annot do this, his objection rests upon
a mere unsupported hypothesis. It is very easy to conceive that more light
might have been imparted to men, and greater influences brought to bear on
their feelings; but it will not follow that such additional inducements to
virtue would have been good for them. For aught we know, it might only
have added to their awful responsibilities, without at all conducing to
their good. For aught we know, the means employed by God for the salvation
of man from sin and misery have, both in kind and degree, been precisely
such as to secure the _maximum_ of good and the _minimum_ of evil.

Let the sceptic frame a more perfect moral law for the government of the
world than that which God has established; let him show where more
tremendous sanctions might be found to enforce that law; let him show how
the Almighty might have made a more efficacious display of his majesty,
and power, and goodness, than he has actually exhibited to us; let him
refer to more powerful influences, consistent with the free-agency and
accountability of man, than those exerted by the Spirit of God; let him do
all this, we say, and then he may have some right to object and find
fault. In one word, let him meet the demand of the Most High, "what more
could have been done to my vineyard, that I have not done in it," and show
it to be without foundation, and then there will be some appearance of
reason in his objection.

Section VII.

The glory of God seen in the creation of a world, which he foresaw would
fall under the dominion of sin.

It may be said that we have not yet gone to the bottom of the difficulty;
that although omnipotence could not deny the capacity to commit sin to a
moral agent, yet God could prevent moral evil, by refusing to create any
being who he foreknew would transgress his law. As God might have
prevented the rise of evil in our world, by refusing to create man, why,
it may be asked, did he not do so? Why did he not, in this way, spare the
universe that spectacle of crime and suffering which has been presented in
the history of our fallen race? To this we answer, that God did not choose
to prevent sin in this way, but to create the world exactly as he did,
though he foresaw the fall and all its consequences; _because the highest
good of the universe required the creation of such a world_. We are now
prepared to see this great truth in its true light.

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