our world, and pour out His blood upon the cross? It was to satisfy the violated justice of God, and thus open a way for the exercise of mercy. If God had not been just, inflexibly just; if He had not had a strict regard for His own authority and rights as a Sovereign, and for the honor and authority of His law; if He had been capable of disregarding the claims of justice, and thus putting at hazard all the interests of the universe; in this case He might have pardoned sin, with or without an atonement, with or without repentance, in any way that caprice and prejudice might have dictated. But the great God of heaven and earth is a just God. "Justice and judgment are the habitation of his throne." And His justice must be satisfied, ere His mercy can be exercised. A governmental equivalent, as before explained, must be rendered, ere the penalty of the law can be remitted. A full atonement must be made in the sufferings and blood of the Son of God, or the provisions of gospel grace and mercy can never be unfolded. It thus appears that the great plan of Redemption, with all the mighty interests involved in it, rests entirely on the justice of God. Redemption is indeed a display of mercy, but it is also, and equally, a display of justice. It is a provision of God's love which rests entirely on His justice, and which, but for His justice, need never have been made. It follows from the principles here laid down, that those who, in their conceptions of God, divest Him in great measure of His justice, leave His character deformed and imperfect. They leave it essentially different from what it is; and thus the God in whom they believe and confide is, in reality, a false God. And is not this the mistake of many, very many, in this Christian land? They believe there is a God, and they clothe the being whom they call God, it may be, with all His natural attributes; but of an essential part of His moral attributes they, in imagination, divest Him. He is mild, gentle, forbearing, compassionate, desiring the good of all His creatures, and deeply grieved at their transgressions; but with no heart to vindicate His authority and His rights, to maintain His justice, and punish the guilty as they deserve. We have only to say, that the God of such persons is a false God. It is not the God of nature, or of Scripture. It has no existence out of their own fancies. And the service which they render it cannot be accepted by the God of heaven. Such persons may love the God of their own creation, and yet hate the true God. They may admire and adore an imaginary divinity, while all their feelings are hostile to the holy and just God of heaven and earth. From the importance to be attached to the justice of God, it follows that a display of this attribute is essential to the Divine glory. God's essential glory consists in His being just what He s. His declarative glory consists in the manifestation, the dis play of His glorious attributes and character. Thus "the heavens declare the glory of God," by showing forth His wisdom, His greatness, and His power. And His providential dispensations declare His glory, by manifesting His general goodness. God is glorified in the display of His mercy, His compassion, His forbearance, His grace. And God is equally glorified in the display of His glorious justice. God's justice is manifested in the cross of Christ. It was to satisfy and glorify Divine justice, that the cross was erected. So taught the apostle Paul." Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation, through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God; to declare, I say, at this time his righteousness, that God might be just, and yet the justifier of him that believeth in Jesus." Rom. 3: 25, 26. God's justice is also displayed, in the rewards of the obedient, and the punishment of the disobedient; and in the one as signally as in the other. No one doubts that God is glorified, in preparing mansions of everlasting rest for His willing, devoted, and obedient people. But is He not equally glorified, in preparing an eternal prison for the confinement and due punishment of the incorrigible disturbers of His dominions and His throne? God's justice, let it be kept in mind, is an essential part of His moral character; so essential, that, without it, He would, in fact, be no God. And it is as necessary to the glory of His character, that His justice should be displayed in all appropriate and suitable ways, as it is that His goodness should be displayed. And His true friends love, they are pleased with, the displays of the former attribute, not less than with those of the latter. We conclude with the inquiry, which we would press upon our readers, as well as upon our own heart: Do we love the justice of God? This question, it will be perceived, is equivalent to another: Do we love God at all? God is just—inflexibly and gloriously just; and unless we love His glorious justice, we do not love Him in His true character, as manifested in His works and in His Word. This As sinners against God, His justice does indeed condemn us. But if we are penitent sinners, we condemn ourselves. We accept the punishment of our iniquities. Nor do we love the Divine. justice at all the less, because it condemns us. Indeed, we could not love it, and approve of it, if it did not condemn us. sense of condemnation, if it have its proper effect upon us, will lead us, not to quarrel with the Divine justice, nor to sink in despair, but to flee away to the cross of Christ; in which God's justice and mercy are alike displayed, and through which alone the sinner can be accepted. ARTICLE III. THE NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN IN HIS SPIRITUAL RELATIONS. By Samuel Adams. M. D., Professor of Chemistry and Natural History, Illinois College Und was die innere Stimme spricht, Schiller The Necessity of a Miraculous Revelation. In a previous article1 we argued the probability of a miraculous revelation on the ground of a universal anticipation of the human race. We also touched upon certain rationalistic objections to miracles, based first upon the assumption of their incredibility, and secondly upon the allegation of their inutility, even though it were admitted, that they were not incredible, and though it had been proved, that they had actually been wrought. The first form of the objection assumes the incredibility of miracles. This objection, when analyzed, amounts to this: "The mind instinctively believes in a uniform order of nature, and ever clings to that belief as true. A miracle assumes to be a deviation from the uniform order of nature, and is thus contrary to an inevitable instinctive belief of the human mind, and, therefore, utterly incredible." Now we are ready to admit, that the mind spontaneously believes in a uniform order of nature, and that nature conforms to that belief. Nay more, we contend that this belief and the conformity of nature to it, are essential to the possible conception and very existence of a miracle. For if the mind did not believe in an established order of nature, how could it recognize a deviation from that order? And if there be absolutely no order of nature, how can there be a deviation from it? Admitting, however, all that the objector alleges with regard to the order of nature, and the corresponding belief of the human mind, we affirm that it is also true, that the mind just as spontaneously believes that under certain circumstances there will be a deviation from the established order of nature. In proof that such a belief exists, we need do little more than refer to the railings of infidelity against the alleged credulity and su 'Bib. Repos. Oct. 1844., p. 353. perstition of mankind in believing in all sorts of impostures in the form of pretended miracles. Such greediness for the marvellous and miraculous, such readiness to swallow the vilest impostures in the form of alledged miracles, does not look much like an instinctive reluctance in the human mind to admit, in any circumstances, a deviation from the order of nature. On the contrary, we recognize in these facts a universal anticipation of a miraculous manifestation of the Power that rules the universe. Call it credulity,—call it superstition,—call it the tyranny of custom, there it is, interwoven with every thread and fibre of the complicated web of human history. As far back as history penetrates into the twilight of antiquity, man has been waiting and watching for a miraculous revelation. From time immemorial, the anxious spirit has been watching for some mysterious hand to lift the curtain that hides futurity, and listening for some miraculous voice to break the silence of ages and give utterance to those truths which might solve the dark enigma of human destiny. It is not true, therefore, that the spontaneous convictions and anticipations of the human mind are opposed to the credibility of miracles. On the contrary, a miraculous revelation has ever been one of the most urgent of the felt wants of humanity. But, says the objector, "if it be admitted that miracles are credible, and even though it were proved, that they have actually been wrought, still they prove nothing, and can therefore be of no possible utility as an accompaniment to a revelation. For reason, says he, is adequate to attain all needed truth without the aid of miracles." But if, as we have contended above, there be a conscious want of the human race which nothing but miracles can supply, it then follows that whatever can supply that want, possesses the very essence of utility. But we suppose the objector will be satisfied with nothing short of a specification of the precise point of utility involved in the question. Let us proceed then to an examination of the objection and to a specific reply. This objection, when analyzed, is based upon one of two assumptions, which though somewhat allied to each other are nevertheless essentially distinct. It is assumed, either that reason is adequate to reveal all that the well-being of man requires him to know, or that such is the affinity of reason for the truth, that the latter need only be uttered in order to gain universal acceptance; and that miracles can consequently add nothing to the convincing power of simple utterance. The first of these assumptions was discussed somewhat in detail in the article referred to above. We there attempted to show, that reason is not the light, but the eye of the soul,—not the revealer, but the perceiver of truth. We are aware, however, that the language of many able writers on the philosophy of the human mind is in seeming conflict with the position which we there attempted to maintain. We hear of the "a priori intuitions of reason," of ideas or truths of the pure reason," and of "original suggestion" as a source of ideas. Reason in these various aspects seems to be spoken of as a revealer of truth. 66 Now, we are ready to admit that reason, in an appropriate sense, is a source of ideas—of knowledge. But we believe that these ideas are suggested to the reason, and not revealed by it. We regard reason as the spiritual eye, by which the mind penetrates beneath the material and the sensible, and recognizes the spiritual and the unseen. And we hold, that like the eye of the body, it reaches its objects through the instrumentality of a medium. The facts of perception, the facts of consciousness, and living utterance, we conceive to be the medium through which truth is revealed to the reason. Thus the facts of perception reveal the reality of the external world. Our conscious exertion of causal power suggests the idea and discloses the existence of cause. The facts of perception and of consciousness combined, reveal the existence of an intelligent, omnipotent cause in nature. And simple testimony is often the only medium through which the mind can reach important truth. To the brute, however, the mighty spectacle of nature and his own consciousness, reveal no unseen cause, because he is destitute of the faculty of reason, he has no eye to recognize the invisible. The second assumption, alluded to above, alledges that such is the affinity of reason for the truth, that the latter needs no extraneous support, and carries conviction by its own inherent power, and that for this very reason a miracle can prove nothing, though it may have actually occurred as a matter of fact. The morality of the sermon on the Mount and of our Saviour's teaching generally, is frequently referred to as a specimen of truth, that binds the reason and conscience independently of the person, by whom it was uttered, or of the circumstances in which it was published. Let us investigate this power of unaided reason to attain to the belief of all essential truth. 1. It must be admitted that reason is adequate to attain those truths, which lie along the every day path of life and are involved in our hourly experience. Thus the facts of daily consciousness reveal to the mind the moral freedom and responsibility of man; and no miracle is needed to substantiate this truth. So also the phenomena of nature reveal the existence of an unseen cause. 2. Reason is adequate to recognize truth when uttered by superior minds, even though unaided, it could never have reached it. A mind which is incapable of pursuing without aid a given train of mathematical reasoning, may still be able to follow another mind through that same train of reasoning, and to |