such wickedness. For it is the height of wickedness to desire that some
method should be invented, and introduced into the universe of God,
whereby the wages of sin shall be life and joy; whereby a sinner can look
into his own wicked heart and be happy.

III. A third characteristic of the knowledge which every man will possess
in eternity will be a clear understanding of _the nature and wants of the
soul._ Man has that in his constitution, which needs God, and which
cannot be at rest except in God. A state of sin is a state of alienation
and separation from the Creator. It is, consequently, in its intrinsic
nature, a state of restlessness and dissatisfaction. "There is no peace
saith my God to the wicked; the wicked are like the troubled sea." In
order to know this, it is only necessary to bring an apostate creature,
like man, to a consciousness of the original requirements and necessities
of his being. But upon this subject, man while upon earth most certainly
knows only "in part." Most men are wholly ignorant of the constitutional
needs of a rational spirit, and are not aware that it is as impossible
for the creature, when in eternity, to live happily out of God, as it is
for the body to live at all in the element of fire. Most men, while here
upon earth, do not know upon this subject as they are known. God knows
that the whole created universe cannot satisfy the desires of an immortal
being, but impenitent men do not know this fact with a clear perception,
and they will not until they die and go into another world.

And the reason is this. So long as the worldly natural man lives upon
earth, he can find a sort of substitute for God. He has a capacity for
loving, and he satisfies it to a certain degree by loving himself; by
loving fame, wealth, pleasure, or some form of creature-good. He has a
capacity for thinking, and he gratifies it in a certain manner by
pondering the thoughts of other minds, or by original speculations of his