be neither the same meritoriousness in the obedience of the inferior party, nor the same opportunity for his disobedience, during the presence of the superior, as during his absence. The obedience of servants to be meritorious, must be free; and to be free, must be voluntary; rendered on the principle of duty alone. A motive of fear might constrain to an unwilling obedience on the one hand, and a motive of self-interest might tempt to it on the other, where ill desert was resented by immediate punishment, and good desert encouraged by immediate reward.

The personal zeal, fidelity, or attachment, which are the producing causes of the willing and cheerful obedience of servants, whether to an absent or a present master, will be followed of course by their natural effects even when he is at hand, but will not be known to others, nor acknowledged as the true and proper causes of the effect produced, except when he is absent. The personal indolence and carelessness, the want of personal attachment, or personal principle, in servants, which even under the superintendence and inspection of their master, not unfrequently lead to their deliberate violation of his will; will much more naturally conduct to that result, when they are removed from his observation : or if they were restrained from breaking out into action merely by the presence of the superior party, it can scarcely fail but that they will operate, according to their natural tendency, the moment he is personally removed from view.

If the object of a master, then, were to ascertain the individual genius, disposition, or fidelity of his servants, the method which he would ordinarily resort to for that purpose, would be to place

them in a situation of trust, with the management of something committed to their care; to allow them an interval of absence and separation from himself, sufficient to put their principle to the test; to exempt them from the influence of any motive which might produce an unwilling or an interested obedience; and to leave them as much as possible to the single operation of the sense of duty. Still more likely would he be to adopt this expedient, if the end of the discovery of the characters of his servants were some further profitable use, to be made of their talents and capacities; some more enlarged confidence, to be reposed in their good disposition; some ulterior reward, to be assigned to their meritorious zeal and fidelity. Hence, if Jesus Christ, as the master of Christians in general, deals with them after the manner in which human masters ordinarily deal with their servants, it was to be expected that a similar œconomy of probation would be employed by him, for the sake of discovering the personal character, zeal, and attachment of any of his servants, with a view to the same ultimate œconomy of retribution, in the dispensation of reward or punishment, according to the results of the discovery; as any merely human master also might employ.

The duty of the subordinate members of the same household, in respect of their common master, is the same in general to all; viz. the obedience which each, in his proper station, is bound to render to his master's will. Where, however, the subordinate personages are many and various, while the principal personage is one and the same, the duties incumbent on the inferiors, in deference to the will of the superior, will be many and various also; and the

duties of one department will differ respectively from those of another, though all are alike required to be discharged for the sake of the master alone. The great families of antiquity belonged to single masters; but they consisted of numerous divisions of inferiors, all of which in a well regulated household, had a work or function of their own, differing indeed from the rest, but exercised and pursued in common with theirs, for the sole good and advantage of their master.

The visible church, as we have seen, is compared to an æcia or family of this description, of which Christ is the common Lord and Head, and Christians are the common subordinate or dependent members, distinguished like other households, into two (but only into two) comprehensive divisions, the ministers of religion, and the people. Now, with respect to a family of this sort, the temporary departure of its master, leaving his household behind him, constituted as it always was-that is, leaving each class and department of its members to pursue their proper business, as before-would be the commencement of an economy of probation to his household and his return, to inquire into the course of things during his absence, and to take cognisance of the personal good or ill desert of each of its departments, while he was absent, would be the commencement of an œconomy of retribution; since it cannot be doubted that he would both institute such a scrutiny into the behaviour of one and all of his dependents during his absence, and would dispense such proper notes of censure or approbation, as the results of the investigation might shew to be just and reasonable. The masters of antiquity possessed

full powers to qualify them for such an inquiry, even to the infliction of capital punishments upon their slaves, and much more of any below them.

66

In like manner, the departure of Jesus Christ into heaven at the ascension, when he was personally removed from the immediate or future cognisance of his church on earth, constituted the beginning of an œconomy of probation in respect of Christians, considered as his servants; and his return to judgment, to resume his personal cognisance of the state of things on earth, by an inquiry into the life and conduct of every individual member of his church, will be the beginning of an œconomy of retribution. Such a departure of Jesus Christ, and for such a purpose with regard to the church, seems to be intimated in the following verse of St. Mark: "As a man, who was abroad, having left his household, "and given authority to his servants, and to each of them his work, commanded the porter also that "he should watch a" the ideas of which description, in their primary sense, are evidently borrowed from the known constitution of a household of antiquity in general-supposing what would be the case with that, if the departure of its master had taken him away for a greater or a lesser time from home; and in their secondary, are not less clearly designed to be understood of what was about to ensue in the constitution of the church, considered in like manner as the household or family of its proper master-by virtue of his own approaching departure into heaven, and personal separation from it.

66

It appears essential, then, to the doctrine of an œconomy of probation, that it should affirm or imply a Chap. xiii. 34.

the fact of the absence of Christ; and to the doctrine of an œconomy of retribution, that it should affirm or imply the fact of his return. Without his departure, the economy of probation could not be supposed to begin; and without his return, it could never be supposed to have ceased. The duration, therefore, of such an œconomy is strictly coextensive with that of the absence of Christ; or in other words, with that of the being and continuance of the visible church. For this church began to have a being within ten days only of the departure of Christ himself; and its being will be fulfilled, and its consummation may be expected, simultaneously with the return of Christ to judgment. To an œconomy of probation, however, as preparatory only to an œconomy of retribution, it seems further essential, that the fact of the departure of Christ should be described as past, and his consequent absence as matter of present certainty; but the fact of his return, as to come, and therefore as matter of faith, and of future assurance only.

The period of probation being understood as preliminary to the period of retribution, the latter may be said to begin, whenever the former ends. The expiration of the period of probation, to whomsoever, and whensoever, it takes place, is to them, and at that time, the same thing as the coming of Christ; and conversely, the coming of Christ to whomsoever and whensoever it takes place, determines to them their period of probation. Hence, there may be as many different periods of trial, or as many different senses of the phrase, œconomy of probation, as there can be periods of the return of Christ, or senses of the phrase, coming of Christ.