CHAPTER II.

ON THE GOVERNMENT OF GOD BY REWARDS AND PUNISHMENTS, AND PARTICULARLY ON THE LATTER.

I. If a Future State were only as credible as the last Chapter proves it to be, yet it is sufficient to urge us seriously to inquire, whether it is to be a State of Rewards and Punishments, depending upon our Conduct here? The probability of this appears from our happiness, and, in a great measure, our misery, in this life, being left dependent on our own actions; and objections to it are answered.

II. That there is to be a Future State of Punishments, appears from several particular analogies.

I. THE importance of the question concerning a future life arises from our capacity of happiness and misery. But the consideration of this question would appear of so little importance as only to be brought into our thoughts by curiosity concerning the mortality of others, or the near prospect of our own, if there were not a supposition of our happiness and misery hereafter depending upon our actions here.

That there is a future state of rewards and punishments, appears from the following General Analogy—We are at present under such a government; 40 all that we enjoy, and a great part of what we suffer, is put in our own power; for pleasure and pain are the consequences of our actions, and we are endued, by the Author of our nature, with capacities of foreseeing the consequences. Our preservation, and every kind and degree of our enjoyment, is effected by the means of our own actions. Generally (though not always) our sufferings are produced by our own actions, though instruction, example, and experience forewarned us that the effect of such conduct would be injurious to our reputation, our property, or our life. But why is the happiness and misery of creatures left dependent on themselves Perhaps any other course would, from the nature of things, be impossible, or would confer a less degree of happiness, or not answer the end of an infinitely Perfect Mind, which may be pleased with the moral piety of moral agents in and for itself, as well as on account of its being a means of conferring happiness, or, perhaps, it would not answer the whole end of the Deity, which our faculties can not discern. But is not the dispensation of happiness and misery in this world to be ascribed to the general course of nature? True, this is the very point asserted; it is to be ascribed to the general course, and, therefore, to the Author of nature; for we must not deny that He does things at all, because He does them constantly—because the effects of His acting are permanent 41 whether His acting be so or not, though there is no reason to think it is not. The natural course of things is the appointment of God; our natural faculties, which guide us in our actions, by enabling us to foresee their effects, are given by Him also; the consequences of our actions are, therefore, His appointment, and the foresight of these consequences a warning given us by Him how we are to act; so that we are at present actually under His government in the strictest sense—in such a sense as that He rewards and punishes us for our actions—in the same sense as that we are under the government of civil magistrates. Because the annexing pleasure to some actions and pain to others in our power to do or forbear, and giving notice of this appointment beforehand to those whom it concerns, is the proper formal notion of government. It matters not, in this case, whether the Deity interpose or not. If civil magistrates could make offenders execute their laws upon themselves, or could execute them some other way, without interposing at all, we should be under their government in the same sense then as we are now, but in a much higher degree and more perfect manner. 1st. Objected: Is the pleasure, then, naturally accompanying every particular gratification of passion, intended as an inducement and a reward for the gratification of it in every such particular instance? No, certainly; no more than our 42 eyes, which were unquestionably given us to see with, were intended to give us the sight of each particular object to which they do or can extend, however destructive of them, or however improper. 2d. Objected: Is every trifling pain an instance of Divine punishment. The general thing here asserted can not be evaded, without denying all final causes; for if pleasure and pain be annexed to actions, as apparent inducements for our conduct, they must be admitted as instances of final causes, and as rewards and punishments. If, for example, the pain felt on approaching too near the fire be intended to prevent our doing what tends to our destruction, this is as much an instance of God’s punishing our actions, as if He did after having warned us by a voice from heaven.

II. A future state of punishment, being what men chiefly object against (either from man’s nature being so frail and exposed to temptation as almost to annihilate the guilt of human vice, or from the nature of God, irresistible in His will, or incapable of offense and provocation), will appear farther credible from the following particular analogies between the punishments in this life and what religion teaches us of those in the next:—

“1st. Natural punishments often follow actions that are accompanied with present gratification; for example, sensual pleasure followed by sickness and untimely death.

2d. The punishments are often much greater than the present pleasures or advantages.

3d. The punishments are often delayed a great while, sometimes till long after the actions occasioning them are forgotten, contrary to what we might imagine, that they would immediately follow crimes or not at all.

4th. After such delay, these punishments often come, not by degrees, but suddenly, with violence and at once.

5th. Though these punishments, in very many cases, inevitably follow at the appointed time, yet persons have seldom a distinct full expectation, and, in many cases, see, or may see, only the credibility of their following: e. g., that intemperance will bring after it diseases.

6th. The thoughtlessness and imprudence of youth does not prevent the punishments of excess following, and continuing the whole course of their existence in this life. These consequences are generally not considered, and can seldom be properly said to be believed beforehand.

7th. There are frequent punishments for want of acquirements, which being neglected at the natural season of acquiring, could not be acquired afterward: this is very observable in the natural course of things. The indocility of youth makes the consequent defects of old age irretrievable; the neglect of the seed time brings with it the irrecoverable 44 loss of the whole year. There is a time when real reformation may prevent the consequences of extravagance; ascend to a higher degree, and there is no place for repentance.

8th. The punishments of neglect from inconsiderateness are often as dreadful as those of any active misbehavior from the most extravagant passion.

9th. Civil government being natural, its punishments are so too, and some of these capital; as the effects of a dissolute course of pleasure are often mortal. So that many natural punishments are final,¹⁴¹⁴It can not be said that it is Scripture only, and not natural religion, which informs us of a future state of punishment, and the duration and degree of it. For this was known to the heathen poets and moralists; and reason might well conclude that it would be finally, and upon the whole, ill with the wicked. But what is peculiar to revelation is, it fixes the time when this distributive justice shall take place; namely, at the end of this world.—Butler. and seem inflicted naturally to diminish the aggregate of mischief, either by the removal of the offender from such a course, or by his example.

These things are so analogous to what religion teaches us concerning the future punishment of the wicked, that both would naturally be expressed in the same words. So much so, that it is doubtful to which of the two, principally, the following passage from the book of Proverbs, i., 22-32 refers:—Wisdom is introduced as frequenting the most public places of resort, and as rejected when she 45 offers herself as the natural appointed guide of human life—“How long, ye simple ones, will ye love simplicity? and the scorners delight in their scorning, and fools hate knowledge? Turn ye at my reproof; behold, I will pour out my Spirit unto you, I will make known my words unto you. Because I have called, and ye refused; I have stretched out my hand, and no man regarded; but ye have set at nought all my counsel, and would none of my reproof: I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when your fear cometh; when your fear cometh as desolation, and your destruction cometh as a whirl wind; when distress and anguish cometh upon you: then shall they call upon me, but I will not answer; they shall seek me early, but they shall not find me: for that they hated knowledge, and did not choose the fear of the Lord: they would none of my counsel: they despised all my reproof: therefore shall they eat of the fruit of their own way, and be filled with their own devices. For the turning away of the simple shall slay them, and the prosperity of fools shall destroy them.”

The instances of punishments now mentioned¹⁵¹⁵Hence may be deduced experimental answers to many popular objections and excuses; as, that God is too merciful to inflict everlasting punishment; that we were sincere in our intentions; that we did not know it was a sin we were committing, &c. Our misery, like our neglect, is self-induced. (for men are not always punished here in proportion to their sins) are sufficient to show what the 46 laws of the universe may admit, and to answer the usual objections against a future state of punishment. Indeed, nothing but a universally acknowledged demonstration on the side of Atheism can justify unconcern about such a state. The folly of such security without proof appears from the following analogy. May it not be said of any person upon his being born into the world, that he may act in such a manner as to be of no service to it but by being made an example of the woful effects of vice and folly; he may bring death upon himself from the hands of civil justice, or from the effects of his excesses; or infamy and diseases worse than death. So that even with regard to the present world, it had been better for him that he had never been born. And shall we suppose that there is no danger of something similar in a future state, under the providence and government of the same God, though we rest as secure and act as licentiously as we please?

QUESTIONS—CHAPTER II.

1. What supposition makes the consideration of the question, concerning a future life, evidently important to each individual?

2. Describe the general analogy, which makes a future state of rewards and punishments perfectly probable.

3. Why is the present happiness or misery of creatures left so much dependent upon themselves?

4. Suppose it to be granted that “The dispensation of happiness and misery, in this world, is to be ascribed to the general course of nature,” what follows from that admission?

5. What is the proper formal notion of government, whether human or divine? And what would be the most perfect manner of it?

6. State the two objections urged against the assertion that, “pleasure or pain is annexed by God to certain actions as an apparent inducement for our conduct,” and refute them.

7. Describe at full length the particular instances of analogy between natural punishments in this life, and what religion teaches us of those in the next.

8. For what purposes are the above-mentioned instances of analogy amply sufficient?

9. By what analogy may the folly of a person, who s unconcerned about a future state, be demonstrated?