constitution of nature, muft love God, and can't hate him,unless they fix a false and hateful character to him, by which he appears to them, not like God, but like the devil. Full to this point are thefe words of his : "This univerfally holds true in fact, viz. Men who "hate God, his ways and righteous fervants, always "mifrepresent their characters to themfelves, paint "them in falfe and odious colours, and place them in "fuch a wrong view, as to make them appear either " contemptible or morally evil." And again, "No man ever did speak evil of God's ways,viewing them

as they truly are,as equitable and good, but as placing "them in a wrong light to themselves." + So that if we believe Mr. H. it is a truly hateful, a "morally evil and contemptible character" unhappily affixed to God and holy things, which is the object of wicked men's hatred, and not God himself. But who does not fee that this is the effect of a divine and fpiritual tafte; and fo all the enmity of wicked men turns out, on trial, to be true holiness or love-Strange doctrine !

As a clearer proof of this, if clearer there can be, he fays, "Many very honeft and good fort of people, "have often complained of a fecret enmity and hard "thoughts of God-which does not, like that we have "been difcourfing upon, arise out of the wickedness of "the heart; but is wholly occafioned by mifrepre"fentations of the character and ways of God to the "mind,and falfe and wrong views of him, which have "unhappily gotten poffeffion of the mind, and are "fuppofed,through ignorance and wrong inftruction, "to be the true and genuine views of his cha"racter and works. 'In the light wherein they view "them, they appear morally evil, and wrong, and

objects of just hatred. The enmity which the mind "conceives against them, viewed in this wrong light, "is, in a proper fenfe, a natural enmity; that is, it "arifes from the moral frame of the mind, and the "innate

I

"innate fenfe of the hatefulness of actions and cha"racters morally evil and wrong. And if the heart "is gracious, this fenfe is greatly heightened.” * think I may retort, and fay," Now Mr. H. teems "quite perfect in his way.' "But if this is true, there is no enmity; there is nothing but love in the hearts of men to God. They hate nothing but a falfe, a morally evil character, falfely afcribed to him; and this is nothing more nor lefs, than true holiness, for God hates this as truly as they. But how is this confiftent with his faying, "Doubtless there is a spirit of "enmity against God working in the finner's carnal "heart." But Mr. H. may object, that he diftinguishes this enmity from that " which arifes out of the wickedness of the heart." Answer. I know he does fo: But yet it is evident from the paffages before quoted, that he will allow of no worfe enmity than this in the worst of men, or even in devils; and in this paffage he spoils his very good fort of people, by afcribing this virtuous enmity to those who have no grace, as well as to those that have, only in a lefs degree; for he fays, " And if the heart is gracious, this fenfe" (i. e. enmity to a falfe god)" is greatly heightened." By this he plainly intimates that this boly enmity is in ungracious hearts, though in a lefs degree than in those that are gracious, and that it "arifes "from the moral frame of the mind and the innate "fense of the hatefulness of actions and characters "morally evil, which is effential to all moral beings "as fuch, both righteous and wicked," both men and devils. Therefore all this páffage relates to very bad, as well as "very good fort of people," i. e. it is to be found in the wicked as well as in the righteous: for he afferts that" it univerfally holds true in fact, that "men who hate God,his ways and righteous fervants, "always mifreprefent their characters to themselves, "paint them in falfe and odious colours, and place "them + D. p. 47:

D. p. 68, 69.

<< them in fuch a wrong view, as to make them appear either contemptible or morally evil.” *

From thefe two paffages compared together it ap pears according to Mr. H. that the only difference between the hatred of God which is in the righteous and wicked lies in this, viz. the wicked mifreprefent God's character to themselves, and fo are the caufe of the mifreprefentation (though on his principles, they do it without any hatred of God,) while the righteous or "very good fort of people" have him misrepresented to them "by wrong inftructions", and so they are not the active cause of affixing this falfe character to God; but yet, after the falle reprefentation of God is made, they both have the fame enmity to it, only the gracious heart will hate it in a higher degree. And that it may appear quite evident, that this enmity, which is all and the worst which cau be found in any man, " is in no true conftruction, a hatred of God's true "character, but of a really bad character falfely "afcribed to him," he gives us a fimile, and fays, "This may be illuftrated by the cafe of a child edu"cated abroad, who has inftilled into his mind, per"haps by the foolish tattle of his nurse or school-maf

ter, very wrong and injurious notions of his father's “character, and temper, and defigns towards him ; "representing of him as very unreasonable, arbitrary "and cruel, or falfe and hypocritical toward him; "whereas, in truth, he is quite the reverfe. This 8.6 wrong view raifes in the child difaffection, and hard "and blaming thoughts. His father who knows the " cafe, pities him, confidering it as ignorance and error, and not malice against his true father.The "true and effectual cure of this kind of enmity, is ac"complished by correcting these unhappy misappre"henfions, and giving the mind a juft view of the "true character of God, and fetting his actions and "difpenfations in that true light wherein he himself has placed them." + K

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By

74

By this illuftration he fufficiently fhews his opinion to be this, that all men, especially thofe whofe hearts are gracious, really love God's true character and never hate him, but when, by one means or other, he is represented to, and viewed by them "in falfe and "odious colours, either as contemptible or morally " evil," and therefore that their hearts are right, holy and good, and that there needs nothing to bring them to love God, but only to reprefent God in a just light, and rectify the errors of their judgments. His notion may be illuftrated by two friends who are seperated by a tale-bearer, mifrepresenting them to each other as fecretly defigning each other's ruin-While they believe this, their hearts are alienated from each other; but when they find that all is falfe which has been told them, they fly to each other's arms with unfeigned affection. Thus when men find that God has been falfely reprefented to them, their friendly, holy hearts will abhor the deception, and triumph in God as the portion of their fouls, without any change wrought in them.

I will trouble the reader with but one paffage more, out of many, to prove the above to be Mr. H's fentiment, viz. "Natural confcience neceffarily implies a

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faculty by which we difcern the difference between "moral good or excellence, and its contrary, and that "the mind feeing this difference, approves the good, 66 as excellent, and worthy of esteem and honour,and "difapproves the evil as wrong, bateful and blame"worthy. This is abfolutely inconfiftent with fuch "a kind of enmity, and total want of tafte for moral "excellency, and utter abhorrence of God's whole "character, interwoven with the very frame of the "heart, as Dr. Whitaker and others dream of."+— Here in plain terms he afferts, that a taste for moral excellency is effential to the existence of natural conscience; and that to deny this to any being, is to deny that he is a moral agent.

* D. p. 64. + D. p. 62. Note.

I

I now leave it to the reader to judge, whether Mr. H. does not moft fully maintain that all beings endowed with natural confcience bave neceffarily a tafte for moral· excellency. And whether this is not juft the fame thing as to affert, that all moral beings are neceffarily holy and love God's true character fo far as they know it.

SECT. II.

Wherein fome arguments are proposed in confutation of Mr. H's leading fentiment, and in proof of total moral depravity.

R. H. and I agree in this, That there is in all moral

Mbeings, as fuch, faculty of difcerning between

moral good & evil, which takes place by a law of nature, or divine constitution,in virtue of which man is capable of knowing fome truths, by fimple perception or intuition without any reasoning about them, and this appears to me to be the principle of natural conscience which is effential to moral agency; and the truths thus known are the rule or law according to which reason forms a conclufion or judgment of any action; which reasoning or comparing and judging of the agreement or difagreement of any action with the known rule, is the exercife of confcience. Thus far, for aught I know, Mr. H. and I agree. But he infifts that this decifion or judgment by which moral good and evil are diftinguished from each other, involves, or neceffarily implies in it a taste for mor al excellency, or a love to thole actions which agree to the given rule, and a hatred to those which difagree. But in this I must differ from him for the following rea fons.

I.. Confcience or knowledge however great or clear, is no moral virtue; and the want of it is no moral evil or vice, unless we take into it, the inclination or disposition of the heart. The knowledge of a Solomon, a Newton or an Edwards, thus confidered, has