A

SYSTEM

OF

TEMPORAL RETRIBUTION,

VINDICATED

BY VARIOUS CONSIDERATIONS,

DRAWN FROM

SCRIPTURE AND OBSERVATION.

BY THE

REV. WILLIAM T. WISHART, A. M.

Minister of the Presbyterian Church at Shelburne.

"BE SURE YOUR SIN WILL FIND YOU CUT."

HALIFAX, NOVA SCOTIA:

A. & W. MACKINLAY, BOOKSELLERS.

1841.

TEMPORAL RETRIBUTION.

NUMBERS XXXII. 23.

66 BE SURE YOUR SIN WILL FIND YOU OUT."

INTRODUCTION.

It is no heresy to affirm that the opinions of mankind. in regard to the doctrine of a special providence, are generally vague, fluctuating, and superficial—and very commonly are quite erroneous and false. It is natural enough that this should happen in the case of the sceptic or freethinker. He labours to expunge the being and attributes of a God from the scheme of things. He endeavours to disprove the likelihood of a system of final retribution. He impugns the notion of rewards and punishments in a world to come. What he denies to the future, it is not strange that he should deny to the present also. It is natural and consistent that he should refuse to see in the plan of the world as it is, that system of retributive justice which he will not allow to enter into the arrangements of a future state. Neither is it singular that the practical unbeliever should be slow to discern, and loath to admit, the symptoms of such a scheme in the mechanism of this lower world. His thoughts flow in quite