PRINTED FOR THE AUTHOR, AT THE METHODIST BOOK CONCERN,
CORNER OF MAIN AND EIGHTH-STREETS.

R. P. THOMPSON, PRINTER

1853

Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1849, by

R. S. FOSTER,

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the District of Ohio.

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INTRODUCTION.

THE subject of Predestination has, for many ages, engaged the attention of theologians and philosophers. That the world is governed by fixed and permanent laws, is evident, even to the casual observer. But by whom those laws are established, and how far they extend, have been matters of controversy. In the Christian world, all admit that the will of God is the great source of law. In the arrangements of the vast systems of worlds, as well as in the formation of the earth, with all its varied tribes, we recognize the hand of Him who doeth "his will in the heavens above and in the earth beneath." All acknowledge the existence of a Divine decree; but the questions arise, Do all things thus come to pass? Are human actions the result of laws as fixed and unalterable as those which govern the movements of the planets? Is the destiny of every human being unchangeably determined before his birth, without reference to foreseen conduct? Or has the mind a power of choice? can it move freely within certain specified limits? and will the nature of its movements and choice influence its eternal happiness? These are questions which, in some form, have exercised the highest powers of the human intellect.

The Atheistical school of philosophers, ancient as well as modern, taught the doctrine of necessity. With them, matter is eternal; and no designing mind superintending its movements, there must be a necessity in nature. This has been differently expressed in different ages. Sometimes it appears as the atomic theory of Democritus and Leucippus, and, again, as the Pantheism of Spinoza. But, whatever form it may assume, it teaches that all actions come to pass

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