It is true that everything which befalls us is determined by God's special providence, for which reason we justly conclude that, in many cases, an occurrence, after it has happened, is a real expression to us of God's will. But there is another truth, that the designs of God's special providence are chiefly reserved among the awful secrets of his own fathomless wisdom. He forbids us to attempt to surmise his secret purpose from the apparent tendencies of his sovereign dealings, and pointedly remands us “to the law and the testimony” for our practical guidance. The light which “providences” cast upon the question of God's will as to our conduct is chiefly cast backward on the past, not forward on the future. The man who attempts to frame the “leadings of providence “into an indication of duty, instead of resorting to his revealed will, is often in danger of wickedly intruding into those secrets which belong to the Lord our God, and of profanely foisting the selfish leanings of his own inclination upon the Holy One as the teaching of his acts.