SOCIETY OF HEAVEN. 



117 



love,&quot; and who are governed by a principle of 

 idfiskneis in the general tenor of their conduct, 

 must be considered as unqualified for taking a 

 part in the benevolent employments of the celes 

 tial world.* 



Let us now consider for a little, the happiness 

 which must flow from an association with intel 

 ligent beings animated with the sublime prin 

 ciples and holy dispositions to which I have now 

 adverted. 



In the present world, one of the principal 

 sources of misery, arises from the malevolent 

 dispositions, and immoral conduct of its inhabi 

 tants. Pride, ambition, malignant passions, 

 falsehood, deceit, envy, and revenge, which ex 

 ercise a sovereign sway over the hearts of the 

 majority of mankind have produced more mi 

 sery and devastation among the human race, 

 than the hurricane and the tempest, the earth 

 quake and the volcano, and all the other concus 

 sions of the elements of nature. The lust of 

 ambition has covered kingdoms with sackcloth 

 and ashes, levelled cities with the ground, turned 

 villages into heaps of smoking ruins, transformed 

 fertile fields into a wilderness, polluted the earth 

 with human gore, slaughtered thousands and 

 millions of human beings, and filled the once 

 cheerful abodes of domestic life, with the sounds 

 of weeping, lamentation, and woe. Injustice 

 and violence have robbed society of its rights 

 and privileges, and the widow and fatherless of 

 their dearest enjoyments. Superstition and re 

 venge have immolated their millions of victims, 

 banished peace from the world, and subverted 

 the order of society. The violation of truth in 

 contracts, affirmations, and promises, has in 

 volved nations in destruction, undermined the 

 foundations of public prosperity, blasted the 

 good name and the comfort of families, perplexed 

 and agitated the minds of thousands and millions, 

 and thrown contempt on the revelations of hea 

 ven, and the discoveries of science. Malice, 

 envy, hatred, and similar affections, have stirred 

 up strifes and contentions, which have invaded 

 the peace of individuals, families, and societies, 

 and imbittered all their enjoyments. It is 

 scarcely too much to affirm, that more than nine- 

 tenths of all the evils, perplexities, and sorrows, 

 which are the lot of suffering humanity, are 

 owing to the wide and extensive operation of 

 such diabolical principles and passions. 



What a happiness, then, must it be, to mingle 

 in a society where such malignant affections 



* This subject might have been illustrated at 

 greater length ; but as the author has already had 

 occasion to enter into a minute discussion of the 

 yrinciples of moral action, and their relation to the 

 inhabitants of all worlds, in his work on &quot; The Phi 

 losophy of Religion,&quot; he refers his readers to that 

 tieatise, for a more ample elucidation of the several 

 topics, to which he has briefly adverted in the pre 

 ceding pages particularly to Chap. I. throughout, 

 Chap. II. Section 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, and the General Con- 

 etufiona. 



shall never more shed their baleful influence, 

 and where love, peace, and harmony, mutual 

 esteem, brotherly-kindness and charity, are for 

 ever triumphant! To depart from a world 

 where selfishness and malignity, strife and dis 

 sensions, wars and devastations so generally 

 prevail, and to enter upon a scene of enjoyment 

 where the smiles of benevolence beam from the 

 countenances of unnumbered glorious intelli 

 gences, must raise in the soul the most erratic 

 rapture, and be the ground-work of all those 

 other &quot; pleasures which are at God s right hand 

 for evermore.&quot; Even in this world, amidst the 

 physical evils which now exist, what a scene of 

 felicity would be produced, were all the illus 

 trious philanthropic characters now living, or 

 which have adorned our race in the ages that are 

 past, to be collected into one society, and to as 

 sociate exclusively, without annoyance from 

 &quot; the world that lieth in wickedness !&quot; Let us 

 suppose a vast society composed of such cha- 

 ract rs as Moses, Elijah, Jeremiah, Daniel, 

 Paul, James and John, the Evangelists, men 

 who accounted it their highest honour to glorify 

 God and to promote the salvation of mankind, 

 such philanthropists as Howard, Clarkson, Ven- 

 ning, and Sharpe, who displayed the most be 

 nignant affections, and spent their mortal exist 

 ence in unwearied efforts to meliorate the con 

 dition of the prisoner, and relieve the distresses 

 of the wretched in every land-rto deliver the 

 captive from his oppressors to unloose the 

 shackles of slavery to pour light and vital air 

 into the noisome dungeon, and to diffuse bless 

 ings among mankind wherever they were found ; 

 such profound philosophers as Locke, Newton, 

 and Boyle, whose capacious intellects seemed to 

 embrace the worlds both of matter and of mind, 

 and who joined to their mental accomplishments, 

 modesty, humility, equanimity of temper, and 

 general benevolence ; such amiable divines as 

 Watts, Doddridge, Bates, Hervey, Edwards, 

 Lardner, and Dwight, whose hearts burned with 

 zeal to promote the glory of their Divine Mas 

 ter, and to advance the present and everlasting 

 interest of their fellowmen. To associate per 

 petually with such characters, even with the im 

 perfections and infirmities which cleaved to them 

 in this sublunary region, would form something 

 approaching to a paradise on earth. 



But, let us suppose such characters divested 

 of every moral and mental imperfection, endowed 

 with every holy principle and virtue that can 

 adorn a created intelligence, and with capacious 

 intellectual powers in vigorous and incessant 

 exercise, dwelling in a world where every natu 

 ral evil is removed, where scenes of glorv meet 

 the eye at every step, and where boundless pros 

 pects stretch before the view of the enraotured 

 mind. Let us further suppose, intefligences in 

 vested with faculties far more energetic and 

 sublime who have ranged through the imrnen- 



