the decree of God that the wicked, the abandoned shall not reach the
extreme of human life, because they indulge in those very crimes,
which, in the constitution of things, must inevitably carry them to an
early tomb. Of the truth of this we see thousands of instances in the
world. And God has decreed that the meek, the peaceable shall reach
the extreme of life, because they pitch upon that happy course of
conduct which naturally leads to it. All that we are to understand by
his _decree_, is that he has inseparably connected the _end_ with the
_means_ by so constituting our natures, and so ordering his providence
that _sin, dissipation, anger,_ and _revenge_ shall not only destroy
happiness, but shorten life, so certain as men pursue such a wretched
course. And that the opposite course of conduct shall not only
communicate happiness, but protract life so certain as they engage in
it.

Here then, my young friends, you may readily perceive how God punishes
vice and rewards virtue. He does not do it by any abstract law, or
arbitrary mode of procedure, but lie has in infinite wisdom
interwoven, the whole in the very constitution of our natures, so that
the wicked cannot go unpunished, nor the righteous unrewarded. To
teach that man can indulge in vice, and yet escape its punishment by
future repentance, is not only dangerous to the morals of society, but
is a direct impeachment of the divine administration, as it must in
such case, be defective. And to teach that men may live righteously
and godly and yet go unrewarded, is equally dangerous to the morals of
the community, as it is but discouraging them from engaging in a
virtuous course of conduct. To teach that men are to be rewarded in a
future world for their _goodness_ here, is but in substance saying
that virtue is attended with mental misery, and so far as it fails of
rewarding its possessor _here_, the balance is to be made up