ard this
false principle, substitute the truth in its stead, and the sincerity of
God will come out from every obscurity, and shine with unclouded
splendour.

Section II.

The attempt of Howe to reconcile the eternal ruin of a portion of mankind
with the sincerity of God in his endeavours to save them.

To illustrate the justness of the remark just made, we shall select that
solution of the difficulty in question which has been deemed the most
profound and satisfactory. We mean the solution of "the wonderful
Howe."(161) This celebrated divine clearly saw the impossibility of
reconciling the sincerity of God with the offer of salvation to all, on
the supposition that he does anything to prevent the salvation, or promote
the ruin of those who are finally lost. He rejects the scheme of
necessity, or a concurrence of the divine will, in relation to the sinful
volitions of men, as aggravating the difficulty which he had undertaken to
solve. This was one great step towards a solution. But it still remained
to "reconcile God's prescience of the sins of men with the wisdom and
sincerity of his counsels, exhortations, and whatsoever means he uses to
prevent them." Let us see how he has succeeded in his attempt to
accomplish this great object.

He admits in this very attempt, "that the universal, continued rectitude
of all intelligent creatures had, we may be sure, been willed with a
peremptory, efficacious will, if it had been best." He expressly says,
that God might have prevented sin from raising its head in his dominions,
if he had chosen to do so. "Nor was it less easy," says he, "by a mighty,
irresistible hand, universally to expel sin, than to prevent it." Now,
having made this concession, was it possible for him to vindicate the
sincerity and wisdom of God in the use of means to prevent sin, which he
foresaw must fail to a very great extent?

After having made such an admission, or rather after having assumed such a
position, we think it may be clearly shown that the author was doomed to
fail; and that he has deceived himself by false analogies in his gigantic
efforts to vindicate the character of God. He says, for example: "We will,
for discourse's sake, suppose a prince endowed with the gift or spirit of
prophecy. This most will acknowledge a great perfection, added to
whatsoever other of his accomplishments. And suppose this his prophetic
ability to be so large as to extend t