And

the supposed evil had been a real evil. When Joseph's brethren came to their father and made him believe that Joseph had been torn to pieces by a wild beast, ought not Jacob to have been submissive to God under his supposed bereavement? And was he not criminal in feeling, and saying as he did?"It is my son's coat: an evil beast hath devoured him: Joseph is without doubt rent in pieces. Jacob rent his clothes, and put sackcloth upon his loins, and mourned for his son many days. And all his sons and all his daughters rose up to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted."-Though his son was not dead, yet he verily believed that he was dead, and that God had bereaved him of his darling. In this belief he was altogether inexcusable in refusing to submit to God, and to be comforted. And surely, if he had submitted to this supposed, or if you please, imaginary evil, it would have cost him much, and been worth all the gold of Ophir. The application is easy. A real christian, who believes he is not a real christian, ought to be willing to suffer that future punishment, which God might inflict upon him, if he were, and always should be an impenitent sinner.

Objection 5. Imaginary submission can never be a real test of Christian character. Actual submission only is evidence of it. Indeed, no state of mind which depends upon the future, can ever be at present, evidence of a Christian temper. We appeal, and must appeal, to past experience, or present actual experience only, for a test of our religion. Submission, then, to a supposed misery that is future, is no evidence to us of religion, unless that misery is so certain that it becomes present. But in the case supposed, the misery is not only future but actually impossible.

Answer. Is it not a present evil, to expect and fear a future and eternal evil? Has it not been shown that a real christian, who does not know, nor think, that he is a real christian, has just ground to expect and fear a future and eternal evil? His fear is not imaginary, but real; and his submission ought not to be imaginary, but real. His case exactly resembles Jacob's. He supposed his son was dead; and his supposition, though not founded in reality, was yet founded upon credible evidence, and such as carried full conviction to his mind, and laid him under moral obligation to be really and immediately submissive to the supposed will of God; yea, to the real will of God; for it was his revealed will that he should be submissive to him in the mournful situation in which he had really placed him. So it is the real will of God, that a real christian, who does not know nor believe that he is a real christian, should be at that time, whether before or after he has had a hope, willing that he should cast him off for ever, if his glory requires it, as he does not know but it may. I now ask whether unreserved submission to the divine disposal, is not directly calculated to remove the doubts of a doubting christian; and whether any thing else can remove his doubts? Submission in this case is the test, and the only infallible test to himself of his Christian character. If a doubting christian comes to be submissive to God whether he should save or destroy him, he then has an infallible evi

dence that he is a friend of God, and that God is his friend; which must remove his painful doubts.

Objection 6.There are other difficulties still, attending this speculation. A state of future misery, involves a state of future disobedience and rebellion against God. And we have already seen that submission can never be opposed to obedience. Submission to a state of future disobedience is absolute rebellion.

Answer. It is granted that present submission is inconsistent with present disobedience. No person in the actual exercise of submission to God, can, by that actual submission, disobey God. But how does it appear, that present submission to God is inconsistent with future disobedience to him? Does not a real christian, in the morning of life, desire that God would not take him away in the midst of his days, but allow him to live longer in this world? But does he not expect, that, if he should live to the common age of man, he shall be guilty of more or less disobedience to God in that period? Is he not, then, willing, at present, to disobey God in future? And is his present willingness to disobey God in future, when he has told him that he shall not be perfect in this life, present disobedience? It is real submission to a certain, expected evil, which he hates in its own nature. But if a christian may be submissive to God, in appointing him to disobedience in time, why may he not be submissive to God, in appointing him to disobedience in eternity? Supposing God had told Lucifer, the day before he disobeyed, I have determined that to-morrow you shall disobey. Ought not Lucifer to have said, from the heart, I submit: Not my will, but thine be done? And had he felt and said this, would his submission to future disobedience, have been present, actual disobedience? I leave it to Mr. S. to solve these cases of conscience, which I have mentioned.

Objection 7. But the question sometimes comes up in this form: If we could be assured, that it would be for the glory of God that we should be cast off, ought we not to acquiesce? And, in answer to this, I have simply to observe, that such an assurance is absolutely impossible. God cannot break his promises. God cannot change his character. It cannot be for his glory that those should be miserable for ever, who are submissive to his will. Of what use is it, then, to state and reason from cases that are impossible ones, and subversive of the whole nature and government of God, if they should occur? Much more, how can it be a test of Christian character, to conjecture how we should act and feel, or ought to act and feel, in cases that are actually impossible?

Answer. It is readily conceded, that a christian, who does not know nor believe that he is a christian, cannot be assured that it would be for the glory of God that he should be cast off; and it is asserted, on the other hand, that a christian, who does not know nor believe that he is a christian, cannot be assured that it would be for the glory of God that he should be saved. For God cannot break his promises, nor his purposes. The christian, who does not know that he is a christian, cannot know what God's purposes are respecting him; and

therefore, it is his present duty to be willing that He should execute his purposes, whether they are in his favor or against him. His present state of uncertainty requires him to exercise present submission, whether his future state should be either happy or miserable. And his present submission or opposition to God, in his present state of uncertainty, is a criterion, to determine whether he feels right or wrong at present; but not to determine whether he is a real christian or not. For though he may feel wrong in his present state of darkness, he may afterwards feel right, as Jacob did, after he had refused to submit and be comforted.

Objection 8.—It is again asked, Is it not the duty of those who are cast off, to submit to their condition? And if you will only view this question as it respects different considerations, it is very easy to answer it. As to that part of the future state of condemnation, which involves disobedience and rebellion, it is no duty to submit to this, but to become obedient and cease from rebellion. And in regard to actual misery, fallen spirits are bound to acknowledge the justice of God in it, and their full desert of it. But it is their duty to repent and reform, and, were it possible, to deliver themselves from misery, though we have reason to believe that they will never do this.

Answer. The spirits in prison are undoubtedly bound cordially to acknowledge the justice of God in punishing them for ever, and cordially to acknowledge the sovereignty of God in continuing them in a state of moral depravity for ever. And the cordial acknowledgment of both the justice and sovereignty of God towards them, I should call perfect submission to God, both as to their sinfulness and misery. Mr. S. concludes his arguments or objections against unconditional submission with the following general observations, which deserve some notice:

"On the whole it is a matter of regret, that this subject has been agitated in our churches. It is easy to perceive that much has been said upon it, without definite ideas of the nature of true submission; and much said against it with mistaken apprehensions of the design of those who advocate the affirmative. What is aimed at, I take to be these simple truths: The will of God is the rule of right, and creatures ought to submit to that will; the law of God is perfectly just, and we ought to approve of it, though it condemn our conduct; we ought to feel that we deserve to be cast off, and it is mere grace which delivers us from destruction. To these truths we all accede. Why not inculcate them then in this simple and intelligible form, and not endeavor to impress them by the statement of cases which are revolting to the feelings and impossible in the nature of things! Most of the disputants upon these subjects seem to me to have left submission undefined, and not to have distinguished between active obedience and suffering with resignation, or show how the one stood related to the other, or that the one can never interfere with the other.

Answer. Will not all those who are finally cast off at the last day, be constrained to accede, in their understandings and consciences, to these simple truths: "That the will of God is the rule of right, and

creatures ought to submit to that will; that the law of God is perfectly just, and they ought to approve of it, though it condemn their conduct; that they ought to feel that they deserve to be cast off, and that it would have been mere grace to have delivered them from eternal sin and misery?"

But will those who are finally cast off exercise any true submission? Is a sense of moral obligation to obey God the same as obeying him? Is a sense of our desert of being punished for disobeying God, the same as submitting to his hand and heart in punishing us? Is there any thing in Mr. S.'s definition of submission, that an unregenerate man, remaining unregenerate, may not feel and express? I regret that the doctrine of unconditional submission, has not been better defined, and more repeatedly and forcibly inculcated in our churches than it ever has been, and especially of late. " Young men think old men to be fools;" but it would be well if young men would remember the last clause of the proverb.

Yours, affectionately,

NATHANAEL EMMONS.

CHAPTER V.

EFFECTS OF HIS MINISTRY. THE HONOR WHICH GOD CONFERRED UPON HIM.

SOME have thought and said that the ministry of Dr. Emmons was unsuccessful. But there never was a greater mistake. His influence was, indeed, more like "the still small voice," than like the wind and the earthquake; but although comparatively noiseless and unobtrusive, it was powerful, pervading, and salutary. He has given us, in his Memoir, an account of three interesting revivals, which took place under his ministry, the first of which was very extensive and powerful. During the fifty-four years in which he performed the active duties of his office, there were added to his church three hundred and eight; thirty-six by letter, and two hundred and seventy-two by profession. If it be considered that the greater part of his ministry was during the great declension of religion in Massachusetts, when the enemy came in like a flood, when revivals of religion were little known, and when a majority of the churches in his vicinity were either overrun or torn asunder by the prevalence of Unitarianism and its kindred errors, these

facts indicate much more than ordinary success in the conversion of sinners. It is well known to the people in the immediate vicinity of his labors, that conversions among his people were much more frequent and striking, than in the neighboring societies generally. His success as a preacher was once a common subject of remark. The number that was added to his church during the long period of his ministry, is not indeed great for these days of revivals and increased population. But for the times in which the vigor of his life was spent, and for the population of the place in which he lived, it was uncom

mon.*

But the greatest success of Dr. Emmons did not consist in the number of sinners whom he was directly instrumental of converting. His influence in preserving his church and congregation from the corrupting influence of error, which in his day undermined the foundation of many generations, was a most important achievement. So thoroughly were they established in "the faith once delivered to the saints," that they were not even shaken in their faith by all the various forms of error with which they were assailed, or by the overwhelming popular influence which the friends of the misnamed liberal principles, for a long time, exerted around them. Only one or two of his church were affected with the prevailing heresies of the day. And the influence of these was immediately neutralized by the kind and faithful exercise of the discipline of the church. Though the leaven of error began to work in the congregation, and some few expressed their preference for "liberal Christianity," "falsely so called," yet the great body of the people remained firmly united with the church through all the changes that occurred in the vicinity, and in the face of all the efforts that were made to draw them off from the principles and practices of their fathers. While almost every other society in the county has been divided, and many of them subdivided, his people still remain one people, worshipping in the same temple, and adhering steadfastly to the great principles of the gospel which they were accustomed to hear from his lips.

It has often been said that the preaching of such doctrines as he preached, and especially the dwelling upon them so much as he did, is suited not only to prevent a revival of religion, but to divide and distract a people. But the experiment which he made proves very satisfactorily that it need not have either of

*It ought to be considered here, that the place of Dr. Emmons' labors was one from which a great multitude of young people emigrated. A large number of those who became pious under his ministry, professed their faith in other places. And he had not, as many preachers in our flourishing villages have at the present day, a great increase of hearers from abroad every year.