Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further: and here shall thy proud waves be stayed."

It extends to the world which God has constituted the residence of man. The radiant light and the impervious darkness, the clouds and the vapours, the sweetness of the calm and the roar of the tempest, the lightning and the thunder, the earthquake which convulses