Hannah Adams

“ Bedeemery and an atonement to appease the divine wrath; but in a real subjugation of the powers of darkness; in a res- toi*ation of order in the spiritual world; in checking the over- grown influences of wicked spirits on the souls of men, and opening a nearer and clearer communication with the hea- venly and angelic powers; in making salvation} which is re- generation^ possible for all who believe on the incarnate God and keep his commandments, — 5, That there is an univer- sal influx from Grod into the souls of men. ”

“ Were men endowed witii a micro- scopic eye, the bodies which surround him would appear as diiJTerent, from what they do at present, as if he were transport- ed into another world. His ideas, upon that supposition^ would be more agreeable to strict truth, but they would be far less serviceable in common life. Analogous to this in the moral world, the Deity has im- planted in mankind the ddustoc notion of the power of being in- different, that they may be led to the proper exercise of that activ- ity for which they were design- ed. ”

“ Big hypothesis : — ^That, com- paring together the moral and matenal world, every thing is as much the result of establish- ed laws in the one as in the other. There is nothing in the Whole universe which can pro- perly be called contingent; but every motion in the material, and every determination and action in the moral world, are directed by immutable laws: 80 that, while those laws re- main in force, not the smallest link in the chain of causes and effbcts can be broken, nor any fme thing be otherwise than it is. ”

“ They separated themselves, not only from the Grentilcs, but from all other Jews; but their separation consisted chiefly in certain distinctions respecting food and religious cei'emonies; and does not appear to have in- terrupted the uniformity of re- ligious worship, in which the Jews of every sect united.^ The dissensions between the schools of Hillcl and Shammai, a little before the christian era, in- creased the number and power of the Pharisees : Hillel and Shammai were two great and eminent teachers in the Jewish schools. Hillcl was born an hundred and twelve years be- fore Christ. ”

“ It has long been a subject of controversy between Arminians and Calvinists, whether moral agents can act of necessity.- Upon this subject. Dr. P. labours to prove the doctrine of ne- cessity from the general prin- ciple, that no effect can exist without a cause. ”

“ But though it is in his power to see every thing, yet he does not always make use of that pow- er: he generally leaves his creatures at liberty to act or not to act, that they may have room to be guilty or innocent. ”

“ Shall we say that Christ was the supi'ema God, and thus render sdl the representations of God's love in sending his Son as perfectly unintelligible as the docti*ine of the Trinity? Shall we say that Jesus was a mere man, and gave up all his claims to his being a pattern of humilty, and consider him as the most arro- gant and vain-glorious teacher that ever appeared in human form? ”

“ When a man believes, yet that faith, much less any work, the matter of that ^usness for '^ hich a sin- justified; it is the im- righteousness of Christ ► which gives the believer it to these and all saving ngs. By both this and fth head, it appears, that Elating is excluded, and we laved by IDrec grace. — 7. alone receives the Lord and his righteousness ”

“ Correspondence, in a philosophical sense, is a kind of .analogy that one thini^ bears to another, or the relation subsisting between the essence of a tiling and its form, or between the cause and its effect ”

“ Nor (2.) is faith, or any other grace or acts of ours, any atonement for sin, satisfaction to justice, mer- iting qualification, or any part of that righteousness, for which we are justified at the bar of God? This I deny in places innumei*able. Nor (3.) whether the gospel be a law more new than is implied in the first promise to fallen Ad- am, proposed to Cain, and o- beyed by Abel, to the differen- cing him from his unbelieving brother? This I deny. (4.) Nor whether the gospel be a law that allows sin, when it accepts such gi-aces as true, though
shall be finally saved ”

“ Mechanical ne- cessity follows materialism : moral necessiity results from the presumption, that there is a power existing distinct froja matter. Dr. Priestley's scheme of mechanical, or philosophical necessity, has been delineated under the article MateriaUstSf on account of its connexion with the doctrine of Material- ism. ”

“ For, say they, the primitive disciples of Christ were all of them inward and spiritual; and when Jesus Christ said to them^ It is expedient for you that I go away; for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come un- to you; he intended thereby, to draw them oflf from that^ which was sensible, though ve- ry holy, and to prepare their hearts to receive the fulness of the holy spirit, which he look- ed upon, as the one thing neces- sary.
To prove, that our love to the Deity must be disinterest- ed, they allege, that the Lord hath made all things for himself
• Brou^^litoiii Tol. ii. p. ”

“ There is, we may hence infer, such a pe- culiar union between God and the man Christ Jesus, both in his pre-cxistent and incarnate state, that he may properly be called God-man in one complex person.
Dr. Watts supposes that the doctrine of the pi*e-existcnce of the soul of Christ, explains several dark and difficult scrip- tures, and discovers many beau- tics and proprieties of expres- sion in the word of God, which on any other plan lie unobserv- ed. For instance ”

“ The uni- verse, whatever it may be, is all of a piece, like an ocean : the least motion produces its effect to any distance, though the effect becomes less sensible in propoi*tion to the distance. God having settled every thing beforehand, having foreseen all good and evil actions, &c. every thing did ideally contribute be- foi*e its existence to his creat- ing plan ”

“ The concerns of the worid, they believe, ai-e committed by the Almighty to the superintendance and direc- tion of subordinate spirits, over whom they suppose certain magical ceremonies have great influence. A white fowl, sus- pended from the brancli of a particular tree, a snake's head, or a few handfuls of fruit, are offerings, which the Negroes often present, to deprecate the wrath, or to conciliate the fa- vour of these tutelary agents. But it is not often that they make their religious opinions the subject of conversation ”

“ III. It seems needful that the loul of Christ should pre-exist, that it might have opportunity to give its previous actual con- MDt to the great and painful aadertaking of atonement for our sins. The divine nature is incapable of suffering. ”

“ That there is in matter a neces- sary, but blind and refractoiy force, which resists the will dT the supreme Artificer; so that he cannot perfectly execute his designs : and this is the cause of the mixture of good and evil, which is found in the materid world. That the soul of maa was derived by emanation firon Grod; but that this emanatidii was not immediate, but tlirougji the intervention of the soul tf the world, which was itself di^ based by some material admii- turo. That the relation wluA the human soul, in its orighid constitution, bears to mattor^lk the source of moral evil. ”

“ That heaven and hell are not arbitrary appoint* ments of Grod. Heaven is a state arising from the good af- fections of the heairt, and a cor- respondence of the words and actions, grounded on sincen love to God and man: and hell is the necessary conse- quence of an evil and thought- less life, enslaved by the vib afi*ections of self-love, and flis love of the world, without beii|; brought under the regulatifw of heavenly love, by a right submission of the wUl, the im- derstanding, and actions, to fliB truth and spii'it of heaven.— 8. ”

“ He is there- fore called the Son of GtNl, and the only-begotten;t for gcr.er- ation, when applied to God, is only a figurative word, signify- ing immediate derivation of be- ing and life from him.
To prove that Jesus Christ was ^nerated (or produced) before the world was created, the' doctor adduce^s the follow- ing considerations : The Father made the world by the opera- tion of the Son. (John i. 3—10. 1 Cor. viii. 6. Eph. iii. 9. &c.)
That all Christ's autliority, power, knowledge, and glory, are the Fathei*'s, communicated
Moftbeim's Eocles. ”

“ Whether man is a necessa- ry or a free agents is a ques- tion^ that has been debated by writers of the first eminence. Hobbesy Collins, Hume, Leib- nitz, Kaims, Hartley, Pricst- Iqr, Edwards, Grombie, Top- lady, and Belsham, have writ- ten on the side of Necessity : wlule Clarke, King, Law, Reid, Bnfler, Price, Bryant, Wollas- ttm,Hor8ley, Beattie, Gregory, and Butterwoilh, have written against it. To state all their arguments in this place would take up too much room; suffice It to say, that the Anti-necessa- ^nans suppose that the doctrine of Necessity charges God as %he author of sin ”

“ In this view he renounces his right of acting upon his crea- tures, and directing their reso- lutions: but when he chooses to know any thing, he always does know it; because he need only will that it shall happen as he sees it, and direct the resolu- tions of his creatures according to his win. ”

“ That, as man must act with consciousness and spon- taneity, it is necessary that he should have some sense of things possible and contingent. Hence the Deity has wisely im- planted a ddtisroe sense of lib- erty in the mind of man, which fits him to fulfil the ends of action to better advantage than be could do, if he knew the ne- cessity which really attends him. ”

“ Does any one sufficiently prize die happiness of healthy who liai never been sick? Is it not generally necessary, that alik tie evil should render a good more sensible, and consequent- ly greater? '*
President Edwards' scUme of moral necessity is as foUoifB: That the will is in every due necessarily determined by fte strongest motives, and thatflie moral necessity may be as ab- solute as natural necessity; L c a moral effect may be as per- fectly connected with its jbos al cause, as a naturally nebei- sary effect is with its natonl cause. ”

“ PRE
mother church, hot differ from each other in eertain particu- lars of little moment. Most of their ministci's are bred up in the establishment.^
PRE-ADAMITES, a denom- ination given to the inhabitants of the earthy conceived by some people to have lived before Adam. ”

“ That mankind, thei*efore, are capable of repentance and amendment, and of arriving to the highest degrees of piety and virtue, by the use of their nat- ural faculties and powers; that, indeed, external grace is neces- sary to excite their endeav- ours, but that they have no need of the internal succoui-s of the ”

“ On the contrai*y, they main- tained, that silence, tranquillity, repose, and solitude, accompa- nied with such acts of mortifi- cation as might tend to ex- tenuate and exhaust the body, were the means by which the hidden and internal word was excited, and of instructing men in the knowledge of divine things. *<< tlic Sjpirit makes irUercession for us. Now if the Spirit pray in us, we must resign ourselves to its impulses, by remaining in a state of mere inaction. ”

“ That the soul is iBi- mortal : and by disengaging itself from all animal pasfflonsy and rising above sensible ob- jects to the contemplation ef the world of intelligence, it may be prepared to return to its ori- ginal habitation. That matter never suffer^ annihilation : but timt the world will i*emain for* ever ”

“ Edwai-ds thinks, that the moral necessity lie de- fends is not inconsistent with the utmost liberty which can be conceived. — (2.) Kaims sup- poses, that the terms uitaxtoida^ bUf impossible, &c. are equally applicable to the case of moral and natural necessity. Ed- wards maintains, that such a necessity, as attends the acts of the will, may with more pro- priety be called certainty, it be- ing no other than the certain connexion between the subject and predicate of the proposition which affirms their existence.-* (3.) ”

“ That the Deity predestinated a certain number to salvation^ before the world was formed. —
2. That ho predestinated the wicked to eternal punishment in consequence of their sins, which were eternally foreseen. — S. That Christ came not to save all men individually^ and that none shall perish for whom he shed his blood.*— 4. That Miice the fally mankind can ex- ercise free-will only to do that which is evil.* The term Pre- destinarian has since been ap- plied to all doctrinal Calvinists, ^ho hold, for substance^ the ginne opinr/ms. ”

“ PLATONISTS. The Pla- tonic philosophy is denominated fi*om Plato, who was born about two hundred and sixty seven yeai-s before Christ. He found- ed the old academy on the opin- ions of Heraclitus, Pytliagoras, and Socrates; and by adding the information he had acquir- ed to their discoveries, he es- tablished a sect of philosophers, who were esteemed more per- fect than any who had before appeared in the wiorlcL
Tlic outlines of Plato's philo- sophical system were as follow : — ^Tbat there is one Grod, eter- nal, immutable, and immate- rial; perfect in wisdom and goodness ”

“ Our happiness is only a subordinate end^ whiph^ he has made relative to the lai^ and great end, which is his |^ ry. To conform, therefore, t^ the great end of our creatioB^ we must prefer God to ijnaf, selves, and not desire ow owji happiness, but for his ghurj.^ otherwise we shall go contraiy to his order. ”

“ VII. When the blessed God appeared in the form oC a man, or angel, it is evident that the true God resided in this man, or angel; because he assumes the most exalted names and characters of godhead. And the spectators, and sacred his- torians, it is evident, consider- ed him as true and proper God, and paid him the highest worship and obedience. He is properly styled ^*the angd oj Oo^s presence^' — and ^the cav^ enant, Isaiah IxuL Mai. ”

“ That the grace of God ia given in proportion to our mer- its. — 5. That mankind may ap- rive at a state of perfection in this life. — 6. That the law quel* ified men for the kingdom of hea- ven, and was founded upon equal promises with the gospel.*
PELEtV ISLANDS. The inhabitants of these islands be- lieve in one God, in the unlim- ited extent of his government in the most important moral distinctions, and religious du- ties as taught by the light of nature, in the immortality of the soul, and in future rewards and punishments. ”