demonstrates that its cause is also sinful, and, if universally, causes must have in themselves all the qualities which exist in their effects, it follows incontrovertibly, that whatever sinfulness exists in the soul of man, must have its exact counterpart in the nature of God, and that every sinful act, therefore, which man exerts, presents as demonstrative evidence of the depravity of his Creator's nature, as it does of his own!

Such is the dreadful climax of the reviewer's system.

Which now-I appeal to the church and world to decide-is true; this scheme, which thus overthrows every truth of the gospel and involves these imputations on God; or the system-advanced in this work-to which it stands opposed?-or rather, for this is the question at issue, which is true-this system of absurd "science, falsely so called," of the reviewer; or "the gospel of the grace of God"?-for one or the other of them must manifestly be given up. They certainly are not the same, and as assuredly cannot consist with each other. If this scheme is true, it is as cer tain as is the truth of the scheme, that God is not such a being as the scriptures represent him, but is, in all his moral attributes, precisely the reverse; that his government is not what they claim it to be, but is the opposite of the justice, wisdom, and grace, which they ascribe to it; and that neither man, nor his obligations, are such as they are there represented.

To pretend that this scheme-discerning what it is-is the scheme of the gospel, were, I hesitate not to say, an outrageous farce, as palpably impious and inexcusable as

to pretend that the doctrines of idolatry, mahomedanism, or atheism, are the doctrines of the Bible. What can be more fearfully impious than to pretend that the scriptures authorize the belief that the nature of God is such as necessarily to cause him to sin in all his agency? Yet such is the fact, or this system entirely misrepresents them. Or to teach that God is the author of sin? Yet such is the fact, or this scheme is wholly erroneous. Or to claim that he has no right to require men to obey his laws, and does not desire them to? Yet such also is the fact, or this scheme is totally false.

I put it, therefore, to the conscience of the reviewer, whether he can with the least show of propriety claim that his doctrine is the doctrine of revelation, and justify himself to his Creator or fellow-creatures, for teaching it as such; and pray him to abandon it, and adhere to the scriptures as the guide of his faith.

I put it to the consciences of the ministers of religion, who hold and teach this system, whether, in inculcating it, they are not manifestly "teaching for doctrines the commandments of men," and entreat them to pause in so deplorable a dereliction of their office, and return to the doctrines of God.

I put it to the consciences of their hearers, whether, in countenancing the inculcation of this system as the system of revelation, they are not sanctioning a most fatal perversion of the gospel, and implore them, as such, to reject and denounce it, and enforce its abandonment by their teachers.

PROFESSOR FITCH'S

DISCOURSES AND REPLY

ON THE

NATURE OF SIN.

THESE publications have high claims to the attention of the Christian public, both from the subjects of which they treat, and the able manner in which they are discussed.

The Discourses are employed in stating and demonstrating the doctrine, alike of natural and revealed religion— unhappily so generally overlooked or disallowed-that sin is an attribute of voluntary actions solely, not of the substance of the mind, as the dogma of physical depravity represents. The Reply is a vindication of that doctrine from the misapprehensions and objections of the reviewer of the Discourses in the Christian Advocate.

The considerations which Professor Fitch alleges in proof of the doctrine are, the fact that God expressly teaches it in the scriptures, defining sin as an attribute of voluntary actions; that, accordingly, in his moral government he takes

cognisance solely of those actions, requiring and prohibiting them only, and making them alone the grounds of rewards and punishments; that nothing occurs in his word but what is consistent with and corroborative of this; that the mind is so formed that it cannot feel blame for any thing but its voluntary acts; and that mankind universally act on it, in respect to each other, as a self-evident truth.

These facts, perspicuously and forcibly stated, present in the certainty with which they demonstrate the doctrine, a striking contrast to the reasonings advanced by the reviewer in vindication of the scheme which he advocates.

That writer does not pretend that he is authorized to adopt his theory by any passage of the sacred volume, explicitly affirming that the nature of the soul, as well as its actions, is sinful; nor that any of its requirements or prohibitions formally recognise any such sinfulness of nature; nor that its existence is directly perceivable by the mind itself. He confessedly has neither the clear voice of revelation nor consciousness to sustain him.

From what source then-groping without the aid of these important guides does he derive his scheme? Not from any known fact, either revealed in the scriptures or ascertained by experience, but by mere inference from an assumption, and that the extraordinary assumption that mind as a substance and cause or agent, is governed by the same laws as matter!

This assumption he has not indeed formally set forth as the basis of his scheme, but has made it, and reared on it the whole superstructure of his theory, as undisguisedly as though he had announced it in so many words.

"We admit indeed that sin in the heart previously to action is latent, and that while it remains so, we can have no direct consciousness of it."

How then is it ascertained that any such sin exists? By assuming that the nature of the mind itself precisely resembles the actions which it exerts.

"But when by a succession of evil thoughts it betrays itself, we are as certain of its existence, as of the acts of which we are conscious; and have no more doubt about the depravity of the principle, than of the acts which proceed from it; just as when from a concealed fountain poisonous streams issue, we are assured that the fountain itself is poisoned; or when we find bitter or unwholesome fruit produced by a tree, although the nature of the tree is hidden from us, yet by its fruit we know that it is evil."

The acts of the mind then, according to this representation, participate and thence reveal the nature of its substance, in the same manner as portions of matter-as streams and fruits-partake and thereby make known to us the nature of the substance of which they are emanations !

This doctrine he indeed, in another place, announces in so many words in the assertion, that causes universally must have in themselves all the attributes which exist in their effects.

"To maintain that there is a cause existing in the soul from which all sinful volitions proceed, and yet that this principle has no moral evil in it, bears very much the appearance of a palpable absurdity. It seems to us like saying that there is something, or rather every thing in an effect, which was not in its cause; which is the same thing as to say, that there is an effect without a cause."

This, then, is the sole foundation of his theory, and is to