His willing to order things so that evil should come to pass for the sake of the contrary good, is no argument that he does not hate evil as evil; and if so, then it is no reason why he may not reasonably forbid evil as evil, and punish it as such.”(78) Here we are plainly told, that although God hates sin as sin, yet, all things considered, he prefers that it should come to pass, and even helps it into existence. But man loves and commits evil _as such_, and is therefore justly punishable for it. There are several serious objections to this extraordinary distinction. It is not true that men love and commit sin _as sin_. Sin is committed, not for its own sake, but for the pleasure which attends it. If sin did not gratify the appetites, or the passions, or the desires of men, it would not be committed at all; there would be no temptation to it, and it would be seen as it is in its own loathsome nature. Indeed, to speak with philosophical accuracy, sin is never a direct object of our affections or choice; we simply desire certain things, as Adam did the forbidden fruit, and we seek our gratification in them contrary to the will of God. This constitutes our sin. The direct object of our choice is, not disobedience, not sin, but the forbidden thing, the prohibited gratification. We do not love and choose the disobedience, but the thing which leads us to disobey. This is so very plain and simple a matter, that we cannot but wonder that honest men should have lost sight of it in a mist of words, and built up their theories in the dark. Secondly, the above position, into which Edwards has been forced by the exigencies of his doctrine concerning evil, is directly at war with the great fundamental principle on which his whole system rests, namely, that the will is always determined by the greatest apparent good. For how is it possible that men should commit sin _as sin_, and for its own sake, if they never do anything except what is the most agreeable to them? How is it possible that they pursue moral evil merely _as moral evil_, and yet pursue it as the greatest apparent good? If it should be said that men love sin merely _as sin_, and therefore it pleases them to choose it for its own sake, this reply would be without foundation. For, as we have already seen, there is no such principle in human nature as the love of sin _as such_, or for its own sake; and consequently sin can never delight or please the human mind as it is in itself. And, besides, it is self-contradictory; for the question is, How can a man commit sin _for its own sake on account of the pleasure it affords him_? It would be an attempt to explain an hypothesis which denies the very fact to be explained by it.