bits the mode of divine agency, as that of creating.

He cannot consistently employ it to denote any other mode, nor mean by it any thing less, than that God creates the acts of men.

He cannot mean by it, that God merely brings men into a state, in which they are disposed to act, or to act in a given way; leaving them to exert their volitions by their own power, instead of His creating those volitions; for he denies that any disposition can exist in the mind, which is distinct from and the cause of volition.

"Some," says he, "suppose that a good heart essentially consists in a good principle, taste, or relish, which is totally independent of the will. But this sentiment is totally repugnant to the law of love. This law requires no dormant, inactive, torpid disposition, inclination, or taste. There can be no such thing as an holy principle, disposition, or inclination, which is distinct from true love." "Some suppose that a bad heart consists in a bad principle, disposition, or inclination, which is entirely distinct from sinful, voluntary exercises. But it appears that all sinfulness consists in the various exercises

and modifications of self-love." Vol. i. pp. 265, 266, and 267.

"Moral exercises flow from a divine operation upon the mind of a moral agent, and not from any natural faculty, principle, or taste, enabling him to originate his own internal exercises, or external actions." Vol. ii. p. 195.

"But there was no possible way in which he could dispose them to act right or wrong, but only by producing right or wrong volitions in their hearts."

p. 40. As the Doctor thus denies that a disposition, distinct from volition, and antecedent to it, enabling a moral agent to originate his own internal exercises, or external actions, ever exists; and denies also, that God can possibly dispose a moral agent to act right or wrong, in any other way than by producing right or wrong volitions themselves in his heart; he cannot of course mean by those phrases to designate an agency which produces such a disposition. Besides, under such a mode of agency, men, according to the Doctor, would be passive. "We know that love is a free, voluntary exercise, and not any taste, habit, or principle, which is totally inactive and involuntary. It is absurd to suppose, that God should require any

thing of us in which we are altogether passive." Vol. ii. p. 173, 174.

But the Doctor denies that men ever are passive under the divine influence. "Men act while they are acted upon by a divine operation." Vol. i. p. 223.

"As saints can act while they are acted upon, so sinners can act while they are acted upon." p. 228.

"If the making a new heart consists in the exercising of holy, instead of unholy affections, then sinners are not passive, but active, in regeneration." p. 178.

If that be true, and if "the good and evil heart are both made up of exercises," with no other difference than that "their exercises are diametrically opposite in their moral quality," p. 191, then the converse of the preceding proposition is equally true, viz. that, as the making a bad heart consists in the exercising of unholy instead of holy affections, sinners are not passive but active under the divine influence, in all their sinful agency.

From the first and last of these quotations, as well as from many other passages in the Doctor's volumes, it is seen that he holds, that a taste, habit, principle, or disposition, is perfectly inactive and involuntary: and that if God exerted an agen

cy on men, producing such a taste or disposition, they would be perfectly passive under that agency. He infers from the fact, that love is a free, voluntary exercise, and not a taste or disposition; and that the making a new heart consists in the exercising of holy affections, and not in the production of a disposition; that men are not passive, but active under the divine agency. If thus he holds, that men are active under that agency, because voluntary exercises, and not a disposition, are produced by it; then he of course holds, that if a disposition were produced by it, they would be passive under it, and

not active.

As then he holds, as stated in the quotations, that men are never passive under the divine agency, he cannot mean to denote by those phrases any agency under which, according to his own views, men would be passive. He means an agency that produces the acts themselves of men, not that merely brings them into a state in which they are disposed to act, or that produces a disposition which is antecedent to their acts, and which leads to those acts; and an agency that produces the acts themselves must be a creating agency. Nor can he mean by that phraseology

to denote an agency by which God merely excites men to act, or to exert a power of acting, belonging to themselves; leaving their exercises to be the effects of their power, and only the indirect consequence, not immediate production of His power; for that would be producing nothing more nor less than a disposition to act. But the Doctor affirms, that "there is no possible way in which God can dispose men to act, but by producing volitions in their hearts."

Besides, he denies that the acts of men ever are the effects of their own power, and only the remote effects of God's operation; and also that men have any power to originate and exert acts of themselves, in such a way as that supposed. "Our moral exercises are the productions of the divine power." Vol. i. p. 224.

"There is no occasion for a distinct faculty of will, in order to put forth external actions, or internal exercises. It is God who worketh in men both to will and to do. Moral exercises flow from a divine operation upon the mind of a moral agent, and not from any natural faculty, principle, or taste, enabling him to originate his own internal exercises, or external actions." Vol. ii. p. 195.