In knowledge, the idea and the knowledge being the same. other words still, any given conception of the Deity must produce the same effects upon the heart and life, that would be produced by the knowledge of an existing God corresponding precisely to that conception. A fundamentally false apprehension of the divine being, embraced and adhered to, whether wilfully or from ignorance, would visit upon the individual as gloomy a train of consequences as would flow from his receiving undoubted intelligence that such a God really existed, provided (which is supposed,) that he believed the apprehension as implicitly as he did the intelligence. It will be understood that we do not say that a wrong conception of God would work all the mischief and ruin to the individual that such a God himself would cause. This certainly we could not affirm any more than that a right conception of God would confer all the blessings which a right God, that is, the true God, does bestow. There are innumerable benefits which God confers as a benefactor upon his creatures, even upon those who have very erroneous ideas of his character; and doubtless in this capacity he rescues foolish and fallen man from numberless evils which would otherwise, in consequence of his wrong conceptions of the Divine Being, prove his destruction. We speak of God, however, not as a benefactor, but as an object of contemplation, and it is in this capacity, (which should be kept quite distinct from the other,) that we say that all the advantage which we derive from him, depends upon our knowing or conceiving of him aright. If as an object of thought, of love, of homage, or of service, we totally misapprehend him, that is as fatal to us as if he were the being we mistake him to be. This we affirm upon the same principle which lies at the foundation of a proposition which no one, we presume, will deny, namely, that the moral effects of fully believing that there is no God must be the same with those of knowing that there is no God-supposing there really were none. It is by no means sufficient that there be a God of absolute moral perfections, his intelligent creatures must have ideas of him corresponding to his perfections, or, as an object of thought and affection, he might as well not be the God he is. The Hindoo, whose conception of Deity is that of a bloody monster, delighting in frightful immolations of human interests and life, is, so far as the influence of his idea upon his own being is concerned, in just as deplorable a condition as he would be in, if that idea were the veritable reality. The importance then of right views of the divine Being is, in one sense, and that too a most critical one, commensurate with the importance of the existence of a right God. We speak, of course, not of those frivolous and idle speculations in which some indulge simply to gratify their pride of philosophy, and with no persuasion of their truth; but rather of those views which, being deliberately formed, and seriously held, impose upon the intelligence, control the sensibility, and carry the will. It is of such views of God, that we affirm that, being fundamentally erroneous, they exert the same baleful influence that would be exerted by the contemplation of an actually existing God of the character and attributes conceived. It is of such views that we now add that supposing them to retain their hold during time upon every department of the mind, and to maintain it unbroken through eternity, they would involve the soul in substantially the same condition that it would be in, if the God of the imagination were known to be the real God. And let such conceptions take possession and control of every intelligent creature in the universe, and maintain it forever-then the moral aspects of the universe would be the same that they would be if a God corresponding to such ideas actually existed, and forced his Gorgon-visage omnipresent upon his dismayed creatures. We proceed now to mention certain erroneous views of the Deity, and to point out their respective bearings upon the human character. We pass by those grosser errors which obtain among heathen nations, the effects of which upon the character and life are too glaring to need illustration, and too horrible to be contemplated without painful emotions. The errors in the conceptions of Deity which are to be found in christian countries are comparatively refined, being mingled more or less with truth. They are composed usually, not by importing some foreign or false element into the divine character, but by seizing upon some one of the true attributes and wresting it from its established correlations, or by giving an overshadowing prominence to some subordinate quality, or by investing with the imperial purple some secondary power, and thrusting beneath the throne, that attribute "whose right it is to reign." There is no more effectual way of obtaining a perverted view of any character than by deranging the adjustment of its attributes, and thereby disturbing the true perspective. One class of observers take their stand directly in front of the divine Compassion. This they make the leading attribute. The others they arrange to suit this principal figure casting them into different degrees of shade, while justice is thrown so far into the background that it is scarcely discernible. This important attribute makes, by this arrangement, next to no figure on the canvass. We infer of course that it holds no higher place in the esteem of these perspective makers, as an attribute of their God. Then what is he? A being possessed nominally of all the attributes of Deity, but having them so distorted and deranged, as to make him a contemptible weakling, incompetent to the government of a half dozen children. These God-framers in their eagerness to instal compassion on the throne of the attributes, deny God even that degree of justice which they will own essential to the idea of a good ruler or parent! What then, we ask, must be the bearings of believing in such a God? Another class of observers take their humble position at the footstool of the divinę Sovereignty, and adjust from that point their perspective. What sort of God do they behold? A stern and awful majesty "whose frown terrifies the glance its magnificence attracts," arbitrary and despotic, or what is little better, coldly just; dooming a soul to perdition with the same indifference with which he would annihilate a lump of lifeless clay. This can hardly be called an exaggerated representation of a long established view of the Divine Being. Alas! unnumbered souls, we might almost say whole generations,since the christian era too, have lived and died, and shuddered both living and dying, before this appalling view of God. They drank not one smile from their Father's face-they felt not one pulsation of the heart of infinite Love-they enjoyed not one tone or utterance of endearment from the most affectionate Being in the universe. They durst not smile themselves, for that would be sin-they durst not love God, for that would offend his awful majesty-they feared him with a consuming fear, a fear that desolated their loveliest affections, that struck dumb the voice of gladness, that, Ahab like, razed to the ground the altars dedicated to the sacrifices of praise and thanksgiving,and reared in every grove gloomy altars on which joy, peace, happiness, and the throbbing heart itself, were daily immolated. To a soul that has once beheld God as he is revealed in Jesus Christ, this monstrous conception is as revolting as Hindooism itself. Still another class of observers view God, chiefly, as the impersonation of omnipotence, whose symbol is the ocean and tornado blent. With this image of resistless and terriffic power occupying the prominent place in the view, and the moral attributes ranged retreating in the background, exerting about as much influence over the master passion as the pearls and corals in the depth of the sea, or the stars above it, exert over its storm-driven waves, what a monstrous conception is formed of the divine Being-and what God-dishonorers are they who worship upon the basis of such a conception! The sentiment, both of their songs and of their supplications, of their sacrifices and their services, is expressed in a fragmentary portion of what, taken together, is a most evangelical hymn "The God who rules on high, And manages the seas; With this class, to think of God is to think of omnipotence. To meditate upon the ways of God, is with them to dwell upon the stupendous exhibitions of his power which abound in the universe. PHYSICAL FORCE is at least the Alpha if not also the Omega of their divinity. When they approach God in prayer or homage, they seem to be crushed with an intolerable yet cherished sense of Almightiness. Their language, looks, tones, posture, and entire manner, when addressing God, indicate unmitigated awe-the awe of terror, not the awe of trust. They accumulate in their addresses all the scriptural phraseology which they can command, which is expressive of God's almighty power, and these are the offerings which they lay at their heavenly Father's feet! How painful to hear them pray, and how unutterably offensive must not their sacrifices be to Him whose name is love. This is what Dr. Arnold expressively styles "power worship; and power worship," he adds, "may be devil worship." Were not the hearts of these worshippers better than their heads, it might be expected that the Lord would consume them in his fierce anger. We mention one other class of observers, perhaps the most numerous, certainly not the least erroneous, of all false conceivers of God. As these view Deity, he presents two diverse but equally prominent aspects-that of factious favoritism, and of personal vindictiveness. In connection with these leading features, all the other attributes are ranged according to their several affinities. This notion of God is framed with a view to account for the different attitudes which he is represented in the scriptures as holding toward the righteous and the wicked; and we need not say it is a weak and wickeď substitution for the Bible account. Keeping out of view the holiness, benevolence and justice of God, on the one hand, and the moral character of man on the other, it holds up mankind as arbitrarily divided into favorites and reprobates, and portrays God as an infinite partialist—an unprincipled partizan, who created and upholds a race in order to gratify his selfish personal caprices by loving, or more properly, liking one part, and disliking the other; by smiling upon this portion, and frowning upon that; and so doing without the least regard to the characters, the merits, the interests, or the rights of either party. This view obviously robs God of the attribute of love, and it equally robs him of justice. For the former, it substitutes weak fondness, or wicked favoritism, or rather a compound of both. For the latter, it substitutes wanton malignity, or the fell rancor of envenomed jealousy, or rather a mixture of the two. The God of these theorists is a hideous deification of the worst extremes of depraved humanity, a collossal concentration of all caprices, from imbecile fondness to outrageous fury, an apotheosis of the North American savage with his pipe in one hand, and his tomahawk in the other, and this double inscription on his Janus-brow:-"Forgets no friend, forgives no foe." A The next enquiry proposed is, what is the true perspective of the divine attributes? In simple language, what is the right view of the divine Being? The reason for stating this plain subject in the somewhat singular form first employed, is that it conveys precisely the idea which we wish to make prominent. In contemplating God, the mind naturally and justly, considers him not as a being of one quality, or attribute, but of many; it conceives of these attributes not as severally independent, but as mutually related, and as combining in fixed modes to form one character; and furthermore, it of necessity gives a commanding position to some one of these attributes in relation to all the others. Thus we spontaneously view God in a sort of perspective; some one of his attributes being brought forward or placed in the foreground, and all the others viewed thence along a gradually receding vista. This last phraseology, however, must be taken in a qualified scnse. None of the divine attributes suffer diminution in any such |