em unknown. Yet not less determinate than the laws and
dispositions of the material world are all His arrangements, especially
his covenant provisions made with regard to man. The lower creatures of
God, though they know him not, obey his word. Moral agents on earth are
subject wholly to his control. The decrees of his providence affect his
intelligent and moral creatures not less than those that know not to
resolve. All things continue according to his ordinances--the material
creation and his immortal offspring. His statutes bind the heavens and
the earth; and by his appointment, the relations unto him into which men
are brought, are constituted and sustained. Whatever may be the
character of a solemn covenant with him, to his appointment it is due,
and by his will continues.

If to them that fear God will be verified the declaration, "Thou shalt
decree a thing, and it shall be established unto thee,"[490] will not
all his own holy purposes stand? And was not all that he
established--was not the covenant which he established, decreed? His
purposes and their fulfilment are alike sure. "There are many devices in
a man's heart; nevertheless, the counsel of the Lord, that shall
stand."[491] To some who had disregarded his covenant were directed his
words,--"Because ye have said, we have made a covenant with death, and
with hell are we at agreement: when the overflowing scourge shall pass
through, it shall not come unto us: for we have made lies our refuge,
and under falsehood have we hid ourselves. Therefore, thus saith the
Lord God, ... The hail shall sweep away the refuge of lies, and the
waters shall overflow the hiding-place. And your covenant with death
shall be disannulled, and your agreement with hell shall not stand." But
revealing the Mediator of his covenant, and, consequently, making known
that covenant, as to obtain, instead of the covenant with death, which
was to be swept away, at the same time he says, "Behold, I lay in Zion
for a foundation, a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a
sure foundation: he that believeth shall not make haste. Judgment also
will I lay to the line, and righteousness to the plummet." Regarding
both the threatening and the promise, are his words,--"This also cometh
forth from the Lord of hosts, which is wonderful in counsel and
excellent in working."[492] And may there not also be applied to both
his own averment,--"The Lord of hosts hath sworn, saying, Surely as I
have t