It is evident, therefore, that we can know nothing of the good or evil character of any man's works, except so far as we are enabled to trace those works backwards from their external forms, and correctly estimate the internal designs, or ends, from which they originate. It is this inmost or spiritual form of man's works,—that form which lies open before Him, from whom no secret thought or intention is hid, to which we understand the Divine Word to refer, where it so often assures us, that every man will be rewarded according to his works.
But when it is seen and admitted, that happiness is inseparably and permanently connected with goodness, and misery with wickedness, it will be easily seen, that these spiritual rewards are not arbitrarily given, but are the necessary effects of the good and evil, with which they are connected. This principle is so obvious, and so fully illustrated in the observance and violation of natural laws, that it seems quite unaccountable that any intelligent mind should hesitate to see and acknowledge its truth. The enjoyment of health, riches, honors, or any other form of natural or worldly happiness, is readily seen to be the result of obeying the laws which relate to these things. But the good man is he who faithfully observes the laws of his higher or spiritual nature, or, in other words, who loves the Lord and his neighbor; which is the normal state of the human affections. And it is manifest that the happiness which follows, is the result of obeying those laws,—as plainly so, as that the enjoyment of health, is the result of obeying certain physiological laws. It is true, these laws,—the natural, as well as the spiritual,—are divine in their origin; they are the form in which the divine goodness is manifested, the medium through which it operates; and in this sense, the happiness or misery which results from their observance or violation, may be said to come from God. But the point to which we wish to gain the reader's attention is, that this happiness or misery is the necessary and uniform effect, of the good or
