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plexed that God should afflict us for our own wilfulness—and we feel that we may thank ourselves for so many of our troubles that the remainder thrown in would scarcely make the balance kick the beam—but it is the good of the whole method that puzzles us. We would question the benevolence that allows one folly on any account whatsoever,—which allows us to suffer for the sins of our ancestors, and allows many a thing to trouble us which neither we nor our ancestors have known how to point towards hope in the future. Life and its calamities we could endure for their own sake, if we saw any love of God in them; but if our evil comes only from the wanton will of a despot, only woe, terror, and judgment can fill the gloomy passages of death.

These are the difficulties, dear reader. And now we shall presume to promise that if you will follow us closely to the end of our little volume, we shall at last defy you in the name of reason to change an atom of the universe, theoretically to fear death, or to murmur at your lot.

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