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 to hazard a whole eternity upon one stake? Is it not infinitely more desirable to be in a state wherein, tho encompassed with infirmities, yet we do not run such a desperate risk, but if we fall we may rise again?

See then, upon the whole, how little reason we have to repine at the fall of our first parent, since herefrom we may derive such unspeakable advantages both in time and eternity. See how small pretense there is for questioning the mercy of God in permitting that event to take place, since, therein, mercy, by infinite degrees, rejoices over judgment! Where, then, is the man that presumes to blame God for not preventing Adam's sin? Should we not rather bless Him from the ground of the heart, for therein laying the grand scheme of man's redemption and making way for that glorious manifestation of His wisdom, holiness, justice, and mercy? If, indeed, God had decreed, before the foundation of the world, that millions of men should dwell in everlasting burnings because Adam sinned hundreds or thousands of years before they had a being, I know not who could thank him for this, unless the devil and his angels: seeing, on this supposition, all those millions of unhappy spirits would be plunged into hell by Adam's sin without any possible advantage from it. But, blessed be God, this is not the ease. Such a decree never existed. On the contrary, every one, born of woman may be unspeakable gainer thereby: none ever was or can be loser but by choice.