jector for questioning God's proceedings, and calls on him to submit himself blindly, to the absolute and almighty control of Him who does what He will, and gives no account of His doings.

The whole validity of this reasoning, however, evidently rests on the assumption, that the meaning thus generally attributed to the objection, is indeed the true meaning, and that the Jew is really herè represented by the Apostle, as defending his nation from the charge of guilt, on the ground that their actions were appointed for them, and forced upon them, by the irresistible decree of God. Now even if I admitted that this was the meaning of the objection, I could not go along with the reasoning founded on it and therefore much more, disallowing as I do that meaning, I also disallow the reasoning.

It seems to me that the obvious meaning of the objection is, as I have rendered it above, "Why doth He yet find fault, for who hath opposed or thwarted His plan or purpose ?" that is, Why doth God condemn me for actions which do not counteract His purposes, and of which He even takes advantage for accomplishing His purposes ?

The Apostle had taught in the preceding verses, that God made use of men, and even of their sins, for advancing His own large schemes, and that sometimes the reason why he forbore to punish flagrant sinners, was, that He would still turn them to account, in the arrangements of his providence,—and having taught this, he most naturally con cludes, that the self-justifying Jew, would immediately take advantage of it, as furnishing a plea to urge against the punishment of his nation, because, however much they had sinned, God had still effected His purposes by means of them.

The plea of the Jew for his nation, therefore is, not that God had constrained them to commit sin, but, that He had not suffered any loss by them, inasmuch as He had taken advantage of their sin, after it was committed, for the advancement of His own ends; and his inference is, that God, having thus gained His object by them, and in a manner profited by their sin, ought not, and needed not, to cast them off for it. This view of the Jewish objection, seems to me most satisfactorily, and decisively, confirmed, by the parallel passage in chap. iii. 7.

We have already seen, in our examination

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of the preceding verses, that the Apostle is, in this part of the Epistle, resuming that expostulation with his countrymen which he had been addressing to them in chapters ii. and iii., and reproducing the same objections which appear there, and which he had there answered by an appeal to their consciences, and to general moral principles, in order that he may here answer them by an appeal to the Scriptures. He has already treated in this way, the objection which the Jew founded on the length of time during which his nation had been upheld in the possession of their privileges, as we have shown, by comparing chap. ix. 14-17, with chap. ii. 4 and 5, and chap. iii. 5. And now, agreeably to his plan, he is proceeding to treat, in the same way, the remaining objection which is thus stated in chap. iii. 7, "But if the truth of God hath more abounded through my lie, unto His glory, why yet am I judged as a sinner ?”

That the objection stated in our passage, (chap. ix. 19,) "Why doth He yet find fault, for who hath opposed His purpose?" is really a reproduction of this old objection from chap. iii., must be manifest to any one who will compare them together. For is it not plain, that the man who defends his lie on

the ground, that God has taken advantage of it to make the glory of his own truth more abound, is using the self-same plea as the man who defends his sin on the ground, that he has not by it thwarted God's purpose? "Why doth He yet find fault;" for after all, has not his purpose been fulfilled, and even by the co-operation of that very thing which he calls sin?

The comparison of the two passages, especially when taken in connection with the plan which the Apostle is manifestly pursuing, of resuming the argument of chap. iii., seems to me decidedly to lead to the conclusion, that they are strictly parallel, and that therefore the Calvinistic meaning attributed to the objection is erroneous, and consequently the reasoning founded upon it, is invalidated. For thus the Apostle's answer in ver. 20th and 21st, "Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God," &c., ceases to be an implicit acknowledgment of the doctrine of election, and becomes merely an assertion of God's right to make use of even the wicked actions of the Jewish nation for the advancement of his plan of grace, without thereby disqualifying Himself for righteously punishing those very actions.

As the Apostle has already answered this objection on the grounds of moral reasoning, by identifying it, in chap. iii. 8, with the principle of those who say, "Let us do evil, that good may come,” he considers the matter settled as a question of right and conscience, and he now goes back on it, not with the view of repeating his moral argument, but with the view of confronting the Jews with the express declarations of God, in former times, that He would cast them off when their iniquities should be full. And indeed thereappears a greater need for him to adduce such arguments in this place, because his last-cited example from Exodus, showing that God's forbearance when despised, must terminate in judgment, having been primarily addressed to Pharaoh a Gentile, might therefore be refused by them as an inapplicable case. He accordingly frames a reply entirely made up of references to passages of Scripture, of which God's prophetic declarations of His dealings with the Jews, form the direct and principal subject. And as he wishes to set before them, not only the certainty of their own national rejection, but also the unwelcome fact of the