whether as nations or individuals, to the power of a potter over the clay which he forms into vessels, and which, after forming, if he does not choose to preserve, he breaks, and perhaps moulds again into some other shape, for some different purpose)-how often this simile has been applied to illustrate, and to prove the sovereign right of God as Creator and Ruler of the world, to create individuals irrevocably predestined and prepared for eternal life or death eternal, by an immutable decree, antecedent to their creation, and independent of any thing foreseen in the individuals thus predestined, exactly as the potter hath power over the clay, "to make out of the same lump one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour; some vessels of wrath fitted to destruction, other vessels of mercy, before prepared unto glory."* In truth, I believe that this metaphor, thus explained, more than any or even all other passages applied to support the predestinarian scheme, has appeared to supply an irrefutable authority in its favour, and to silence all opposition to it, as stigmatised by the rebuke of the apostle-“ Nay, but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed, say unto him that formed it, why hast thou made me thus ?"

Now the conclusions which it is thus attempted to draw from this figurative expression, cannot possibly be supported by its applications in the prophecy; because they are expressly contradictory to the literal and unambiguous declaration of the prophet immediately following it, which, as it were, deliberately and designedly excludes such an application, and declares, without a shade of doubt or obscurity, that man is free to choose obedience or disobedience, good or evil, free to transgress or to repent, unrestrained by any decree of absolute predestination, any chain of inevitable necessity, whether from prescience or from prophecy: and that God governs, not according to arbitrary decrees, but according to the principles of equitable retribution, mitigated and softened by the tenderness of mercy-a mercy ever prompt to hear the prayers, and pardon the guilt of the returning penitent.

What then is the metaphor meant to illustrate, as it is thus used by the prophet? CLEARLY AND SOLELY THE IRRESISTI

Rom. ix, 20, 22, 23.

BLE POWER OF GOD TO CARRY INTO EFFECT THE DICTATES

OF HIS JUSTICE AND MERCY. It represents all mankind, nationally and individually, as completely under the control of God's power in every stage of their existence and every vicissitude of their fortune, just as the clay in the hands of the potter. He can in an instant crown them with glory and happiness, or sink them to shame and misery: He can change or continue their prosperity, make or mar, save or destroy, as he shall himself judge right. But he has also declared by the prophet, how he will exercise this power-even according to the known rules of equitable retribution, and in the administration of a moral government. "Let then man take heed unto his ways." This is the immediate inference drawn by the prophet, and which he presses upon his countrymen, as alike enforced by the absolute power of their God, which he had illustrated by this similitude, and by his retributive justice, which he had also expressly declared. This lesson he enforces by the express command of God, who directs him; "Now therefore go, speak to the men of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, saying, Thus saith the Lord, behold I frame evil against you, and devise a device against you; return ye now every one from his evil way, and make your ways and your doings good."* But the obstinacy of the Jews repelled this solemn, this last merciful warning from their God!" they said there is no hope, but we will walk after our own devices, and we will every one do the imagination of his evil heart." They even conspired to devise destruction against Jeremiah, indignant that he foretold evil against them; "because they had forgotten God; and burnt incense unto vanity, and caused men to stumble in their ways from the ancient paths;" hence God declared by his prophet, "I will scatter them by an east wind before the enemy, and I will show them the back and not the face, in the day of their calamity." These denunciations of punishment, if they persisted in their evil ways, united with these calls to reform, repeatedly urged, and repeatedly despised, produced ultimately the positive determination of God to execute the judgment announced, when, by command of God, the prophet stood in the court of the Lord's house, and said to

* Jeremiah, xviii. 11, 12.

the people: "Thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, behold I will bring upon this city, and upon all her towns, all the evil that I have pronounced against it, because they have hardened their necks that they might not hear my words."_"Thus saith the Lord of hosts, I will break this people and this city, as one breaketh a potter's vessel that cannot be made whole again.

Surely nothing can be more repugnant to every idea of absolute predestination and arbitrary decrees to the idea of action without freedom or contingency, and fate unchangeable by prayer or repentance, than this whole series of prophetic denunciations and administrations, those calls to repentance and encouragements to prayer. Nothing is more evident, than that the prophet employs the simile of clay in the hand of the potter, to illustrate, not the despotic sovereignty, but the resistless power of God; not the divine right to select or reprobate without any regard to moral discrimination, but the divine power to carry into full effect the dictates of retributive justice, combined with long-suffering mercy. Is it then to be supposed or believed, that the inspired apostle, adopting the same simile, means to express by it a contrary doctrine, and to exhibit the divine attributes and government, as exercised on totally different principles; to represent man accountable but not free, subject to law, without possessing moral agency, called on to obey and to repent, when his obedience or disobedience is preordained and unavoidable, and his repentance impossible or fruitless? Let us consider whether such a conclusion can be forced upon us by the apostle's reasonings, carefully examined, and candidly discussed.

What then is the occasion on which the apostle† introduces this simile, previously employed by the prophet? Evidently to illustrate the divine dispensation, which called and established the Gentiles in the privileges of the Christian religion, in place of the unbelieving Jews-a dispensation which regarded not a selection of men as individuals, some for eternal life, and others. to death eternal in a future world; but a selection of nations, to fill their appointed place in the providential arrangements of the present world, under the Gospel scheme, regulating the

national and visible establishment of the Christian church. A selection not predestinating Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, personally, to eternal salvation; Moab and Ammon, Ishmael and Esau, personally to eternal perdition; but selecting the Israelites, descended from the former, as the chosen people of God, in preference to the children of Moab and Ammon, and also to the Arabians and Edomites, descended from the latter.

terms.

The original history declares this in the most clear and express It records the divine discrimination of the progenitors, as exemplified in the fortunes of the nations which were to descend from them-fortunes which it predicts with a clearness transcending all human foresight. And the accomplishment of those predictions we can trace in the history of these nations, from that period to this hour, through a series of four thousand years, with an accuracy of providential arrangement equally exceeding all power of human agency. But in the entire of the selection, the prediction or the accomplishment, not one word can be found to establish personal election to heaven, or personal reprobation to hell, decreed "before the individuals were born or had done any good or evil." This deplorable misinterpretation of scriptural truth, is evidently unsupported by the original history which describes Esau and Jacob as 66 TWO NATIONS to be afterwards distinct in their religious advantages and professions, or according to the apostle's reasoning, that as the posterity of Jacob was preferred to that of Esau at the giving of the law, so it was not wonderful that at the promulgation of the Gospel, the believing Gentiles should be preferred to the unbelieving Jews."* Yet when the history and the reasoning are both set aside and forgotten, then this celebrated simile, thus torn from the context, thus mangled and deformed by the rent, is brought forward as exhibiting a scriptural pattern of absolute predestination.

* Gen. xxv. 23,-"The Lord said unto her, (Rebecca,) two nations are in thy womb, and two manner of people shall be separated from thy bowels: and the one people shall be stronger than the other people; and the elder shall serve the younger." Rom. ix. 30, 31.-" What shall we say then? that the Gentiles which followed not after righteousness, have attained to righteousness, even the righteousness which is by faith. But Israel which followed after the law of righteousness, hath not attained to the law of righteousness. Wherefore? because they sought it not by faith, &c." Is it not evident that Israel and the Gentiles are spoken of collectively, not personally, as Jacob and Esau, or their posterity had been, in verses 11, 12, 13.

In truth, that no such idea as personal and unconditional predestination to life or death eternal, entered the apostle's thoughts in his entire train of reasoning on this subject, is evident; first, because the Divine preference or rejection which he here speaks of, altogether regards nations, and collective bodies of men, and it is clearly repugnant to reason, to suppose any one entire nation, or collective multitude, predestined to heaven, merely as a nation, while another is doomed to hell. And secondly, it is also contrary to Scripture, which represents different individuals of the favoured race of Judah, with all possible variety of moral and religious character in the present life, and clearly receiving a corresponding discrimination in the rewards and punishments of another world; as surely as Moses and Elijah were crowned with glory, while Ahab, Manasseh, and Herod were justly objects of divine punishment.

The same truth is equally evident from the very enumeration the apostle gives of the advantages which the Israelites possessed as the chosen people of God; "to them belonged the adoption, and the glory, the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises; theirs were the fathers, and of them, as concerning the flesh, Christ came, who is over all, God blessed for ever, Amen."* But great and illustrious as were these privileges and advantages, not one of them, not even all united, were necessarily connected with the eternal happiness either of the entire nation, or of the individuals composing it, otherwise than as they were carefully and piously improved. The last, and greatest of all, the advent of the Messiah, by their cruel persecution and impious rejection of Him, led to the ruin and dispersion of that unhappy race. How greatly would all these advantages and privileges have been exceeded, if the apostle could have declared, "that the Israelites, as a nation, were all predestined to eternal glory in the kingdom of heaven," and that this distinction was now transferred to the Christians their successors to the favour of God, and to this privilege of his chosen people. But where does this apostle give a hint of any thing like this? On the contrary, at the very commencement of this epistle, as if to guard against his meaning in any

*Rom. ix. 4, 5.