ce it beyond all liability to sin. But
this is a mistake. Almighty power itself, we may say with the most
profound reverence, cannot create such a being, and place it beyond the
possibility of sinning. If it could not sin, there would be no merit, no
virtue, in its obedience. That is to say, it would not be a moral agent at
all, but a machine merely. The power to do wrong, as well as to do right,
is included in the very idea of a moral and accountable agent, and no such
agent can possibly exist without being invested with such a power. To
suppose such an agent to be created, and placed beyond all liability to
sin, is to suppose it to be what it is, and not what it is, at one and the
same time; it is to suppose a creature to be endowed with a power to do
wrong, and yet destitute of such a power, which is a plain contradiction.
Hence, Omnipotence cannot create such a being, and deny to it a power to
do evil, or secure it against the possibility of sinning.

We may, with the atheist, conceive of a universe of such beings, if we
please, and we may suppose them to be at all times prevented from sinning
by the omnipotent and irresistible energy of the Divine Being; and having
imagined all this, we may be infinitely better pleased with this ideal
creation of our own than with that which God has called into actual
existence around us. But then we should only prefer the absurd and
contradictory model of a universe engendered in our own weak brains, to
that which infinite wisdom, and power, and goodness have actually
projected into being. Such a universe, if freed from contradictions, might
be also free from evil, nay, from the very possibility of evil; but only
on condition that it should at the same time be free from the very
possibility of good. It admits into its dominions moral and accountable
creatures, capable of knowing and serving God, and of drinking at the
purest fountain of untreated bliss, only by being involved in
irreconcilable contradiction. It may appear more delightful to the
imagination, before it comes to be narrowly inspected, than the universe
of God; and the latter, being compared with it, may seem less worthy of
the infinite perfections of its Author; but, after all, it is but a weak
and crazy thing, a contradictious and impossible conceit. We may admire
it, and make it the standard by which to try the work of God; but, after
all, it is but an "idol of the human mind," and not "an idea of the Divine
Mind."