It is a little, distorted image of human weakness, and not a
harmonious manifestation of divine power. Among all the possible models of
a universe, which lay open to the infinite mind and choice of God, a thing
so deformed had no place; and when the sceptic concludes that the
perfections of the Supreme Architect are limited, because he did work
after such a model, he only displays the impotency of his own wisdom, and
the blindness of his own presumption.

Hence, the error of the atheist is obvious. He does not consider that the
only way to place all creatures beyond a liability to sin, is to place
them below the rank of intelligent and accountable beings. He does not
consider that the only way to prevent "sin from raising its head" is to
prevent holiness from the possibility of appearing in the universe. He
does not consider that among all the ideal worlds present to the Divine
Mind, there was not one which, if called into existence, would have been
capable of serving and glorifying its Maker, and yet incapable of throwing
off his authority. Hence, he really finds fault with the work of the
Almighty, because he has not framed the world according to a model which
is involved in the most irreconcilable contradictions. In other words, he
fancies that God is not perfect, because he has not embodied an absurdity
in the creature. If God, he asks, is perfect, why did he not render virtue
possible, and vice impossible? Why did he not create moral agents, and yet
deny to them the attributes of moral agents? Why did he not give his
creatures the power to do evil, and yet withhold this power from them? He
might just as well have demanded, why he did not create matter without
dimensions, and circles without the properties of a circle. Poor man! he
cannot see the wisdom and power of God manifested in the world, because it
is not filled with moral agents which are not moral agents, and with
glorious realities that are mere empty shadows!

If the above remarks be just, then the great question, why has God
permitted sin, which has exercised the ingenuity of man in all ages, is a
most idle and insignificant inquiry. The only real question is, why he
created such beings as men at all; and not why he created them, and then
permitted them to sin. The first question is easily answered. The second,
though often propounded, seems to be a most unmeaning question. It is
unmeaning, because it seeks to ascertain the _reason why_ God has
permitted